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Ten Years of Talloires Network - Times Higher Education Opinion Piece - Special Offer
This month brings an occasion for collective celebration as we commemorate ten years since the signing of the Talloires Declaration on the Civic Roles and Social Responsibilities of Higher Education, which gave birth to our network.
In September of 2005, 29 university presidents and leaders gathered at the Tufts European Center in Talloires, France. They came from places as diverse as Brazil, Indonesia, Ghana, Australia, and the United States. They represented very different higher education institutions facing similar challenges: How do we ensure that university education instills a sense of civic service in students? What can our universities do to prepare graduates to have impact in their communities through meaningful partnerships and social entrepreneurship? How can we collaborate across the globe to strengthen our commitment to social responsibility within academia?
In the last ten years, we have brought people together to explore these questions. What started with those 29 university presidents has expanded to include colleagues in more than 350 institutions. Today, many more people are directly engaged or represented in TN’s work, through the Youth Economic Participation Initiative, the University Volunteers Program, the MacJannet Prize for Global Citizenship and the Regional Perspectives in Civic Engagement cohort.
This week, the Talloires Network Steering Committee will gather in New York City to evaluate our collective efforts to date, and to chart the course for the future. We hope that, wherever you might find yourself today, you will contribute and be part of that future as well.
Best regards,
Anthony P. Monaco
President, Tufts University
Chair, Talloires Network
Talloires Network Leaders Challenge the Global Rankings
The negative impacts of the university rankings on civic engagement were a significant topic of discussion at the 2014 Cape Town conference. The seven-point conference Call to Action urged TN and its members to: "Influence the global university ranking systems to take civic engagement seriously and to reduce the negative effects of the ranking systems on the public service responsibilities of higher education."
Talloires Network Steering Committee Chair Tony Monaco and Vice Chair Cheryl de la Rey penned an op-ed Times Higher Education: World University Rankings blog: should global league tables consider community engagement. They said:
University civic engagement is vitally important—for faculty and students, for communities, and for universities themselves. It offers a unique opportunity to improve teaching through an active, experiential pedagogy that can elevate student learning across the full range of fields. It educates future leaders for change by giving future engineers, physicians, or businesswomen meaningful opportunities to serve while they learn.It can significantly improve conditions in communities, whether by increasing literacy rates or cleaning up the environment. And it builds support for higher education by providing visible evidence that universities are a good public investment.
But the global rankings pay little attention to these activities. In fact, their overwhelming emphasis on research reputation and productivity systematically undercuts other key missions. The result? Unrealistic research aspirations at many universities, and unrealistic research expectations among policy-makers and funding authorities. The cumulative effect is that, worldwide, too many universities direct scarce resources disproportionately toward the kind of research measured by rankings at the expense of their civic, social, and educational missions.
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