Traditional Evaluation Methodologies: The New Corporal Punishment.
Attached below is a piece on the education system. I wrote it because I feel I face a dichotomy between being graded or ranked, and one where I would prefer to not be ranked. I would rather participate in a system where I meet the standard of work, I don't have to enter a competition of passing or failing, and I am given a reasonable opportunity to implement feedback and to learn from mistakes (in order to meet the standard of the diploma). What I deplore of the contemporary education system is a feeling of arbitrary randomness, where indelible mistakes can determine progress through a system, one that I don't even want to participate in. I find the whole thing demoralizing and that it takes away from my experience of learning.
Anyway, enjoy :)
RE: Traditional Evaluation Methodologies: The New Corporal Punishment.
“I have a dream…”
The famous quote by Martin Luther King jr. are profound and recognizable words. I would be honoured to have my dreams complement his dreams. One such dream is emancipatory participation of students and freedom from the threat of failure. I have a dream that students will be empowered. The following is my personal motivation for a case study within the MPH program.
The education system systemically discriminates against individuals who have a diathesis, or vulnerability, to stressful environments. Individuals who cannot cope with acute or chronic stress may be excluded from attempting or completing their education. I do not think this would be overt discrimination (you cannot be in this program because you cannot cope with stress), rather, I believe this to be covert discrimination (i.e. your grades are not high enough). As such, I see an opportunity for novel evaluation methodologies of students that extend beyond their traditional mandate and support the needs of students for a healthy life (WHO, 1986). I believe a case study would be one way to facilitate change and would not represent undue hardship.
A barrier to novel evaluation methodologies are traditional evaluation regulations. One method to overcome tradition is via academic accommodations and medical documentation but barriers remain. Soliciting alternatives could challenge the traditional system of evaluating students and could escalate to the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario. I believe students have the evidentiary value to accomplish this, but rather than compete for access to a healthy evaluation methodology, I would prefer to collaborate to achieve what is desirable for both: enhanced learning, accountability, and health.
Creating new evaluation methodologies and acknowledging the social environment as a social determinant of health is a public interest. Its ignorance has been described as “The Perfect Legal Storm” by Shain (2010), who discusses the legal sources to have employers answer for their negligence of chronic stress. By ignoring chronic stress, employers jeopardize the well-being of their staff. As a result, the employer is liable for mental injury that may range in the multi-thousands or the millions of dollars (Shain, 2010; see OHCOW, 2012, for further reading on mental injury).
I argue that universities are negligent to the stressful work environments of students by conflict of interest (MacKean 2011; Queen’s University, 2012). Capital, personal loyalty, personal bias, and favouritism are examples of structural negligence. The inevitable harm results in structural violence. Leadership ought to be prepared for the future – as this testimony indicates – as a lack of change could lead to ongoing harm and liability.
The capital of universities acknowledges the prestige of their faculty is more important than the health of their students. For example, tenured faculty receive exorbitant subsidies and concurrently, languishing mental health is endemic within universities (LeViness et al., 2019; Gallagher, 2014; Queens Printer for Ontario, 2020). In the UofT (2017) National College Health Assessment Survey, more than one in 10 students reported seriously considering suicide, about half had above average stress and about one in six to seven reported tremendous stress; furthermore, in 2019 counselling wait times were several months long (DeClerq, 2019). As such, one could argue the university’s payment scheme is a conflict of interest with students who have an inadequately subsidized, over capacity, mental health support system.
Universities have a subordinate loyalty to a legal document designed to promote public health and well-being. The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms promotes public health by codifying rights, freedoms, and our value of “[ameliorating the] conditions of disadvantaged individuals or groups …”. Diverting subsidies from a mental health support system to university faculty wages demonstrates a personal loyalty superseding our values codified within the Charter. Awareness of this conflict is an opportunity for faculty to have a value clarification and to reflect on how they may be a part of a solution: will their first loyalty be to the Charter … or will it be to their own prestige?
No doubt there may be educated counterarguments; however, educated counterarguments may be impartial related to their personal relationship with the education system. As faculty have declared, students are untrustworthy: “We can’t trust students” … “Well, it’s the truth” (Paton, 2017, to 20+ graduating fourth year nursing students). Conversely, Brenan (2018) reports: “nurses [former students] rated highest for honesty and ethics for 17th consecutive year”. This demonstrates a personal belief-based practice that overrides evidence-based practice, a personal bias that affects judgement; in other words, a conflict of interest.
As a custodian of a social determinant of health, universities renege on their responsibility to expand access to under-resourced students by favouring systems that advantage resourced students. Social circumstances determine the health and well-being of students, and ultimately these social circumstances determine how well a student does in school. Their similarity among the public has led to these circumstances being called the social determinants of health. By neglecting these circumstances, universities give advantage (via further education – in itself a social determinant of health) to already flourishing students. This mindset of selecting the most resourced students propagates structural violence by giving advantage to students of resourced families, and by neglecting the welfare of disadvantaged students.
I hope to participate in a case study based on emancipatory participation, where in a historical context the education system has replaced the threat of violence with the threat of failure as its novel form of control. Students experience exclusion as punishment for making mistakes, living under a threat of failure without the opportunity to demonstrate learning & advancement from mistakes. I argue students require: meaningful participation in the collective bargaining process of the university and its faculty and staff to ensure students’ needs are represented during discussions of faculty workload and compensation; a student-centered approach that assesses learning needs (consistent with Brooks & Holmes, 2014); and implements capacity building acknowledging that all students will make mistakes, and those with more are likely under-resourced rather than personally at fault.
Thank you.
References
Brenan, M. (2018). Nurses Again Outpace Other Professions for Honesty, Ethics [PDF]. Retrieved from https://news.gallup.com/poll/245597/nurses-again-outpace-professions-honesty-ethics.aspx
Brooks, M. & Holmes, B. (2014). Equinox Blueprint: Learning 2030 [PDF]. Retrieved from http://learning2030.org/wp-content/themes/equinox/files/learning2030blueprint.pdf
DeClerq, K. (2019). Students speak of long wait times for counselling appointments at U of T. Retrieved from https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/students-speak-of-long-wait-times-for-counselling-appointments-at-u-of-t-1.4343443
Gallagher, R. (2014). National Survey of College Counseling Centers 2014 [PDF]. Retrieved from http://d-scholarship.pitt.edu/28178/1/survey_2014.pdf
LeViness, P., Gorman, K., Braun, L., Koenig, L., & Bershad, C. (2019). The Association for University and College Counseling Center Directors Annual Survey: 2019 [PDF]. Retrieved from https://www.aucccd.org/assets/documents/Survey/2019%20AUCCCD%20Survey-2020-05-31-PUBLIC.pdf
MacKean, G. (2011). Mental health and well-being in post-secondary education settings: A literature and environmental scan to support planning and action in Canada [PDF]. Retrieved from http://www.cacuss.ca/_Library/documents/Post_Sec_Final_Report_June6.pdf
OHCOW (Occupational Health Clinics for Ontario Workers). (2012). Action on Workplace Stress: Mental injury prevention tools for Ontario workers [PDF]. Retrieved from http://www.ohcow.on.ca/edit/files/mip/MIT%20Guide%20Tool%20%20Sept%2011%202013%20survey%20REV.pdf
Paton, S. (2017). NSE418: post-exam review, May 2, 2017.
Queen’s University. (2012). Student mental health and wellness: Framework and recommendations for a comprehensive strategy [PDF]. Retrieved from http://www.queensu.ca/principal/sites/webpublish.queensu.ca.opvcwww/files/files/CMHFinalReport.pdf
Shain (2010). Tracking the Perfect Legal Storm [PDF]. Retrieved from https://www.mentalhealthcommission.ca/sites/default/files/Workforce_Tracking_the_Perfect_Legal_Storm_ENG_0_1.pdf
UofT. (2017). Student Health and Well-Being at The University of Toronto: A report on the findings from the National College Health Assessment [PDF]. Retrieved from https://www.provost.utoronto.ca/wp-content/uploads/sites/155/2018/03/Report-on-Student-Health-Well-Being.pdf
WHO. (1986). The Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion. Retrieved from https://www.who.int/healthpromotion/conferences/previous/ottawa/en/index1.html