"The tradition of the oppressed teaches us that the ‘state of emergency' in which we live is not the exception but the rule...There is no document of civilization which is not at the same time a document of barbarism. And just as such a document is not free of barbarism, barbarism taints also the manner in which it was transmitted from one owner to another. A historical materialist therefore dissociates himself from it as far as possible. He regards it as his task to brush history against the grain."
Walter Benjamin, "Theses on the Philosophy of History."

Harris's relevancy remarks hit nerve

Jennifer Lewington, The Learning Beat [Globe and Mail, December 1, 1997, A8]

Last week, Ontario Premier Mike Harris got some answers to questions he asked recently of the province's universities.

He had set teeth on edge among the province's universities last month when he mused about the capacity of institutions to chop or change programs to meet the job demands of the economy. He also hinted at the use of performance-based funding for government to measure the value that institutions provide to students and taxpayers.

"Who in our university system will decide to reduce enrolments or close programs when they are no longer relevant or when there are few jobs available in the profession, such as certain PhD programs?" Mr. Harris asked in a speech to Ontario's university presidents last month.

While he did not name programs, the text of his speech noted there are 10 PhD programs in geography and six in sociology. He also asked "who is responsible for opening or expanding programs in fields where there are significant shortages in computer science and software engineering?"

Later, he told reporters that "universities themselves realize there are still some programs they are offering that their graduates are in surplus and have very little hope of contributing to society in any meaningful way. Yet there are many other disciplines where we need more programs. With each individual university autonomous, my challenge to them is how do they collectively make decisions that will ensure a better distribution of courses that are more relevant to the next century?"

Typically, the institutions themselves decide what programs to add and subtract. In Ontario, there is no system-wide evaluation of programs at the undergraduate level, but graduate programs are reviewed every seven years on the basis of quality, enrolment, graduation rates and thesis publication. While job placement also counts, getting data is difficult because institutions don't necessarily know the whereabouts of graduates.

An official of the Council of Ontario Universities said that evaluating program need based on labour market demand is notoriously faulty. "Five years ago, you would have closed all engineering programs because there weren't jobs," the official said. "Now they are crying for more."

Last week, in events unconnected to the Premier's remarks, Carleton University sparked a campus furor with its announced plans to close some programs. The proposed closing of undergraduate and graduate degree programs in the school of languages, literatures and comparative literary studies is scheduled to be discussed this week by Carleton's senate.

The rationale for possibly closing the school (though individual courses in Spanish and Russian may stay) is not because graduates don't get jobs. Rather, university officials say they need to cut $5.8-million from its operating budget by May 1, 1998. They also said the school's relatively low-demand degree programs, which account for 200 out of 13,000 full-time students, do not fit the university's new focus on public affairs and management and high technology.

Carleton's effort to rethink its place in the Ontario system, which was sparked by a slide in reputation over the past few years, began in November, 1996 when the university Senate approved the new academic mission. But students and faculty are livid now because they only learned the identity of the threatened programs through a memo leaked two weeks ago.

"There was no reason to think something would come down on us," said graduate student Erin Manning, a PhD student in comparative literature, because her program was launched only 2 1/2 years ago. Moreover, she adds, Carleton's graduates in comparative literature are in demand by multinational corporations hungry for students who are multi-lingual.

Carleton president Richard Van Loon said it's never easy for universities to close programs, not least because the Senate, the academic body that includes elected faculty representatives, is faced with pulling the plug on programs and jobs of tenured colleagues. "You have to make choices in the end," he said, agreeing in part with the Premier's remarks.

But Mr. Van Loon questioned Mr. Harris's contention that PhD students are not getting jobs, adding that the value of higher learning must also be measured in qualitative terms, such as the acquisition of thinking skills.

The Learning Beat may be reached at jlewington@globeandmail.ca by E-mail.