PROBLEMÁTICA Y SOLUCIONES MIMÉTICOS TANTO DE MEMBRANAS COMO DE PROTEÍNAS

The difficulty m ost frequently raised by lecturers as constraining the w ay they would like to w ork w ith a diverse range o f students was student numbers. Increased participation and w idened participation frequently appeared to be understood as either identical or at least closely linked by both lecturers and m angers and therefore the problem s o f coping w ith increased num bers were often seen as ‘widening participation p ro b lem s’. A lthough the m ove to a m ass higher education has had im plications for diversity (Y orke, 2001) expansion in itself has some bearing on the experiences o f academ ics purely in term s o f volume, and this has been compounded by funding levels not having had a sim ilar rate o f increase. This has led to lecturers experiencing a considerable change in dem ands. The experience o f such demands m ay partly explain the apparent attitude o f requiring increased support to cope with stu d en ts’ needs, regardless o f the form o f such support.

A lecturer from health and care rem arked that ‘ .. .w e’ve huge numbers o f students ... in the first year, an am azing am ount o f students to deal w ith’ (HFm2), w hilst a sport lecturer talked about ‘ ...lectu rin g to crowd that wouldn't disgrace a second division football stad iu m ’ (S M m l) and the difficulties this presented in term s any individual

attention. Such difficulties w ere illustrated in the com m ent that ‘ ...som ebody with a hearing im p airm ent could be sat in lectures w ith everybody else and could probably go th ro ug h three years w ithout it being picked u p ’ (S F sl). A nother lecturer, who also com plained ab ou t class sizes, regretted the lim ited ability to engage in dialogic approaches, as he stated, ‘I ’m not sure you ’re going to be able to crack it because once you get beyond m aybe 18 or 20 the dynam ic changes and you w on’t get people offering c o m m e n ts’(SM m 2). He saw his m ost ‘rew arding’ w ork as being ‘...five m inutes after the lecture w hen the interested ones or the ones who are not sure about som ething com e up and say “Can you explain?” ’ (SM m 2). He also believed this availability en abled him to be m ore ‘inclusive’. A lthough his availability to students w as likely to be appreciated, the success o f this approach depended on students’ having sufficient self-confidence to m ake contact and, possibly, the ‘...s e lf certainty o f m iddle-class h ab itu s’ (B ourdieu, 1984:66). A nother lecturer had com m ented ‘...it is very relian t on them to com e to y o u ,’ and ‘...it takes a m aturity to do th at’ (S F el), indicating th at the ability to approach lecturers w as seen as an attribute only some students possessed.

As already noted the health and care departm ent had some problem s reaching its student recruitm ent targets. Those w ho w orked with larger courses in this department generally expressed the view that inappropriate dem ands were being made by the university as one said ‘ .. .the thing is w e’re under pressure from the university as well to take students, you have to get the course num bers u p ’ (HFm2). Those on smaller, p rofession ally validated, courses w here num bers were capped believed they were ‘p ro tec ted ’ from the dem ands placed on other colleagues because funding or placem ent availability restricted the num bers that could be recruited. However, the

m anager interview ed believed the lecturers on these courses faced a different set o f dem ands w hich also constrained their practice.

The p ro b lem is that, in a big percentage o f our programmes, the curriculum is p rescrib ed f o r us by professional bodies an d by statutory bodies, a n d we have a lim ited time period in which to deliver that program m e. So any additional demands on academ ic s ta ff are not p a rtic u la rly w ell tolerated. In other words they w ill fo c u s on the delivery. I f there are any additional issues or problem s as a result o f in crea sed diversity or an increase o f non-traditional students their response is usually reactive rather than pro-active -because it has to be, because lim e doesn't allow yo u to be pro-active. (HM)

It appeared th at such tim e dem ands and seeming lack o f ‘room to m anoeuvre’ resulted in either apathy or frustration on the part o f academic staff and consequently a som ew hat m inim al or reactive engagem ent with issues related to greater diversity o f the student population.

The d epartm ent w ith sport related courses had a history o f high recruitm ent and had som e o f the largest courses in Inter-U. Just like those who taught on larger courses in the health and care departm ent, lecturers found the actual num ber o f students a constraint on practice. U nsurprisingly, given what has already been said, they did not express as m uch concern about pressure to recruit. Some saw the large class sizes as a problem o f the sector rather than the university or their department.

I th in k we are a t the stage now... and again this is talking about the system , not the university and certainly not the [department]... we are a t the stage now where we are pushing as many numbers through as we can a n d hoping to retain as m any numbers as we can. (S M m l)

M any lecturers throughout the university spoke o f the difficulties o f dealing with large classes and the volum e o f work.

A nother aspect o f the tim e constraints experienced was the new expectations o f academ ic sta ff in relation to both research and enterprise. In particular, all the

corporate policy docum ents review ed showed a strategic goal was to gain greater recognition and status in the field o f applied research. This goal, com bined with an im pending application for Research Degree Awarding Powers and an imminent R esearch A ssessm ent Exercise, resulted in a considerable focus on staff being research active. A num ber o f staff believed that research was the ‘w ay forw ard’ but the current w orkload, w hich was seen as being stretched by the dem ands o f non- traditional students, prevented any concerted research activity.

We a ll w orry at the m om ent about our workloads and about the fa c t tha t in certain areas that we ’re encouraging [pause]. You know [Inter- U] is trying to up its profile in research and trying to encourage lecturers to research in their specific area o f expertise and to p a rtic ip a te in research. Because l e t ’s be honest th a t’s what we should

be doing, we sh o u ld all be doing a certain am ount o f research to underpin our teaching in one w ay or the other. A n d I think y o u ’ve got such a high w orkload anyw ay ...but y o u ’ve also g o t more dem anding students, so as a result, how on earth are lecturers m eant to participate in a ll these other things w hich the u n iversity’s going to have to rely on?( H Fm 2)

The existence o f different dem ands in post-92 universities leading to dilemmas o f prioritisation has been recognised, as M arr (2006:16) states,

The n eed to becom e research active presents a dilem m a fo r those in institutions w here the m ajority o f fu n d in g comes fr o m teaching - leaching a n d adm inistration lake up increasing am ounts o f time and p re v e n t the level o f engagem ent in research necessary to acquire the reputation w hich attracts funding.

It w as easy to see how the concerns o f the lecturer quoted above could develop into resentm ent o f w idening participation policy if viewed as partly responsible for preventing involvem ent in higher status research activity.

A lthough the size o f teaching groups, the tim e available and conflicting demands w ere m ost frequently m entioned as constraints on practice, there was one other issue that revealed itse lf in conversations with academic staff. This issue related to lecturer’s confidence and understanding o f possible strategies when dealing with

certain n on -traditional students. One lecturer com m ented on her feelings o f insecurity in dealing w ith som e stu d en ts’ problem s w hen she first began lecturing.

. . . i f I g o ba ck to w hen I fir s t started, y o u ’d be fa c e d with these situations, [pause] I come fro m what I consider a very normal upb rin ging a n d I fo u n d it very daunting having some students sitting in fr o n t o f me telling me some horrific experiences that they were going through. A n d y o u com e out o f that thinking well how am I qualified to help them through this? N o t necessarily to counsel but to help them a n d in w hat w ays can we accom m odate them ? [pause] A n d i t ’s been p u re ly through experience. (S F el)

The lim ited know ledge o f potential strategies does not imply there w as any lack o f concern, or a lack o f recognition that some groups o f non-traditional students may have d ifferent needs w ithin the learning environm ent. In this case the m ajor issue appeared to be the lecturers ow n fear o f not doing the ‘right thing’. However, there w as also little appreciation show n o f the possible need for alternative learning strategies. D espite som e understanding that ‘...academ ic culture is not uniformly accessed or ex p erien ced ’ (R ead et al., 2003:261) there was lim ited attention given to the p ossibility o f a need for changes to assessm ent, course design or teaching. A lthough nearly all academ ic staff could talk extensively about the support strategies needed to rem edy stu d en ts’ perceived deficiencies there was only little discussion o f pedagogical responses to student diversity. Thom as (2002:432) has noted that

M ethods o f teaching, learning and assessm ent provide sites fo r interactions betw een s ta ff students and their peers, a n d with institutional structures, a n d thus have a central role in both changing a n d reproducing social a n d cultural inequalities.

A lthough the m ajority o f staff interview ed did not talk explicitly about inclusive approaches, and show ed som e insecurity regarding appropriate strategies, there was a general w illingness to be inclusive as shown in previous com ments regarding availability to students. There was also evidence o f trying to ensure that students from

non-traditional backgrounds were given the opportunity to get to the same level as their peers, although this w as som etim es seen as a difficult balance, as shown in the follow ing com m ent.

We ’re taking peo p le with all these variety o f backgrounds and we ’re exp ected to g e t them into the same basket so to speak. T h a t’s one o f the things, fr o m a sta ffin g p o in t o f view that is so difficult, [pause] You sp ea k to traditional A -level students at the end o f the first-year an d say to them ‘Well have y o u enjoyed it? ’ A n d they say, ‘Yes but ... ’A n d you sa y ‘B u t w hat? ’ ‘We d id it in A-level. ’

What they don ’( seem to appreciate is that w e ’ve got these people o f differen t backgrounds com ing in to get up to the same skills level.

(H M e2)

As this show s there w as a concern for the w elfare and attainm ent o f students from underrepresented groups in the sense o f ‘getting them up to the same level’ but actions w ere constrained by a conceptualization o f what was ‘norm al’ in terms o f teaching and assessm ent practices. Read et al. (2003:269) have noted how it is ‘... possible to talk o f a ‘cu lture’ o f academ ia, ways o f thinking and acting that are institutionally d o m in an t’ and that certain practices ‘...co m e to be seen as the only or ‘n atu ral’ w ay o f thinking or actin g ’. Lecturers in Inter-U talked about the difficulties students experienced w ith certain practices as if these practices were sacrosanct and the only po ssib le course o f action w as for the student to adjust. This was particularly the case in relation to assessm ent practice w ith examples o f student deficit being illustrated by the difficulties they had in w riting a ‘5,000 word essay’ or that they had to be ‘given ...re sits and resits and resits’. Teaching practices showed greater variation, although even here traditional lecturing approaches dominated, largely ow ing to the aforem entioned constraints on lecturers’ time and availability and large student num bers.