Alternatives in Higher EducationAuthor(s): David PrestonSource: Area, Vol. 7, No. 1 (1975), p. 54Published by: The Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers)Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20000936 .

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54 Reports of symposia

to stimulate the flow of information between geography departments in the London area. The Chairmen summed up the session by suggesting that, first, an annual residen tial conference should be run for all entering into postgraduate geography work. This

would allow people to get to know those working in their field at an early stage of research. Secondly, it was necessary to systematize the flow of information between geography departments. At present this flow was far too patchy. Lastly they felt that communication was inhibited by the ethos of debate which insists that research is only discussed when finely polished reports can be presented. There was a need for alternative and more informal forums where such an ethos did not prevail.

Peter Clark(LSE) Ian Cook (Liverpool Polytechnic)

Alternatives in higher education Organizer: David Preston (Leeds)

The main purpose of this session was to encourage participants to discuss what they were engaged in doing by way of new or successful teaching methods and to explore what problems we have in common in educating students about geography. This session was more successful than the rather impromptu meeting in Norwich in 1974 in getting people to air their views and share their worries. Thirty or forty people attended from a range of institutions and with considerable differences in age, seniority and outlook. Andy Blowers (Open University) spoke of the work associated with the preparation of the sophisticated teaching packages that make up OU courses. He suggested that we might learn from the care with which course aims were speci fied and objectives defined and large first year university courses might make use of at least some OU material. No-one reacted to this. Other OU staff present supported

Blowers and commented on the important differences between students at the OU and conventional universities. Speakers seemed impressed by the OU work but unwilling to admit that much was relevant to them.

David Preston (Leeds) reported on an effort to develop a more student-centred course structure in a course on Latin America and on the difficulty of arriving at any realistic measure of student benefit from this organization. Discussion was lively and strayed over problems of assessment, research on teaching methods, the virtues of

Oxbridge tutorials. Some questioned what was wrong with lectures anyway. Several participants referred to their own teaching programmes and reactions to innovation. It was unfortunate that this session coincided with the post-graduate forum which was concerned with similar problems from a different angle. It seemed clear that people were willing to discuss their involvement in education but that a future session might be most productive if organized around a single theme, such as assessment. This will be explored for the Lanchester Conference in 1976. Meanwhile anyone with comments and suggestions is encouraged to write to David Preston.

David Preston University of Leeds

The housing market and social class segregation in British cities Organizer and Chairman: Prof. J. H. Johnson (Lancaster) Contributors: A. A. Kirby (Newcastle-upon-Tyne) Housing market studies: a critical review S. S. Duncan (Cambridge) Research direction in social geography: housing oppor

tunities and constraints

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