Collegiate spirit drives us to help advance the academic enterprise
I am struck at alumni events around the world by how many graduates affectionately recall their tutors, professors and lecturers but also the departmental secretary or porter or the counsellor who sorted out emotional and financial problems. Universities these days are a seamless web of professional support for students, staff, supporters and sponsors. Without that support, academics would spend most of their time administering rather than teaching and researching.
Celia Whitchurch, in her work for the Leadership Foundation for Higher Education, has shown how new breeds of “blended professionals” are emerging in higher education, for example in educational enhancement or learning resources. These people have excellent academic credentials alongside highly developed professional skills. As a result, the “them and us” divisions that unproductively marked out the territory of the past are giving way to a partnership model whereby all staff work together for the good of students and universities, with no artificial divisions between academic and “civilian” staff. This trend is particularly marked in a younger generation educated and now employed in the age of mass participation.
Times Higher Education, online, Oct. 22, 2009
David Allen, registrar and deputy chief executive, University of Exeter, UK