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Reflections

“The fact is that given the challenges we face, education doesn't need to be reformed — it needs to be transformed. The key to this transformation is not to standardize education, but to personalize it, to build achievement on discovering the individual talents of each child, to put students in an environment where they want to learn and where they can naturally discover their true passions.” — Sir Ken Robinson (14.10.2010) 


In an era where restructuring and the need to balance the books has led to an exodus of experienced staff, students are told they have more options than ever to take those crucial first steps into their own pathways of choice. However fluctuating Government policy priorities have failed to provide a long term and realistic funding models. And the question ‘what are Universities for?’ remains unanswered. Education still needs transformation not standardisation. The late great Sir Ken Robinson was my inspiration, and as I move into a new phase of my academic career, some reflections on creating an environment where students want to learn may be helpful to those at the beginning of a new academic cycle. Do start by watching the RSA video he created about changing education paradigms and the ‘What if’ message it contains. We may not be able to change the whole system, but we do have agency in our own classrooms. 


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In ‘boring old professor’ mode, we did see this coming! Noble, in his essays on the ‘Digital Diploma Mills’ clearly predicted the ‘trainification’ of education, with curriculum divided into ‘saleable; chunks’ and where the drivers of Higher Education would be framed as a reductionist approach to ‘skills for industry’. My favourite book chapter ever goes back to 2004, where, with my writing companions on a journey that would span three decades, Sandra Sinfield and the late Tom Burns, we talked about new managerialism, the commodification of education and the impact this would have on widening participation students. Where was the space for the ineffable, for transformation, for creativity? 


This is not a cry of despair: We can make a difference! Using technology to empower and enable students (and the staff supporting them) starts to break down time and space barriers; Creative methods can fire up a whole class and skilfully scaffold learning; Virtual Learning Environments (VLEs) underpinned by active pedagogy can map out ‘owned’ learning journeys; and thinking about learner analytics from a learner perspective will bring about (some) of the voluntary personalised change called for by Ken Robinson...and concluding the formal role I held in the Department of Nursing Science at Bournemouth University, my proudest achievement has to be colleagues choosing to represent my contribution as a now emeritus professor of ‘innovative education’ as a limerick, not a  PowerPoint!  


Prof Ed McFLIE is my online persona and was created for use in different lectures, keynotes and workshops with the assistance of the BU Learning Technology team. Enjoy and be horrified about what your social media feeds say about you: 


link to video below
link to video below

Written without the assistance of GenAI 


References: 

Kitchenham, A., Holley, D., Biggins, D (2024)  The meaning of metrics: An educator’s perspective The International Federation of National Teaching Fellows IFNTF Symposathon proceedings. IFTNF. Access here: https://staffprofiles.bournemouth.ac.uk/display/chapter/389177 

Noble, D.F., 1998. Digital diploma mills, part 1: The automation of higher education. October, 86, pp.107-117. Access here: https://firstmonday.org/ojs/index.php/fm/article/download/569/490 

 



 
 
 

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