Reflecting back on my previous post, exploring the Diamond 9 ranking activity in which my first year students participated, led to a Wonderland of philosophical and Political rabbit holes.
This post, in starting to question why and which engagements matter, attempts to make some of those rabbit holes a little more familiar and consider how they might be untangled to give a clearer picture of what we might want to constitute students engagements at the University of Northampton.
Commonly, researchers conceptualise student engagement into three main components: behavioural, psychological and socio-cultural (Fredricks et al, 2004, cited by MacFarlane and Tomlinson, 2017, p7). Macfarlane and Tomlinson (2017), who have been critical of conceptual weaknesses in defining student engagement, seem to accept the integrity of such a three-fold construct as set out by Kahu (2013) into dimensions of behaviour, affect and cognition.
However, different paradigms inform a diversity of research into student engagement (Zepke, 2015), which will shape different emphases. Whilst Zepke considers that Kahu’s (2013) model of engagement captures the sociocultural ecological perspective well (2015, p1316), he wants to progress the model further; adding a focus on developing students’ critical consciousness – leading to social and political engagement that empowers and encourages students to challenge neo-liberalism. He wants student engagement to indicate something more emancipatory, embracing critical active citizenship and challenging social injustice (op cit, p1319).
This links directly to a key thread of discussion at this week’s ILT conference (ILT, 2020) and goes beyond students’ engagement with their learning at a surface or instrumental level (Korhonen et al, 2019) to what they then DO with what they learn. Integral to Active Blended Learning (ABL) is that “context is key. What matters is what students do with content, why and with whom” (University of Northampton, 2020). So perhaps this emancipatory view of student engagement sits well within Changemaker values; but does it sit well alongside learner analytics that seek to capture indicators of student engagement?
Then, when we consider which aspects of student engagement are most measurable or even visible, we need to ask how that tallies with which aspects of student engagement are considered most valuable, by whom and why. MacFarlane and Tomlinson (2017) argue that Zepke’s (2015) approach puts too much focus on the behavioural (which would link in to a context actively utilising learner analytics (Dyment et al, 2020)) and that Kahu’s (2013) emphasis is too much on affect and belonging. However, their main concern about the student engagement narrative is that it serves as a means of disciplining students into conformity and countering their potential autonomy as adult learners, reducing learning to ‘gamification’ (2017, p16) and infantilising students into performed ‘engagement’.
If we accept that we do operate within a neo-liberal context, where students may see themselves as consumers as well as learning in order to support their employability (Kelly et al, 2017), should our view of student engagement seek to liberate them from that model that seems in line with their own beliefs (even if we believe that is because neo-liberalism has given them few options but to accept it)? Or should we seek to evaluate their engagement within our current context, acknowledging the fears that if we accept that context is current we may be accepting that context. If we believe that “context is king” (University of Northampton, 2020) then we might see the functional utility in the latter approach. That would not necessarily stop us from looking for the unseen and what is absent of value in context, and exploring with our students what they might consider to be absent from the engagement narrative and if, how and why that might matter. The fear might be that if we accept working within the neoliberal context for too long, will it be harder for our students to achieve critical consciousness (Zepke, 2015) thus centring our functional, institutional targets at the expense of the emancipatory potential of Education? Can the two co-exist? Even co-operate? Is that what we mean when we talk about Education for social innovation and Changemaker? Do the functional (behaviourally measurable) elements of student engagement facilitate the cognitive elements of student engagement, and create a scaffold for deeper, analytical learning (Korhonen et al, 2019) that supports action for social justice (Zepke, 2015)? Might they support that level of learning (ie. If you attend we can help you learn) but not be necessary for it (ie. Learning independently might be more personalised and relevant) if you have the study skills to best enable autonomous learning (Korhonen et al, 2019). So, if we feel that attendance is such a key measure of engagement, is this because we believe our students are not equipped to learn best autonomously – in which case, should our focus be on developing their skills of enquiry… which could, again, tie in to the definition of ABL in terms of sense-making elements and students building their own knowledge. If we want to focus on “promoting student autonomy” – a core element of ABL – (University of Northampton, 2020) do we need to look again at our model of student engagement to ensure that this also supports (and is recognised to support) that autonomy?
Dyment, J., Stone, C. and Milthorpe, N. (2020) ‘Beyond busy work: rethinking the measurement of online student engagement’, Higher Education Research and Development, DOI: 10.1080/07294360.2020.1732879
Fredricks, J.A., Blumenfeld, P.C. and Paris, A.H. (2004) ‘School engagement: Potential of the concept, state of the evidence’, Review of Educational Research 74(1): 59–109.
Institute of Learning and Teaching (ILT), (2020) ILT Conference, University of Northampton, 16th June. Online.
Kahu, E. (2013) ‘Framing student engagement in higher education’, Studies in Higher Education, 38:5, 758-773
Kelly. P, Fair. N and Evans, C (2017) ‘The Engaged Student ideal in Higher Education Policy’, Higher Education Policy, 30, pp105-122.
Korhonen, V., Mattsson, M., Inkinen, M. and Toom, A. (2019) ‘Understanding the multidimensional nature of Student Engagement during the first year of Higher Education’, Frontiers in Psychology, 10: 1056 pp1-15
MacFarlane, B. and Tomlinson, M. (2017) ‘Critiques of Student Engagement’, Higher Education Policy, 30, pp5-21
University of Northampton (2020) ‘Active Blended Learning – a definition’, Institute of Learning and Teaching. Accessed 18/06/20 at https://www.northampton.ac.uk/ilt/current-projects/defining-abl/
Zepke, N. (2015) ‘Student engagement research: thinking beyond the mainstream’, Higher Education Research & Development, 34:6, 1311-1323