Dr Elisabeth Simbuerger
Centro de Políticas Comparadas de Educación
Universidad Diego Portales
Vergara 210
Santiago
Chile
Tel +56 2 676 8549
Email e.a.simbuerger@gmail.com

Biography

Elisabeth is a researcher at the Centro de Políticas Comparadas de Educación at the Universidad Diego Portales in Santiago, Chile. She has recently finished her doctoral thesis, Against and beyond – for sociology: a study of the self-understanding of sociologists in the UK, at the University of Warwick. The writing of this article was facilitated by an early career fellowship of the Institute of Advanced Study, University of Warwick.

Key words: sociology, critique, Enlightenment, teaching, research, assessment

The core of a Reflexive Sociology then is the attitude it fosters toward those parts of the social world closest to the sociologist – his own university, his own profession and its associations, his professional role, and importantly, his students and himself – rather than toward only the remote parts of his social surround. A Reflexive Sociology is distinguished by its refusal to segregate the intimate or personal from the public and collective, or the everyday life from the occasional ‘political’ act. It rejects the old-style closed-office politics no less than the old-style public politics. A Reflexive Sociology is not a bundle of technical skills; it is a conception of how to live and a total praxis.

(Gouldner, 1970: 504)

Researching sociology in the UK, I am indebted to Gouldner’s reflexive sociology. Studying the discipline and its inhabitants in a holistic manner means paying attention to sociology’s intellectual claims and the institutional frameworks within which sociology is practised. Based on a larger empirical study that investigated British sociologists’ disciplinary aspirations and how they are put into practice in current UK higher education (HE) (Simbuerger, 2008), this article looks at what British sociologists identify as one of the key features of sociology – critique – and how it is practised and compromised in research and teaching in UK HE.

A brief analysis of the so-called crisis in British sociology in its different facets will be followed by a discussion of sociologists’ claims for critique as one of the distinctive features of the discipline. Thereafter – moving to practices – we will analyse the institutional framing of research and teaching by the current appraisal formats in the UK and how these compromise sociologists’ relationships to their initial disciplinary aspirations. Finally, we will argue that teaching sociology needs to be revisited as a key site for practising the disciplinary traditions of sociology.

Crisis, what crisis?

Sociology in the UK is said to be in crisis. It is charged with having become very fragmented (Scott, 2005; Stanley, 2000). Instead of providing a cohesive and complex analysis of society and engaging with current challenges, such as the biosciences, sociology gets lost in specialisms. As a result, other disciplines seem to have taken over the role sociology has had for decades (Fuller, 2006). The diagnosis of a crisis within sociology is by no means new, and almost seems to be a fixture of the discipline itself (Bottomore, 1975; Holmwood, 1996). Yet, while sociology has been said to be in a crisis many times throughout its history, the crisis of sociology at the turn of the millennium seems to take a unique shape. The massification of UK HE throughout the past 40 years, the scarcity of state funding and the implementation of assessment procedures in the UK such as the Research Assessment Exercise (RAE) have resulted in the increase of fixed-term contracts and more academics competing for jobs (Hockey, 2004; Miller, 1996; Shore and Wright, 2000; Tight, 2000). Sociologists are not only pressured to prioritise research over teaching, but also face the challenge of finding a balance between their research interests and the demands of funding bodies (Sparkes, 2007; Willmott, 2003). All these developments have substantially challenged academic identities (Henkel, 2000; Parker and Jary, 1995) and have had an effect on the discipline of sociology itself (Rappert, 1999). In 2003, in the UK, the Commission on the Social Sciences observed a tendency in sociological research to be repetitive and less innovative and saw this as a result of restructuring processes in HE towards output (Commission on the Social Sciences, 2003).

Doing a sociology of sociology

Both the alleged crisis in sociology and the material conditions of knowledge production that sociologists face today trigger the question of how sociologists relate to their subject. The increasing number of publications on the state of sociology within the last few years indicate that analysis of the self-understanding of the discipline and its inhabitants seems to be experiencing a revival (Beck, 2005; Burawoy, 2005). Yet, while a crisis seems imminent, with a few exceptions (Halsey, 2004; Platt, 2003), these sociologies of sociology are rarely the result of more comprehensive empirical investigations. The topic at hand is mostly approached in a rather segmented way, not connecting the discourses on changes in HE (Ylijok, 2005) in their impact on academic activity (Slaughter and Leslie, 1997; Smyth, 1995) with an analysis of the development of sociology as a discipline in this context (Fuller, 2006; Scott, 2005) or with sociologists’ relationship to the discipline in theory and practice. However, the actual shape of the sociological discipline and its changing format cannot be understood without taking into account the material conditions within which academics produce knowledge.

One author who envisions sociology as a life-encompassing way of being and as a critical and transformative endeavour that counters the segregation of professional and personal roles is Alvin Gouldner (Gouldner, 1970). For Gouldner, being a reflexive sociologist implies living up to the theoretical claims one makes in one’s research, teaching and everyday sociological practice inside the university, as well as among the wider public. In this sense, his reflexive sociology is an epistemological position that recognises the inextricable link between the material conditions within which sociologists are working, their disciplinary traditions, the knowledge they produce and how they practise it. Gouldner’s reflexive sociology therefore lends itself to being applied to a study of current sociologists in England and their negotiation of disciplinary aspirations in research and teaching. Gouldner’s relevance for current studies in the UK has also been emphasised in a number of contributions of leading British sociologists (Eldridge et al, 2000; Stanley, 2000).

It is the missing connection between apparently related bodies of literature, as well as the lack of empirical insights into how sociologists relate to the discipline and how they practise it, that I took as my point of departure for my investigations into the self-understanding of sociologists in England (Simbuerger, 2008). I analysed how current sociologists in England see themselves, how they frame their sociological calling and how they practise sociology. These questions were investigated based on 30 qualitative interviews with sociologists from ten sociology departments in England in the winter and spring of 2007. The ten narratives I selected for the purpose of this paper are indicative of the perspectives of the overall sample, and they cover gender, various age groups, positions, research interests and types of institution.

The critical calling of sociology

The initial part of the interviews was devoted to an exploration of the callings of sociology and my respondents’ aspirations. The social synthesis and critique were thereby identified as key features of the sociological discipline (Simbuerger, 2008). Within the realms of this article, I can only focus on one of these features – critique.

So maybe the unique thing about sociology is that it is more questioning the way things are than other disciplines. It takes as its starting point the very fact that the way we live is not inevitable or the best of all possible worlds, I guess.

(Lydia, 32, lecturer, 1960s university)

According to Liz Stanley, other disciplines pay equal attention to critique as an analytical tool; yet sociology distinguishes itself from these disciplines through employing critique as its main tool of analysis (Stanley, 2000). Lydia’s conviction that critique is a distinctive feature of sociology resonates with Liz Stanley’s view. However, what exactly critique signified for my respondents varied substantially, leaving us with three major modes which correspond to longstanding traditions within sociology. First of all, critique is considered to be a means for social transformation and progress. Second, critique is envisioned within a humanist, interpretive tradition, yet detached from politics. Third, on the level of outcomes, a critical approach makes sociology a provider of empirical evidence for policy makers, but without taking a political stance.

According to Neil, a lecturer at a post-1992 university, sociologists have a duty to think critically. He considers the attempt ‘to place oneself outside of society’, ‘to question the taken-for-granted with the power of reason’ and thereby to ‘think ourselves freer’ as distinctive features of sociological thought. Neil, who researches and teaches critical theory, makes a reference to the Enlightenment, which he regards as the foundation of sociology. It could be argued that Neil’s emphasis on critical inquiry derives from his affinity with the ideas of critical theory. Looking at Neil’s case only, it may therefore not be legitimate to deduce that the pursuit of critique and the aim for social transformation is intrinsic to sociology.

With Carl, we encounter a sociologist whose interpretation of critical inquiry as an inherently sociological mode of analysis differs from Neil’s. Carl is a senior lecturer at a red-brick university and was intellectually socialised in the 1960s. From his point of view, sociology can be characterised by its questioning of ideologies. He notes that his distance from what he calls dogmatic beliefs is informed by, among other things, Nobert Elias’ (1971) sociology of knowledge:

In many ways, I take a stand on not taking a stand. That comes straight out of my sociology. I find it impossible to argue in any kind of dogmatic way. Sociology gives you a kind of detachment from the belief systems of the vast majority of people. They sense that I am not one of them. If I am not one of them, from their angle, I must therefore be a conservative. This is polarisation in belief systems. I am not from that camp either. That’s the thing many people in sociology cannot deal with.

(Carl, 64, senior lecturer, red-brick university)

For Carl, the true sociologist is ‘embattled’ and does not subscribe to one particular position: ‘The more embattled you are, the truer you are to the discipline.’ The fact that Carl needs to justify his position of embattlement, not only outside sociology, but also within it, could signify two things. First, it is indicative of a lack of consensus on the concept of ‘embattlement’ within sociology. Second, it may signify that the practice of most sociologists does not match Carl’s notion of sociology and his framing of critique that equals the constant detachment from any position. Consequently, by critically referring to his colleagues, Carl observes that key principles of sociological work – critique – are often compromised. Rather, critique is ‘carried out on behalf of groups’ and could thus be labelled as ‘disguised politics’ rather than as an attempt to decode ideology.

Stephen, a professor from a college of London University, also refers to Enlightenment ideas and their foundational significance for the discipline. He identifies critiquing, making and re-making arguments as the distinct features of sociology. According to him, ‘questioning, thinking otherwise and being humble about one’s own knowledge’ are the distinctive features of sociology that are informed by the Enlightenment:

So I think of it as a vocation. To live with thinking, to live with doubt in a productive way. To try and address audiences. To connect with the issues of the day and to make some kind of contribution to the representation of our time and the issues that are broad, the big questions about it.

(Stephen, 44, professor, University of London college)

According to Rose (29), a young research fellow from an old university, ‘evidence’ is the key word that allows sociologists to make a critical contribution. Rose thinks that sociologists should not propose critical interventions in society unless they can provide enough evidence. ‘Evidence’ is the keyword that explains the major difference from Carl’s seemingly similar conception, at first sight, of the separation between sociology and politics. What follows is that sociologists are in no way more entitled to enter the sphere of politics than other people. Hence, for slightly different reasons, both Carl’s and Rose’s narratives stand for an approach to sociology that distances itself from taking a political stance.

Despite my respondents' varying epistemological positions, all of them refer to the Enlightenment as a milestone in shaping their understanding of critique. The foundational significance of the Enlightenment for sociology that emerges from my respondents’ narratives has been sufficiently documented (Hawthorn, 1987; Kilminster, 1998). Geoffrey Hawthorn argues that sociological thought in its current variation could not have been developed without the preceding work of key thinkers such as Rousseau, Kant and Hegel (Hawthorn, 1987). Likewise, Richard Kilminster illustrates that eighteenth century ideas need to be seen at the core of an understanding of how the comparatively autonomous sociological point of view came into existence (Kilminster, 1998). Critical inquiry and the attempt to question traditional assumptions about the order of the world are understood to be at the heart of this enterprise.

For Wolf Lepenies, the heritage of the Enlightenment becomes apparent in the different ways in which critique unfolds in sociology and its development between the two cultures of science and literature. Sociology emerged as the discipline of letters, trying to distinguish itself from science, philosophy and literature, while still drawing on them (Lepenies, 1988). While some sociologists of the nineteenth century were keen to take over the role of literature as society’s critics, others were tempted to imitate the methods of the natural sciences. For these early days, Lepenies illustrates sociology’s struggle for identity as a process of negotiation between reason and feeling or, as he puts it, between Enlightenment versus counter-Enlightenment (Lepenies, 1988). These processes of negotiation are still manifest in current sociology and can be seen in how Carl, whom we might describe as a representative of the interpretive camp, and Rose, who can be seen within a positivist tradition, describe their understanding of critique. My respondents' conceptualisations of critique not only differed with regard to the means they sought to employ in the pursuit of critique and the disciplines they considered as relevant reference points for doing that. We also observed fundamental differences concerning the objectives that came about with sociologists’ varying conceptualisations of critical inquiry.

The glorification of research: ‘how to write one’s career without audience’ or ‘how to count nothing for practising critique in the classroom’

My respondents identified critique as one of sociology’s key features. Yet, in the spirit of Gouldner’s reflexive sociology, we would like to investigate how these claims of critical inquiry unfold in practice. We will thus analyse the impact of the current RAE culture on the relationship between teaching and research. More specifically, we will look at how the critical calling of the discipline is challenged by the institutional framing of research and teaching.

The Research Assessment Excercise (RAE) was implemented in the UK in the early 1980s due to the scarcity of state funding. Universities were increasingly treated as ‘cost centres’, with academics as ‘work units’ (Shore and Wright, 2000: 67). The implementation of the RAE has substantially altered working conditions for academics, putting stronger emphasis on research and publications (Miller, 1996), with a rising teaching workload as a result of the massification of academia from the 1960s onwards (Martin, 1999). Moreover, managerialism put a stress on administration, leaving less time for research while at the same time involving rising pressure to publish (Dominelli and Hoogvelt, 1996; Henkel, 2000). Elizabeth describes what lies at the heart of these changes.

There is the RAE culture, most obviously. But this is a general question for academics, not simply for sociologists. And in my previous workplace that changed the intellectual culture quite a lot. And it created a great deal of competitive anxiety.

(Elizabeth, 39, lecturer, old university)

With Elizabeth describing the RAE as a culture, we can already see some of the far-reaching effects and anxieties that it triggered. Strathern identified the RAE as one of the most powerful discourses in academia (Strathern, 2000). The facts are clear. Yet only in a limited number of writings do the all-encompassing effects of the RAE get captured, going beyond a sketch of the technicalities of submission requirements and touching the theme that the RAE now determines our work practices and our approach to the discipline. Based on informal interviews with academics at various universities in England, Andrew Sparkes looked at the stories behind the scenes and presented the ‘embodied struggles of an academic at a university that is permeated by an audit culture’ (Sparkes, 2007: 521). As he explains in the beginning of his article, his way of making sense of the RAE is ‘inspired by partial happenings, fragmented memories, echoes of conversations, whispers in corridors, fleeting glimpses of myriad reflections seen through broken glass, and multiple layers of fiction and narrative imaginings’ (Sparkes, 2007: 521).

Just as Sparkes analysed the effects of the RAE on his respondents’ lives, the RAE could also be seen to be at the forefront of my respondents’ reflections. Janet is a young research fellow in a 1960s university. She experiences academia as highly competitive and describes the RAE requirements for publications as particularly difficult to fulfil for academics at the beginning of their careers:

So many people are teaching on 15 courses. And I am not because of the nature of my kind of post. So I am really lucky. There is tremendous pressure on younger scholars. It is enormously competitive. And I think that is quite hard. You are awarded for what you publish. So teaching really isn’t that important. As long as you teach on an adequate level, that’s fine. Research funding is becoming more important. Admin isn’t really; you have to tick particular boxes. But, essentially, it is what you publish. I think that is quite constraining, in particular for younger academics.

(Janet, 31, research fellow, 1960s university)

Janet notes that her ‘luck’ consists in having obtained a research fellow position. More than any other form of employment, this contract facilitates her conforming with the requirements of the RAE. Her self-description as ‘lucky’ could further be understood as an expression of dislike for the activity of teaching. Notwithstanding experiencing teaching as a rewarding occupation, Janet concedes that being almost ‘free’ from it and instead focusing on research allows her to build a career. One way of looking at Janet’s case is that her predominant preoccupation with research and her neglect of teaching are due to reasons that are not linked to her like or dislike of research and teaching as modes of practising the traditions of the discipline. Despite teaching being assessed through Teaching Quality Assessment, performing well in teaching does not have the same status as excelling in the spheres of research output and publications (Skelton, 2004). In fact, leaving aside occasional prizes for excellent teaching practice, there are hardly any structural incentives for engaging in teaching (Skelton, 2004). The unbalanced appraisal of teaching and research is further exemplified by Janet’s statement that ‘teaching really isn’t that important. As long as you teach on an adequate level, that’s fine.’

This disparity in rewards becomes most apparent in promotional matters. According to Gibbs, ‘only 12% of promotion decisions are made on the basis of teaching excellence (only 10% in ‘old’ universities) and in 38% of universities no promotions at all are made on the grounds of quality of teaching’ (Gibbs, 1995: 148). While the emphasis on research-related output makes maintaining a position or advancing one’s career particularly difficult for younger scholars, institutional affiliation is another variable that should be taken into account (Sikes, 2006). The starting conditions for competing within the RAE are very different for academics in post-1992 universities compared to those in pre-1992 institutions. Traditionally, most universities of the latter type have been strongly research-based and excelled in previous RAEs, whereas the so-called new universities have mainly focused on teaching. Yet, as Sikes illustrates, the ‘shadow of the Research Assessment Exercise’ has become bigger and is increasingly dominating the work practices and orientations of academics in post-1992 institutions (Sikes, 2006).

The hierarchies between these two types of university have been consolidated as academics in the post-1992 universities have come to face a larger teaching workload than their peers in pre-1992 institutions. With the traditionally researched-based institutions having a strong track record of research that facilitates their success with research grant applications, the gap between old and new universities is widening. Thus, the chance of successfully participating in the research arena is comparatively more difficult for academics in post-1992 universities than for their colleagues in pre-1992 universities. However, the dominance of the RAE discourse slightly overshadows the fact that the asymmetries between the statuses ascribed to research and teaching were in place prior to the emergence of the audit culture. Particularly in old and established universities in the UK, ‘research productivity and quality judged by peer review has always been central to the academic labour process’ (Harley and Lee, 1997: 1429). Oili-Helena Ylijok refers to this phenomenon of idealising the research and teaching relationship from the past as ‘academic nostalgia’ (Ylijok, 2005). Based on qualitative interviews with 23 senior researchers in Finland, Ylijok found out that nostalgia does not describe the actual past of the research and teaching relationship, but an idealisation of it, which seems to serve as a coping mechanism with the present (Ylijok, 2005). While the study draws on data from Finnish universities, with performance measurement and audit culture being an almost common phenomenon in the western HE world, the conclusions of this study are also relevant for the UK. One way of looking at this is that the pre-existing separation between research and teaching was further reinforced by the implementation of the RAE and the status ascribed to it.

The devaluation of teaching is not confined to sociology, however, but concerns all disciplines in UK HE. Based on a study of geography departments in the UK, Jenkins concludes that the current funding arrangements have encouraged individuals, departments and institutions to make research a priority at the expense of teaching (Jenkins, 1995). Young’s research on social policy lecturers’ perceptions of the status and rewards for teaching and research reached similar conclusions. Her respondents unanimously suggested that the status of teaching could only rise if its importance becomes reflected in appraisals similar to the RAE (Young, 2006). In her case study of sociology, English and biology departments, Lucas investigated the impact of the RAE on departmental life (Lucas, 2006). She describes the game character of the RAE and identifies how accommodating and deviating from the requirements set by the assessment exercise are negotiated at the departmental level among academics, playing out disciplining and self-disciplining mechanisms (Lucas, 2006). According to her analysis, sociologists who deliberately decide to focus on teaching may elicit mixed reactions from their peers. This phenomenon also becomes evident in my respondents’ narratives. Brian, a well-published reader in a post-1992 university, has always had a passion for teaching, and has pursued this activity beyond the teaching requirements of his senior position:

One of the unintended consequences out of the RAE is this separation of teaching and research. All the glamorous attention. And I think it is such a great shame, such a great shame. I just feel that, as a reader as well, it pushes me to one specific trajectory. You must be very stupid to do teaching. This year, I teach year 1, year 2, year 3 students. Why should I involve myself in undergraduate teaching? That, I don’t like, that I really, really don’t like. That glamour that is attached to research, notwithstanding its value. And therefore devaluing teaching and the contribution made by my colleagues who teach only. Because that is still the main business of the university if you look at it. That glamour is totally out of proportion. I don’t like that.

(Brian, 43, reader, former polytechnic)

In an RAE-dominated environment, teaching undergraduates is not perceived as beneficial to an academic career and is seen to put departmental RAE results at risk. Brian knows that he could have advanced much faster in his career had he left teaching aside. Putting more emphasis on teaching than was required, Brian could be considered as violating the ‘rules of the game’ – to use Lucas’s term – that are set by the RAE and followed by most academics.

The stronger focus on research and publications in the last 15 years has led to a massive expansion of the publishing market (Nixon, 1999). As Nixon found from a study of senior editors in the UK publishing industry, the academic publishing market has also become more professionalised and fragmented, with access being increasingly restricted and a more general public hardly being addressed (Nixon, 1999). With the development of rankings and index measures of top journals, RAE publishing requirements are about to enter the next stage that will severely affect academic publishing. Yet, knowing that so little of what is published is read makes it even more difficult to justify the current emphasis on research and publishing. Many of my respondents deplored the lack of institutional incentives to publish outside merely academic publications. Christopher, a well-published lecturer from a 1960s university five-star department, mentions that his recent publication in an international journal was recognised for the RAE, whereas his numerous articles and commentaries in newspapers did not count. With only journal articles in recognised journals and research monographs contributing to the RAE, the spectrum of all research contributions and formats of expressions that do not count is very large indeed.

While sociologists claim to stimulate critical discourse, the realities of how research and teaching are currently organised and rewarded do not seem to hold up to the academic aspirations mentioned earlier. It is no surprise that this partly results in frustration and a more general questioning of the utility of academic endeavour as a whole. How do these sociologists ultimately negotiate their initial disciplinary aspirations to practise critical inquiry?

On the cultivation of critique: educating the next generation

Much has been written about the RAE and the devaluation of teaching. Yet little has been said about the implications this devaluation of teaching has for sociology as a discipline. It is by conveying critical thinking – the ‘skills’ to question – to future generations that sociology could be at its best in implementing critique in society.

While my respondents regarded teaching and research as the most important ways of practising sociology, many of them emphasised teaching as a way of putting critical disciplinary traditions into practice. In fact, the extent to which critique features at the forefront of sociology became clear when I asked my respondents what they considered to be the most important thing to bring across to students: critique.
For Lydia, a well-published early career sociologist, part of being a good sociologist is to teach well and to think about teaching as much as about research. She admits that what really reassures her in her aspirations as a sociologist is teaching:
 
I think the only place through which we can really have a positive impact on people’s lives is how we speak to our students and how we teach our students and what we give to them to take away. So I feel quite strongly that part of being a good sociologist is to teach well and to think about teaching as much as you think about your research.

(Lydia, 32, lecturer, 1960s university)

The idea that sociology’s critical values particularly come to the forefront in teaching has also been discussed by Rosie, Bufton and Hirst (2001). Based on a case study of sociology undergraduate students taking courses in social theory, they analysed how sociology as a discipline promotes an understanding of moral categories. This also relates to what many of my respondents said about the importance of critique in teaching sociology. For Christopher, the driving force to come to sociology was his commitment to social and political change. While he had hoped that his research endeavours would contribute towards these aims, the realities of the RAE and the devaluation of teaching made him question the framing of research as the only avenue through which he could pursue his disciplinary aspirations. In the light of these developments in HE, teaching is the only commitment that remains for him as a sociologist:

I think the thing that remains for me within the academy, on a political level, are the students and the commitment to the students. And wanting to see young people do well and develop some of the understandings that I have been exposed to. They don’t need to agree with me, of course, but reading and trying to understand and to form their own views and critique. That goal is still there with me and really hasn’t become jaded … It is still there and I would say that my commitment to – it sounds arrogant, so please forgive me – but my commitment to students is the one commitment that remains. And, for the academy, I am dispirited with the academy, if you like. I would put my allegiance with the students rather than with the academics.

(Christopher, 49, lecturer, 1960s university)

Providing students with the skills to think critically for themselves is experienced as a rewarding activity despite a lack of appropriate material recognition. These responses also feed into recent research across other disciplines (Hannan and Silver, 2000; Young, 2006). Notwithstanding the systematic devaluation of teaching, these studies on academics and their relationship with teaching and research suggest that many academics remain committed to teaching.

For Stephen, looking back to his own experience as a student, the preoccupation with knowledge and the opportunity to think otherwise were the most important and liberating experiences:

I think, to me being a sociologist, it is a matter of taking teaching seriously. It is important in my mind. The kind of dialogue and the spaces of thinking that can be made possible, however damaged and fraught and subject to external pressures that can happen in the university lecture room or the seminar. To me, in my experience, coming to university, was such a mind-opening experience. To think otherwise, to be allowed. To be allowed to think. To be wrong. To say outrageous things and then to think, ah that’s rubbish what I have just said. To reflect. And the importance of thinking in and of itself, and trying to create an environment where thinking in and of itself can happen that relates to the issues of the day and to the experiences of the people in the classroom. I think that is the task of what sociology should be about. Facilitating that. Not only in the university seminar, in the lecture theatre. It is also about going out into other environments.

(Stephen, 44, professor, University of London college)

Stephen would like to create circumstances where knowledge is taken as a value and students can experience the liberating power of ideas in the same way that he did. It is in teaching, in which we promote the relentless questioning of knowledge, that we have to demonstrate our intellectual roots at their best. Thus, one of the most striking points mentioned by many of my respondents across all institutions concerned the audiences they could reach in the lecture theatre. George argues that one of sociologists’ most significant privileges and responsibilities is to teach the next generation and thus have an impact on society:

One obviously is teaching. I don’t mean it to sound pompous. There is a privilege involved in teaching. You have access to young people, you will have major influence on their generation. It is a remarkable opportunity to engage with the most able people of a generation. The inadequate resources. Teaching is very important. And I enjoy teaching.

(George, 64, senior lecturer, University of London college)

All of this resonates with Michael Burawoy’s call for sociologists to consider students as the first public that they need to address. Burawoy (2005) emphasises the need to see the challenges of the mass university in a new light. The argument of purveying critical thinking through teaching can be further substantiated in the light of the widening of HE and increasingly diversified student populations. In a C-SAP-funded project called ‘Learning sociology for life’, Alex Law, Wallace McNeish et al investigated the contribution of sociology in the lives and careers of ‘non-traditional’ students from working-class backgrounds. Based on 24 qualitative interviews with sociology undergraduate students on coming to university and studying sociology, the authors concluded that sociology students particularly value the skills of critical thinking they gain throughout a sociology degree. Sociology allowed them to develop a different perspective on the world (Law, McNeish et al, 2004). In a similar vein, coming from a teaching perspective, many of my respondents from post-1992 universities reported on their encounters with students from non-traditional backgrounds as being particularly rewarding. In particular, the respondents who had been the first ones in their families to go to university emphasised the significance of teaching in their lives as sociologists. Elizabeth, a lecturer at an old university, appreciated the critical thinking she gained when she went to university as an undergraduate student. She found her disciplinary aspirations to convey critique confirmed in teaching:

It is in teaching that you feel that your work can have some kind of impact beyond you and the computer screen and you and the page … I do think part of the changing culture, the RAE culture, has been to give this weight to what is called ‘research’, which often is just writing. That overstates its importance and certainly its impact, its wider impact. Whereas with teaching – and it comes out of my own experience – going to university changed my life and gave me opportunities that I would never have had otherwise. And I think that’s the case with the students that I have taught, particularly at X. The students at X, a lot of their experience was similar to mine, the first people of their family to go to university. Being able to engage with people in that way is potentially empowering for them and rewarding for you … I think the experience of education is such an important one and that is where I see the real impact happening.

(Elizabeth, 39, lecturer, old university)

The future of conveying critique

While conveying critique was considered to be the most important thing to bring across to students by my respondents, it nevertheless remains unclear why academics, and sociologists in particular, silently accept the devaluation of teaching. In spite of structural changes, such as the implementation of performance measurement and the increase in fixed-term contracts, having severely affected academics in both their employment security and working conditions, as well as in their ability intellectually to practise their disciplines in both research and teaching, academics in the UK have not mounted much resistance to any of these changes (Roberts, 2002). While this lack of engagement and critique may also be an expression of the decreasing political activism of academics that reflects a general decline in political participation (Gitlin, 1994), it raises particular questions for a discipline such as sociology that is essentially founded on the aim of contributing to critique and social change in society (Hawthorn, 1987). That the discipline is still being unified around this key feature – even though this may partly be confined to a rhetoric level of engagement – can be seen in the frequent reference to C Wright Mills’ conceptualisation of sociology and sociological activity as critique, as spelled out in The Sociological Imagination (Mills, 1959/2000). Yet current developments within the discipline as a body of knowledge and as a sociological practice as presented in this article raise questions of whether the discipline still lives up to its initial calling.

Following their critical ambitions, sociologists should be particularly drawn to see the university as the first space where their aspirations can jointly unfold in their thinking, their pedagogies and their writing. One way of giving teaching the significance it deserves as a way of putting the disciplinary aspirations of critique into practice would be to reflect its value in adequate institutional rewards, comparable to the credits academics get for research. As Gibbs (1995) suggests, this could be achieved by implementing peer review of teaching. Irrespective of the problems that may arise from attempting to measure ‘good teaching’, strategies for the enhancement of the status of teaching that disregard research may further segregate what Humboldt once envisioned as a unit. Initiatives such as the foundation of 74 HEFCE-funded Centres for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETLs) in the UK can be seen as institutionalised incentives for going beyond this separation and thinking and living research and teaching in relation to each other (Lambert, Parker and Neary, 2007; Bell, Neary and Stevenson, 2009). Whereas the relationship between research and teaching has been a frequent subject of investigation in recent years, with a few exceptions (Abbas and McLean, 2001; Canaan, 2002; Cope, Canaan and Harris, 2006; Law, McNeish et al, 2004; Rosie, Bufton and Hirst, 2001), the intellectual remit of teaching sociology has hardly been touched upon. Yet valuing teaching is particularly important for a discipline such as sociology that takes the principle of critique as one of its key points of departure. Rather than keeping a discussion of teaching and research separate from sociology’s intellectual heritage, this article has demonstrated the necessity of thinking them in their togetherness. Based on empirical research on part-time teachers in sociology, Andrea Abbas and Monica McLean argue along similar lines and conclude that sociology’s devaluation of teaching will have long-term effects on the development of sociology as a discipline: ‘if what we currently understand as sociology has developed out of the practices and writings of sociologists of the past, then sociology of the future will also depend on the current workforce’ (Abbas and McLean, 2001: 339). Coming back full circle to Alvin Gouldner’s reflexive sociology of knowledge, we would like to argue that a discourse on researching and teaching sociology can only be advanced by acknowledging the intertwining between sociology’s intellectual shape and the material conditions within which we craft and teach sociology. A discussion about teaching first and foremost needs to revisit sociology’s disciplinary traditions, recognising that conveying critique is right at the centre of what sociology has always been about. Rather than seeing teaching as an add-on, it needs to be understood as central to any intellectual discourse about sociology. In order for that to happen, sociologists need to show a little more awareness of how their disciplinary aspirations can directly unfold in their sociological practice, in particular in teaching.

References

Abbas A and McLean M (2001). ‘Becoming sociologists: professional identity for part-time teachers of university sociology’. British Journal of Sociology of Education, vol 22, no 3, pp 339–352.

Beck U (2005). ‘How not to become a museum piece’. The British Journal of Sociology, vol 56, no 3, pp 335–343.

Bell L, Neary M and Stevenson H (eds) (2009). The future of higher education. Policy, pedagogy and the student experience. London: Continuum.

Bottomore TB (1975). Sociology as social criticism. London: Allen and Unwin.

Burawoy M (2005). 2004 American Sociological Association presidential address: ‘For public sociology’. The British Journal of Sociology, vol 56, no 2, pp 259–294.

Canaan J (2002). ‘Teaching social theory in trying times’. Sociological Research Online, vol 6, no 4. Available at: www.socresonline.org.uk.pugwash.lib.warwick.ac.uk:80/6/4/canaan.html (accessed 20 June 2007).

Commission on the Social Sciences (2003). ‘Great expectations: the social sciences in Britain’. ‘Available at: www.the-academy.org.uk/ (accessed 5 April 2005).

Cope J, Canaan J and Harris D (eds) (2006). Learning and teaching social theory. Birmingham: Sociology, Anthropology, Politics (C-SAP), the Higher Education Academy Network.

Delanty G (2009). ‘Varieties of critique in sociological theory and their methodological implications for social research’. Semi-plenary paper at the European Sociological Association conference 2009, University of Lisbon, 1–5 September. (Accepted for publication in Irish Journal of Sociology, 2011, vol 19, no 1.)

Dominelli L and Hoogvelt A (1996). ‘Globalization, contract government and the taylorization of intellectual labour in academia’. Studies in Political Economy, vol 49, pp 71–100.

Eldridge J, MacInnes J, Scott S, Warhurst C and Witz A (eds) (2000). For sociology. Legacy and prospects. Durham: Sociologypress.

Elias N (1971). ‘Sociology of knowledge: new perspectives – part one.’ Sociology vol 5, pp 149–168.

Fuller S (2006). The new sociological imagination. London: Routledge.

Gibbs G (1995). ‘The relationship between quality in research and quality in teaching’. Quality in Higher Education, vol 1, no 2, pp 147–157.

Gitlin T (1994). ‘From universality to difference: notes on the fragmentation of the idea of the left’ in C Calhoun (ed) Social theory and the politics of identity. Malden: Blackwell, pp 150–174.

Gouldner AW (1970). The coming crisis of western sociology. London: Heinemann.

Halsey AH (2004). A history of sociology in Britain. Science, literature and society. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Hannan A and Silver S (2000). Innovating in higher education: learning, teaching and institutional cultures. Buckingham: Open University Press.

Harley S and Lee F (1997). ‘Research selectivity, managerialism, and academic labor process: the future of non-mainstream economics in UK universities’. Human Relations, vol 50, no 11, pp 1427–1460.

Hawthorn G (1987). Enlightenment and despair. A history of social theory (second edition). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Henkel M (2000). Academic identities and policy change in higher education. London: Jessica Kingsley.

Hockey J (2004). ‘Working to return to employment: the case of UK social science contract researchers’. Studies in Higher Education, vol 29, no 5, pp 559–574.

Holmwood J (1996) Founding sociology? Talcott Parsons and the idea of general theory. London: Longman.

Jenkins A (1995). ‘The Research Assessment Exercise, funding and teaching quality’. Quality Assurance in Education, vol 3, no 2, pp 4–12.

Kilminster R (1998). The sociological revolution. From the enlightenment to the global age, London: Routledge.

Lambert C, Parker A and Neary M (2007). ‘Entrepreneurialism and critical pedagogy: reinventing the higher education curriculum’. Teaching in Higher Education, vol 12, no 4, pp 525–537.

Lambert C and Simbuerger E (2008/2009). ‘Sociologists talking’. An interactive, site-specific exhibition on sociologists’ relationship to the discipline, teaching and research. Sound exhibits and online exhibition documentation available at: www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/sociology/rsw/undergrad/cetl/filmspublications/sociologiststalking/

Law A, McNeish W, di Domenico C, Gray L and Tanner C (2004). ‘Learning sociology for life: the contribution of sociology in the lives and careers of nontraditional students’. C-SAP project Sociology (28/S/03). Available at: www.c-sap.bham.ac.uk/resources/project_reports/findings/showfinding.htm?id=28/S/03
(accessed 20 September 2007).

Lepenies W (1988). Between literature and science: the rise of sociology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Lucas L (2006). The research game in academic life. Maidenhead: Open University Press.

Martin E (1999). Changing academic work. Developing the learning university. The Society for Research into Higher Education & Open University Press.

Miller H (1996). ‘Academics in their labour process’ in C Smith, D Knights and H Willmott (eds) White-collar work. The non-manual labour process. Studies in the labour process. London: Macmillan Press, pp 109–138.

Mills CW (2000) (1959). The sociological imagination, Fortieth Anniversary Edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Nixon J (1999). ‘Teachers, writers, professionals. Is there anybody out there?’. British Journal of Sociology of Education, vol 20, no 2, pp 207–221.

Parker M and Jary D (1995). ‘The Mcuniversity: organisations, management and academic subjectivity’. Organization, vol 2, pp 319–338.

Platt J (2003). The British Sociological Association. A sociological history. Durham: Sociologypress.

Rappert B (1999). ‘The uses of relevance. Thoughts on a reflexive sociology’. Sociology, vol 33, no 4, pp 705–723.

Roberts RH (2002). ‘The end of the university and the last academic?’ in RH Roberts Religion, theology and the human sciences. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp 86–110.

Rosie A, Bufton S and Hirst J (2001). ‘Sociology as a moral discourse: a case study of social theory teaching’. British Journal of Sociology of Education, vol 22, no 2, pp 217–226.

Scott J (2005). ‘Sociology and its others: reflections on disciplinary specialisation and fragmentation’. Sociological Research Online, vol 8, no 3. Available at: www.socresonline.org.uk/pughwash.lib.warwick.ac.uk:80/10/1/scott.html (accessed 22 March 2006).

Shore C and Wright S (2000). ‘Coercive accountability: the rise of audit culture in higher education’ in M Strathern (ed) Audit cultures. Anthropological studies in accountability, ethics and the academy. London: Routledge, pp 57–89.

Sikes P (2006). ‘Working in a ‘new’ university: in the shadow of the Research Assessment Exercise?’. Studies in Higher Education, vol 31, no 5, pp 555–568.

Simbuerger E (2008). Against and beyond – for sociology. A study on the self-understanding of sociologists in England. Unpublished PhD thesis. University of Warwick.

Skelton A (2004). ‘Understanding ‘teaching excellence’ in higher education: a critical evaluation of the National Teaching Fellowships scheme’. Studies in Higher Education, vol 29, no 4, pp 451–468.

Slaughter S and Leslie L (1997). Academic capitalism: politics, policies, and the entrepreneurial university. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

Smyth J (ed) (1995). Academic work. The changing labour process in higher education. Buckingham: Society for Research into Higher Education & Open University Press.

Sparkes A (2007). ‘Embodiment, academics, and the audit culture: a story seeking consideration’. Qualitative Research, vol 7, no 4, pp 521–550.

Stanley L (2000). ‘For sociology. Gouldner’s and ours’ in J Eldridge, J MacInnes, S Scott, C Warhurst and A Witz (eds) For sociology. Legacy and prospects. Durham: Sociologypress, pp 56–82.

Strathern M (ed) (2000). Audit cultures. Anthropological studies in accountability, ethics and the academy. London: Routledge.

Tight M (ed) (2000). Academic work and life: what it is to be an academic, and how this is changing. Amsterdam: Elsevier.

Willmott H (2003). ‘Commercialising higher education in the UK: the state, industry and peer review’. Studies in Higher Education, vol 28, no 2, pp 129–141.

Wright S (2004). ‘Markets, corporations, consumers? New landscapes of higher education’. Learning and Teaching in the Social Sciences, vol 1, no 2, pp 71–93.

Ylijok O-H (2005). ‘Academic nostalgia: a narrative approach to academic work’. Human Relations, vol 58, no 5, pp 555–576.

Young P (2006). ‘Out of balance: lecturers’ perceptions of differential status and rewards in relation to teaching and research’. Teaching in Higher Education, vol 11, no 2, pp 191–202.

Key words: electronic portfolios, reflective learning, personal development planning, social science

Serena Bufton
Faculty of Development and Society
Collegiate Crescent Campus (Southbourne)
Sheffield Hallam University
Sheffield S1 1WB
UK

Tel 0114 225 2417
Email S.A.Bufton@shu.ac.uk

Ian Woolsey
Faculty of Development and Society
Collegiate Crescent Campus (Southbourne)
Sheffield Hallam University
Sheffield S1 1WB
UK

Tel 0114 225 6070
Email I.Woolsey@shu.ac.uk

Biographies

Dr Serena Bufton is a principal lecturer in sociology and a faculty teaching fellow at Sheffield Hallam University. She is a member of Cohort III of the Inter/National Coalition of E-Portfolio Research (INCEPR) and, as part of this coalition, has conducted research into the use of e-portfolios for reflective learning. Serena has also published work in the areas of personal development planning and working-class, mature students’ experiences of higher education.

Ian Woolsey is a lecturer in sociology and a faculty research fellow at Sheffield Hallam University. He has published work in the areas of autism and pedagogy, and has a forthcoming publication which discusses football supporter identities. 

Introduction: the reflective learner

The Dearing Report (1997) advised universities to give all students the opportunity to engage in personal development planning (PDP), defined as ‘a structured and supported process undertaken by an individual to reflect upon their own learning, performance and/or achievement and to plan for their personal, educational and career development’ (Quality Assurance Agency (QAA), 2009: 2). This definition foregrounds reflection as the foundation upon which learning – personal, academic and professional – can inform ‘lifelong and life-wide activity’ (ibid: 4). Race (2006) defines reflective learning in the following way:

The act of reflecting is one which causes us to make sense of what we've learned, why we learned it, and how that particular increment of learning took place. Moreover reflection is about linking one increment of learning to the wider perspectives of learning – heading towards the seeing of the bigger picture.

The concept of ‘integrative learning’ (Huber and Hutchings, 2005) captures this sense of ‘seeing the bigger picture’ through reflection, which lies at the heart of PDP and implies a more intentional approach by the learner (ibid), who develops a greater sense of direction and purpose in their learning.  Yancey (1998: 6) describes this kind of intentional learning when she defines reflection as:

the dialectical process by which we learn to develop and achieve, first, specific goals for learning; second, strategies for reaching those goals; and third, means of determining whether or not we have met those goals or other goals.

It is argued that the process of reflecting, of making sense and creating links, not only improves the quantitative aspects of learning but also changes the nature of the learning by promoting ‘deep’ and ‘transformative’ learning through the encouragement of ‘metacognition’: ‘the awareness of one’s own cognitive functioning’ (Moon, 2001: 6, 7), which ‘entails knowing what one knows and does not know, predicting outcomes, planning ahead, efficiently apportioning time and cognitive resources, and monitoring one’s efforts to solve a problem or learn’ (Huber and Hutchings, 2005: 9). 

Reflection can be seen as an inherently social process, as Yancey indicates when she writes: ‘we learn to understand ourselves through explaining ourselves to others’ (Yancey, 1998: 11). Clegg, Hudson and Mitchell (2005: 5) also note ‘the essentially dialogic nature of reflection’, emphasising that the greater individualisation which characterises our society today actually increases the need for interdependence because dialogue with others may result in a reframing or revaluation of experience and may impact on the sense of self and development: ‘in conditions where personal reflection is paramount, dialogue becomes even more, not less, important’ (ibid: 6).

Attempts have been made to locate the learner on a continuum of reflective development. Hatton and Smith (1995: 40), for example, distinguish between ‘descriptive writing, descriptive reflection, dialogic reflection and critical reflection’. Similarly, Davis (2006: 282) distinguishes between: ‘unproductive reflection’, which is descriptive rather than analytical, with poor connectivity of ideas and use of evidence and a judgmental rather than evaluative approach, and ‘productive reflection’, which is characterised by analysis and a connectivity of ideas which result in ‘integrated knowledge’ (ibid: 207). A useful typology of reflective learning has been developed by the Alverno College Faculty (2000) and elaborated by Rickards, Diez et al (2006). This typology distinguishes between three levels of reflection and learning: ‘beginning’, ‘intermediate’ and ‘advanced’ (Rickards, Diez et al, 2006: 15). At a beginning level, students exhibit the ‘unproductive’ reflection identified by Davis, with descriptive, uncritical reporting of feedback on performance and little perception of connectivity in learning. At the intermediate level, there is a growing sophistication in the use of evidence to make judgments on learning, more connectivity in learning and a developing sense of self as learner. Students at the advanced level demonstrate these abilities to the full, emerging as accomplished, flexible learners in different contexts, able to draw upon multiple frameworks and to situate their learning within a wider narrative of personal development (Rickards, Diez et al, 2006: 15).

The problem with reflective learning

The concept of reflective learning is not unproblematic, however. For example, the relationship between ‘reflection’ and ‘learning’ cannot be assumed: these are distinct, if related, activities. Reflection may be superficial and have no conscious purpose (Moon, 2001: 1); conversely, and more contentiously, learning may occur without systematic reflection. Drawing on the literature in this area, Clegg and Bradley (2006: 470–471) argue: ‘Learning is not accomplished entirely at the level of the cognitively accessible … ‘knowing how’ may be entirely tacit and … people may not be able to describe what they are doing’. Being able to consciously think about and articulate learning may only be possible after repeated practice has itself produced an improvement in performance (ibid: 471).

Further difficulties emerge when we attempt to promote reflective learning in our students. How can it be incorporated within the curriculum? Should it be addressed explicitly or implicitly? What kind of pedagogy is implied? What, if any, tools can be used to support it? Should we assess it, and, if so, how? And, crucially, how do we know that our interventions have helped to create the ‘deep’ and ‘transformative’ learning that we are told is associated with it?
Evidence of the effectiveness of reflection on student learning was sought in a systematic review by the Evidence for Policy and Practice (EPPI) Centre (Gough et al, 2003). Drawing on all empirical evidence available at the time, the authors ‘confirm the central policy claim that PDP supports the improvement of students’ academic learning and achievement’ (ibid: 6), adding, however, a caveat that the diversity of policy and practice being researched in the studies they reviewed ‘limit[s] the extent that clear conclusions can be drawn about the usefulness of PDP in enabling learning’ (ibid: 5). In addition, the authors note that there was insufficient evidence to make a judgment about the impact of PDP on personal factors such as identity or about the type of approach to PDP that is most effective in promoting student learning.

Supporting students to become reflective learners

Universities have responded to the task of supporting the development of students as reflective learners in a variety of ways, including the development and use of e-portfolios ‘to structure and support learning’ (QAA, 2009: 4). A recent survey of practice in the UK indicates that higher education institutions are increasingly using an e-portfolio tool to support PDP (Strivens, 2007). Although e-portfolio is not an unproblematic concept (Becta, 2007), given its many potential uses, in the present context it can be seen as a web-based electronic tool which enables students to build a digital repository of learning artefacts, both formal and informal, for multiple purposes – for example, to record and reflect upon progress and plan future learning and career development. It has been argued that e-portfolio encourages a pedagogy which ‘shifts from a course-driven focus to a student-centred approach, placing emphasis for learning firmly on the student’ (Tosh and Werdmuller, 2004: 3). In addition, a good e-portfolio can provide a tool for ‘linking together people, ideas and resources’ (Tosh, Werdmuller et al 2004: 6), providing a vehicle for bringing together learning from across modules and levels of study and also for linking curricular and extra-curricular learning experiences. As such, e-portfolio can be seen as potentially useful for supporting personal, academic and professional development (see, for example, JISC, 2006).

The research project

This paper has emerged from a longitudinal research project (2006–2009) into the use of reflective e-portfolio tools by undergraduate students on a large, social science degree programme. The project was undertaken as part of our membership of Cohort III of the Inter/National Coalition of Electronic Portfolio Research (http://ncepr.org/cohort3.html), a research group based in the USA, and involved the introduction of a web 2.0 e-portfolio tool (PebblePad). The introduction of this tool was a response to an earlier project which had uncovered serious problems in the way in which first-year students had responded to the introduction of a paper-based PDP activity and to their sense of dislocation from, and disenchantment with, the learning process over the course as a whole (Pates and Bradley, 2004; Clegg and Bufton, 2008). Our findings at the time echoed Moir’s observation that students may see PDP in an instrumental way, a ‘process of managing information’ rather than one of ‘discovery, insight and growth’ (Moir, 2009: 7). It was hoped that the e-portfolio tool would support the PDP process, improve the reflective learning that students engaged in throughout their course and provide a tool through which their learning could be both captured and integrated. It was also hoped that the tool would promote increased dialogue – tutor–student and student–student – which would further support the learning process (Bufton and Diamond, 2007).

PebblePad was embedded initially during 2006–2007 within a core, first-year social science skills and support module with an emphasis on the development of undergraduate academic skills, and was used by students to reflect upon and improve their learning throughout the year. This reflective e-portfolio work was assessed at the end of the year. In 2007–2008, PebblePad was embedded in a core, second-year, work-related learning module in which students were required to make connections between their academic skills and knowledge and the world of work. Again, their reflective accounts were assessed at the end of the year. Finally, in 2008–2009, PebblePad was integrated within an optional module where it was used to assess coursework which had a reflective component. 

An analysis of the students’ reflective e-portfolio work at the end of their first year indicated that reflections were largely at the ‘beginning’ level, as outlined by Rickards, Diez et al (2006), that students often accepted tutor feedback on their work uncritically and that many had difficulty in understanding, integrating and acting on this feedback to progress (Bufton and Ehiyazaryan, 2008). Bernstein (2000: 162–163) argues that students new to sociology may have difficulties understanding the nature of its language, its conventions and rules of argument. This, he claims, is because sociology has a ‘horizontal knowledge structure’ with a ‘weak grammar’ and employs competing conceptual frameworks (with associated assumptions and languages) that have only loose relationships with their empirical bases. Bernstein argues that students need to be acculturated to the conventions and languages of the discipline – to the sociological ‘gaze’ (ibid: 164) – through social interaction with their tutors.

As the students shared their work and feedback with us through their e-portfolios, tutors gained greater insight into the challenges they faced in the transition to higher education and felt more able to support them to meet these challenges. When the students moved on to their second and third years, tutors were cautiously optimistic about the continued value of the e-portfolio tool to: provide an electronic repository, drawing together completed work and feedback to support dialogue and reflective learning; to create an additional channel for tutor–student communication and formative feedback; and to provide an additional electronic space for collaborative working between students. This paper reports some of the findings of research into student views of the benefits of the e-portfolio tool for their learning as they reached the end of their final year of study.

Method

In March 2009 an online census was distributed to the 86 final-year social science students whose courses had required them to use PebblePad for at least two years. Students were asked about their use of PebblePad and their attitudes towards the tool. As an incentive, all participants completing the questionnaire were automatically entered into a prize draw to win an Apple IPod touch phone. Of the 86 students who were eligible to complete the questionnaire, 54 replied. This gave a response rate of 63 per cent. The vast majority of the respondents were female (87%, n=47). The questionnaire consisted of closed and open-ended questions. Open-ended data were analysed thematically. SPSS 16.0 was used during the analysis. All percentages reported have been rounded up to whole numbers.

Following this, a purposive sample was drawn up of ten students who had indicated on the questionnaire that they would be willing to participate in a semi-structured interview. Participants were selected for interview on the basis of their questionnaire responses about the PebblePad tool. The authors sought to ensure that students who expressed a range of views were included in the final sample. Interviews explored students' attitudes towards this e-learning tool, and their engagement in reflective practice, in greater depth. The interviews lasted between 31 and 49 minutes. All interviews were recorded digitally and transcribed fully by an external professional. Transcripts were analysed and coded thematically. Nvivo 8 software was used during the analysis.

Findings

We wanted to find out how useful our students had found the e-portfolio tool for supporting what we regard as the constituent elements of reflective learning: the gathering together of work and feedback to allow review across modules and years; the recording of skills and achievements; collaborative learning and dialogue; forward planning. We specifically asked students if they had found the tool useful for reflecting upon and analysing their progress in a cumulative way.

e-Portfolio as a support for learning

Students were asked to rate on a 5-point Likert scale how helpful they found PebblePad for performing specific tasks (see table 1). In order to gain a more general understanding of students' attitudes towards the tool, responses in the ‘very helpful’ and ‘helpful’ categories were merged into one category, as were responses in the ‘very unhelpful’ or ‘unhelpful’ categories. Significantly, four of the six tasks which ranked most highly were associated with the ‘repository’ function of PebblePad as a site for storing completed assignments, feedback and evidence of skills, including those skills necessary for future study or employment. However, students also indicated that they had found the tool useful for a variety of reflective tasks.

Table 1 below summarises some of the data from the survey and gives an indication of student views of the helpfulness of the e-portfolio tool for specific activities. The table indicates that approximately half of the respondents assessed PebblePad as helpful or very helpful for reflective learning: reflecting upon and analysing progress in specific modules (50%, n=27) and across the course (50%, n=27); identifying general aspects of academic learning that need to be improved (48%, n=26). Approaching a third were neutral on these issues, and sizeable minorities – around a fifth of respondents – felt that PebblePad was unhelpful or very unhelpful for these reflective activities. In terms of planning strategies for further academic learning, PebblePad was seen as less helpful, with 41 per cent (n=22) of respondents saying it was either helpful or very helpful.

These survey findings were interesting but did not really uncover the complexities of student views about reflective learning, which are shaped as much by their learning techniques and the pedagogic approaches of their tutors as they are by the presence of an e-portfolio tool to support this learning. These issues were discussed more fully during semi-structured interviews.

In order to explore the success of integrating the PebblePad tool into course modules, interviewees were asked whether they had: reflected on their learning as they progressed throughout their courses; analysed their performance across modules and years; thought about their skills; and made changes to become better learners. Six of the ten students responded that they had. Of these, five indicated that PebblePad had supported their reflective practice, two suggesting that the tool had done so, at least in part, by allowing them to gather together work, feedback and reflections in the same place:

Certainly when you got to the end of the second year and you had to reflect on what you’d done the year before and the year you were in you could see the sort of similarities – the same things that you were still trying to overcome or some of the things that you had overcome.  So I think in that sense it did help because you could see it all in one place.
(Participant 3)

However, for one of the students who had engaged in the specified activities, PebblePad was simply seen as the tool that they had been required to use to document their reflections:

I wouldn’t say Pebble Pad itself helped me. It’s more that I had to use PebblePad to do that reflection exercise on.
(Participant 9)

There is an indication in one interview that PebblePad might be useful as a means of scaffolding reflective practice in the transition to higher education by providing a structured environment to support the development of higher-level cognitive skills. However, this interviewee felt that it had a limited use later on when more sophisticated cognitive skills had been developed and there was less need to write reflections down:

I just sort of looked at it and used my own judgment and didn’t feel the need to write things down – like to put it in written words, to be able to think where I needed to do more work – whereas in the first year I think you’re quite unsure about the learning process of university ... and it’s a bit more helpful because it gives you some sort of direction. (Participant 7)

Insightful comments were also made by the four students who stated that they hadn’t engaged in the specified reflective activities. One of these, conflating the tool (e-portfolio) with the practice (reflection), said that they had not reflected on their learning because they had not ‘used PebblePad to the full advantage’, adding that, with increased integration into their course, the tool could be ‘really useful’. This comment is supported by the survey data, which showed that students who had been required to use PebblePad in their third year of study had more positive attitudes towards it overall than those for whom its use had been confined to the first two years of study.

These findings suggest a complex relationship between reflection, use of an e-portfolio and student learning. While some students clearly benefit when reflection is scaffolded through the use of an e-portfolio, others may see such scaffolding as helpful only in the early stages of learning at university, as just one of a number of supports for learning, or even as an irrelevance.

More broadly, the data indicated that reflective practice constitutes only oneof the ways in which students feel that they learn. A lack of engagement in reflective exercises and alternative ways of learning reported by some of the students suggest scepticism about the value of ‘reflection’ for their learning, which is discussed in the following sections.

The value of reflection

Findings from this study indicate mixed levels of engagement among students with reflective learning activities, even though these were embedded in at least one module at each level of study and assessed. To a variable extent, students had been able to: identify weaknesses and reoccurring trends; evaluate previous reflective work; monitor progress; and develop strategies for improvement:

I do remember … going through the marks I got for my modules and targeting the one that I was weakest at in, thinking, ‘Right, well I need to work on this’, and then in semester two I did considerably better. (Participant 7)

However, as noted earlier, not all students had engaged in reflective exercises with the same degree of conviction. Describing the mandatory reflective exercises that they had been asked to complete in their first and second years, one student, who indicated that they had engaged with the reflective activities specified in the previous subsection, commented:‘Most people who I've known off my course, the reflection exercise is done an hour before it’s due to be handed in’ (Participant 9). Another was equally forthright:

Everyone hates them. Everyone thinks they’re pointless. You do them in the last day in an hour and you usually get a first for it. The only good thing is you usually got a first for it because it was you just sat and wrote bullshit really. Most of it was like ‘I think I’ve improved because of this’, and it wouldn’t actually be true. You just knew what you had to write.
(Participant 8)

There was a feeling that reflective work is not real academic work and that it takes up valuable time that should be spent on ‘actual studies’. This use of the term ‘actual studies’ by one interviewee is indicative of a hierarchical positioning and de-prioritising of specific learning activities, ‘actual’ studies being conceptualised as the legitimate outward focus on academic knowledge as distinct from the inner focus on personal development. One student, for example, argued that reflective work should not be assessed because ‘your reflection is your own reflection’ (Participant 9) – it is a personal and introspective process which does not sit easily with the impartial academic stance that, as social scientists, students are urged to adopt.

The data also raise some interesting questions about the role of structured, externally imposed reflective learning. Might it be that knowledge acquisition owes more to tacit practice than to scaffolded reflective tasks and skills targeting? Two students provided useful insights into this. The first suggested that, throughout the degree, they had just ‘learned by practice really’, although they did concede that they had been able to identify errors in their academic performance from some of the feedback they had received. However, when asked whether the 'practice' which informed their learning was consciously recognised, the student answered:

You’re not really aware of the fact that you are improving. It’s just a natural process as you learn more about uni. You’re not really aware physically of what you’ve done wrong in an essay, if you know what I mean – like exactly like structural-wise. You just kind of get a general feel about it when you get feedback, so the next time you do an essay you’re sort of sub-consciously aware of it in your mind and I think it just comes through.
(Participant 7)

The interplay of tacit and conscious learning was acknowledged by another student who, when asked about the point at which tacit learning becomes consciously recognised, replied:

Let’s say for example throughout uni each year we’ve had to do this reflection exercise. Now I’ve never gone … say in the first year I did my reflection exercise; in the second year I never looked back and read over that reflection exercise to help me, but I’ve remembered a lot of what I did that maybe I needed to improve on, do you know? So I kind of used more … I kind of … Oh, it’s hard!Â
(Participant 9)

The data suggest, therefore, that while some students may feel they gain very little from reflective exercises, this does not mean that they do not think about, and work to develop, their learning – they clearly do, but not necessarily during externally imposed timescales and tasks.

Dialogue and tutor support

Following our assumption that dialogue is an important part of reflective learning, we asked students about their collaborative working practices. A minority of students had used the e-portfolio for collaborative learning. For example, 33 per cent (n=18) had used it for giving feedback to other students. However, many more of them had used other electronic tools for working together, 71 per cent (n=38) saying that they had used Facebook. This finding supports the claim made by Tosh, Werdmuller et al (2004) that what is needed to support learning is not an e-portfolio but an integrated electronic ‘learning landscape’ comprising a range of tools. However, in the current dash to find electronic ‘fixes’ for a decreasing teaching resource in higher education, the centrality of face-to-face dialogue must not be overlooked, and the students in our research underlined the importance of this kind of dialogue – both with each other and with tutors – in their learning process. One, for example, commented:

PebblePad’s helped me with my reflection and with me sharing stuff with other students but mainly me and my friends just sit and chat. Like we’ll just say, ‘Well, I’ve done this and I’ve done this’ because it’s a lot easier rather than, say, emailing stuff to each other all the time ... So normally, just like in between lectures, we’d just meet up in a cafe and just talk it out that way.
(Participant 2)

Dialogue with tutors was also seen as an important support for learning and some students argued that written feedback from tutors was only the firststep in helping them to gain a greater understanding of how they might improve as learners. Six students recounted how they had held discussions with their tutors as a means of clarifying their feedback:

Sometimes the feedback forms … you sort of look at them and think, ‘Well no, I did that. I did that. I did that’, but when you go and talk to someone about it, it’s like, ‘Oh, I actually didn’t do that, and I didn’t do that and I didn’t do that.’ So I don’t think feedback forms sometimes are enough’.
(Participant 6)

The student added that it was not always possible to see a tutor's point of view until they had received an opportunity to discuss this with them. In a similar vein, another student underlined the importance of dialogue in supporting reflective learning:

I think, you know, maybe reflection would be better to do speaking with someone like your tutor because then you can talk it through and hear someone else’s opinion on how you’ve done as well.
(Participant 9)

The value of face-to-face dialogue with tutors was made explicit by allof the students interviewed during this study. Interaction had helped some of these students to improve their work and others to increase their confidence as they worked towards the assessment. Interaction with tutors was also seen as important for developing personal relationships, which were thought to be important in the learning process:

You know, that’s where a lot of my learning’s done or at least they’re a stepping stone towards the learning experience through face-to-face interaction with your tutors because, for one, you’re seen as you, as people, and you’re not sitting at a distance. Lecturers that you see once a week, you know, you can actually develop a relationship, a student–lecturer relationship and, you know, that for me is crucial and very important.
(Participant 5)

Emerging from the data therefore is a strong sense that students want tutors to know them and their work and that these personal relationships are important, not only for their learning, but also for their general experience of higher education. It may well be that the perceived absence of these personal relationships underlies much student dissatisfaction with their courses. There is no evidence from our data that the increasing use of electronic supports for learning is in any way a substitute for the personalised, face-to-face learning contexts that are now becoming very difficult to provide in higher education.

Discussion

Our data suggest that e-portfolios can be used effectively to support certain components of reflective learning: the gathering together of work and feedback on which to reflect; the scaffolding of reflective processes (at least in the early stages of study at university); and the cumulative collection of materials and reflections which allows progress to be assessed over time and further learning planned. However, our data have problematised the practice of making ‘reflection’ an explicit part of the curriculum and, more generally, have led us to think more about how our social science students learn and the role of personal, face-to-face relationships with tutors in this process.

From the interviews with students, it is clear that reflection on learning does take place, but it may do so informally rather than formally, may be driven by a self-recognised need rather than an externally imposed timescale, and may occur in conversations with others rather than as a solitary activity. There is a real sense in which the activities devised by tutors to support learning through reflection are perceived, by some students at least, as artificial, a distraction from their ‘actual studies’ and as things to be done mechanically, at the last minute, and for no real purpose. This is not to claim that students do not reflect on their learning – clearly, they do – but that the teaching interventions we put in place to support this kind of learning are not necessarily bringing the benefits we hoped for.

Students may perceive a disjunction between the approaches they are expected to demonstrate in their ‘actual’ studies and those they have to adopt in their reflective writing. For example, some students expressed the view that reflection is a personal process and should not be assessed (although they conceded that, without assessment, many students would not engage with it). Perhaps we are giving students a mixed message when we require them to write their personal reflections while at the same time stressing the impersonal and impartial nature of the social science perspective (which students – and some of their tutors – routinely interpret as an injunction on using the personal pronoun ‘I’ in their writing).

At a deeper level, the role of tacit learning is raised in our data and the complex ways in which this articulates with more explicit learning. In all academic disciplines, at least some of what is learned is tacit knowledge about the conventions of that discipline, what counts as knowledge and how this knowledge is acquired (Lave and Wenger, 1991). Very often, such knowledge is tacitly rather than explicitlycommunicated. As argued earlier, this may be particularly problematic for students in social science subjects such as sociology, where there are competing knowledges, disourses and claims to truth (Bernstein 2000: 162–163). In this situation, students new to sociology may experience great difficulty in working out the ‘ground rules’ of the discipline. Following Bernstein, we contend that these ground rules are learned through interaction with those familiar with them.

As the move to a mass higher education system has reduced tutor–student contact time, the opportunities for face-to-face interaction between tutors and students have diminished and it is unsurprising that attention has turned to electronic tools to support the learning process. Such tools are clearly of huge benefit to students in many ways but, we would argue, cannot replace the learning that takes place through face-to-face dialogue. This is particularly the case when the learning involves a transmission of tacit knowledge, as Falconer suggests when she writes, ‘tacitness is hard to diffuse technologically as it requires face-to-face interaction and exchange of experiences’ (Falconer, 2006: 145). It is through this ‘exchange of experiences’ – between tutors and their students and between students and their peers – that the tacit messages encoded in tutor feedback can be made clear and the tacit learning that students have demonstrated (or not demonstrated) can be made explicit and discussed. 

Although the students in our study found it difficult to express their ideas about tacit learning, what they said indicates the importance for them of learning ‘by practice’, of ‘getting a general feel’ about what they have done well and not so well, of learning as a ‘natural process’. While we are constructing pedagogical approaches and curricula that explicitly incorporate reflective activities and modules, and introducing ever more elaborate electronic tools to support these, students may be gaining more insight into their learning, and making more progress, as a result of the tacit learning that takes place through casual chats with their peers over coffee or individual discussions with their tutors. So while e-portfolio may provide a useful tool to support reflective thinking, it is just that – a tool. What is important is not the tool but how it is used – the pedagogical approach, the learning activities and, most important, the relationships and dialogue that support the learning process.

References

Alverno College Faculty (2000). Self assessment at Alverno College.  Milwaukee, WI: The Alverno College Institute.

Becta (2007). Impact study of e-portfolios on learning [online]. Available at www.becta.org.uk/  (accessed 10 March 2010).

Bernstein B (2000). Pedagogy, symbolic control and identity: theory, research, critique (revised edition). Lanham, Maryland: Rowland and Littlefield Publishers.

Bufton S and Diamond S (2007). ‘e-Portfolios: communities of learning’. Application for membership of Cohort III of The Inter/National Coalition of ePortfolio Research [online]. Available at: http://extra.shu.ac.uk/eportfolios/  (accessed 19 April 2010).

Bufton S and Ehiyazaryan E (2008). Using reflective e-portfolios to promote student learning in the transition to higher education. European First Year Experience Conference, 7–9 May 2008.

Clegg S and Bradley S (2006). ‘The implementation of progress files in higher education: reflection as national policy’. Higher Education, vol 51, pp 465–486.

Clegg S and Bufton S (2008). ‘Student support through personal development planning: retrospection and time’. Research Papers in Education, vol 23, no 4, pp 435–450.

Clegg S, Hudson A and Mitchell A (2005). ‘The personal created through dialogue: enhancing the possibilities through the use of new media’. Research in Learning Technology, vol 13, no 1, pp 3–15.

Davis EA (2006). ‘Characterizing productive reflection among preservice elementary teachers: seeing what matters’. Teaching and Teacher Education, vol 22, no 3, pp 281–301.

Dearing R (1997). Higher education in the learning society: the report of the National Committee of Inquiry into Higher Education. Hayes: NCIHE Publications.

Falconer L (2006). ‘Organizational learning, tacit information, and e-learning: a review’, The Learning Organization, vol 13, no 2, pp 140–151.

Gough D, Kiwan D, Sutcliffe K, Simpson D and Houghton N (2003). ‘A systematic map and synthesis review of the effectiveness of personal development planning for improving student learning’. Research Evidence in Education Library. London: EPPI-Centre, Social Science Research Unit, Institute of Education, University of London [online]. Available at: http://eppi.ioe.ac.uk/ (accessed 1 April 2010).

Hatton N and Smith D (1995). ‘Reflection in teacher education – towards definition and implementation’. Teaching and Teacher Education, vol 11, no 1, pp 33–49.

Huber MT and Hutchings P (2005). ‘Integrative learning: mapping the terrain’. The Association of American Colleges and Universities and The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching [online]. Available at:
www.carnegiefoundation.org/sites/default/files/publications/elibrary_pdf_636.pdf (accessed 6 April 2010).

JISC (2006). ‘e-Portfolios: what institutions really need to know’. JISC briefing
paper. March.

Lave J and Wenger E (1991). Situated learning: legitimate peripheral
participation. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Moir J (2009). ‘The personal, the platform and the political’. Enhancing Learning in the Social Sciences, vol 2, no 2, pp 1–15.

Moon J (2001). ‘Reflection in higher education’. PDP working paper 4. The Generic Centre Learning, Learning and Teaching Support Network, UK.

Pates S and Bradley S (2004). ‘Personal development planning evaluation report for the social science skills and methods module within applied social science’. Sheffield Hallam University [unpublished report].

Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) (2009). ‘Personal development planning: a guide for institutional policy and practice in higher education [online]. Available at:
www.qaa.ac.uk/academicinfrastructure/progressFiles/guidelines/PDP/PDPguide.pdf  (accessed 1 April 2010).

Race P (2006). ‘Evidencing reflection: putting the ‘w’ into reflection. Escalate  [online]. Available at: http://escalate.ac.uk/resources/reflection/02.html  (accessed 1 April 2010).

Rickards WH, Diez ME, Ehley L, Guilbault LF, Loacker G, Reisetter Hart J and Smith PC (2006). ‘Learning, reflection and electronic portfolios: stepping toward an assessment practice’. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association, Montreal, Canada.

Strivens J (2007). ‘A survey of e-pdp and e-portfolio practice in UK higher education [online]. Available at: www.ied.edu.hk/obl/files/eportfolio%20practice%20in%20UK.pdf
(accessed 1 April 2010).

Tosh D and Werdmuller B (2004). ‘ePortfolios and weblogs: one vision for eportfolio development’ [online]. Available at:
http://eduspaces.net/bwerdmuller/files/61/178/ePortfolio_Weblog.pdf
(accessed 6 April 2010).

Tosh D, Werdmuller B, Chen H and Haywood J (2004). ‘The learning landscape: a conceptual framework for eportfolios’ [online]. Available at:
http://homepages.ed.ac.uk/jhaywood/papers/The%20Learning%20Landscape%20preprint.pdf  (accessed 6 April 2010).

Yancey KB (1998). Reflection in the writing classroom. Logan, Utah: Utah State University Press.