Where's my tute gone?
In 1909, Lord Curzon, the Chancellor of the University, declared: "If there is any product of which Oxford has special reason to be proud, which has stamped its mark on the lives and characters of generations of men, and has excited the outspoken envy of other nations, it is that wonderful growth of personal tuition which has sprung up in our mist almost unawares."
Curzon would probably turn in his grave at the proliferation of classes in Oxford, creeping into the fabric of an increasing number of departments and threatening to undermine not only the legendary stature of the tutorial, a globally-celebrated emblem of academic excellence, but possibly the entire nature of the collegiate system as we all know it.
Let us look at the damning evidence that has thus far come to light. Economics and Psychology introduced small group teaching two years ago to replace some tutorials for Final Honours School students, i.e. second and third years. The new typical format is four tutorials and four classes per term rather than the eight tutorials of old. Last term, the Philosophy faculty introduced a similar policy, but with four tutorials and eight classes per term, allowing for the fact that group teaching of up to ten undergraduates would probably not accede to the intellectual heights of its predecessor. There is a less widespread trend of class teaching in Law, and Classics furtively got in on the act recently as well with the organisation of inter-collegiate language classes.
It would appear that our feted pedagogical style is being severely menaced. Oxbridge has finally buckled under the weight of financial pressure, spiralling numbers of undergraduates and overstretched teaching resources.
In fact it is miraculous that we have resisted it for so long. Since 1985, the government has expanded the provision for higher education but has not been prepared to pay its escalating price. Many UK universities have seen student numbers double while annual funding per student has nearly halved. As the top tier struggle to maintain seminars of under ten students, it is not unknown for university tutors to struggle to inculcate three times this number of students at one sitting, leaving all participants unfulfilled by the experience.
The once-elusive accolade of a university education is now widely available, and individual attention has been the sacrifice made. We currently spend half of the OECD average on higher education and a third of the US level. There have been whispers of 'top up' fees to straddle the financial chasm, and in this market, if it comes to fruition, the tutorial system will command a high price.
However, the evidence suggests that economic considerations may not be the sole, nor even the overwhelming factor. Dr Brown, a Philosophy tutor at Wolfson College, elucidated two causes. First of all is "the feeling of many tutors that there are too many tutorials" leaving them precious little time to do research.
"Research is becoming more and more competitive, and Oxford must strive to maintain its reputation as one of the top three research universities in the country," even if undergraduates end up paying the price.
The 'work load' factor is probably not just a poor excuse. When the OxStu investigated the perturbing rise of Oxbridge tutors giving in to the allure of lucrative opportunities in America, even its patriotic critics cited the heavy burden of teaching as a decisive reason.
The other professed motive of the faculty powers that be, is to increase the opportunities for graduate teaching. While the venerable tutorial is still left to the experts, a large number of the new classes are, across the board, being taught by graduates, a pattern that is typical in the States. When asked whether he anticipated that classes would increasingly replace the tutorial in Oxbridge, Brown had no reservations that it would.
Such a development would no less than throw the future of the collegiate system into jeopardy. Tutorials represent a necessary role and function of the college; the decision to have class teaching must be a University-wide mechanism. In Cambridge some similar damage has already been done in that the Director of Studies for each student is allocated on a University rather than collegiate level and generally less effectively, with reports of students having to approach tutors after lectures to request supervisions.
While some tutors have obviously been quick to rise to the defence of this embryonic system, arguments that class teaching fosters skills that will be useful in the workplace, and is a more productive way of evaluating non-essay work, are too reactionary for the stalwart don. While in Economics and Mathematics, classes have largely been uncontroversial, in more recently affected subjects, both students and tutors have reacted angrily. A politics tutor who asked not to be named, remonstrated that a class milieu "inhibited the student's ability to express opinions and evaluate arguments as well as in a tutorial."
Our loss is certainly a great one. The tutorial generates an intensity that is unparalleled and an inherently demanding nature that aims at "getting intellects to sparkle, for filling heads with knowledge, for making undergraduates big with wisdom" (Rose and Ziman, 1964). With possible solutions to the funding deadlock looking belated and piecemeal, now that the ball has started rolling in deriding the cult of the tute in favour of more realistic and financially-viable alternatives, the momentum looks irreversible.
However two further points are worth raising. In the light of the recent A-Level fiasco, debate has been sparked on the subject of what exams are supposed to achieve, and the same critical process may be applied to university teaching. Is it more important to give to each student the opportunity to stretch the intellectual parameters of their chosen subject with their chosen subject for its own sake, or to train them in presentation and teamwork which they may use in the workplace?
Secondly, we talk of the tute as if its present form had been unaltered since time immemorial. Yet it has recently been persuasively argued that the tutorial is in fact a much more of a fluid entity. Tapper and Palfreyman concluded that "the flexibility of the tutorial system has enabled it to survive; it has been continuously redefined to meet changing conditions and new demands, and in some form or other it will persist into the twenty-first century...therefore whether in twenty years we have a tutorial system that is recognisable to today's students, let alone yesteday's, is debatable."
c. £3000 extra spent per student for the tutorial experience.
staff : student ratio at Oxford of approx 1:12 compared to 1:20 elsewhere
'labour productivity' of Oxford Dons above average for academics in UK Higher Education
decline of resource/funding per student of 50% over last decade
amount of taxpayer money paid to Oxford to be cut by a third over 10 years
All statistics from The Oxford Tutorial, edited by David Palfreyman and published 2001, Oxford Centre for Higher Education Policy Studies, available from Blackwell's, priced £3.50
17th Oct 2002