THERE are not many masters courses that inspire graduates to return and volunteer for the unglamorous tasks of fundraising, advertising and course development, but I have just spent a weekend with more than a dozen graduates and teachers from the Centre for Human Ecology (CHE) doing exactly that. Having finished the course in 2005, I am now a member of the board of directors.
The CHE’s main aim is to help people develop the practical, intellectual, and emotional skills to pursue social justice and ecological sustainability. We offer short courses and educational events. The masters course is our largest ongoing project a
nd, though delivered through a mainstream university, it challenges conventional ideas about learning by encouraging students to ask difficult questions and find creative solutions.
Now, the CHE itself is exploring creative solutions for issues that affect higher education. With increasing student numbers and shrinking budgets, Scottish universities are scrambling to cut costs, often sacrificing educational quality for financial expedience. Typical approaches include cutting contact hours, increasing class sizes and techno fixes – all of which have a negative impact on students. There have been some positive developments (the increase of cross-disciplinary courses), but these do not remove the growing pressure on staff to do more with less.
The CHE masters in human ecology is more resource-intensive than most courses. Teaching takes place in workshops that last two to seven days. Class size is limited to the number of students that can reasonably have a group discussion, and there is a strong emphasis on building an effective “learning community”.
The course is team-led, team-taught and heavily reliant on guest speakers, many of whom contribute their time for free – but an enormous amount of energy goes into crafting a coherent educational experience from diverse perspectives. It is a course that changes and evolves each year, requiring intensive preparation and development work, but there is a fifteen-year track record proving the effectiveness of the approach.
This year, a group of graduates from the past six years was invited on an intensive working weekend to reflect on their experience of the course. While many courses are being forced to cut corners in order to survive, we hope to draw on the enthusiasm and dedication of graduates to bridge the gap between student needs and university funds. The weekend followed a similar approach to the course itself, moving freely between “head, heart, and hand”.
We discussed emotional issues, engaged in intellectual work and took collective responsibility for the practical side of things. Somehow, the different elements clicked into place, and we finished the weekend with clear plans for action.
There is a lot of work ahead, but the weekend has reaffirmed the idea that it is possible. The Centre for Human Ecology does not represent the entire remedy to the problems facing universities or to those facing the world at large – but it does represent one small part of the solution. I am glad to be involved.
• Myshele Goldberg is a PhD student at the University of Strathclyde. Her website is
www.myshelegoldberg.com.
