Notes of group discussing readings 3 Oct. 2018
Note taker/table host: Sophia
Starting points: readings for 26 Sept., but also discussed others
Public vs. privatized/marketized/commodified university
Marketization and commodification processes not the same thing
Purpose of university education changes from learning to CV building
Involve questions of:
—capitalist ecologies vs. local concerns and values
—how ‘services’ & their ‘providers’ become profit oriented through tendering/bidding processes
—growth as paramount
—class interests
—branding becomes a driver of statements of ‘values’
Particularly pronounced in case of international students, seen as just consumers
—how to think about international students (especially non-EU) outside a commodity rationale?
Some frustration with constantly returning to the same points
—how to move forward from theorizing without constantly trying to reinvent the wheel?
—visions as possible entry points to action
—resistance from below as critical resource
—mechanism of unofficial organization involving staff and students
Discussion on lecture recording
—University is imposing new policy in which all lectures will be recorded unless staff ‘opt out’ from Jan., without agreement from the union (UCU)
—accepting surveillance in the classroom without discussion in the name of ‘convenience’ and ‘following the trend’
—broader question of how to deal with automation and technology, e.g. lecture recording as complement not substitute
—pits staff against students
—difference between ‘public’ recorded lecture as performance and a specific lecture, more ad hoc, possible to extemporize
—importance of interactive, face-to-face education
—ethics of staff ‘data’ management
On lecture recording, agreed some of us might write a staff-student conversation blog on this topic (or possibly recording of conversation?)
