Thirty years ago, Dr. Peter March, Dr. Robert Ansel and
myself sketched in some detail the Professional Society of Academics (PSA)
model and then tried to raise awareness for it. This is a model that does not
rely on university and college employment for the public provision of academic
services (i.e., teaching, researching and community servicing). There is no
model like it, standing as the only comprehensive challenge to our inherited model
of institutional employers and academic employees. Since that time, PSA has
been further developed and disseminated. This blog is a record of both.
As philosophers, we are not expert in fields that (ought to)
contribute to the construction of an alternative model for the provision of
higher education (HE). Suppose you are one such established or aspiring expert,
looking for a fresh thesis topic, an unspoken hypothesis, then this post might
be for you.
There is in this professional model the opportunity to explore a new area of research, call it: Alternative higher education models (AHEM). I recognize that calling for alternatives, change, reform, or revolution in the sector is obscenely common and deplorably misleading. None, I repeat, none of it references an alternative to the HEI model. All light filters through this institutional lens, and what a kaleidoscope it presents. This must be acknowledged, if alternative, change, reform, or revolution is to gain footing. Anything less is relegated to a footnote of the HEI model.
But never mind the bashing. This post is about something intellectual, something academic: possibility.