The Research Commodity

There is a debate that often occurs in universities, especially new (or modern) universities. It centres around whether the institution should focus on research or teaching.

It is a very simple argument. Some claim that new universities should realise their commitment to students and to widening participation in higher education. They embrace a two tier system in which serious researchers work in old universities, and preferably Russell Group ones at that. Meanwhile, the new, with their roots in the polytechnic system, have an agenda for social change through pedagogy. New universities can help relatively disadvantaged people to develop their skills and to make a full contribution.

Others claim that those of us who have made the investment in our own higher education are principally interested in pursuing research. This is not to say that they have no desire to teach, but simply that research is their vocation. Why else would they have required a PhD? Sometimes such folk point to their contracts and note that it is a requirement to do research, and then argue that they are not given enough time to honour this commitment.

Finally, there is a middle ground in which it is claimed that good teaching must be informed by research. How can a higher education be provided if staff are not on top of their disciplines? Often this argument bleeds into claims about scholarship, which is tacitly seen as a lesser activity, capturing the investment in ideas but without the ambition of contribution.

This debate strikes me as profoundly anti-intellectual.

The pro-research lobby are often heard to say “all I want to do is some research” as part of their request for more time. The notion of ‘doing’ research is peculiar. Research is a process, one that is enacted in order to sate curiosity. Surely we should expect keen academics to say something like, “I really want to understand the proximate psychological mechanisms governing fertility decisions”; they should be chasing after a truth, an understanding. To talk of ‘doing’ research strips away the actual interest.

In particularly hard-pressed universities, pro-research lobbyists are often heard to ask one another how much research they have done recently. And, of course, we have a metric with which to provide an answer. I would much prefer the question “so, what have you learnt lately?”

Arguing that good teaching can only be provided in the context of research commits to the same bleak view. Teaching in universities should not be about relating a canon of facts to students but instead should be about chasing interests with them. Academics should come to work focused upon their concerns and they should pursue them through extended conversations with the student body, with colleagues and through interrogation of the phenomenon at hand. So, the notion that good teachers must engage in scholarship, which is really the view that teachers should be given time to look up the latest exciting findings and package them into a lecture, removes the key ingredient of higher education: exploration.

It could be claimed that talk of ‘doing’ research is merely a convenient shorthand. This might have been true in the past. However, the camps outlined above are real and they would not exist if intellectual virtues had not been sidestepped. All sides are guilty of this and reflection on the terms adopted might cause them to rethink this situation.