Convention for Higher Education

Education Crisis

CONVENTION FOR HIGHER EDUCATION

University of Brighton, Friday 24 & Saturday 25 May 2013

Organised by the Centre for Applied Philosophy, Politics and Ethics (CAPPE), University of Brighton, and co-sponsored by the Campaign for the Public University, the Council for the Defence of British Universities, and UCU at the University of Brighton, this two-day conference on Higher Education – What it is for, and how to defend it: towards a Charter for Higher Education in the UK investigates the current changes that British Higher Education (in England and Wales) is undergoing.

The Convention is designed to enable colleagues from the full range of university disciplines to address how to preserve a properly described ‘higher education’ from the effects of current proposals, and from the redefinition of universities and of higher learning. As a complement to the Council for the Defence of British Universities and the Campaign for the Public University, it will consider, and adopt a draft of, a Charter for Higher Education that the organisers hope will be debated and refined in most or all institutions of higher learning throughout the UK, and which could then form the core of values around which colleagues could cohere, whether as members of Councils and Academic Boards, Faculty or School Boards, as members of their Course Committees, or as union members.

The Convention has been occasioned by the 25th anniversary of the Humanities Programme at the University of Brighton. Born in adversity in 1988 – in the midst of an earlier assault on the Humanities – it has survived and thrived by resisting both governmental pressure and temporary fashions in education and pedagogy. It is an interdisciplinary, non-modular range of degree courses based on small-group teaching, and research-focused student development.

Keynote speakers: Priya Gopal, Colin Blakemore, John Holmwood, Martin McQuillan, Gill Scott, Will Hutton, Martin Hall, Luke Martell, Bob Brecher, Peter Scott, Tom Hickey, Colin Green, Caroline Lucas (MP), Thomas Docherty, Michael Rosen

 

Discussion:

A draft Charter for Higher Education

And sessions on:

• The Ambit and Character of a University for the 21st Century

• What is Special about a Public University System

• Knowledge and Dissemination: the Commercialisation of Learning & Research

• Constraints and Conformities: Defining Economic and Social 
Engagement

• Academic Freedom: its Meaning in the New Century

• Work and Contracts in a Corporate University

• The Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences in Adversity: Governmental Myopia

• How Mass Higher Education Does Not Entail Lower Standards (Humanities at Brighton)

• Research Supervision: Craft or Mass Process?

• Of Education, Entertainment and Satisfaction: Student Evaluation vs the NSS

• Students, Staff and Democracy in the Academy

• The Bureaucratisation of Learning: aims, objectives, methods, 
outcomes

• Of Careers and Careerism – Who Benefits: the Equality Agenda

• Global HE as International Trade: Commerce and Contradiction

• Quantum of Recognition: Vacuities of Research Measurement

 

Registration:

The registration fee for this event is £40 for employed delegates and £10 for students/retired/unemployed delegates. This includes lunch and refreshments on both days.

Online registration is available via the following link

For further information e-mail Bob Brecher at r.brecher@brighton.ac.uk

The Convention: http://publicuniversity.org.uk/2013/03/14/convention-for-higher-education/

Campaign for the Public University: http://publicuniversity.org.uk/

 

**END**

 

Cold Hands & Quarter Moon, ‘Stagnant’ at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLjxeHvvhJQ (live, at the Belle View pub, Bangor, north Wales); and at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkP_Mi5ideo (new remix, and new video, 2012)  

‘Cheerful Sin’ – a song by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIbX5aKUjO8

 

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk

MySpace Profile: http://www.myspace.com/glennrikowski

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Glenn Rikowski on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/glenn.rikowski

Online Publications at: http://www.flowideas.co.uk/?page=pub&sub=Online%20Publications%20Glenn%20Rikowski

 

Social Policy, Risk and Education

Education Crisis

SOCIAL POLICY, RISK AND EDUCATION

CALL FOR PAPERS

Social Policy, Risk, and Education

This special issue of the journal Policy Futures in Education – www.wwwords.co.uk/PFIE – takes the broad lens of risk as its point of departure and invite empirical and theoretical papers which focus on the ways in which risk is enacted through and within education. Risk has become a central discourse – a cultural mindset – in modern societies which frames identities and organizes the governance of individuals and populations. The neoliberal, deregulated state, which emphasizes market-based solutions to the distribution of social goods, has collapsed economic and social policy: the paramount reality is competition and risk. Risk in multifarious settings now dominates social, political and economic discourse.

In a world where uncertainty and harm are governed through risk assessment and risk management, it is no surprise that educational policy similarly aligns loss, injury, and disadvantage with educational management strategies. American education, largely associated with formal schooling, has long embraced the concept of risk (e.g. ‘at-risk children’ and ‘a nation at risk’) as the basis for securing the nation’s economic future competitiveness. Public program initiatives such as Head Start are fashioned upon the perception of a perilous future, and attempt to assess and manage negative risks to children and society, as do the policies of many private intervention programs. Similarly, school-age children, from kindergarten through high school, are systematically identified as ‘at risk’ and targeted for academic and social intervention. While the US Department of Education’s ‘A Nation At Risk’ predated Beck’s risk society, the ‘at risk’ child can only be imagined within a risk society. Conversely, both official and unofficial educational sites are also governed by risk, but individual identities are frequently portrayed as ‘risk takers’. Here, risk is aligned with well-being and the enterprising self. Learning to skydive or rock climb, taking a challenging class, ‘having a go’ at spelling a new word, or returning to college to transition a career indicates a life worth living.

The purpose of this themed issue is to bring together international and critical perspectives on risk theory and education in both formal and informal settings.

All papers submitted will be evaluated using the journal’s normal peer review process. Please also see the journal’s guidance for authors: www.wwwords.co.uk/pfie/howtocontribute.asp

Publication for the special issue is planned for 2014. Deadline for submissions is September 1, 2013. Papers should be sent as an email attachment to the Guest Editor, Policy Futures in Education, Professor Steve Bialostok, College of Education, University of Wyoming: stevebialostok@yahoo.com

 

**END**

Cold Hands & Quarter Moon, ‘Stagnant’ at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLjxeHvvhJQ (live, at the Belle View pub, Bangor, north Wales); and at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkP_Mi5ideo (new remix, and new video, 2012)

‘Cheerful Sin’ – a song by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIbX5aKUjO8

 

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk

MySpace Profile: http://www.myspace.com/glennrikowski

Rikowski Point: http://rikowskipoint.blogspot.com

Volumizer: http://glennrikowski.blogspot.com

Glenn Rikowski on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/glenn.rikowski

Online Publications at: http://www.flowideas.co.uk/?page=pub&sub=Online%20Publications%20Glenn%20Rikowski
 

Conservatism and Ideology

Arya Stark

CONSERVATISM AND IDEOLOGY

Call for Papers: ‘Conservatism and Ideology’

Global Discourse: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Current Affairs and Applied Contemporary Thought
Volume 4: Issue 3: September 2014

Michael Oakeshott described conservatism as a non-ideological preference for the familiar, tried, actual, limited, near, sufficient, convenient and present. Historically, conservatives have been associated with attempts to sustain social harmony between classes and groups within an organic, hierarchical order grounded in collective history and cultural values. Yet, in recent decades, conservatism throughout the English-speaking world has been associated with radical social and economic policy, often championing free-market models which substitute the free movement of labour and forms of competition and social mobility for organic hierarchy and noblesse oblige. The radical changes associated with such policies call into question the extent to which contemporary conservatism is conservative, rather than ideological.

This issue of Global Discourse seeks to explore contemporary conservative political thought with regard to topics such as the following:

–          ‘One Nation’ politics and Big Society,

–          sovereignty, multiculturalism and international blocs

–          paternalism and negative liberty with regard to narcotics, pornography and education

–          regional and international development

–          public faith, establishment and religious diversity

 

The issue will include a review symposium with Richard Hayton, who will respond to reviews of ‘Reconstructing Conservatism? The Conservative party in opposition, 1997–2010’.

Submission deadlines

Abstracts: October 1st 2013

Full articles of around 8,000 words (solicited on the basis of review of abstracts): March 1st 2014

Publication: September 2014 – all articles will appear as online firsts as soon as they are accepted and processed

Instructions for authors:
http://www.tandfonline.com/action/authorSubmission?journalCode=rgld20&page=instructions#.UX-WG8qSJHo

Further details: http://www.tandfonline.com/rgld (previous website: http://global-discourse.com)

Editor contact details: matthew.johnson@york.ac.uk

Journal Aims and Scope

Global Discourse is an interdisciplinary, problem-oriented journal of applied contemporary thought operating at the intersection of politics, international relations, sociology and social policy. The journal’s scope is broad, encouraging interrogation of current affairs with regard to core questions of distributive justice, wellbeing, cultural diversity, autonomy, sovereignty, security and recognition. Rejecting the notion that publication is the final stage in the research process, Global Discourse seeks to foster discussion and debate between often artificially isolated disciplines and paradigms, with responses to articles encouraged and conversations continued across issues. The journal features a mix of full-length articles, each accompanied by one or more replies, shorter essays, rapid replies, discussion pieces and book review symposia, typically consisting of three reviews and a reply by the author/s. With an international advisory editorial board consisting of experienced, highly-cited academics,Global Discourse welcomes submissions from and on any region. Authors are encouraged to explore the international dimensions and implications of their work. With a mix of themed and general issues, symposia are periodically deployed to examine topics as they emerge.

 

**END**

Cold Hands & Quarter Moon, ‘Stagnant’ at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLjxeHvvhJQ (live, at the Belle View pub, Bangor, north Wales); and at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkP_Mi5ideo (new remix, and new video, 2012)  

‘Cheerful Sin’ – a song by Victor Rikowski: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIbX5aKUjO8

 

Posted here by Glenn Rikowski

The Flow of Ideas: http://www.flowideas.co.uk

MySpace Profile: http://www.myspace.com/glennrikowski

Rikowski Point: http://rikowskipoint.blogspot.com

Volumizer: http://glennrikowski.blogspot.com

Glenn Rikowski on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/glenn.rikowski

Online Publications at: http://www.flowideas.co.uk/?page=pub&sub=Online%20Publications%20Glenn%20Rikowski