Through a Glass Darkly: The Social Sciences Look at the Neoliberal University

Thornton, Margaret

doi:10.26530/oapen_515938

Cited by 37 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 67 publications

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“…The rising cost of university has prompted researchers from countries such as the UK, Australia and Sweden to raise concerns about the massification and marketisation of higher education, which has propelled student consumerism deeper into the higher education discourse (Anne-Charlotte et al 2013;Pitman, Koshy, and Phillimore 2015;Thornton 2014;Tomlinson 2017;Wong and Chiu 2017). Recent higher education research has focused on what universities and staff can do to support students.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

University lecturers’ construction of the ‘ideal’ undergraduate student

Wong

Chiu

2018

Journal of Further and Higher Education

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Research on the 'ideal' or 'good' student tends to be situated within compulsory schooling. Few recent studies have focused on lecturers' conceptualisation and construction of the 'ideal' university student. Informed by 30 in-depth interviews with lecturers from two post-92 English universities within the social sciences, we explore how the notion of 'ideal' student is understood in contemporary higher education. We focus on lecturers' expectations of undergraduate students, as well as their views of the 'ideal' student in different teaching and learning contexts. We identified specific personal and academic skillsets that are desirable of students, including preparation, engagement and commitment, as well as being critical, reflective and making progress. The ability to achieve high grades, interestingly, is rarely mentioned as important. Implications for policy and practice are discussed as we present a muchneeded update on the current features of the 'ideal' university student, which can influence student experience, especially the lecturer-student relationship.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

University lecturers’ construction of the ‘ideal’ undergraduate student

Wong

Chiu

2018

Journal of Further and Higher Education

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“…Similarly, increasing competition has led universities to rely on metrics and 'league tables' of questionable validity and limited relevance to the quality of education, as they try to prove their 'excellence' across other measures (Mok & Neubauer, 2016). The effects on academics have been negative and material, often teaching increased class sizes with reduced resources including fewer administrative support staff and related increases in administrative responsibilities (Deem, 1998;Thornton, 2014b). Many academics are struggling, particularly in the UK, where some have an additional role as personal tutors providing pastoral care for students (Student Minds, 2014).…”

Section: A Background Of Neoliberalismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Student Wellbeing Through Teacher Wellbeing: A Study with Law Teachers in the UK and Australia

James

Strevens

Field

et al. 2019

SUCCESS

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Research confirms law students and lawyers in the US, Australia and more recently in the UK are prone to symptoms related to stress and anxiety disproportionately to other professions. In response, the legal profession and legal academy in Australia and the UK have created Wellness Networks to encourage and facilitate research and disseminate ideas and strategies that might help law students and lawyers to thrive. This project builds on that research through a series of surveys of law teachers in the UK and Australia on the presumption that law teachers are in a strong position to influence their students not only about legal matters, but on developing attitudes and practices that will help them to survive and thrive as lawyers. The comparative analysis reveals several differences, but also many similarities with law teachers in both countries reporting negative effects from neoliberal pressures on legal education programs that impact their wellbeing, performance as teachers and ability to adequately respond to student concerns.

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“…That interpretation, though, runs the risk of suggesting, or of being interpreted as suggesting, that liberal ideology is a primary driver of the nature of the contemporary cultural context. It could be argued that the neo-liberal tenets of the contemporary cultural context are, rather, essentially incidental to its cultural dominance, while acknowledging that the coincidence has provided a fruitful ground for much critique of neo-liberalism from concerned commentators (Davies 2014;Thornton 2014) and has served to embolden those reformers seeking to respond to the imperative for educational performativity in the contemporary cultural context (Bagnall 2004). In Western culture at least, the prevailing cultural context in recent times may be seen as the product of what Habermas (1983, p. 9) termed 'the project of modernity …to develop objective science, universal morality and law, and autonomous art.'…”

Section: Jarvis's Theorisation Of the Contemporary Cultural Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

A critique of Peter Jarvis's conceptualisation of the lifelong learner in the contemporary cultural context

Bagnall¹

2019

The Learning Adult

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Through a Glass Darkly: The Social Sciences Look at the Neoliberal University

Cited by 37 publications

References 67 publications

University lecturers’ construction of the ‘ideal’ undergraduate student

University lecturers’ construction of the ‘ideal’ undergraduate student

Student Wellbeing Through Teacher Wellbeing: A Study with Law Teachers in the UK and Australia

A critique of Peter Jarvis's conceptualisation of the lifelong learner in the contemporary cultural context

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