I was at ECER in Istanbul with the new ESE Network – which you will know all about if you've been paying attention.
The meeting was at BAU, a university I'd not been to before. There’s a rumour that it’s given the egregious Sepp Blatter an honorary degree (I think, for services to Sepp Blatter); if so, I'll not be going again. It was a fine setting though, on the shore of the Bosphorus.
I confess that this was as much a culture week as an ECER one, and as such, the star of the show was the Blue Mosque. You don't have to be in thrall to the Prophet's pen (p.b. ...) to see this as a wonder of the world. A rival, I'd say, to the Tutor splendour of Charlecote Park as the most perfect of perfect buildings. Just wonderful in every sense. I am in thrall to the Blue Mosque.
In more secular terms, the highlight of the ECER meeting for me was a paper by Johann Öhman from Örebro University who brought together three research studies about sustainable development in educational practice, exploring possibilities and restraints. Very well done, and excellent scholarship. Worth the entry price just for this.
The prize for thoroughness goes, unsurprisingly, to a couple of splendid German academics, Marco Rieckmann (University of Vechta) and Matthias Barth (University of Applied Science Ostwestfalen-Lippe) whose nuanced paper on current trends and approaches in research in HE for sustainable development was as informative as it was detailed and careful.
At the opposite pole was a report on a project around participation for / about / in / under / etc sustainability. It was funded through Interreg IV A which is an EU fund with € zillions to aid integration. In this case, to help southern Sweden and the Copenhagen region to understand each other better. Ha! What a ridiculous idea. As boon a doggle as you'd not want to find. This programme was surely designed for Belfast, Bosnia, Berlin, the Basques, Beiruit, and even Berwick, maybe, but not two countries who get on together just fine. The EU just has too much German taxpayers tax cash to dish out if it funds nonsense like this. It's enough to bring out the inner Eurosceptic.
The hotel bar was full of square-jawed, silent Americans, with their thin-lipped, carefully-thin spouses, who all looked as if they'd just stepped off the flight deck of the USS Charlton Heston to put some backbone into the locals. They did not seem to be enjoying themselves.
This is a city where commerce never seems to sleep, and it is hard not to be urged to buy something. It's certainly where Milton's dictum applies with force: they also serve who only stand and wait around on the streets by their stalls. As it was, I lost count of the number of would be sellers who approached me with the opening line: "You from Australia?". There is, of course, no surer way to turn me off consumption altogether. I did buy some fine Turkish socks, though, at a price which made me wonder where the profit (p.b. ...) was.
So; Enjoyable? Certainly. Culturally ab fab? Yes! A good start to the ESE network? A qualified maybe. All will depend on how clear and tight the guidelines for the network's functionings are. Will the self-indulgent, descriptive and confused be kept out. Well, I do hope so ... .
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