Challenging Data and Dominant Discourses in Higher Education

The experience of COVID has in very interesting ways provided an opportunity to see some of that change and its consequences in a very stark way. In a very personal sense, it has meant that I have suddenly found myself feeling utterly out of date, particularly in those areas where I would normally claim to be ‘an expert’. That expertise has eluded me, and now I feel that I am out of touch and a new generation is running in an entirely different direction.

When I was at Birmingham University, around ten years ago, I had the privilege of leading in three areas where Birmingham was among the leading institutions in the sector. We established an approach to employability that was referred to at the time as ‘the Birmingham model’ and was copied by several other institutions. I worked hard with colleagues in human resources to transform the culture of Birmingham University, particularly in equality, diversity and inclusion and our approach of working across all characteristics, and across the whole University, are now considered standard practice throughout the sector. Finally, I was among a small group of colleagues who worked, in different ways, to build a new relationship with the community immediately around the University, with the city in general, and with various sectors (education, culture, business) within the city’s economy, what is now referred to as Civic Mission.

Having been at the forefront of the debate, and of action, in each of these three areas of work, I know feel very strongly that the debate has overtaken me, and I am left behind, trying to argue for an older, and often somewhat outdated approach that nobody is really interested in listening to. What is more, in each of these areas, there are many more ‘experts’ who can use contemporary, fashionable language within each discourse and carve a career for themselves as leaders in their field.

So, what has changed? Is it simply that I have been asleep during COVID, too interested and focused on running the university and making sure that we all survived the colossal shift in teaching, student support and work practices, that I have simply missed what has been happening elsewhere? That I am, quite simply, left behind?

I am not sure that that is all that there is to this situation. When I come to look at each of these areas – employability, EDI, and civic mission – I can identify a very similar structure of development, something that must be more than simply the changes of fashion in particular discourses. There are, I would suggest, two – perhaps contradictory – forces at work within each of these areas of work within the university sector.

Data

The first dramatic change has been the use of data. This has been seen across the work of the university from student analytics through to many different areas of human resources. When I was initiating the work in employability and EDI at Birmingham, data was central to our approach. It was the ability to engage with individual schools and departments, programme by programme, about their employability rates that enabled us to bring them on board and to recognise the importance of embedding employability in the curriculum. Likewise, Athena Swann has always had a strong element of data analysis and it was the ability to identify, extract and manipulate the data, not just on gender, but across the protected characteristics, that gave us the lever through which to influence the wider structures and processes of the university. Data is, in both cases, evidence and data was used to support a narrative that was aimed to persuade those who had other priorities to put employability or EDI up there with all the other priorities that needed to be addressed.

The priorities of the University more generally have now changed dramatically. It is not that research and teaching are no longer priorities, they are, but they sit alongside skills development, student mental health, EDI, ethnic minority attainment gaps and civic mission (to mention only a few) as core priorities, and often as key performance indicators of the University. This is in large part due to the fact that the data around these key areas is being collected and the evidence that is generated from this data is being publicised (and compared between institutions in league tables) in a way that is demanding action, if not directly from senior leadership teams, then from those most directly affected, and by the leverage of ‘evidence’ to the senior team.

Discourse

While much of the narrative and discourse around data stresses the idea of evidence led behaviours and decisions, this is, I would suggest, only one half of the change that has occurred. The other element of the change relates much more directly to some of my own research into the role of discourse in religion. It is particularly the concept of ‘discourse’ and Gerd Baumann’s idea of a ‘dominant discourse’ that I would suggest links these two very disparate worlds.

I talked earlier about the rise of experts and one of the changes that has occurred in all the areas that I have mentioned – EDI, civic mission, employability (skills), and others such as student mental health, student analytics and so on – is the growth in the number of people coming forward as ‘experts’, ‘consultants’ and ‘advisors’ to lead the university through the analysis of the data into action, strategic planning and implementation.

What has struck me, however, is how consistent the language of these experts appears to be. It is an accepted position in discourse analysis that ‘expertise’ is identified, in part, by the ability to use a technical language in a defined way that identifies the particular discipline, or area of expertise. There are, therefore, key phrases and jargon language in each of these areas of work that have become not only accepted, but also essential to demonstrate an individual’s understanding of, or expertise in, that field.

What is interesting, however, is that this jargon plays into a wider structure of the discourse such that a specific ‘dominant’ discourse becomes the only way in which to present a subject, a dominant discourse that severely limits what the individual (whether expert or not) can say in that environment. The use of so called ‘woke’ language and values in EDI, especially in debates on race and sexuality or trans issues, is an obvious example, and that particular ‘dominant discourse’ is rooted in a liberal, essentially left wing, sensibility. In relation to the skills agenda however, which is now dominating discourses in employability, or the levelling up debate that has seeped into the discussion on civic mission, then the dominant discourse is more in line with UK government thinking and is essentially right wing in approach (if left and right are still valid distinctions in many of these fields). There is no consistency here, but the presence of a clear dominant discourse that must be spoken, and whose values must be articulated, is a clear feature of all these debates. It is this, I would suggest, that make me most uncomfortable, and makes me, suddenly, feel so terribly out of date.

Contradiction

Finally, therefore, the contradiction. The growth in the use of data suggests openness, especially when linked to the idea of ‘evidence based’ decision making. The growth of dominant discourses, however, with fixed language, values, and expressions, suggests that it is the discourse that is leading the decision, almost irrespective of the evidence. Of course, those who use the discourse will point to data, and to the evidence to support their position. The development of ‘what works’ – building on a pattern that I think originally came from Advance HE’s work on retention – reinforces both the assumption of evidence and the dominant discourse in a particular field. Others have demonstrated that particular actions ‘work’ and they have the data, the evidence, to prove it. So, it is suggested, the dominant position, along with the discourse and the values inherent in that position, are enhanced. But is this necessarily the case.

The problem with a ‘dominant’ discourse is that it is very difficult to speak outside of that discourse and still be heard, however much evidence you might have to support your case. It immediately shuts down debate, not through ‘no platforming’, but simply by the assumption of correctness. The analysis of data very rarely in my experience leads to single answers, or simple solutions. In the hands of an experienced data analysist the data can be allowed to show subtlety, nuance and even surprises, things that go against the dominant discourse. Long term qualitative analysis, listening to life stories, lived experience and the power of individual testimony can often show areas where the data cannot reach. It is not an either/or – data or narrative – it is always a both/and, but it takes more work, more time, and, I would have to say, more openness to really hear what is going on and to challenge the dominant discourses of the field in question, to sustain this position.

So, I suddenly feel out of my depth in areas of work within the university where, at one time, I was among the leaders. I have not kept up with all the new discourses. I do not speak the language of skills, of race, of civic mission, with the fluency of many others who define themselves as ‘experts’. That might not be a bad thing. The new generation will come up with new ideas. Ideas and activities in all these areas moves on and so the world progresses. Yes, but…

It is not just the language, however, but often the values that underpin these new approaches, that I have difficulty with, and which do not match my consistent emphasis on the human. Whether we talk about data, or through data, or whether we use new dominant discourses that are filled with trendy, and often meaning-less, terms and phrases, we almost always manage to lose sight of the real human beings that are the root cause and purpose of these agendas. It is students seeking gainful and fulfilling employment, it is those from a wide range of minority groups (and particularly those who intersect across a range of such groups), it is the people who live around the University and who often feel excluded from it, who need to be put back at the centre of these debates, not data, and certainly not experts.