Sinéad Baker | Deputy Online Editor
Candidates running for the position of Dean of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences (AHSS) expressed concerns about the College’s current commercialisation strategy, increasing financial cuts and the proposed rebranding of College at a forum in the Synge Theatre of the Arts Block that took place yesterday.
The candidates for the position are Prof. Louis Brennan from the School of Business and Prof. Darryl Jones from the School of English. Present were various academics from the faculty as well as student class representatives.
Both candidates, as well as various academics in attendance, mirrored concerns communicated by groups such as the various capitated bodies and the fellows.
Prof. Brennan referred to the Identity Initiative as “an exercise in shambolic marketism” and spoke of the “mindlessness” of attempting to enforce a managerial mindset in Trinity, claiming that it undermines our ability to excel. He emphasized the importance of ensuring that College’s increasingly limited resources are allocated in the most effective way possible, before clarifying that the rebranding project was not the correct method for achieving this. Prof. Jones stated his belief that we are in danger of betraying “a loss of confidence in ourselves”, affirming that although we cannot become complacent, currently College is not going about it “in the right way”.
With regards to increasing financial cuts across the board Prof. Brennan maintained that investment in education needs to be increased, and that the current growing workload of staff is going “unrewarded” and “unremarked”. Prof. Jones offered that universities “should act as a site of resistance to the conventional wisdom” stating that it “terrifies” him to think we might arrive at a position where the answer to any question comes down to money, adding that a university “is not the sum of its budgets”, that we need to “change the conversation”. He added that the reality is “we’re never going to get more money from the government”, and need to make clear this is “a moral outrage”.
Both professors rebuffed the importance of university rankings yet maintained that they must be considered. Prof. Jones asserted that if College is to be considered excellent, then we need to fight for what is considered excellent, including more staff.
Other issues raised by attendees were staff contracts, student to staff ratios and allocation of resources. The importance of promoting the unique research undertaken in the faculty, the importance of younger academics and diversity within the faculty were also discussed. All permanent staff, adjunct staff, administrators and class reps in the AHSS faculty can vote in the election.
