CONTRACTION AND MERGERS OF UNITED KINGDOM COLLEGES OF EDUCATION: SOME LOGISTIC COMMENTS
| Date | 01 February 1978 |
| Published date | 01 February 1978 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/eb009799 |
| Pages | 212-218 |
| Author | K.E. SHAW |
| Subject Matter | Education |
THE JOURNAL OF EDUCATIONAL ADMINISTRATION
VOLUME XVI, NUMBER 2 OCTOBER, 1978
CONTRACTION AND MERGERS OF UNITED KINGDOM
COLLEGES OF EDUCATION: SOME LOGISTIC
COMMENTS
K.E.
SHAW
Contraction in Colleges of Education in Britain has been complicated by their role in
catering for university overflow candidates. Evolution in the structures of higher education
affected the chances of survival of non-university institutions differentially. The Depart-
ment of Education and Science exercised both direct and indirect powers to manage
the situation in the teacher education sector; the colleges were put in the position of
having to make changes in their internal structures and course patterns in a situation
of considerable uncertainty, sharpened competition and reduced resources. Unit-struc-
tured diversified courses, often certificated by non-university bodies do not easily square
with the traditional pattern of concurrent training.
INTRODUCTION
The management of contraction calls for skills of a higher order than
are needed in expansion with its regular increase in resources and
consequent opportunities to redeem mistakes with the promise of a
preferential share in next year's hand-out. My purpose in this paper is
to comment on and illustrate the impact of severe contraction in size
on colleges of education in the United Kingdom, and I shall draw my
illustration from the recent experience of St. Luke's College, Exeter. It
seems likely that these colleges are the first of several sectors of the
educational system which may experience a substantial reduction in the
scale of their operations as a result of the steep decline in births and
disenchantment with educational investment in the U.K. and elsewhere.
However humdrum they are when stated baldly the aspects I shall
describe acquire no little poignancy when they begin to apply to an
institution in which the reader has a personal interest.
In the highly optimistic atmosphere which inspired and was in turn
strengthened by the Robbins Report1 of 1963 non-university education
in Britain was fast growing with great expectations. Like the Polytechnics
in their early stages many large colleges of education which were
orientated to the training of secondary school teachers acted to a great
extent as a pis-aller for failed would-be undergraduates. In the early
seventies more students had Advanced level General Certificate of
Education qualifications as a proportion of the age-group then had
KENNETH E. SHAW was Head of Education at St. Luke's College, Exeter, until October
1978.
Thereafter he becomes Lecturer in the School of Education, University of Exeter.
He holds the degrees of M.A. (Manchester), M.A. (Ed.) (Bristol) and Ph.D. (Bath). Dr.
Shaw has published numerous articles in the field of curriculum.
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