‘Embedded into the core’: The discursive construction of ‘policy’ in higher education learning and teaching documents and its recontextualisation in practices

Abstract

<jats:p> With increasing competition and metrics focusing on teaching quality (e.g. the teaching excellence framework or TEF), there is a spotlight on learning and teaching (L&amp;T) in policies and practices within universities. Bodies at national and institutional levels focus on disseminating policy ideas on L&amp;T which are oriented to government priorities. This article focuses on how policy itself is discursively constructed in selected L&amp;T policy documents and explores the means of the recontextualisation of policy discourses. I discuss the following three findings: (1) the construction of policy as ‘embedded within processes and practices’, (2) shifts in genre and discursive strategies as policy ideas become short guidelines and (3) the role of ‘discursive mechanisms’ in forcing engagement with policy ideas. Through an analysis of discursive strategies and recontextualisation, I demonstrate the seeming insecurity around policy compliance and show how constructions of L&amp;T are never value-free. </jats:p>

Bundled or unbundled? A multi‐text corpus‐assisted discourse analysis of the relationship between teaching and research in UK universities

“…In this way, the texts have an enacted ontology as policy objects (Sin, 2014) that influence the future development of the university (Matthews et al, 2021). Horrod (2020) and Mathieson (2019) point out that policy mechanisms may be embraced, resisted or creatively negotiated and some of the most interesting discourse is found in the 'creative negotiation'. Bear in mind that the evaluation panels of TEF and REF submissions are mostly populated by academic leaders from other universities and one will realise that the TEF and REF written submissions are largely written for an audience of academics in a mode that writers think will impress.…”

Becoming-teacher as (in)activist: Feeling and refusing the force of university policy

“…8 To support the University’s goal to develop and maintain a high-quality learning environment by providing a framework for the evaluation and quality assurance of learning and teaching at the level of the course. 9 In the language of quality and good practice, ‘the ideological character of policy ideas’ is obscured (Horrod, 2020: 17). Yet, as the second extract above indicates, the rise and rise of teaching and learning policies 10 is a function of the late 20th-century emergence of the performative university and its embrace of the ideology of excellence (Readings, 1996).…”

“…Its logic ‘offer[s] to make us better at what we are supposed to do, through interventions of various kinds, but at the same time they ensure that perfection is always out of reach and that there is more work to do on ourselves’ (Ball, 2015: 308). The demand of teaching policies – ‘improve yourself!’ – is limitless; the implicit judgement is that the becoming-teacher’s practice is ‘never good enough’ (Horrod, 2020: 10). In this logic, the ‘truth’ of teaching and learning is that they are always already problems of someone’s failure (the becoming-teacher’s, the becoming-student’s) requiring the fix of this policy or that.…”

“… 4 See, for example, Sarah Horrod (2020) on teaching policies in the UK. In my own university, there are currently around 70 policies and guidelines listed on the online ‘Learning and teaching’ policy hub, including 12 on ‘Learning and teaching practice’; 5 on ‘Assessment’; and 1 on ‘Lecture capture and release’.…”

“…Horrod writes: ‘[L&T policies] are solutions to perceived problems. For example, … “partnership” is presented as a solution to the perceived difficulties in engaging students’ (Horrod, 2020: 15).…”