It is now two weeks since the government appointed a new inquiry into the university's governance and resource allocation. The inquiry is long-awaited and given how many people have been interested in it, it is not unexpected that the directive was received with mixed reactions. Some thought that there was too much focus on collaboration. Others thought it was good to have a holistic approach. Someone else thought the investigation was given too little time. SFS is generally positive. But like everyone else we want to tab in some "but…"
The directive states exactly what we hoped for, namely that the investigation will
"Propose in what way grants for education and research should be allocated so that higher education institutions have the conditions to conduct long-term activities, can achieve the goals for education and research and achieve the highest possible quality".
Good! For us, quality of education is a matter of the heart. Many educations today are underfunded, which provides poor conditions for good quality. The most important thing for an investigation into resource allocation should of course be to come to terms with it.
But our next thought was that the directive shuts the investigator in a far too cramped cage. If the educations are underfunded, it is not enough to redistribute money as long as the total amount is too low. The only ways to cover the costs of high quality would be to take responsibility and add more money or, contrary to all reasonableness, to reduce the number of study places. But the government puts an end to both possibilities by writing in the directive that the proposals must not require increased resources or a reduced number of students in order to be implemented. It is certainly not an easy task the government has given the investigator.
Another thing that puzzles is the concept research affiliation is completely absent from the Directive. Historically, the connection and reciprocity between education and research has been discussed in almost all major changes in the higher education sector, but now the government seems to want to give it a hidden role. In a way, the concept has complete environments (for education, research and collaboration) has a similar meaning, but neither is it given much space.
Nevertheless, an investment in the connection between research and education - or complete environments if you will - could perhaps strengthen education even if the lack of resources persists. We do not give much for the strong emphasis or ambition to allocate resources based on collaboration, but we strongly believe in a better integration between the universities' three tasks. We hope and believe that the inquiry will devote a great deal of thought to strengthening the links between education and research and allowing collaboration to continue to be an important component in both. Perhaps an investment in complete environments can lead to the research resources creating more value that benefits the educations. Perhaps investments in pedagogical competence development among teaching researchers can lead to higher quality without it having to be taken from educational grants. Perhaps it is possible to create synergy effects that lead to more than just a redistribution of insufficient resources. We are not at all sure that it is possible, but the alternative would be that we must continue to nag about erosion and lack of resources for another 25 years. We hope we do not have to.
It will be exciting to see how Pam Fredman handles it.