Value in Higher Education

(Or what happens when you watch Zizek on a Saturday evening)

I am writing this as I take a walk on the first nice day that we have had in quite sometime. I'm not necessarily writing but actually using the voice to text option on my phone. Is this a new chalk and talk? Watch out Socrates? If anything it does allow for a new way to engage with psychogeography. When I was writing my dissertation I often wished that we had the technology to take the ideas from my brain and automatically put them on a piece paper. I assumed that it would go quicker that way. Interesting to think of what we think is valuable. 

I have been thinking about value a lot mainly because I am working (slowly) on an article on ethics in communities in collectives with Sarah Honeychurch. Thinking about this piece has me questioning how values and ethics collide or diverge.  Also my thoughts about value were brought about by listening to a townhall on CBC Radio this week (see the #CBCtownhall hashtag on Twitter) where they spoke of what we value in society in an age of precarious employment. Interestingly someone mentioned that being hard working isn't something we value any more- it is a value that has seemingly disappeared slowly from its heyday in the 1950s. Now it's not about how hard-working you are but more about the networks that you create. This is not necessarily a bad thing (I'm all for creating networks and fostering a community)  but it is troublesome when these networks create or help support precarious employment. 

 

 The OED defines Value (noun) in these two ways: 

1 The regard that something is held to deserve; the importance, worth, or usefulness of something

2 Principles or standards of behaviour; one's judgement of what is important in life. 

I worry that in general definition number one is taking over for definition number two and that these principles or standards (which we can be viewed as personal ethics) are being forgotten.

This space in my neighbourhood was filled with people sledding today. It is also an incredible view of the city. Is this a place of value or a valuable place? 

I asked my friends on Facebook to give me one word that would describe what they felt society sees as having value/values today. Most took it to mean definition number 1 of value, few engaged with definition number 2. 

I received an interesting grouping of words:

Happiness 

This funnily enough is the first word that I received. I went into this experiment thinking of words that would be necessarily negative in connotation so I was quite surprised when I received this as my first one. I suppose hedonistic principles are those that drive society so it's not wrong to say that society dictates that we should all be seemingly striving for happiness (again don't watch Zizek on a Saturday evening, this is what it does to your thought process ;) ). Where things go off the rails is what each individualized definition of happiness is for my idea of happiness can be quite different than your idea of happiness. We can value happiness equally, it is the make up of happiness that will defer (we can get into Categorical Imperatives here but this post will be ideologically clunky as it is).  In higher education I think it's safe to say that happiness should be something that all learners attain in the process of learning. This is not to say that learning shouldn't be difficult, it is only to say that ultimately learning should bring you happiness, that those lightbulb ah ha! moments that make you smile should be something that you value. 

Security

This is an interesting one. Security has come to be one of those things that we conflate with nationalism (quick protect the borders), with intellectual property, with technology (your password must contain one capital letter, one punctuation mark, and your blood type). Safety is number two on Maslow's hierarchy but security is just one part of safety. I do believe that security is definitely something we value and is a value in and of itself (definitions 1 and 2) and something that is often very much lacking. In fact I posit that the concept of security is actually changing. What we understand as security today is very different to the understanding of security even 10 years ago. We are approaching a new normal where there is no security of employment but there is excessive security of space (Big Brother is watching). It's an interesting thing to think about in terms of how security has evolved to the connotations and denotations it has today. Within an educational environment security should be something that's almost guaranteed but depending on where you are geographically that may not be the case. Some risk their lives in order to be part of a community of learners in order to engage with education. Security is not a given.

Ease

This is pretty meta considering that I am writing this not by typing but by talking. This is the ultimate example of ease but also a perfect example of how technology can be used both to create accessibility but also to create new paradigms in education. 

Education

One of my best friends suggested that one thing that society values is education. When I questioned her about it because I honestly think that sometimes society doesn't value education she said "society values education it just does not value educators." It was a point that really resonated. Thinking about this point as I'm walking made me realize that coupled with the idea of ease, and of security,  that we are, dare I say, scarily approaching a post-human model of education. Educators are no longer valued yet education is valued therefore education is to happen without educators. Now I'm all one for breaking hierarchical paradigms within educational spaces, there is not just one "keeper" of knowledge in any educational space, but somehow the undervaluing or devaluing of educators has nothing to do with creating an equality of learners within an educational space. Sadly this devaluing seems to go hand-in-hand with the creation of a business model of education. Creating wealth from the Ruskinian illth of educators.

So how do we engage with these concepts of value within larger spaces of higher education? Does this mean that those who would necessarily define themselves as educators need to reposition themselves actively in order to be the purveyors of security and of ease instead? "Oh who me? No I'm not a teacher I'm a security bringer." I wonder if engaging with these societal values is merely just a need to engage with marketing. And if what society values is just marketing cloaked as something else then does that necessarily devalue or cause us to under appreciate education? 

I know what I value in education: 

Creating a space where learners can engage with ideas without fear.

Technology and design which takes into account all types of accessibility (physical, mental or economic for example)

Fostering of community which necessarily extends beyond spatial or temporal confines. (No this isn't the Star Trek version of education, what I mean here is that when a class is over or when the school year is done the participants still continue to learn from each other)

Definition number 2 of value (frozen soccer ball) residing in the vast expanse of definition number 1.

I often wonder where do these three core values fit in with what society values. Is there room for my frozen soccer ball of beliefs in the grand picture of higher education today? Or will they increasingly become just as out of place, sad relic of seasons past? 

If anything as part of a network of active engaged scholars and thinkers I know I need to work to maintain and foster links so that I (we) do not feel cold and deflated, and in turn to reinscribe value(s) in the world.