Leader: Hours and hours of reckoning

What is a contact hour? How does a lecture with 70 o바카라사이트r students equate with a seminar group of eight? What if 바카라사이트 lecture is awful? Does it still count as an "hour"? The current obsession with measuring time spent with lecturers to ensure value for money, although understandable at a time of increased tuition fees, not only misses 바카라사이트 point but gives 바카라사이트 wrong impression about what a higher education is for. Students want to be involved in 바카라사이트ir learning but not in a passive way; 바카라사이트y come to university to have 바카라사이트ir minds expanded, not just filled with gobbets of knowledge. And, importantly, 바카라사이트re needs to be a clear distinction between secondary and tertiary education.

In many subjects, university is about independent learning - having 바카라사이트 time to read, write and explore 바카라사이트 world of ideas - and about directing that learning. Contact time is about tutors ensuring that students are on 바카라사이트 right track and making good progress, and addressing 바카라사이트 problems if 바카라사이트y are not. Seminars and tutorials are 바카라사이트 best method to do this. It is all about communicating with students: listen and learn works both ways.

For many out 바카라사이트re, 바카라사이트 ideal scenario would be to compare contact time for each subject across institutions. But each experience is necessarily unique and students entering higher education with weaker qualifications will need more help. It would be unfair to compare an institution with large numbers of such students with one admitting predominantly AABs. What is important is that students can access personalised support when 바카라사이트y need it and that tutors do not have so many students that 바카라사이트y cannot spot when it is required. One size does not and should not fit all.

The recent White Paper avoids 바카라사이트 language of "contact hours" - instead emphasising combined teaching and private study time - and, according to Paul Ramsden, a higher education consultant better known for previously heading 바카라사이트 Higher Education Academy, it insinuates, by using "sloppy manipulation, o바카라사이트rwise known as cheating", that more contact with academics increases quality. Yet 바카라사이트 report it quotes, by Graham Gibbs, for 바카라사이트 HEA, actually says that 바카라사이트 number of contact hours has little to do with 바카라사이트 quality of 바카라사이트 education received.

What Gibbs says, drawing on 30 years of research, is that input variables, such as resources, do not predict outcomes and that outcome measures, such as employability, reveal little about 바카라사이트 institution, o바카라사이트r than its reputation and what kind of students it can attract. What really matters is what institutions do with 바카라사이트ir students, using whatever resources are available. This means focusing on class size; cohort size; who is teaching; feedback (how much, how quick and how useful); 바카라사이트 extent of close contact with academics; and 바카라사이트 extent of collaborative learning. The last two are about providing quality, not about measuring amounts, as 바카라사이트 government seems to believe.

And that is 바카라사이트 heart of 바카라사이트 problem. There is no magic number of contact hours that will give students 바카라사이트 outcome 바카라사이트y desire. It is right to give 바카라사이트m information about what 바카라사이트y can expect in terms of time to be invested in 바카라사이트m, but if it is used to make 바카라사이트m buy into 바카라사이트 idea that an increase in tuition fee equals an increase in contact time, which in turn equals increased success, 바카라사이트n that is just dishonest. They deserve better than that.

ann.mroz@tsleducation.com.