Our first “Inclusivity Friday” blogpost by James Derounian, De Montfort/ Society of Local Council Clerks
Ageing and inclusivity in the Academy?
James Derounian, a Tiggerish 60-something lecturer in community engagement, and 2007 NTF, takes aim at ageism within academia…….
The aphorism runs, ‘with age comes wisdom’! Even if this was half true then, surely, we turn our backs on older academics, colleagues and humans, at our peril? And yet I heard recently from a colleague who believes age was a key factor in why they lost their job – that and a related issue that, given donkey’s years’ service, they were expensive. Why pay for one wrinkly, when you can take on two cheaper whippersnappers on doubtful contracts?
Older academics rather than being expendable, can carry the institutional memory. Here’s an example. Imagine an HE institution that was awarded grant aid to build a hub to enable particular approaches to teaching and learning. After a while the money runs dry, linked staff depart and the building becomes general teaching space…the purpose dies, with all that knowledge and experience lost. What a waste.
There’s also research showing that students rate the teaching by younger academics over that of older ones. Joye and Wilson (2015: 126), for example found students “reported greater perceived rapport and attractiveness with…younger versus older professors…Thus, age…bias likely impact student evaluations of teaching.” Inclusivity is rightly about an equal playing field across genders, sexuality, class etc. But what of age? Truly the invisible, the elephant in the staff room. Universities are so keen on widening participation – including attracting students across the age range, to promote lifelong learning – that they fail to see the mote in their eye – the retention, reward and acknowledgement of older lecturers that are not deadweight but can be cloth of gold.
Carstensen et al (2011) presented evidence showing that compared to younger adults, older ones display greater emotional stability, are less likely to express anger or fear, and more likely to seek to make meaningful contributions. They go on to support the idea that older people generate wiser responses to highly charged personnel problems, which are potentially beneficial for workplace productivity and cohesion.
Audre Lorde in a 2007 collection of essays and speeches memorably commented that If younger members of a community, or managers “view the older members as contemptible or suspect or excess, they will never be able to join hands and examine the living memories of the community, nor ask the all-important question, ‘Why?’ This gives rise to a historical amnesia that keeps us working to invent the wheel every time we have to go to the store for bread.”
Colleagues mature in age can be social capital incarnate. They may also embody Vygotsky’s (1978: 86) Zone of Proximal Development (‘the distance between the actual development level as determined by independent problem solving and the level of potential development as determined through problem solving…in collaboration with a more capable peer’); whereby – as I wrote in my PhD by published work (Derounian, 2021: 58) – This chimes strongly with the ability of a senior academic to enable a younger one to solve problems via guidance/mentoring alongside a better equipped peer.
Older faculty members are social capital. Such accumulated ‘wealth’ protects against a ‘rainy day’, such as a pandemic. If not those who have experienced adversity and dealt with it in their extended lives, who then can we turn to in a time of acute need and opportunity?
References
Carstensen, L.L. Turan, B. Scheibe, S. Ram, N. Ersner-Hershfield, H. Samanez-Larkin, G.R. Brooks, K.P. and Nesselroade, J.R. (2011)Emotional Experience Improves with Age: Evidence Based on Over 10 Years of Experience Sampling. Psychol Aging. 26(1): 21–33. Available online at https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3332527/ [accessed 18.8.2020]
Derounian, J.G.P. (2020) A confluence of two rivers: A reflection on the meeting point between community development and higher education teaching and learning. PhD by publication, with accompanying narrative. Cheltenham: University of Gloucestershire. Available online at http://eprints.glos.ac.uk/9477/1/9477_J_Derounian_%202020_PhD_%20by_%20publication_A_confluence_of_two_rivers_A_reflection_on_the_meeting_point_between_community_development_and_HE_teaching_and_learning.pdf [accessed 18.8.2021]
Joye, S.W.and Wilson, J.H. (2015) Professor Age and Gender Affect Student Perceptions and Grades. Journal of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, 15(4): 126-138
Lorde, A. (2013) Sister Outsider ESSAYS AND SPEECHES. Berkeley: Crossing Press
Shaw, S.M. (2020) Gender and Ageism in the Academy March 4. Inside HigherEd. Available online at https://www.insidehighered.com/views/2020/03/04/universities-should-not-minimize-influence-older-women-academe-opinion [accessed 18.8.2020]
