Assessment, Learning & Teaching Reflections |
Wednesday 8 February, 2006
Fabric is made of threads. If these threads would be just arranged in parallel, they would not form a fabric – the fabric would fall apart. Instead, for a fabric to provide a stabile structure, the threads need to be woven into patterns, interacting with each other and creating mutual support.
University faculties are like these threads: if aligned only in parallel, without interaction across boundaries, the fabric of a university does not exist. There are many opportunities to create this fabric: such an opportunity arose when the Running Stream Professors of Leeds Metropolitan held a joint dinner on 16 January. Topics from such diverse areas as health, sports, ethics, creativity, business, learning, teaching, and technology were discussed in a relaxed atmosphere, providing the basis of an exchange of ideas, concepts, thought models. This gave insights into the thinking and teaching process of other disciplines, hereby enlightening each individual’s perception of their own fields of expertise and providing new perspectives for the student-teacher relationship. The Queenswood building provided the appropriate frame for such an evening – a quiet setting in a historic building. This kind of networking promotes the weaving of the university fabric – into a large-scale tapestry of research and teaching.
Reinhold Behringer
Running Stream professor
