IN-PERSON MADRID FOCUS ON PEDAGOGY. SECTION A

Abstract

Working at the intersection of professional services and academe in the UK, I see Higher Education increasingly characterised by a fragmentation of the learning (and teaching) experience, notably in the proliferation of services and resources meant to “support” and “empower” students. The holistic nature of education together with its human touch and care seem to be rooted out in favour of a complex and impersonal system that leaves too many students overwhelmed, confused and isolated – even more so since the covid crisis. A sustained interest in care in education together with the theory of relationality proposed by Escobar et al. provide a promising theoretical framework to consider how different actors within the machine can join forces to help repair the human fabric of HE. I propose to weave theories of relationality and care to inform my own praxis, “supporting” a postgraduate programme as its “critical friend” (as a colleague called me). This master’s brings history and architectural design together to imagine reparative approaches to the built environment. The programme, which attracts a very international cohort, actively encourages a critical, interdisciplinary and intercultural engagement with the past and historical inequities. Rather than outsourcing the teaching of skills, we want to embed criticality and communication in the fabric of students’ learning journeys. Criticality here is then considered in its interdisciplinary dimensions: as a way to both engage with the historical pasts and help ignite designers’ imagination in order to foster distinct, creative and critical voices.