[SSC] teach-in

Tue Nov 15 08:03:35 UTC 2011

Hi everyone,

Sorry for arriving late to this. I'm in the middle of a particularly intensive period of work…

Richard contacted me before the Teach-in to make sure it was OK that he speak about the SSC at Tent City. Of course, I said yes - he's a member of the SSC and at our last meeting we agreed that we needn't 'vet' each other's writing about the SSC. Richard is also a close friend and one of the first people Mike and I discussed the idea of the SSC about. He's aware of it being a politically motivated project from the start. Revolutionary? Yes, that was the idea.

However, from our very first SSC meeting earlier in the year, we acknowledged that by constituting a non-hierarchical, consensus-based co-operative, the direction and nature of the SSC was very much transferred to the agreement of its members. At the signing of the constitution, Mike and I lost the leadership of the SSC that we briefly had and I was very pleased. At last count there were 34 of us. 

At that meeting, we also agreed that the SSC had no explicit political position in terms of what was taught. Everyone was and is welcome, all the time they are happy to work in a non-hierarchical, consensus-based co-operative. The "Fascist in the room" question comes up at most meetings: "What do we do it someone from the far-right joins?" The answer has consistently been: "Fine, let's see how long they last as a member of a non-hierarchical, consensus-based co-operative, with a Statement of Values that rejects their views."

On a number of occasions, we've agreed that the politics of the SSC is defined by the nature of its governance, acknowledging that members all hold often slightly, sometimes radically, different personal political positions. Two members are currently drafting a position paper that attempts to define the SSC's values. My own feeling is that we need only state the minimum necessary in order to function effectively, without constantly questioning the nature and purpose of what we are doing. The Constitution, the Statement of Values, the FAQ were carefully written and agreed by a number of people actively involved in setting the SSC. For me, any further elaboration is premature. We have enough in place to move to the more practical challenges of finding students, working out curricula, managing schedules, creating a logo, and other mundane but useful things.

I think it's also worth remembering that the SSC is us. Me and you. Today it's the 34 of us. Tomorrow it might be the 38 of us. We need members to make this work and having an explicit, political position will alienate people that in fact, we really need. We need to be strategic about how we bring people on board and keep each other motivated. Lincoln is a small city - there aren't to my knowledge, many revolutionaries around and even fewer that have the time, energy and interest in keeping the SSC going. The SSC will be whatever we can make work. Possibly not the revolutionary political project (i.e. 'higher education') that Mike, Richard and I initially discussed, but something shaped by the people that stick around and make it work. I can live with that. It's why we constituted it as a non-hierarchical, consensus-based co-operative, so that no-one person could dominate the direction of the SSC. In that sense, the SSC is what ever is really possible.

So, in short, I think people should describe the SSC in terms of what it means to them, but ensure that the message is clearly personally stated. I don't think we need a more clearly defined or explicitly stated political position on our website or any other formal documentation. We need to communicate the SSC in ways that are meaningful to the people we're talking to, and I think that's probably what Richard did. It was then published, and lost some of that context, as is often the way. I'm keen to move on. The revolutionary in me is grateful to all of you for what you do for the SSC, regardless of whether I agree with everything you say.

Joss
(I wrote this without it being vetted by anyone).

On 15 Nov 2011, at 00:12, Terry Wassall wrote:

> Dear All
> 
> I've hesitated to get involved in this discussion for the same reason that I think others have alluded to; that email exchange is not always conducive to a free flowing and empathetic exchange of views. In addition I think it is fair to say that my involvement with the Lincoln SSC is somewhat peripheral as the main focus is on face-to-face and I live in Bradford. However, I have been a keen supporter of the idea from the start, even putting my money where my mouth is, and hope to be able to make an occasional contribution to the programme when it is up and running.
> 
> I have never been to one of the formally organised setup meetings for the SCC but I have had a number of discussions with founder members in the very early days. My understanding, then at least, is it is a political project. This may of course be a misunderstanding and I would be happy (or rather, unhappy) to be corrected. Things have moved on since then no doubt. What I saw as political is the explicit critique of the marketisation of HE, the construction of students as customers and academics as purveyors of goods and services (and the implications of this for student/lecturer roles and relations), the attack on the arts, humanities and social sciences, the embroiling of HE in the neoliberal ideology and project, and much else besides. This critical stance manifested itself in discussions around who the students would be, what the pedagogy would be (loosely speaking a critical pedagogy), what the curriculum should consist of, what would be the appropriate relationship between 'academics' and 'students', what sorts of assessement and accreditation, if any, would be appropriate, and so on. Much of this was to be negotiated with the students on the basis of their existing knowledge, their ideas and their needs. I never had the feeling that the project was ever about producing a free and partial clone of existing universities. If this was the case, it would still be political of course, by default.
> 
> Maybe this has changed in the face of discussions and realpolitik. Whatever the case, I am happy to be involved, happy to help to 'deliver the curriculum', happy to spread the word, as I have been doing energetically from the start. On the latter, I'll pause until I'm clear what the 'word' is! 
> 
> 
> Best wishes
> 
> Terry
> 
> 
> Dr. Terry Wassall
> Principal Teaching Fellow
> School of Sociology and Social Policy
> University of Leeds
> 
> 
> From: ssc-bounces at lists.aktivix.org [ssc-bounces at lists.aktivix.org] On Behalf Of Edwin Bacon [edwin at baconweb.co.uk]
> Sent: 11 November 2011 17:11
> To: ssc at lists.aktivix.org
> Subject: Re: [SSC] teach-in
> 
> 
> Thanks for this Richard,
> 
> How much of what you blogged is what we have agreed as a cooperative? Do we have a position that students become revolutionary, and that we aim to demonstrate the precarity of capital?
> 
> Does the SSC aim to understand how we can create meaningful criteria for learning and teaching that are not alienating or symbolically violent? Has the SSC decided that what we are doing is an act of political refusal?
> 
> I’m not primarily asking to instigate a debate on the substance of these issues – in fact, I’d rather like to avoid one.  More mundanely, I’m asking to get clarity on whether they are agreed positions of the SSC.
> 
> I joined to teach students who don’t want to get into debt. I didn’t know that we had much beyond that in terms of a political position, but it always possible that I’ve missed something, having only been able to get to one meeting so far.
> 
> Edwin
> 
> 
> 
> 
> From: ssc-bounces at lists.aktivix.org [mailto:ssc-bounces at lists.aktivix.org] On Behalf Of Richard Hall
> Sent: 10 November 2011 17:21
> To: ssc at lists.aktivix.org
> Subject: [SSC] teach-in
> 
> Hi,
> 
> I spoke at a teach-out for Tent City University yesterday about the Social Science Centre. I blogged about it here: http://www.learnex.dmu.ac.uk/2011/11/10/a-teach-in-at-tent-city-university-and-the-struggle-for-alternatives/ 
> 
> There are some issues I raised about student-as-producer and the curriculum that we need to nail. But I wanted to raise them as issues. I also blatantly ripped-off some stuff from the quality paper that Sara/Sarah  drafted.
> 
> Note that Mike spoke last week: http://www.livescribe.com/cgi-bin/WebObjects/LDApp.woa/wa/MLSOverviewPage?sid=PZ8CqlBrJ9r1 
> 
> We have some good friends and comrades at TCU. I had a good chat afterwards, before and on the march. I think they will be amenable to more engagements with us.
> Best wishes, 
> Richard. 
> Dr Richard Hall, 
> National Teaching Fellow (2009), and Reader in Education and Technology.
> Head of Enhancing Learning through Technology, Department of Library and Learning Services.
> DE MONTFORT UNIVERSITY.
> T: +44 (0) 116 207 8254
> E: rhall1 at dmu.ac.uk SKYPE/TWITTER/YouTube: hallymk1
> W:: dmu.ac.uk
> Learning Exchanges @ DMU: http://www.learnex.dmu.ac.uk/ 
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