Les universités nouvelles: Enjeux et perspectives

11 Enacting the New University Principle Over 40 Years in Roskilde

Enacting the New University Principle Over 40 Years in Roskilde Resilience in Flux 11 Poul Bitsch Olsen and Lorna Heaton In the 1970s, increasing demand for access to tertiary education in Denmark led to the formation of two new universities. The authors trace aspects of development and evolution of one of these universities— Roskilde University Centre. This chapter illustrates how pressures to integrate a new segment of students, some of them with less literate social capital, and new requirements for flexibility in the workforce, in relation to new professional sectors like environmental management and public administration, supported the establishment of new academic combinations and new programs of study. A new idea about what a university can and should do emerged. Among its key characteristics are: an accent on quality pedagogy through direct contact with mature, competent researchers, students taking responsibility for their learning, a focus on social relevance through problem orientation and project-based work, as well as interdisciplinary approaches to real-world, complex problems. The design of the educational regime includes problem orientation as the guiding principle for knowing and research, as well as collective project organization and house structure as the organizing units. We discuss how Roskilde University has dealt with the tensions involved in relating to changing political and economic conditions in Denmark over the past forty years. After describing its establishment and how its guiding principles are reflected in university organization and structure, we draw on the concepts of niche university and resilience to explain how, while some things have changed, RUC has remained largely faithful to its original mission and ideals, despite broader social, political and economic forces that have tended to push the academic environment away from the ideals that led to its emergence. In support of 196 Chapitre 11 our argument, we draw on comparison with Denmark’s “other” new university and on recent decisions on how to reconcile structural requirements of the Europe-wide Bologna Accord with Roskilde’s institutional structure and values . Establishment of Roskilde University Roskilde University Centre (RUC) was planned from 1970 and founded in 1972 . Its establishment is the result of a combination of ideological and practical reasons . Denmark had not been spared the student unrest that swept the rest of Europe and North America. Danish universities in Copenhagen and Aarhus were the scene of several student uprisings in the late 1960s. Students were extremely critical of the traditional academic regime, portraying professors as isolated in their ivory towers and far removed from societal relevance and accuracy . They demanded direct contact with and teaching by mature, competent teachers, and more flexible teaching methods. The students also considered the traditional universities undemocratic and demanded more influence in governing the institution, as well as more student-centered education and inclusion in education . At the same time, there was increased demand in Denmark for access to tertiary education, particularly by a new segment of students with less literate social capital who had not previously attended university .1 The establishment of RUC was thus meant to relieve some of the demographic pressure on Copenhagen universities . In addition, university administrators hoped to deal with new requirements for flexibility in the workforce, in relation to new professional sectors like environmental management and public administration, by providing new academic combinations and new programs of study. Two universities, Roskilde University Centre in 1972 and Aalborg University (AAU) in 1974, were created out of the same ideological and pedagogical frame, but implemented in different environments . RUC became radical and humanistic-oriented, while AAU became a regional, technical university oriented to the labor market. RUC was smaller with a more general orientation, while AAU became more integrated into regional business and administration. The evolution of these two universities since 1972 is interesting in the sense that the underlying ideas were similar, but the relation to the environment was understood in very different ways. Today, AAU is the larger but also more normalized educational unit . Problem orientation is less applied in technological and 1. Henning Salling Olesen, “The Danish Universities”, Häften för Kritiska Studier, vol . 7, no . 5, Kristianstad, Civiltryckeriet, 1974 . Enacting the New University Principle Over 40 Years in Roskilde: Resilience in Flux 197 medical training, and the structure has only a half year of basic studies only and earlier specialization—but still emphasizing student-centered teaching has become the norm. Over the years, the idea of academic work with knowing in AAU has...