The projectification of the university: consequences and alternatives

ABSTRACT

Conceptualizations of time and work in the higher education context are increasingly atomized, as time is seen as measurable, quantifiable, and limited. This growing phenomenon, seen through the lens of projectification, has the power to reconceptualize how university leaders and the academic workforce consider and utilize their time and work, leading to significant consequences in daily university life. In this article, I will introduce and discuss this dominant and yet infrequently studied lens of projectified time and highlight how it has come to shape academic teaching practices, curriculum design, and university culture. In the second part of the article, I will offer an alternative lens that contests assumptions found within projectification such as that all work can be compartmentalized into specific projects. To exemplify this alternate lens further, I will also use a fictional narrative approach to showcase how an academic may rebuff projectified time in daily work.

KEYWORDS:

• Higher education
• projectification
• time
• academic work
• project-based learning

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank Amanda White, Hannah Schuholz, Trina Jorre St Jorre, and the reviewers for their feedback on revisions of the paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).