Education Education Education .....

It seems that everyone can teach these days .... or so it would appear from the resurrection of the School of Communication Arts. I looked at this with trepidation. This is a concept similar to the Miami Ad School by all accounts. Industry professionals creating a "curriculum" and delivering "learning" that fulfills their immediate needs. An expensive apprenticeship. This education model doesn't sit well with me for several reasons.

1. There is an assumption that academics are fusty, ivory-tower imprisoned individuals who don't know what they're doing. This assumption smacks of arrogance. Most academics in creative areas have done their time in respective industries. They are creative individuals who are attempting to mould students to not simply do a job of work but to be intellectually rigorous in their approach to creative thinking and problem solving. Yes, admittedly, some are stuck in a mindset that was appropriate to our industries twenty years ago .... most of us acknowledge this and are moving on. In some cases, and I know this through conversation with industry bods, we are engaging our students in debates that are actually informing industry - specifically from my experience the advertising industry! Furthermore, and I'm not on a rant here, we are creating a curriculum within an accepted and established,sometimes suffocating, framework.

2. Anyone can do this teaching lark. Err, no. You may be a brilliant art director. that doesn't make you a good teacher. Teaching is more than mentoring. When you undertake a postgrad teaching course, you engage with pedagogical philosophies that you would never pick up in industry. A talented teacher need not be a talented industry professional. I have met brilliant individuals in other subject areas who cannot teach for toffee. Please Mr Marc Lewis, don't attempt to undermine our profession by suggesting you can all do it better - and to make yourself Dean also makes a mockery of the fact that most Deans have worked their way up after years of establishing their reputations as educators, researchers and managers.

3. Let's forget classroom teaching and set our course up in a mock agency, aren't we unique? Hmm. No actually. My course, for example, does exactly that. We have first, second and third years working alongside each other in our studios. Sometimes, with external briefs, in mixed teams. we have live clients coming in and setting briefs. Our students pitch to agencies in London and New York. They find and work for real clients in their final year. They set up mini agencies. They work with external partners. We've been running this course since 2005 in this way. Others do too.

4. Academia does not have a relationship with agencies. Again, a false assumption. On the BA (Hons) Advertising and Brand Management course at Staffs Uni we work very hard to engage with industry. We work on live briefs with agencies .... and we'd love to have individuals who are now mentoring on the Communication Arts course helping us. Go on, take a look outside of London. There's life and a lot of talent in the Midlands and the North, you know?

I hope this doesn't come across as a rant. I want this debate to become public and would welcome some tweets linking to it, and some genuine discussion to go on.