The impact of Covid-19 and pandemic policies on the freedom to teach

The threat to the freedom to teach at university is conventionally understood in sensationalist terms as the censure of radical university teachers by powerful external bodies. An under-explored alternative interpretation relates to the extent to which university teachers are free to develop and determine their own methods to teach the university curriculum on a day-to-day basis. Yet, this pedagogic self-governance, so long taken-for-granted despite the evolution of quality assurance systems, massification and the professionalization of the curriculum, has recently been subject to more interventionist teaching and learning policies inspired and justified by the Covid-19 pandemic. Under this pretext many universities have introduced policies that increasingly direct how teaching should take place undermining pedagogic self-governance in the process. Significant interventions include the ‘streamlining’ of the curriculum, the replacement of lectures with online learning tasks and the burgeoning influence EdTech companies. Copyright © 2023 Bruce Macfarlane.