Universities exist for the creation and dispersion of knowledge. They are generators of innovation and, through the vast experience of those who teach and do research there, it could be said they are also repositories of wisdom.
But the reality today is that our university is perceived by most people solely as a place where young people prepare for a career. Especially at a time when our society is facing significant social challenges, our higher education institutions need to be held to higher standards than that.
Higher education has responsibilities towards society. It does have to prepare graduates to obtain viable employment. But it is also about offering soundly reasoned and timely criticism in areas of public policy and social and economic life.
Our university and vocational colleges should be significant and influential bodies in civil society, providing guidance and direction. They are responsible not only to produce graduates who contribute to the advancement of society in economic terms but also professionals in various fields who, by their ideas and their engagement, help create a more cohesive and forward-looking community.
All of these daunting challenges require inspirational leadership. Our tertiary education institutions need people at the helm who foster and engage in public debate about how our education system, at all levels, serves society and how it must change and adapt to evolving needs.
Soon, the university will hold an election for the appointment of a rector for the next five years. Two candidates, the incumbent and a faculty dean, will contest the post. The event, however, does not seem to have stirred much debate about what the future rector’s vision should be of the university’s role over the next five years. Andrew Azzopardi, the Dean of the Faculty of Social Well-being, has pointed out that, like other academics, he is “uncomfortable” with this lack of debate and engagement in the run-up to the election.
To those who follow our education system closely, this lack of debate comes as no surprise. The public discussion of educational issues in general is often characterised by petty squabbles between teachers’ unions and policymakers. We rarely hear, for instance, about how our young people need to be better prepared for a variety of roles in the future that are being rapidly transformed by automation and digitalisation.
Various studies indicate that tertiary educated people’s labour market outcomes are better than those without qualifications or early school leavers. Yet, we continue to occupy one of the lowest rankings in the EU of students who leave the educational system with no qualifications. Some of our graduates are also finding it challenging to find the kind of jobs that a university qualification should provide them with. They often end up underemployed in jobs for which they are overqualified.
Our public education system is failing our society because political leaders over the past decades lacked imagination about what needs to be done to promote social mobility for the many and not just the few. As in some western countries, our education system has, for long, been a mincing machine in which too many children and young people from distressed family backgrounds are written off because they do not display certain traditional habits of mind.
Is education creating a fairer society? Does every individual feel of value? Are all students given enough help to live a successful life?
Our society needs to engage in an honest public reflection on how our education system is performing and one would expect the leaders of our tertiary education institutions to be catalysts of this soul-searching exercise.