MEDD6128 Chap.7 Curricular Shifts in Changing Times
Curricular Shifts in Changing Times
The case against a subject area is an argument, so reconstruct it
The final taught session asks what a curriculum should become when its context changes, and it approaches the question through the arguments themselves. The defence of a subject area is usually conducted as though the case against it were a mood, and the result is two sides asserting value at each other.
One reading refuses that and writes the case against the humanities out in three parts: schooling is nationally worthwhile just in the case where it adds to economic output; humanities study neither does nor could; so it is nationally worthless and cuts are justified.
Attack the premise nobody questioned, concede the one they came to defend
The second premise is the one most defenders rush at, and the reading declines to examine or defend the humanities on economic grounds at all.
It also grants openly that economic growth is of national value, which removes the charge of dismissing employment. The attack goes to the first premise: there are national goods, described as democratic goods, which have nothing to do with economic prosperity and which most democratic governments would accept without argument.
If any such good exists the first premise is false, and the conclusion no longer follows even if the second were granted entirely.
Arguing in the vocabulary the decision maker is obliged to use
The reading gives a second reason for framing the case in terms of national value, and it is a lesson about audience.
Existing defences fail partly because the two sides are not speaking the same language, so setting the benefit out in terms of national value and prudential worth supplies reasons in the vocabulary that opponents actually use.
The presentation brief makes the same demand when it asks you to explain alignment with regional or national and global mandates: argue in the terms the decision maker is already committed to taking seriously.
Designing a new area around a technology
The other reading takes the opposite task and proposes a curriculum rather than defending one.
It argues that artificial intelligence stands to worsen three long standing crises at once, in higher education and the humanities, in the absence of diversity and inclusion within computing fields, and in the wider social and economic disruption those technologies enable, and proposes a programme answering all three.
Two commitments give it shape: that critique alone side lines the critics while active engagement carries its own risks, and that technical depth is a prerequisite for useful criticism.
What happens to a shift on the way down
A change that survives the argument still has to survive the institution.
One study read what departments wrote during an institution wide curriculum change, treated the change as a disorienting dilemma in which discomfort is an expected part of the process, and evaluated engagement at three separate degrees: adoption of the language, statement of intent, and actual application.
Engagement was lowest where a theme was not recognised as an academic problem the curriculum could solve, and the conclusion for leaders is to work through disciplinary experts and to treat language adoption as a genuine precursor rather than as empty compliance.
What this chapter covers
- 01
A case for cutting a subject, written out as a formal argument
- 02
Which premise to attack and which to concede
- 03
Democratic goods as national value without economic return
- 04
Arguing in the vocabulary an opponent is obliged to use
- 05
The hidden conditional in any proposal to add or remove a subject
- 06
Three crises and a curriculum proposed to answer all of them
- 07
Critique against engagement, and the position that holds both
- 08
Prerequisites as a distribution decision
- 09
Curriculum change as a disorienting dilemma
- 10
Language, intent and application as separate degrees of engagement
Ten minutes against a cut, without conceding the frame
- 3Write the proposal out as a three part argument.
- 3Decide which premise to concede and say what the concession buys you.
- 4Attack the remaining premise and name what must follow the attack.
Key terms
- Democratic Good
- A national good with no connection to economic prosperity that most democratic governments would accept as valuable, used to show that economic contribution is not the only criterion of national value.
- National Value
- The framing in which a case for or against a subject area is addressed to governments, chosen so that the argument speaks in the vocabulary its opponents already use.
- Hidden Conditional
- The unexamined if and only if buried in the first premise of most proposals to add or cut a subject, which is usually the productive point of attack.
- Human Centred Design
- The commitment to building systems that serve people broadly rather than maximising a narrow economic or mathematical objective, treated here as a curriculum aim.
- Dual Critical Engagement
- The position that holds critique and active participation together, on the ground that critique alone removes the critic from the decisions and engagement alone risks facilitating harm.
- Disorienting Dilemma
- A change that unsettles existing assumptions deeply enough that discomfort and a strong emotional response are an expected part of the process rather than a sign of failure.
- Language Adoption
- The first degree of engagement with a reform, in which the words of the change appear in a unit's documents. It is a genuine precursor to implementation and not yet implementation.
Curricular Shifts in Changing Times FAQ
Why should I write out an argument I disagree with?
Because until it is written out you cannot see which part of it is actually carrying the weight, and you will attack the part that annoys you rather than the part that is weakest. Reconstruction also protects you from the failure that makes most curriculum advocacy ineffective, which is treating opposition as a mood to be countered with enthusiasm.
A written argument has premises, and a premise can be shown to be false in a way a mood cannot.
Is conceding a premise not a sign of weakness?
It is usually a sign of strategy, and the reading makes the point deliberately by granting that economic growth is of national value while declining to defend the humanities on economic grounds at all. A concession removes the reply your opponent came prepared to give and narrows the dispute to ground of your choosing.
What it must not do is concede the premise your whole case depends on, which is why deciding what to concede comes before deciding what to attack.
How does the argument technique apply to adding something rather than cutting it?
The shape is the same with the sign reversed, and the hidden conditional still sits in the first premise. A proposal to make a new subject compulsory usually rests on a claim that a stated need is the criterion of curricular value, and the productive question is whether that criterion is the only one or even the operative one for the body being asked to act.
Naming it takes a minute and turns advocacy into something a decision maker can weigh.
What is the point of measuring language adoption if it is not implementation?
It is a real stage rather than a formality, and reporting it separately prevents two opposite mistakes. Treating language adoption as implementation overstates a reform that has not happened; dismissing it as empty compliance misses that a unit has at least accepted the change as intelligible in its own terms, which the evidence identifies as a precursor.
A proposal that expects departments to move straight to application has skipped a stage the research says exists.
Why was engagement lowest for some themes and not others?
The pattern in the study follows whether staff recognised the theme as an academic problem that the curriculum could solve. Where they did not, there was little acceptance even of the language, still less of intent and implementation, and a theme strongly supported from above was correspondingly weak in the negotiated documents below.
The recommendation that follows is to integrate the strategy with disciplinary experts so that the change is restated inside each field's own terms rather than addressed to the institution in general.
Assessment move
Take the last curriculum change proposed where you work and write it as three numbered sentences: the criterion of value it assumes, the factual claim it makes about the thing being changed, and the conclusion. Then mark which of the three you actually disagree with.
Most people discover they have been arguing about the second while their real objection is to the first, and that discovery is usually worth more than another week of reading.
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