Engaging and Reengaging HE: Possibilities and Challenges

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Engaging and Re-engaging HE Possibilities and
Challenges

• ms. CHAN lean heng, PhD
• Popular Educator
• Assoc. Professor
• School of Social Sciences
• Science University of Malaysia
• Penang, Malaysia
• Facing Global and Local Challenges the New
  Dynamics for Higher Education
• Panel on University-Community Engagement
• 24-26 November
• Macao SAR, P.R. China

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Introductory Preamble

• New (not so new) Model of Scholarship
• Renewed Agenda for HE
• maximize HE capacities in knowledge
  creation/co-creation by embracing and integrating
  all approaches, processes all sys of knowledge
• reclaim value based education so as to produce
  humble graduates who are conscious, committed
  stewards of democracy, equity, peace and
  sustainability while pursuing their professional
  and personal goals
• revitalize universities restore their social
  relevance/ responsibility as a public good
  institution

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Outline

• Current Contexts (a) our current world
• (b) higher education
• Engaged Scholarship
• Participatory Research as Engaged Scholarship
• Possibilities and Challenges (strategies)

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Contextsour current world

• Also brgt much destruction in terms of
• ecol. degrad, econ. instab,
• Soc. exclusion
• loss of cultural diversity, and other critical
  values
• human/psychological, food, pol. insecurity
• increasing consumerism, materialism individ,
  etc
• all the deficits democ,

• Current modern cap devt has brgt considerable
  benefits for many people
• longer life expectancy, more access to education,
  facilities
• more equalities gender, race/ethnicity, class
  etc ,
• more consumerism and consumer choice, and
• some extension of human rights and political
  freedoms

• challenges new opportunities for HE

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ContextsHigher Education

• Traditionally public good inst
• Corporatisation, marketisation, privatisation
• Entrepreneurial U, Res U (world class
  competion/recognition)
• Disconnect fr society
• Monopolistic academic mode of knowledge
  production
• Compartmentalisation of core functions

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Role/Purpose of HEWhat Kind of Knowledge?What
Kind of Scholarship?

• Need to restore, revitalize and reclaim purpose
  of edu scholarship
• the meaning and value of HE
• role of HE/Us
• To restore sustain vitality of HE in 21st Cent,
  a new vision of scholarship is reqd, one
  dedicated not only to the renewal of the academy
  but for the renewal of society itself.

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Engaged ScholarshipScholarship of Engagement

• Response to disconnection bet academe soct
• Reaction agst fragmentation segregation of
  teaching, research, service
• Increasing spec of academic knowl
• Kind of knowl HEIs/Us are producing
• Kind of graduates that are being prod/reprod
• How can core functions of HE serve humanity and
  generate scholarship

Rethinking of the core of academy SCHOLARSHIP
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• Paradigm shift on
• core of the academy
• Knowledge, Scholarship, Education, Learning
• How can HEIs producing socially useful and
  practical knowledge, which lead to theorisation
  and development of theoretical knowledge as well
• What kind of learning, teaching, research
  (knowledge creation) approaches are appropriate?
• What kind of curricula are relevant?

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Engaged Scholarship

• Boyer Reconsidered Scholarship
• scholarship of discovery - contributes to the
  search for new knowledge, the pursuit of inquiry,
  and the intellectual climate of HEIs.
• scholarship of integration - makes connections
  across disciplines, places specialized knowledge
  in larger contexts such as communities, and
  advances knowledge through synthesis.
• scholarship of application - scholars ask how
  knowledge can be applied to problems and issues,
  address individual and societal needs, and use
  societal realities to test, inspire, and
  challenge theory.
• scholarship of teaching - includes not only
  transmitting knowledge, but also transforming and
  extending it beyond the university walls.
  Implications of learning, how we learn, difft
  ways of knowing, difft types of knowl

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Defining features of engaged scholarship

• is collaborative and participatory
• draws on many sources of knowledge
• is based on partnerships
• is shaped by multiple perspectives and
  expectations multiple sites of knowledge
  production
• deals with difficult and evolving
  questionscomplex issues that may shift
  constantly
• is long term, in both effort and impact
• requires diverse strategies and approaches
• Crosses disciplinary lines
• does not aim to replace previous forms of sship
• also stress academic rigor

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Challenges Strategies

• Recog multiplicity of knowledge systems
  knowing tht are horizontal
• Undstd meaning practice of engaged
  scholarship
• Legitimise popularise engaged scholarship
• Role of UNESCO
• Role of HEIs esp, research Us
• Indiv tranformative intellectuals, networks
• Capacities preparedness of HE personnel
• Critical mass of educators equipped with the
  approp orientation, capacities, skills, passion
  commitment for engaged scholarship

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Engagement is not an alternative or third mission
for HE, but central to supportive of the
historic goals of edu, discovery and serving the
public good. Becos of this, engagement can be a
powerful means for HE to refocus strengthen its
mission amid conflicting demands for
commercialisation and privatisation for HE to
reclaim its social responsibility benefiting
academy itself and society

• Engaged scholarship represent the reconstituted,
  renewed pedagogy of HE for the 21 century

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• Is HE
• ready to embark on this model of engaged
  scholarship?