The Core Curriculum

This week, we finally sit down with the most numerous tribe of academia, the students. I’m extremely grateful that all three of the students that are included in our board of governors took time out of their busy schedules to share their views on the matter. From their different professional, social and political backgrounds, they showcase the range and contention in societal expectations about higher education, and at the same time the remarkable consensus around some core features. 

In the first episode, Graham Culbertson mentioned that at some level, it is perhaps impossible to justify the need for the humanities and by extension of universities. Nevertheless, at least in Belgium, the most prominent justification is often that the education they provide supplies the economy with much needed human capital and talent. Therefore, in this episode, we are exploring the core tasks of the university from an employers perspective.  

In this second episode of the 'the core curriculum' podcast, I'm interviewing Eef Boeckx en Kris Coremans. As 'onderwijsbegeleiders', a for of permanent teaching assistant staff, they form an essential bridge between the academic staff and the students in our little 'universitas magistrorum et scholarium'. A position that prompted them to spearhead a 'student lead' initiative in our curriculum. Let's find out what they think are the core tasks of our institute.

Welcome to ‘the core curriculum’

This podcast is trying to give voice to thoughts that might have occurred to you since the pandemic or longer: what are the universities core tasks indeed? 

It’s an outgrowth of the ‘core tasks debate’ at Ghent University, in which the urgency of coming to a feasible budget kneecapped the opportunity to take time to come to terms with that question. The medium of a podcast provides an opportunity to create this much needed time for discussion. The aim of the podcast is to alternate interviews with random UGent’ers from all stripes and colors with interviews with critical friends. 

In the first episode I wanted to take some space to think about that big question myself: what really are my core beliefs about a university, an institution to which I have devoted all my adult life. Therefore, I was thrilled that fellow podcaster and academic Graham Culberson was willing to come on the podcast to bounce our hopes, doubts and aspirations off each other. Graham's own podcast is titled 'everyday anarchism' and I warmly recommend it to anyone interested in how practises of mutual aid define our daily life