As promised earlier we would provide a copy of the background paper which is being circulated in anticipation of the major strategic review into the School of Social and Political Sciences. And here it is. It’s 9 pages long, and has a worryingly large amount of acronyms (only some of which are explained [but the university does have a page explaining all of its acronyms which is helpful]), but fortunately the diagrams in it which outline the possible future models for structuring the school are clear and concise.

To quote the email we received, the paper ‘offers a range of possible models for colleagues to consider and tries to flag the potential benefits and risks associated with each. It is certainly not intended to exhaust all possible options… but rather to provide some background for the ongoing conversation and provoke thinking about a number of possible futures.’

We’ll try here to summarise the main points of the paper, but we recommend that if you want to send a submission to the Review Panel, you read the whole thing yourself.

The paper reinforces the notion that SSPS has grown massively, and that a review is needed to determine the best way to organise the school. In 2008 there was 65 full-time equivalent staff (both academics and admin). This grew to 106 by the end of last year.  There were around 2300 students studying within SSPS last year. If SSPS was a Faculty and not a School, it would be 7th largest (out of 16) at Sydney by staff numbers and the 9th largest in terms of student load.

This growth has resulted in insufficient infrastructure, a less than adequate staff to student ration and an administrative overload.

One of the major focuses of the review is to look at the structure of SSPS. While any change in structure of the school will not fix infrastructure and staff problems (which they do admit) they believe that a review into the structure of SSPS will help to the following questions -

  1. What set of arrangements best serve the interests of our students (both UG and PG), in terms of supporting and helping maintain high quality teaching programs, access to vibrant intellectual communities and the ability to take advantage of our research strengths and expertise?
  2. What set of arrangements best enables us to take advantage of the expertise and research strengths of our academic staff, as well as helping to seed, promote and enable new areas of research and teaching strength, especially through inter (and intra)disciplinary collaboration?
  3. What set of arrangements best serve the interests of the Faculty and the University in terms of creating greater capacity for and visibility of our work in the social sciences more generally, including our engagement with policy makers and the public and private sector?

There are two possible models the background paper looks at for the structure of SSPS, with variants of each model discussed proposed -

1. Single School Model, e.g. either

     a. Single School structure with departments (i.e. the status quo, albeit with those changes required to improve administrative support, research performance better coordination of teaching and public engagement);

or

     b. Rationalised Single School structure – as per the current school but creating a larger, more inclusive grouping of disciplines within a new ‘Politics and IR’ domain (i.e. Government & International Relations plus some or all of Political Economy, Centre for International Security Studies, Graduate School of Government, Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies). The name of this new, larger group would need to be developed in consultation with the relevant constituent units.

2. Two School Model, e.g. either

     a. Two School structure with departments and centres;

or

     b. Two School structure without departments (i.e. as per Economics)

If you’re after more details on the different models please look at the background paper, they have visual models for each which explain things very clearly, and have pros and cons for each model. Discussion of the different models takes up the bulk of the paper.

Infrastructure concerns are limited to an acknowledgement at the end of the paper that some of the models for the restructuring of the school are not feasible with the current arrangements of SSPS being spread widely across the campus.

So there’s our summary.  Obviously as students we’re interested in the first question outlined in the discussion paper (What set of arrangements best serve the interests of our students…?) and if you wish to make a submission to the review panel that would be a good starting place to start brainstorming.

Submissions to the review panel can be made individually, as a group or through the relevant club or society or Department Rep. Send your submissions to Helen Ash (arts.dean@sydney.edu.au) no later than 5pm Thursday 29 September.

Simon Wyatt-Spratt

2011 FASS Undergrad Rep

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