To whoever is reading, below contains personal information about my history as a technician within UAL, which I am using as part of my research evidence. To allow you a moment to understand, this information has fueled my ambitions more so, rather than deflecting my passion for my job or workplace.
Exploring my young lived experience being a grade 4 teaching and learning technician using a narrative analysis approach, in how my journey has been halted at key points that have effectively been career questioning. I have brought forward in a short format these key points to help illustrate and build a topical approach to narrative analysis within this short time frame.
*Being told that the academics have control over ‘HOW’ I teach industry skills, as we are course-related technical resources.
*Overshadowed in creating educational content, that is selected in a review format to question whether the teaching content is overly technical.
*Short-handed informed that crucial skill-building teaching e.g. hand knitting teaching classes, are being transformed from 7-hour workshops to 20-minute demonstrations.
*Being questioned on industry standards that are too technical and are then overlooked to become technical theory over practical teaching. A garment calculation class is axed and turned into a ‘self-investigative’ handout, which then becomes a technical issue to resolve in 1-2-1 needs.
*Being belittled, over-spoken and made to feel inadequate due to not aligning with the course creative pathway over basic industry requirements.
*Being devalued as a creative, business owner, freelancer, or designer due to being in a ‘technical position’.
*Witnessing the neglect in industry comparison, reality and job possibilities, for more ‘creative’ style teaching practices.
While the examples are my personal experiences working as a grade 4 technician, there have been many more occasions, that fuel my ambition to be recognised in equal measures to that of academics. What I do on a day-to-day basis, is student-facing for the whole of my contracted hours. I experience the turbulence of student behaviours, attitudes and daily struggles. I am not just a technician, I am a mentor, a solid figure within their short educational time frames, I am their teacher in more ways than one. I have comforted young LGBTQ students, who have suffered life-changing ordeals, and I have stayed later than my hours to make sure students well beings cared for and understood. I have listened to troubling fears, and insecurities and been there as a father figure for international students who couldn’t see their families during the pandemic.
We a technical body, are just not technicians, we are everything and more to the student learning experience and we deserve the respect and acknowledgement in equality when it comes to our roles, opportunities and futures.
Using my topical narrative approach, I hope to develop a series of questions that will lead me to develop my presentation and survey in a small focus group of my peers. Considering the most important questions as a starting point to carry this research into my future as a creative technician at UAL and beyond.
The other side of this research project is breaking down the inequality of opportunities that stifle career progression or force technicians to transition over into academia. I have been inspired by the work of Tim Savage, the connection that transcribes his literature into my lived experiences was too relatable to ignore, while Savage’s work has ignited my quest to understand and shape my role as a technician, it has provided me with data and evidence that other universities are experiences similar treatment in working environments as well as transitioning to academic roles or management roles and leaving the technical positions due to non-progression routes in those fields.
Using the series of questions below, I hope to see similar evidence that correlates to my lived experience as well as connecting to Savage’s paper: Creative Arts Technicians in Academia: To Transition or Not to Transition? 2018.
1. Do technical staff members understand and know what a pedagogy is?
2. Have they considered that their own practice might be a pedagogy?
3. Would they consider the technicians to teach practice and process?
4. Do you critically reflect on your teaching practice as a technician?
5. Have you heard of active learning teaching practice/pedagogy?
The second portion of the investigation is to see how we can democratically build a technical career map and plan. Comparing the level 4 technical contract roles and responsibilities and aligning those with the current academic career plan. This portion is to allow participants to see the value in our current responsibilities, what they mean to our roles and how we could move into level 5 or higher positions and expand on the technical responsibilities and department commitments.
1. Where is the technical career pathway like that of the academic career pathway?
2. What are the pros and cons of technical positions within creative education?
3. Considering the academic career pathway, what do you feel is important to consider in a technical career pathway?
4. Do technicians have job Satisfaction?
5. Have you considered transitioning to academia?
As a series of additional questions to help the investigation, working out who has attended from which schools, (SDT, SMC, BFS). Another anchor in this research would be to get a range of staffing on different grade levels. This information is about making sure at this stage of my research and providing a space and voice to each part of the LCF technical family.
With all this information, I am navigating towards a thematic analysis gathering my research evidence through a deductive codex, this will allow a position of reliability in finding similarities in working conditions, frustrations and hardships within the roles of the technical teaching and learning teams. An optimistic approach to carrying this research, the findings I believe will also allow me to adapt my codex into an abductive codex, which will refine my questioning and broaden the audience whom I am targeting.
Reflectively, I want to carry this forward into developing my technical career within UAL and LCF, I have decided while I consider applying for the Master’s program or a Ph.D. program, I will use this time to reshape how we as a technical community the space to heighten our skills as well as developing an educational approach to staff longevity.
References:
McLain, M. (2017). Emerging perspectives on the demonstration as a signature pedagogy in design and technology education. International Journal of Technology and Design Education, 28(4), pp.985–1000. doi:https://doi.org/10.1007/s10798-017-9425-0.
Sams, C. (2016). Spark: UAL Creative Teaching and Learning Journal How do art and design technicians conceive of their role in higher education? Artist (formerly a Technician at Central St Martins). Spark: UAL Creative Teaching and Learning Journal, 1(2), pp.62–69.
Savage, T. (2018). Creative arts technicians in academia: To transition or not to transition? Art, Design & Communication in Higher Education, 17(2), pp.237–253. doi:https://doi.org/10.1386/adch.17.2.237_1.
Savage, T. (2019). Challenging HEA Fellowship: Why should technicians in creative arts HE be drawn into teaching? Art, Design & Communication in Higher Education, 18(2), pp.201–218. doi:https://doi.org/10.1386/adch_00007_1.