Exams and essay writing should be ditched because they unfairly favour white students, according to a report from an elite university. Birmingham University says the traditional methods of assessment are measures of ‘smartness based on white privilege’, adding that it is harder for students from ethnic minorities to do well.
It's harder for white men to play basketball, there was even a film about it, but I didn't see any universitoes worrying about that..
And in a commentary released with the report, Prof Sally Everett, from another renowned university – King’s College London – waxed lyrical about the ‘unearned advantages of being white’ and ‘the privileges of whiteness’ and advocated ‘decolonising assessment’. She claimed that traditional assessment methods ‘perpetuate systemic inequalities’ and suggested ‘low-stakes assessments’ such as ‘writing reflective journals’ should replace them.
The report concluded that assessment practices, such as in-person, timed exams or graded essays, should go because they are potentially ‘tools of exclusion’. It said these ‘marginalise knowledge’ and devalue skills from ‘non-Western traditions’.
Unfortunatly, those lead to skills like performing under pressure and timekeeping that Western businesses prize in their employees, so where are you expecting yout alumni to get jobs? Or doesn't that matter to you?
But Chris McGovern, of the Campaign for Real Education, said he was ‘saddened to see academic integrity being brought into disrepute in this way’.
Bit late to the party aren't you, Chris? The devaluing started long, long ago and has reached critical mass now, as David Thompson has repeatedly pointed out.
A University of Birmingham spokesman defended the project as ‘a product of academically rigorous research and discussions with academics within and outside of Birmingham Business School’.
‘This report from colleagues in the business school suggests a range of actions that may help students understand and explore those different perspectives.’
‘Birmingham Business School is a global business school educating students who come from all over the world. Understanding the world from multiple perspectives is a critical skill that we teach our future business leaders.’
Which rather explaines why the quality of world business leaders has been going downhill for years, doersn't it?
4 comments:
What they seem to be implying is that what they are referring to as white privilege is really just white intellectual superiority. Isn't that a bit racist?
Stonyground.
I remember a couple of years ago thinking that in a time of constant remakes and reboots, one film they couldn't possibly remake in these days of woke is "White Men Can't Jump". Then I checked t'interweb and discovered that whoopsie me, they had gone and done exactly that! Woke is only one-way it would appear.
Steven
I'm sick of this bollocks. The only white people who have advantages and privilege are people like the professor. People from the upper and middle classes, the people who don't have to worry about paying bills, or getting a GP's appointment, because they can afford private healthcare. The fact is, dickheads like her, spout of about "white privilege" because they are guilty about having been born into affluent families. The worst ones are the so called social justice warriors, the arrogant bastards who assume that they have a right to speak on behalf of the working class, when they don't even have a clue.
If Prof Everett is white, she should shirley put her qualifications where her mouth is, and stand down, to offer her post to some non-white person who may never have passed an exam, any exam, in their life. The reason she won't is that this "white privilege" doesn't apply to people like her, because, reasons. Numpties.
Penseivat
Post a Comment