A CONTROVERSIAL decision by a leading Scottish university to close a culture and language course is to be reviewed after claims it was unlawful.
The next meeting of Glasgow University’s ruling Court is to hear concerns from two of the institution’s academics that moves to shut the Slavonic Studies course run counter to legislation on higher education.
Dr Aileen McHarg and Professor Tom Mullen, who specialise in administrative law, raised the issue with Professor Anton Muscatelli, the university principal, in June after the closure decision.
They argue the 1966 Universities (Scotland) Act stipulates that withdrawing degree programmes has to be agreed by Senate, which represents academics, before Court can proceed.
In the case of Slavonic Studies, an earlier meeting of the university Senate expressed disapproval over the closure plans.
A letter from the pair circulated to university colleagues states: “The upshot of our discussions is that -- although management remains of the view that the decision is lawful -- Court will be asked .... to review its decision to withdraw Slavonic Studies in light of the concerns we have raised.”
The row comes as universities are facing growing calls to protect lesser-taught languages.
Last week, Oscar-winning playwright Sir Tom Stoppard handed in a petition to the Scottish Parliament backing the retention of “vulnerable” modern languages at Scottish universities.
The 3000-strong petition highlights a campaign to promote lesser-taught languages and cultures such as Russian, Czech and Polish.
Sir Tom -- who has won Academy and Tony awards for his work, including Shakespeare In Love and Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, and who was born Tomas Straussler in the former Czechoslovakia -- said languages have an important role to play.
“Learning Eastern European languages is a resource, certainly for the Scottish undergraduates,” he said. “It’s a resource in the real world of economics just as much as it’s a resource for the general fulfilment of a whole life.”
A spokesman for the University of Glasgow said officials believed the decision had been correctly made.
“At its next meeting, Court will be briefed on a question that has been raised regarding the legal basis for its decision.
“The university’s legal advice is that Court’s decision is sound,” he said.
He added: “The decision to close the course in Slavonic Studies will allow the university to invest elsewhere in the School of Modern Languages and, indeed, elsewhere in the university.
“Modern language provision is a vital part of our offerings. This was made clear .... when it was confirmed we would continue to teach the full, current range of modern languages, and at the levels presently taught.”
The development is the latest battle between the university and academics over the nature and importance of Slavonic Studies.
The university argues the course does not have a language teaching element and that take-up by students has been low.
However, supporters of the course say Slavonic Studies includes optional courses in Czech, Russian and Polish, and student numbers have risen steadily from 2004-05 to 2010-11.
It is also argued that learning about the cultures of Eastern Europe encourages more people to study its languages.
The university argues all the language elements will continue to be delivered at the same level.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article