[SSC] Discussion Document (SSC Curriculum Group)

[Joss Winn]

On 21 Oct 2011, at 15:15, Richard Hall wrote:
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> 8. Does any form of prescription beyond a framework/ethos/range of topics offered, mean that we are just aping formal HE? How tied to formal HE practices do we wish to be?
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Hi Richard, 

My own position is that I'm not interested in creating something wholly different to mainstream HE. We know that it is a good model in some ways and we have always been clear about the SSC offering an "equivalent" to mainstream HE, so in my mind, it remains the model to which we provide an alternative, not an opposite. The SSC needs to be a compelling alternative and not necessarily something so radically different to mainstream HE that it is not, in practice a realistic alternative for people. 

Many of us work in HE and so we might be looking for something really quite different to what we experience day to day, but our students will, I think, find even the idea of doing a degree via a non-hierarchical co-operative model, radical enough. Divesting the SSC of many of the familiar elements of mainstream HE could dissolve the Centre into perpetual experiment when both students and teachers, particularly to begin with, need something familiar to hang off. 

To be clear, I don't want to create a pedagogical laboratory with the SSC. I want to create a Centre that will appeal to lots of people who are willing to take on board the idea of localised, co-governance of their education. If we create a form of "HE in a co-operative setting", that's a pretty good start in my mind.

Joss
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