Howard Newby at Liverpool University
Last updated on 17 January 2010.
If this is the first time you visit the EcoLogics blog, or if you haven’t visited it for several weeks or months, there have been developments which you will find described at When the Exchange of Knowledge Is Threatened. In this page you will find an updated version of a post that originally appeared on 20 May 2009 at http://ecologics.wordpress.com/2009/05/20/howard-newby-higher-educations-dr-beeching-has-been-stopped/. Regrettably, the legal department of the University of Liverpool objected to the comparison that the post established, and WordPress, the blog host, took down the post. In this blogger’s view, the action was tantamount to censorship. Whatever the case, the main content of the post was actually the one that follows, and so it is being re-published at this page, one that many University of Liverpool students contacted at the height of the controversy provoked by Newby’s efforts to close down several departments at the university.
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Earlier this year, Newby tried to close down three departments at the University of Liverpool (Politics and Communication, Philosophy, and Statistics). In the view of many of the affected staff and students, he used the latest RAE results as an excuse to do so, claiming that the departments were not doing well enough in terms of their research achievements. Following Newby’s announcement, many staff and students across higher education in the UK could almost hear the sharpening of knives amongst like–minded vice-chancellors. If Newby could so easily close down three departments, or so many believed, then surely other neoliberal VCs could do the same.
Alas, staff and students at Liverpool opposed the move with such unexpected vigour that Newby was forced to regroup, and to review what many regarded as draconian measures. Now EcoLogics understands that Newby has been forced to back down. According to the Times Higher,
In an email to staff, the vice-chancellor, Sir Howard Newby, says that closure will no longer be recommended, provided that the departments show progress.
“As a result of the formal reviews of the eight units of assessment in which the university was in the lowest quartile nationally in the RAE, each affected department has been asked to prepare a recovery plan. These specify clear targets for research output and improving research performance that will be monitored by faculty deans and academic committee,” the message says.
“Provided these plans are accepted by the departments concerned and by academic committee, we will recommend them to senate and the university council. Assuming demonstrable progress is made towards achieving these targets, the option of closure for the School of Politics and Communications studies, the departments of philosophy, and statistics, will not be pursued.”(1)
Staff and students at Liverpool, and in universities up and down the country, have much to celebrate. The students at Liverpool who made their threatened courses count should be particularly commended for having faced down Newby and his knowledge exchangers. They demonstrated to university communities across the country that it is possible to stop the neoliberal juggernaut, provided that you believe strongly enough in the principles of universitas and educere, and are willing to make your views public. Universities in the UK need not go the way of our railroads—and indeed of so many other public services that, in the view of many people in the UK, have become the cosiest of baskets for some of the fattest cats in the land.
It will of course be important to remain vigilant over the coming months and years. While the economic fundamentalism that is arguably behind the policy of knowledge exchange is now utterly discredited, in the opinion of this blogger, the social network that may have promoted Newby and like-minded managers to key positions in places such as Liverpool University will continue to be very keen on privatising higher education in the UK. The absence of anything like a credible discourse will not prevent other people from trying more of the same at other institutions.
This week, however, is a time to say a big ‘Hip Hip Hooray’ to and for Philosophy, Politics & Communication Studies, and Statistics at Liverpool University…
Update 14 January 2010
Readers of this post may also wish to see the following:
The UWE Experiment – And why it matters to higher education in the UK and beyond
Carter & Carter goes into administration
New Labour’s Assault on Higher Education
References
1) Times Higher Education, ‘Liverpool lifts threat of closure from three departments’, http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=26&storycode=406558&c=1, accessed May 20, 2009.
