Values In Higher Education

This deliberately wide-ranging book addresses issues related to trust, compassion, well-being, grace, dignity and integrity. It explores these within the context of higher education, giving existential and empirical accounts of how these moral duties can be expressed within the academy and why they ought to be. The chapters range from values used in the marketing and management of institutions to their realisation in therapeutic and teacher training spaces. The book opens with a specific introduction which positions the work and outlines the context of duties and obligations at play. This is followed by two distinct but related sections including chapters on theoretical issues, organisational practices and personal praxis. The first part is more abstract and theoretical, the second locates the values discussed within the practices of the university. In doing so the book encompasses a wide range of issues from multi-disciplinary and geo-political regions. The authors are a mixture of world-leading authorities on values in higher education and earlier career researchers, who are nonetheless equally passionate contributors. This mix gives the book vibrancy and offers insight which appeals to both an academic and managerial readership.

Values in Higher Education Teaching explores the way in which teaching, research, learning and higher education are a values enterprise and that an exploration of values is necessary to work out the full purposes of a higher education to guide practices and help academics understand academic work. Values inform thinking and actions and although this is well recognized, values are seldom brought to the forefront of inquiries as practices in higher education are developed. This book argues that by putting values firmly on the agenda of those who teach, work and learn in higher education the academic profession can open up new spaces for value conversations and potentially transform the way in which they practice. Values in Higher Education Teaching is key reading for university lecturers, those with responsibility for leadership and management of higher education and postgraduates studying for higher degrees in higher education. There are few books that directly address the broad and complex question of values in teaching in higher education yet at the same time values are widely recognised as permeating all our practices. In this sense an accepted part of academic life remains in the realm of ‘taken for granted’ rather than being consciously and explicitly explored and practiced. The book deals with the idea of values in both a philosophical and practical manner. It is based on original research and uses both empirical data and theory to address teaching values in higher education and the current values of the higher education system. It explores what academics have valued historically in teaching and also addresses the major reforms of the last 20 years. Reforms have essentially changed the nature of western higher education but have made little real difference to the outcomes for student learning and society whereas teaching with values in all subjects has the potential to radically alter student experiences.

Providing a much-needed global perspective-based analysis of the issue of educational values, this volume examines how higher education cultures are embedded within and heavily influenced by national cultures, norms, and structures through the lenses of Teaching, Learning, Curricula, and Assessment.

In this book, eleven prominent scholars discuss the moral condition of contemporary society and the appropriate response from universities. Specifically, they address such issues as the extent to which university curriculums should treat ethics or human values; what universities and faculties should do to improve the moral thinking and responsibility of students; and what contributions universities can make in improving the morality of society in general.

Originally published in 1974 Values and Moral Development in Higher Education deals practically with various aspects of the impact of higher educational processes, recognising a need for these to be inter-related and understood within a common framework. It takes the form of a set of contributions whose authors have sought to relate their perspectives and experiences by reference to John Wilson’s philosophical analyses of the nature of moral maturity and the possible aims of moral education, and, where possible, to each other.

Providing a much-needed global perspective-based analysis of the issue of educational values, this volume examines how higher education cultures are embedded within and heavily influenced by national cultures, norms, and structures through the lenses of Teaching, Learning, Curricula, and Assessment.

Informed by the most up-to-date research from around the world, as well as examples of good practice, this handbook analyzes values education in the context of a range of school-based measures associated with student wellbeing. These include social, emotional, moral and spiritual growth – elements that seem to be present where intellectual advancement and academic achievement are being maximized. This text comes as ‘values education’ widens in scope from being concerned with morality, ethics, civics and citizenship to a broader definition synonymous with a holistic approach to education in general. This expanded purview is frequently described as pedagogy relating to ‘values’ and ‘wellbeing’. This contemporary understanding of values education, or values and wellbeing pedagogy, fits well with recent neuroscience research. This has shown that notions of cognition, or intellect, are far more intertwined with social and emotional growth than earlier educational paradigms have allowed for. In other words, the best laid plans about the technical aspects of pedagogy are bound to fail unless the growth of the whole person – social, emotional, moral, spiritual and intellectual, is the pedagogical target. Teachers and educationalists will find that this handbook provides evidence, culled from both research and practice, of the beneficial effects of such a ‘values and wellbeing’ pedagogy.