What do we need to know in order to teach well? What values inform the way we teach? Mapping our reflections on these important questions was an effective way of cataloguing our responses, especially for our cohort of mainly visual arts practitioners. It was a revealing method for encouraging self examination of our beliefs and how much these personal principals can affect how we teach. Do we need to be good people to be good teachers? Can we learn to be ethical?
Values were also in the forefront when we examined UAL’s climate, racial and social justice policies. This ignited an interesting debate around the authenticity of the universities ethical stance. As argued in Holmwood (2018), the commodification of academia is at odds with a meritocratic institution. It has led to a neo-liberal ideology which diverts responsibility for issues of inequality and racism on to the individual as the consumer of education. Can a for-profit institution be genuine in promulgating social purpose as their guiding principal? UAL’s policies could either be viewed as merely a USP for branding the university or an honest attempt to build a better society through the education of future generations. As an employee of UAL it seems incumbent on me to fully participate in this debate and to seek clarity on the policies, the framework for measuring progress in these areas, and to try in whatever way I can, to integrate it into my teaching practice, as these values do in fact align closely with my own beliefs; to approach it from a place of hope. As Hooks (2003, p.xiv) affirms, ‘When we only name the problem, when we state complaint without a constructive focus on resolution, we take away hope. In this way, critique can become merely an expression of profound cynicism, which then works to sustain dominator culture.’
Holmwood, J. (2018) ‘Race and the Neoliberal University.’ In Bhambra, G. K., Gebrial, D. and Nişancıoğlu, K. (eds.) Decolonising the University. London: Pluto Press.
Hooks, B. (2003) Teaching Community: A Pedagogy of Hope. New York: Routledge.