Recommended
Recommended
More Related Content
Similar to Collective change workshop for academic board 23 09-20
Similar to Collective change workshop for academic board 23 09-20 (20)
Recently uploaded
Recently uploaded (20)
Collective change workshop for academic board 23 09-20
- 1. COLLECTIVE CHANGE WORKSHOP FOR ACADEMIC BOARD AWAY DAY Dr Sarah Cefai & Prof Jan Plamper On behalf of Collective Change Working Group 23 September 2020 9:45-11:15am Ben Pimlott Building, Goldsmiths, University of London
- 2. WHAT IS COLLECTIVE CHANGE? Collective Change = widest + most inclusive initiative in transparent communication in recent Goldsmiths memory
- 4. CHRONOLOGY COLLECTIVE CHANGE • 'Evolving Goldsmiths’ (January)
- 5. CHRONOLOGY COLLECTIVE CHANGE • 'Evolving Goldsmiths’ (January) • collective letters, 'Alternative Goldsmiths’ (March)
- 6. CHRONOLOGY COLLECTIVE CHANGE • 'Evolving Goldsmiths’ (January) • collective letters, 'Alternative Goldsmiths’ (March) • Professors' Forum (March)
- 7. CHRONOLOGY COLLECTIVE CHANGE • 'Evolving Goldsmiths’ (January) • collective letters, 'Alternative Goldsmiths’ (March) • Professors' Forum (March) • 'Evolving Goldsmiths' discontinued (April)
- 8. CHRONOLOGY COLLECTIVE CHANGE • 'Evolving Goldsmiths’ (January) • collective letters, 'Alternative Goldsmiths’ (March) • Professors' Forum (March) • 'Evolving Goldsmiths' discontinued (April) • Change Rapporteurs (April)
- 9. CHRONOLOGY COLLECTIVE CHANGE • 'Evolving Goldsmiths’ (January) • collective letters, 'Alternative Goldsmiths’ (March) • Professors' Forum (March) • 'Evolving Goldsmiths' discontinued (April) • Change Rapporteurs (April) • Collective Change Working Group: departmental reports, Joint Statement (July)
- 10. CHRONOLOGY COLLECTIVE CHANGE • 'Evolving Goldsmiths’ (January) • collective letters, 'Alternative Goldsmiths’ (March) • Professors' Forum (March) • 'Evolving Goldsmiths' discontinued (April) • Change Rapporteurs (April) • Collective Change Working Group: departmental reports, Joint Statement (July): Anthropology, Computing, Design, Education, ECL, History, ICCE, Law, MCCS, Music, Politics and International Relations, Sociology, TaP, Visual Cultures
- 13. WORKSHOP 1) departmental report highlights re: livelihoods 2) departmental report highlights re: social justice 3) departmental report highlights re: governance
- 14. WORKSHOP departmental report highlights re: governance ↓ actionable points
- 15. 1) LIVELIHOODS protect jobs + improve working conditions, esp. protect ALs + prevent further casualisation
- 16. 2) SOCIAL JUSTICE resource GARA (and GREG) + ways of involving all staff in addressing racism resource ways of addressing socio-economic disparity among staff & students resource the Green New Deal
- 17. Governance
- 18. 3) GOVERNANCE Joint Degree (JD) Programmes (UG)
- 19. 3) GOVERNANCE Joint Degree (JD) Programmes (UG) • Suspension of JDs with fewer than 10 students in 2020-21
- 20. 3) GOVERNANCE Joint Degree (JD) Programmes (UG) • Suspension of JDs with fewer than 10 students in 2020-21 • Small Programme Review Committee: single metric
- 21. 3) GOVERNANCE Joint Degree (JD) Programmes (UG) • Suspension of JDs with fewer than 10 students in 2020-21 • Small Programme Review Committee: single metric • Joint Degree Working Party: 51 recommendations for change
- 22. 3) GOVERNANCE Actionable Points Joint Degree (JD) Programmes (UG)
- 23. 3) GOVERNANCE Actionable Points Joint Degree (JD) Programmes (UG) • suspend suspension immediately
- 24. 3) GOVERNANCE Actionable Points Joint Degree (JD) Programmes (UG) • suspend suspension immediately • with JD Working Party et al.: refined metric, incl. student experience + finances
- 25. 3) GOVERNANCE Actionable Points Joint Degree (JD) Programmes (UG) • suspend suspension immediately • with JD Working Party et al.: refined metric, incl. student experience + finances • expansion of JDs with new marketing approach
- 26. 3) GOVERNANCE Actionable Points Joint Degree (JD) Programmes (UG) • suspend suspension immediately • with JD Working Party et al.: refined metric, incl. student experience + finances • expansion of JDs with new marketing approach • Liberal Arts BA
- 27. Actions ACTION 1. Give AB the opportunity to call for SMT to suspend suspension immediately, to consider JD Working Party et al.: refined metric, incl. student experience + finances, and to support and potentially expand JD's with new marketing approach 2. Give AB opportunity to call for action to be taken to work on delivering a Liberal Arts BA for 21-22 Welcome, Polly
- 29. 3) GOVERNANCE Communications Staff News or SMT News? https://goldscollectivechange.wordpress.com/2020/09/04/staff- news-or-smt-news/
- 30. 3) GOVERNANCE Strategic Planning/Projects without consultation
- 31. 3) GOVERNANCE Strategic Planning and consultation processes, e.g. Citizen Space • Digital platform for consultation • Annual subscription £7,995 to £29,995 + £3,600 training costs + pressure on existing College IT infrastructure
- 32. SUMMARY COLLECTIVE CHANGE Academic staff have lost trust in management → we have developed a participatory approach to restore trust and provide new opportunities for cooperation based on the principles of inclusion and equal representation
- 33. SUMMARY COLLECTIVE CHANGE Academic staff are highly conscious of current economic and political circumstances affecting the prosperity of the College → we demand a seat at the table
- 34. SUMMARY COLLECTIVE CHANGE The concentration of decision-making in the hands of a few does not give the College the best chance as a guardian of artistic and intellectual heritage or facilitator of inclusive planning for sustainable futures → we provide expertise and have initiated a process of participatory problem-solving, decision-making, and setting of the College’s horizons
- 35. SUMMARY COLLECTIVE CHANGE We need to be in the business of job creation, not attrition
- 36. SUMMARY COLLECTIVE CHANGE Centralising administrative operations will not improve the quality of delivery → departments are sources of rich, hybrid thinking, interconnected across the College
- 37. SUMMARY COLLECTIVE CHANGE Outcomes of Collective Change and the actions proposed → can aid to establish the intellectual + reputational value of Goldsmiths that necessarily need to sit alongside any financial calculation in planning for the College’s recovery
- 39. ACTIONS DISCUSSION ACTION RATIONALE/PARTICULARS 3. Immediate halt to Citizen Space software • Immediate financial saving • Citizen Space will only work with buy-in from colleagues: it is bad faith to assume this in present circumstances • Citizen Space cannot offer the democratic and participatory discourse urgently required • We can build on Collective Change for free
- 40. ACTIONS DISCUSSION ACTION RATIONALE/PARTICULARS 4. Consult directly with staff via Academic Board over new software contracts (i.e. Worktribe, SEATS) with the view to cancellation—at least for 20-21 if not indefinitely • Immediate financial saving • There has been no transparent communication with and among colleagues or rigorous cost/benefits analysis on how these contracts will address issues • Such contracts are not a priority for this year and will take labour to implement and adjust to—labour much needed elsewhere
- 41. ACTIONS DISCUSSION ACTION RATIONALE/PARTICULARS 5. Reinstate Department Business Managers in: Anthropology; Sociology; Art; Visual Cultures; Politics and International Relations; TaP; ICCE • Centralised administration has a track record of wrecking universities • The replacement of a DBM with a Senior Administrator reflects a deskilling of administrative support to department • The anticipation of a centralised administration that was rejected by Goldsmiths’ staff on the basis of its misguided assessment: his is ‘Evolving Goldsmiths’ through the back door
- 42. ACTIONS DISCUSSION ACTION RATIONALE/PARTICULARS 6. Academic Board to request a suspension of contracts for the delivery of Unconscious Bias Training and Mental Health First Aider (MHFA) • Expertise exists within the College and knowledge sharing can be organised for free e.g. crowd sourced reading lists, peer-run workshops • Such training does not enable ‘learning by doing’ and is limited in terms of measurable outcomes • Unconscious Bias training directly contravenes an anti- racism approach and is therefore not consistent with the College’s anti-racism commitment • MHFA is not suitable to the HE environment as it disregards the cultural and regulatory environment in which staff work
- 43. ACTIONS DISCUSSION ACTION RATIONALE/PARTICULARS 7. Contextualise the KPMG ‘size and shape’ metrics & call for a different organisation of the review of programme offerings in which the responsibility and resources to do this are passed to departments • Size and shape analytics are based on inconsistent correlations, occluding department level data, & relying on a weak metric to weigh ‘research’ • Size and shape doesn’t best produce ways forward • Make use of Goldsmiths access to already existing alternative narratives on evaluating teaching (such as those prepared for the TEF, or by the SU)
- 44. ACTIONS DISCUSSION ACTION RATIONALE/PARTICULARS 8. Academic Board to agree on taking concrete first steps for a Staff Assembly, such as a year-long convention on democratic governance, or regular Staff Assembly meetings on matters to be decided • HE should be a blueprint for participation, dialogue and interaction on the social, political, economic & ecological problems we face • Meaningful change of Goldsmiths governance is urgently required & GS can be at the forefront of developing a truly innovative democratic approach to governance • Collective Change calls for a commitment to reform in governance that requires the instigation of new forums and different use of existing ones: Collective Change is just one of many calls for deep debate on reform
Editor's Notes
- Hello everyone! We’d like to thank the Warden and the members of the AB for the invitation to be here this morning, for the opportunity to introduce you to the widest and most grassroots, "from below," if you will, staff initiative in the recent history of Goldsmiths.
- How did this initiative come about?
- The roots of the Collective Change process lie in senior management's introduction of the 'Evolving Goldsmiths' restructuring plan in February of this year. The vast majority of staff members felt that the plan was misguided to overcome the financial challenges of Goldsmiths: it had it wrong: wrong expenditures; wrong cuts; too top down; lip service to 'radical transparency', but in truth deeply undemocratic and failing to tap into the knowledge and experience of Goldsmiths as an institution, namely its staff: us.
- Collective letters of protest to bodies of governance were signed, one by 583 colleagues, and an alternative plan was drafted on how to get out of what had become a dual financial-cum-Corona crisis.
- The Professors' Forum constituted itself, a new body representing professors who were convinced their expertise wasn't being heard. It first had the idea for a kind of collective brainstorming – which later became the Collective Change process.
- 'Evolving Goldsmiths' was stopped on April 22nd.
- Meanwhile the Collective Change process took off. Members of academic departments and institutes put themselves forward as 'Change Rapporteurs' who facilitated department-wide discussions on how to deal with the dual crisis and wrote reports – everything, it's important to remember, entirely voluntary and grassroots. Collectively, the reports are a treasure trove for very concrete money-saving, revenue-generating ideas, from new adult education modules to the sharing of office space. Please read them and judge for yourself.
- The Change Rapporteurs formed a Collective Change Working Group, collected the departmental reports, and wrote a Joint Statement that they sent to SMT, Council and Heads of Department on July 24th.
- What you see here is a list of the departments that drew up reports and signed the joint statement. For full disclosure: while some colleagues from service departments were involved, we got a sense that they felt too vulnerable to participate collectively as departments in the Collective Change process. ADD: we are aware that one of the shortcomings of the Collective Change process is that we were unable to engage with non-academic staff as much as we would have liked.
- In summary, over the last 6 months, out of a sense of necessity and urgency, we’ve seen the widest grassroots brainstorming about how we might best transform as an institution. This has meant reflection on who we are and where we want to go as an institution, thinking creatively about how to come out of the now combined crisis of finances and pandemic.
- It is clear from both the Joint Statement prepared by the Change Rapporteurs and the Departmental statements that there are three primary ares of concern.
- For reasons of time, we made the decision to just briefly highlight colleagues’ prevailing concerns with issues of livelihood and social justice, allowing us to consider issues of governance in more depth. We also think that governance is central to addressing socio-economic and identity based inequality within the college.
- Our discussion will progress into a discussion of actionable points that the Warden can take to Academic Board in the afternoon for voting (the Warden has asked us to come up with actionable points and we welcome this).
- There is absolute consensus that the protection of jobs is of upmost priority. What also transpired in Collective Change is a clear consensus on what senior management calls the non-renewal of contracts for Associate Lecturers: this consensus is in line with that of the Union, GUCU and dissents from the current position held by senior management. In particular, there is no support for the idea that Goldsmiths should 'shrink [its staff] now to grow again later’, which is a key proposal presented in the 'Size and Shape analysis’. Why? The idea that we can shrink now to grow later disregards: the irreversibility of staff departures (they cannot be replaced 1:1 a few years down the line); the impoverishment of existing provision; the overstretching of permanent staff; the financial hardship and exclusion from the culture of the university that follows the non-renewal of contracts. 'Shrink now to grow again later’ seems irrevocably, detrimentally short-sighted.
- Similarly, there is clear consensus on the need to improve the College’s record on matters of social justice. Clearly, at present racism is the area under closest scrutiny. Staff are wary of managerial and HR led solutions and it looks like while many are now involved in the right kind of conversations, things really need to speed up, including within departments. We need to better address all forms of inequality between staff. What comes out really clearly in the departmental statements is that understanding issues of Social Justice within the College is not just a legal requirement of the regulatory environment of universities – social justice is the single most important value shared across academics and practitioners of all disciplines, it is at the centre of the Goldsmiths DNA.
- On to governance. As a public institution at the forefront of social change and with a mandate to address the fallout of significant challenges (not only social and economic, but also environmental, cultural, technological, and political) it is essential that Goldsmiths has a robust, democratic – participatory and transparent – decision making process. This process must allow people access to knowledge that informs decision making, and decision making that affects people must take into consideration people’s knowledge of how things work “on the ground”. The main common point that emerged very clearly from all the discussions, thousands of emails, and departmental reports is that there is an urgent need for more democratic governance and transparency, particularly at senior levels of decision making. Now, we know senior managers are not hearing this for the first time, so let's home in on a concrete example and show what management, what WE ALL, would stand to gain from augmented democracy and transparency. We'll walk through this example step by step, finishing with actionable points. Later on, when we move to the discussion bloc, we'll shorten this and directly present actionable points plus their rationales.
- The example is our joint degree programmes, which in many ways encapsulate what Goldsmiths is famous for, namely, interdisciplinarity, a value that is widely shared by colleagues because the pressing problems of humanity – think of climate change! – can only be solved by collaborating across disciplinary boundaries.
- Over the summer, Joint Degree programmes that recruited fewer than 10 students for the 2020-21 cycle were suspended.
- This came in the wake of a small programme review at the end of which it was decided to use a single metric: the 10 student recruitment.
- Now, we are not saying there were no areas of improvement with Joint Degrees; in fact, over the course of an entire year a Joint Degree Working Party had met and identified these areas and made 51 recommendations for change. Some departments have already begun implementing these recommendations (37 as we speak in one department). But why set up a Joint Degree Working Party and in the end use a single crude metric to decide, whether to kill or let live a Joint Degree programme? This means, firstly, bulldozing the granular experience of the people who actually teach and administer the Joint Degrees. It means, secondly, destroying entire ecosystems of teaching and learning that have developed around Joint Degree programmes. For instance, BA History and Anthropology students taking Black British or Queer History modules benefit from methods of oral history and participant observation taught in Anthropology. They apply these in their linking dissertations that help uncover the often forgotten and occluded Black British and Queer experience on the basis of non-written sources. In other words, shutting down a Joint Degree programme has more far-reaching consequences than may appear at first glance. Thirdly, it means disregarding copious evidence that more complex metrics need to be used: numbers and student experience often don't match, some of the Joint Degrees that recruit above 10 have documented longstanding subpar student experience, which in turn negatively impacts the NSS and retention rates, widens the BAME attainment gap, etc. It means, fourthly, being financially reckless, because (a) most Joint Degrees come at ZERO additional financial cost and (b) offers for Academic Year 2020-21 had been made and we were forced to try to convince these students of converting to Single Honours degrees, losing many along the way: so, losing REVENUE. So there were no immediate gains on the table, which is our concern with top-down decision making such as this. It claims to be gains based, but the converse is in evidence. It means, fifthly, destroying the bedrock of cross-departmental research at Goldsmiths, which often starts by jointly supervising a BA linking dissertation. And it means, sixthly and finally, ridiculing the staff in the Joint Degree Working Party and others, who feel duped, all of which ultimately further widens the gap between senior management and the majority of the institution, its academic staff.
- Therefore we suggest that the Warden take the following actionable points for decision to Academic Board this afternoon, as per her request for actionable points:
- Suspend the suspension with immediate effect. Pathways in single departments – which are now being suggested as an addition to joint degrees – are not bad, but they are not the real thing as they only quasi-embody the spirit of interdisciplinarity. They are difficult to market to students if you claim to be taking interdisciplinarity seriously.
- In dialogue with the Joint Degree Working Party and other bodies (such as the Unions, bodies of governance, the Professors' Forum, Collective Change), devise a more adequate metric, taking into account student experience and finances. Only shut down those programmes that do poorly according to this metric.
- In dialogue with the Joint Degree Working Party and other staff stakeholders, actually EXPAND Joint Degree Programmes with ZERO additional cost, reaffirming the interdisciplinarity Goldsmiths stands for and that the Warden also seems to espouse: see her Green New Deal, which can only be achieved working in cross-disciplinary fashion. Marketing needs to play a key role in this expansion of Joint Degrees: it needs to move beyond its 'there's no such programme out there, so no benchmark against which we can project the success or failure of a new Joit Degree programme' (this is what departments heard time and again from marketing, as transpired in the Collective Change discussions).
- Initiate and organise ASAP the ultimate crowning of the interdisciplinarity embodied in Joint Degrees: a Liberal Arts degree. In addition to many concrete proposals for new short courses, foundation programmes etc., the Liberal Arts Degree was also a recurring suggestion. There is consensus that we can do this differently and better than other UK universities that have begun offering such a degree: Liberal Arts with a socially conscious bent, tapping into the growing reservoir of progressive students globally – Liberal Arts, if you will, with a Goldsmiths twist. We will be one of a handful of universities in London to offer such a degree, and it could be promoted as a flagship programme encompassing the unique culture, philosophy and expertise of the College. In a context in which university education threatens to be made ever more generic by the pressures of market rationalisation, let's mobilise these pragmatic revenue-generating opportunities for new delivery.
- We don't have the time to go through many more cases before we turn to the discussion, but we want to raise two issues in the briefest of terms. The first concerns communications.
- We have documented on a blog – you can see the URL here – our attempt to get news of the Collective Change process out via the Comms channel. Our initial request to publish our Joint Statement, to ensure transparency, inclusivity and accessibility, was dismissed out of hand, positioning our institutional work to which so many colleagues are deeply committed as illegitimate business. Why would news about Collective Change not be understood as "staff news"? As of interest and relevance to colleagues across the College? We want senior management to be aware of the antagonising effects such actions have. What is Goldsmiths if not its staff and students? If we are the institution, and Staff News is not for us, who or what is it for? If these kinds of actions continue, staff could veto publicizing the news they produce. Staff News would become very empty and short. So, please note that such actions are registered by staff, including we're sure by many in this meeting, and we think the effects are significant in a context in which staff trust in management is at an all-time low. It is absolutely vital that our comms process – whether Staff News or an alternative avenue – works to enable the free flow of conversation within the College. Examples of poor communication such as that we experienced are linked to shortcomings in Goldsmiths’ governance, and the lack of opportunity for democratic and transparent communication that are a detriment to Goldsmiths’ existing model of governance.
- The second issue concerns strategic planning and projects. Many of the invitations to participate appear out of the blue and without context. We only find out about new ways to collaborate after the remit of our work has been agreed upon elsewhere, namely, at the stage of implementation.
- Take Citizen Space. Staff are aware that Goldsmiths has been looking into a contract for this digital platform provided by Delib Ltd and developed as a joint initiative with the government. The annual subscription comes at £7,995 to £29,995 + £3,600 training costs (not reflecting additional pressure applied to the College’s IT infrastructure). Staff have not called for the use of a digital platform to speak to or be heard by management. Citizen Space represents technological solutionism unlikely to produce perceived benefits until trust between staff and management has been restored. Citizen Space represents another top-down decision that alienates staff and thus achieves the opposite of its intended result. A final word on this: it's not even running yet! Why not tap into a genuine 'citizen space' such as Collective Change, which is running, super-fast and absolutely free (it doesn't cost a penny)?
- In summary, Collective Change reveals that: ...
- Let us now move to the discussion. We have distilled from the Collective Change reports and discussions in the Collective Change Working Group six action points. We propose that we discuss each for roughly 10mins and vote, using Polly, at the end of each point. As we move to survey the consensus among us on particular actions, you’ll find a SNAP POLL appearing in your chat. So please make sure your Chat is open and visible to you now!
- As you’ve just heard Sarah say, this proposed action is to immediately halt Citizen Space. Please read the rationale for yourself.
- On 15th September the department of Visual Cultures advertised for a Senior Administrator: "The Senior Administrator will be responsible for the Department’s administrative processes and will help organise physical and professional staff resources and finances. You will work closely with the Head of Department on all aspects of running our busy academic department, from making sure core student processes work smoothly to helping with strategic planning." In addition to Visual Cultures, the following departments have not replaced there Department Business Managers: Sociology Art Visual Cultures Politics and International Relations Theatre and Performance ICCE (Institute for Creative and Cultural Enterprise)
- Size and shape doesn’t best produce ways forward - E.g. Some departments intentionally run larger programmes completement by smaller but still profitable programmes as a deliberate strategy (bigger numbers; wider participation; prioritising areas of research that while appealing to a more specialised cohort are central to reputational value)
- Academic Board calls on senior management to consult with them in the manner outlined in the Statutes of the College “Higher education institutions should be a blueprint for participation, dialogue and interaction on the social, political, economic and ecological problems that we face. Goldsmiths has an opportunity to be at the forefront of developing a truly innovative democratic approach to governance. Democratic systems work better when a higher proportion of the population have a deep understanding of the issues and can contribute fully to decisions made that impact upon them. We can work towards more shared and distributed models of decision-making and control that will be a beacon of democratic engagement in the sector bringing deeper connections to the people and communities that make up Goldsmiths - sustainability in all its meaning. Without a change that can inspire and engage the whole of the Goldsmiths community, discontent and protest will only continue. Our appointed personnel cannot rebuild democratic governance alone – the wider Goldsmiths community are an essential part of the process. Without a reform agenda, driven by a new participatory relationship between all staff, students and those impacted by the University in the immediate locale then we risk being faced with constant institutional turmoil.”