Conceptions of Academic Freedom in English Faith-Based Universities and University Colleges

Conceptions of Academic Freedom in English Faith-Based Universities and University Colleges Carol Precious Institute of Education University of London Degree of Doctor in Education Abstract Academic freedom is a contested concept, and in the present climate in higher education, is currently considered by many academics to be under threat nationally and internationally. This thesis focuses on how academic freedom is conceived and addressed within the context of a particular sector of higher education. The focus of the study was the fourteen English members of the Cathedrals Group, which is a distinctive sector in higher education, as the members are universities and university colleges with a historical faith-base. Formerly established as Church teacher-training colleges, these institutions have latterly evolved and gained university college and university status. Within higher education, faith-based institutions differ from secular universities and university colleges in that they have a historical relationship with their founding Church, which continues to be a part of their institutional identity to the present day. The reason for selecting this group of institutions was that faith-based institutions are sometimes criticised for placing limits on academic freedom. The empirical data for this research was gathered from in- depth semi-structured interviews with eleven senior managers and eleven academics. The findings indicated that although there were isolated instances where academics had experienced restrictions, for the majority of those interviewed there was no tension between the institutions’ faith-base and their academic freedom. The Christian foundation was not an important consideration, had little effect upon their academic work, and academics’ definitions and experiences of academic freedom were reported as no different from traditional conceptions of academic freedom. One of the possible explanations offered for this is that in their progression towards achieving university status, the institutions have become increasingly secularised and therefore for many academics the possibility of any limitations to academic freedom in relation to the faith- base of their institution was not an issue for consideration. Contents 2000 Word Statement 1 Chapter One: The Rationale and Context for the Thesis Introduction 7 The current rise of a focus upon academic freedom 8 The rise of a Christian focus in higher education 9 Debates concerning academic freedom in universities with a Church Foundation in England 10 The development of the Cathedrals group 11 Thesis structure 12 Chapter Two: Literature Review The historical origins and development of academic freedom 14 The fading influence of the Church 16 The University of Berlin and the genesis of academic freedom 17 The schism between Christian colleges and the American Association of University Professors 18 The 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure 19 Academic freedom and the state in the United Kingdom 21 Protection of academic freedom within an international context 24 Contemporary developments in academic freedom in England 25 Arguments for academic freedom 28 The case for academic freedom 29 Christian universities and academic freedom: arguments for and against Compatibility 32 Definitions of academic freedom are confused 33 Pure academic freedom is an illusion 35 Differing worldviews 37 Institutional academic freedom 40 The range of empirical research: faith-based institutions and beyond 43 Faculty perceptions of academic freedom at a private religious university 44 Academic freedom in public and Christian Canadian universities 47 Private and public responses to controversy 49 Understanding academic freedom: the views of social scientists 53 How Christian are the faith-based universities in the United Kingdom? 55 A summary of the review of literature 58 Chapter Three: Research Design and Methodology 60 The research questions 60 The background to the research 61 Research design 63 Sampling 64 Method of data collection 68 Handling and analysis of interview data 70 The process of analysis 71 Ethical issues 72 Chapter Four: Findings 76 Academics’ understandings of academic freedom 77 Senior managers’ understandings of academic freedom within their institutions 79 Academics’ understandings of academic freedom within their institutions 81 Does the university’s faith-base inform the research agenda? 83 Are there ways in which the Christian foundation enhances the academic freedom of those involved in research? 85 The Christian foundation constrains the academic freedom of those involved in research 89 Challenges involved in implementing the institution’s policy on academic freedom 95 Areas of research or opinions that might be considered inappropriate for academic Staff 95 The ways in which it would be communicated to staff that a piece of research Would be inappropriate 97 Secularisation – institutional growth and expansion 99 Chapter Five: Discussion 106 Chapter Six: Conclusion 117 Bibliography 125 Appendices 132 Appendix A: Email to possible participants 132 Appendix B: Interview questions, academics 133 Appendix C: Interview questions, senior managers 134 2000 Word Statement Before enrolling to study for a Doctorate in Education at the Institute of Education, my professional focus was upon my role as a senior lecturer in Early Years education, within the Primary Education Department at my university. At this particular time in my professional development, my interests were in the pedagogy of young children’s literacy learning with a focus on how young children develop concepts and skills in reading, writing and oracy. Engaging in the process of re-reading and reflecting upon my assignments in order to complete this statement has made me aware of the immense personal development and changes that have taken place, both professionally and intellectually as I have continued with my academic studies. My interest in higher education rather than Early Years education, which has developed during my work on the EdD programme, has resulted in a change of professional focus and academic interests, and I have not pursued one line of enquiry throughout my work. I have therefore taken a sequential approach, using my assignments as a framework, to enable me to reflect upon my development with regard to my understanding of professional enquiry and research, which has culminated in the completion of my final thesis. The first two years I found the initial two years of the programme to be intellectually stimulating and a challenge to the ways in which I thought about my role as an academic and teacher educator. In my first assignment for Foundations of Professionalism, I reflected upon the changing nature of Early Years professionalism. In particular, I focused upon how the relative autonomy in terms of curriculum and pedagogy, prior to the Education Reform Act (1988) had been eroded by successive government initiatives, and in particular the ‘third-way’ plethora of policies introduced by the New Labour government after the election in May 1997. The central argument of my assignment was that Early Years professionalism had a distinctive professional identity, but that government initiatives had resulted in the construction of a professionalism that I described as ‘fragile’. I 1 considered four aspects that lead to this fragility. The continuing historical legacy of marketisation in the Thatcherite period, the fragility of a broader feminised workforce, the fragility of the core concept of edu-care and the fragility caused by constant policy churn in Early Years legislation. Reading, researching and writing this assignment allowed me to reflect upon my own understandings of what it meant to be an Early Years professional and how government policies and initiatives had shaped and changed the nature of my work as a head teacher and latterly as a Senior Lecturer in Education within a new university. Completing this assignment also lead me to deepen my understanding of how wider political issues impacted upon education as a whole, beyond my own particular area of expertise. The requirement for my second assignment for Methods of Enquiry 1 was to apply the knowledge and understanding of research methods developed through the taught sessions to a hypothetical research project, which I then actually implemented for my third assignment, Methods of Enquiry 2. These two assignments represented a departure from my focus on young children and were based on my growing interest in research methodology, and in particular, that academics sometimes disagreed about research methods. This was evident from some internal research conferences at my own university where different professors, often heatedly, debated the merits and demerits of particular approaches to research and from some of the lectures in the taught sessions at the IOE. Against this background, questions had been asked at the political level by Hargreaves (1996) on teaching as a research-based profession and whether educational research was good value for money and Blunkett (2000), regarding the links between research and government policy. My research question for both assignments: ‘What nascent theories of educational research are structuring the thinking of Primary Education Teacher Trainers?’ was based upon my developing understanding of how at a theoretical level distinct epistemological beliefs influenced methodologies in academic research. This project required me to think carefully about a precise focused research

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