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April 9, 2008
Has there been a shift in the way the Commonwealth government views higher education with a change of , government? Angus McFarland, the president of the National Union of Students thinks so. In an op-ed in The Australian he says that a new Rudd commonwealth government allows us to re-conceptualise the role and function of the university student within higher education institutions and society. The shift is away from consumer to citizen and this shift undercuts the understanding of universities as ivory towers that offer no broader benefit to society.
McFarland's argument is this:
The Howard years involved the development of the neo-liberal, free-market view of the university student. Neo-liberalism positions economics as the basis of all relations in society. In this context, students were positioned external to universities. Students were clients. Students were customers paying fees for degrees. Universities were businesses providing a service to consumers. Two key policies of the Howard era illustrate this. The first was full-fee degrees and the notion that an individual's ability to pay should drive access over an individual's merit. Second was the introduction of voluntary student unionism, which framed students as consumers of student services rather than as members of a collegiate community.
McFarland says that the Rudd Government, however, has signalled a two fold shift in education priorities. First,
There's the education revolution and the argument that education is central to national economic productivity. The Government has chosen to frame education as something that benefits society and communities, not just the individual. There's also Education Minister Julia Gillard's social inclusion agenda. She has put the case for access and participation in higher education and for a university role in community building and development. In essence, the Government wants universities to foster a productive society as well as a fair and equitable society.
McFarland argues for a definition of students not as consumers or clients but as active citizens, which he understands as working towards the betterment of one's community through a combination of economic participation, public service, volunteer work and other efforts that improve life for all citizens. Suprisingly, there is no mention of blogging, internship as public intellectuals or deliberative democracy.
This could happen by fostering student democracy which promotes the value of participation; broadening access to campus life; setting bold set bold equity goals to address access for indigenous students, low socioeconomic status students and rural students; integrating a commitment to community engagement into the curriculum; greater linkage of internship opportunities to community development projects, which could be achieved by giving preference or weight in assessment to community-building internships and academic credit for volunteer work; and rethinking of the Higher Education Contribution Scheme by expanding the Government's science and maths HECS cuts to areas of community building or development such as education, engineering or social work.
These are interest ideas. They break down the university as an ivory tower and reinvent the republican idea of active citizenship that had been lost under interest-group liberalism. Surprisingly, McFarland makes no mention of blogging, internship as public intellectuals or deliberative democracy. The emergence of a democracy-minded reform movement -- not just focused on limiting the role of money in politics but on expanding participation, broadening the scope of democracy, and connecting issues of process to substantive outcomes of public policy---has still to connect active citizenship with liberal democracy.
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