Education, democracy, bursaries and change

The following is a comment on the current campaign for a standard tertiary bursary by Simon Collins. He raises some important issues and contains an interesting view on educational change.

The current controversy over bursaries has got the government on the run. MPs are concerned about the effects that 40,000 politically sophisticated bursary-receiving students will have as voters in the election. Already the agitation has had some effect and it is likely to have more pretty soon. This might be claimed as an example of a properly functioning democratic system, were it not for the fact that, as with most purely self-serving demands, it is socially irresponsible.

Quite apart from the fact that it tends to falsely portray the National Party (which did nothing about a standard tertiary bursary in the 12 years it had available), as more attentive to educational needs it also ignores the wider question of the future of tertiary education. It assumes that the elite groups which happen to be in the institutions deserve to be entirely supported by the taxpayers for as long as they want to be. What we ought to be advocating is the extension of higher education from this elite group to everyone who can afford it (?) This is recognised by NZUSA, but by submerging the wider question under the immediate (and more politically sensitive) demand for higher bursaries, the government can ignore them.

First of all, we must be clear as to the basis on which we claim support from the government at all. The onus is on the proponents of government intervention on any issue to prove the need for any such intervention, because generally speaking it must be assumed that individuals are best able to decide for themselves what will make them happy, and what to spend their money on. Consequently unrestrained government intervention has net harmful effects.

In my opinion (and you may disagree) these two reasons are enough to justify government subsidisation of tertiary education, in order to make possible, and encourage, its use by a wider segment of the population.

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Having reached this point in the argument however, I want to suggest that merely to provide COL bursaries, though necessary, is not sufficient to cause these two effects. In particular, if we are to promote truly equal access to higher education, and a more responsible, educated mass citizenry, then we should propose with equal emphasis the following reforms as well:

First, tertiary education is at present restricted to an elite by the all-too-successful screening process of school and external exams. This is undesirable because those excluded could greatly benefit from tertiary education, and could thereby benefit society as well. So long as half the candidates for an exam are required to fail to make the system work, this inequity will remain. What is needed is a much more flexible school system, where all students are helped to reach the standard required to partake of higher education if they want to, at their own pace and in a flexible way, without being branded a 'failure'. In any case, of course, it is really only in science, maths and languages that school learning is directly useful for university courses (besides a competence in English). To provide this grounding to the person who left school without it is another thing that should be covered by bursaries.

It is natural that this abolition of such certificates as School Certificate and University Entrance might upset employers. Whether those employers are profit-seeking capitalists or socialist co-operatives concerned merely to provide a good service to their customers, they will still want to ensure that their new clerk, for example, can add up a row of figures and can spell, or that the new apprentice has reached a certain standard in metal work. In actual fact, a university or technical institute requires just these same kinds of skills but these skills are not at all what is measured by external exams. It would be far better, therefore, for each student to decide what skills and knowledge he wants and will require for a job and higher education. He and his teacher can then keep on trying until they reach those standards, at which stage they can write out a note to that effect to secure the job or place at university.

Actually, the government is already moving in the direction of abolishing external exams, and we ought to be actively pushing it and the public further in this direction.

Secondly, tertiary education must come, come, literally, down off its hill and into the areas where the people live and work. Obviously, people in Blenheim for instance, cannot be expected to come to Wellington for their education if they have family responsibilities, or some other reason for staying in Blenheim. And by concentrating the university in central cities, part-time university is effectively denied to all those who do not work close to the centre of the city and cannot afford the transport and the loss of working time to come into a few lectures a week. Thus we should not only oppose Von Zedlitz -we should advocate that its facilities and personnel (and the university library and laboratories) be duplicated in such locations near the workplaces and homes of Levin, Masterton and Porirua, etc.

By such decentralised de institutionalisation the prejudices against education among such of the population, and the feeling that it is not their sort of place (because they didn't like school) or that they are too 'dumb' for it, can be broken down. Most university departments are already big enough, and it would not hurt them to direct future growth to separate campuses. Indeed, such a move might encourage the cross fertilisation of ideas that tends to occur when there are several independent centres of academic debate and research.

Again, the Labour government is already committed to this decentralisation through its policy on community colleges (the first of which is being set up in Hawkes Bay), and its policy of extending [unclear: technical] institutes to medium sized centres such a Wanganui. They need our support to fortify their resolve to carry these policies through.

Third, the present degree structure is totally unsuited for the purposes I have been describing. Tertiary education has been taken over by professions to such an extent that 'education for citizenship' and 'education for understanding' of the world have been almost excluded. We will not get more people to partake of higher education so long as to do so they are practically forced to (at least if they want to keep their bursaries) to specialise narrowly in one professional field. Rather than that, we should be providing an opportunity for people to get an introduction to the whole range of professions and areas of knowledge within two or three years without forfeiting their bursaries. A student should be free to make up his course entirely of stage 1 units if he so desires, especially if those units are extended somewhat, in a flexible way, with the interests of each student in mind. After all, we can see from our own experiences that there are diminishing benefits to further education in most specialist fields compared with the relatively great value of the first insights into a subject.

Furthermore, this professional division has been taken even to the extent of offering different types of education in different institutions. We are prevented from taking courses at Polytech that might interest us and make us more informed citizens, but both the physical separation of the two institutions and the fact that we have to pass a certain number of university credits to keep our bursaries. And if we have specialised in arts subjects at school but subsequently decide, for example, that we would like to know something about science, we practically have to go back to school before we can take science courses at university. In other words if tertiary education is to cease to be the preserve of professional elites, there needs to be a much greater integration, physically, and in the matter of bursaries among the various institutions that now offer higher secondary and tertiary education. And courses must be more flexible so that they can be attuned to the needs of those who want a general education, as well as those who want a narrow professional training. (This applies not only to content, but also to timetabling - more general education courses should be scheduled at night when part timers can attend more easily.

Beyond that, there are people who are put off by any kind of formalised education at all, but are nevertheless anxious to learn more and think about the world. These people (who at some stage of our lives may include all of us) should be catered to by making the library of each tertiary institution open to the public (and indeed amalgamating with the public library) and providing study guide books for independent use of the library's resources in particular fields; and by appointing tutors in each institution. These tutors can serve as resource persons, available to help people in the neighbourhood in their particular study needs. They should also include adult education teachers who can offer tuition in basic reading, writing and arithmetic and in how to get on in our impersonal world, to those who are excluded from higher education by the fact that they went right through school without picking up these basic skills, as well as to Polynesian and other immigrants.

These people will not be helped by a mere increase in the value of bursaries for page 15 full-time study, because they will not usually be studying full-time But if they do want to study lull-time independently of any institution through using an institution's library and personnel on their own initiative, then this kind of tertiary education too should be covered by the standard tertiary bursary. (Actually if the bursary could in effect be used for any kind of study at all, then it would be necessary to restrict it to a certain number of years of paid higher secondary and tertiary education of his choice during his life time. Anything above that amount should be paid for by the individual himself, because it is not in the interests of the community that it should support indefinitely any number of people who do not contribute their share of effort to the communal well-being, provided that they are able to do so).

Fourth, as higher education is depro-fessionalised, there can naturally be a reduction of the emphasis placed on certificates of passing and failing courses. Instead, as with the schools, students should be able to choose the standard they want to achieve (e.g. a general outline of the subject only, ranging to a fully advanced understanding of it). Then they can work with their tutors and lecturers to ensure that they reach this standard if they still consider it worth reaching. If they have not reached it by the end of the year, they should be able to carry on into the holidays and even the next year, part-time if necessary, until they and their tutors are satisfied that they have reached the standard. If this sort of flexibility is not introduced, higher education will continue to alienate those who are preordained by statistical fetishism to fail, just as school does at present, Everyone should be able to acquire the understanding that he wants in the shortest possible time, without the interference of such arbitrary, discriminatory and alienating processes.

And finally, so long as the family benefit is not high enough to pay for child care, it is necessary to provide free child care facilities for all parents desiring tertiary education. Nothing more need be said on that.