{"id":52121,"date":"2020-05-04T14:15:16","date_gmt":"2020-05-04T21:15:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/world.edu\/?p=52121"},"modified":"2020-05-04T14:15:16","modified_gmt":"2020-05-04T21:15:16","slug":"progress","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/world.edu\/progress\/","title":{"rendered":"Progress"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

Progress \u2013 getting somewhere. Good progress \u2013 doing what is expected and a bit more. Poor progress \u2013 the reverse. Remember those ambiguous school reports? \u201cPatricia is making good progress with\u2026 , but she could do better in \u2026 \u201d\u00a0Patricia is not doing as well as might be expected in all the things that are expected.\u00a0Which of course raises the questions \u2013 As well as might be expected When, and Where? And By whom? And Who decides What Is Expected?<\/p>\n

The word progress has been playing on my mind recently. I am meant to be making progress on a book manuscript. But it has been slow. Painfully slow. If there is a writing equivalent to Shakespeare\u2019s \u201cshining morning face, creeping unwillingly to school\u201d then I am it.\u00a0As I am sure are many of you. Well I certainly hope I\u2019m not the only one! Put it this way, I wouldn\u2019t be surprised if many of you weren\u2019t in the same boat. Keeping going, one sentence after the other, but not making that much headway. A little bit each day.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m book writing. Always book writing. But right now I\u2019ve had to resort to the time-honoured tradition of reading myself into the writing. Not free writing, but reading. I wrote a few lines about each text. I put the lines together. I then sorted the lines into something that looked like the stuff I wanted in the order I thought it needed to be. Then I strung together some words that linked it all together and, yes, it looked like a coherent text.<\/p>\n

Using this reading, noting and writing approach, I ground out 6k or so good-enough-for-now words in four weeks.\u00a0The result is hardly a riveting read. To be truthful, it\u2019s pretty dry and dull. But it is a first draft.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m finding it hard right now to meet my own expectations of progress. \u00a0It is just seriously psychologically tricky \u2013 and there are other priorities besides making progress on a book. Keeping in touch with colleagues and PHDers takes priority. Social media connections are important to sustain too. Still, I have this sneaking worry that I ought to be making more progress. I don\u2019t have caring responsibilities, I\u2019m privileged, I ought to be making better progress than I am.<\/p>\n

So then to read about\u00a0the person who wrote and published a book about the economics of coronavirus in 19 days<\/a>? Less time than I took to write 6k words. Hmmm.\u00a0Well it wasn\u2019t a big book, it was 40k words. But still. 40K words. Compared to this, my progress is pretty poor.<\/p>\n

The quick-off-the-mark economist has gone public about his achievement. He found a publisher in unbelievably fast time. His manuscript was peer reviewed and he corrected it with a week to spare. He describes the process as gruelling \u2013 but largely because of the subject matter.<\/p>\n

Many of the responses to his blog post were critical. Most commenters registered concern that this quick book epitomised an academic productivity that is unreasonable and unhealthy \u2013 excellent progress, outstanding progress yes, but also a norm which was potentially problematic.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m torn between thinking, well good luck to you rapid writer. In another life I\u2019ve been able to crank out a chapter every few days, but this isn\u2019t me now. But my second thought is that my writing task is different. I\u2019m not writing a populist book. The current book I\u2019m working on with a colleague requires a lot of literature work, a lot of data analysis, and a lot of thinking about \u2013 and I\u2019m pretty sure that I\/we couldn\u2019t speedily write anything that was any good.<\/p>\n

Progress is always a relative thing \u2013 it\u2019s related to the task and the time available. In order to assess my own progress more realistically, I\u2019ve had to think \u00a0about the particularity of my own situation. And I\u2019ve had to speak to myself very firmly about not falling prey to very unhelpful comparisons. Comparison is of course the name of the competitive academic game and it\u2019s toxic. I\u2019ve had to remind myself that it is OK to do what you can, as you can, in the extraordinary times we are in. Just as it was in the old normal.<\/p>\n

But I do fear that some of the powers-that-be will be dazzled by the example of the-book-in-a-month. I want those who audit academic productivity to recognise that I, my colleagues and our PhDers\u00a0are<\/em>\u00a0making progress, but it\u2019s good enough progress, the best possible progress we can make, right now. We might not be writing a book in a month, or even three months, or six, but we are still moving along. Slowly, more like the tortoise than the hare, but moving nevertheless.<\/p>\n

And a third thought.\u00a0Dare I hope that we might expunge the notion of universal progress, a normative progress that applies to all people everywhere at the same time? Couldn\u2019t we arrive at a view\u00a0of progress\u00a0that is a bit more nuanced? Is this something that might emerge from the current situation?<\/p>\n

And one final thought. Perhaps publishers of university blogs and news might recognise that rather a large number of scholars have had the possibility of making\u00a0any<\/em>\u00a0progress taken away from them. PhDs stalled. Contracts not renewed. Positions furloughed then cancelled. Redundancies. Shrinking job market. Reading about writing book in a month is not what they need. Not at all. So perhaps it wasn\u2019t the best editorial decision ever made to print this one \u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Progress \u2013 getting somewhere. Good progress \u2013 doing what is expected and a bit more. Poor progress \u2013 the reverse. Remember those ambiguous school reports? \u201cPatricia is making good progress with\u2026 , but she could do better in \u2026 \u201d\u00a0Patricia is not doing as well as might be expected in all the things that are […]\n… learn more→<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":52122,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15645],"tags":[295361],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-52121","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-education","tag-progress"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nProgress - World leading higher education information and services<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/world.edu\/progress\/\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Progress - World leading higher education information and services\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Progress \u2013 getting somewhere. Good progress \u2013 doing what is expected and a bit more. Poor progress \u2013 the reverse. Remember those ambiguous school reports? \u201cPatricia is making good progress with\u2026 , but she could do better in \u2026 \u201d\u00a0Patricia is not doing as well as might be expected in all the things that are […]\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/world.edu\/progress\/\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"World leading higher education information and services\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-05-04T21:15:16+00:00\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/world.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/05\/progress-bars.png\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"680\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"353\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Kevin\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Kevin\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/progress\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/progress\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Kevin\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/42c1c1d5ff7ffbdf0bd50ed94c6ae6ee\"},\"headline\":\"Progress\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-05-04T21:15:16+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/progress\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":933,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/progress\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2020\\\/05\\\/progress-bars.png\",\"keywords\":[\"progress\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Education\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/progress\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/world.edu\\\/progress\\\/\",\"name\":\"Progress - 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