Why studying Theology and Religion matters

In the face of Worries for UK Theology and Religion departments, Helen Ingram has an excellent shout out, 101 Reasons to Study Theology and Religion: The Call for Comments. Helen herself is a University of Birmingham BA in Theology and PhD in New Testament studies and she speaks with authority as well as humour. I think she is right that university leadership often thinks of Theology and Religion as "soft touch" and I would add that this is often born out of ignorance. It's important for those of us working and studying in the sector to let the powers know what we do and why it's worthwhile.

Worries for UK Theology and Religion Departments?

Last week's Church Times has a worrying article about the problems in store for Theology and Religion departments in UK universities:

Axe hovers over world of academic Theology

The report is attributed to a "staff reporter" and suggests that "University theology departments are facing a turbulent autumn with rounds of staffing cuts and closures." At this point is difficult to see if the concerns expressed are legitimate or not.  Bangor's School of Theology and Religious Studies is mentioned, but it appears that the closure is in fact the result of a merger with the department at Trinity Saint David.  The University of Birmingham's Theology and Religion department, my former home, gets a special mention too, with an unnamed "source" speaking about low morale.

The rather vague nature of the claims, and the anonymity of the sources quoted, lead to some scepticism about the scale of the potential threat, at least at this point, but this will be one worth watching, especially in the light of the recent Sheffield and Gloucestershire situations.

HT: Roger Pearse, but I completely dissociate myself from his extraordinary take on the report.

Guardian's British University League Tables published

The Guardian has published its league tables for teaching excellence for 2010. Here is the University league table, with Oxford coming top, Cambridge second and St Andrews third:

University League Table 2010

There are also tables for individual subject areas. Here's the one for Religious Studies and Theology:

University Guide 2010: Religious Studies and Theology

It's the same top three, Oxford, Cambridge and St Andrews, but in this subject area Durham ranks for more highly (4th) than the institution as a whole (14th). I'm naturally delighted to see my alma mater topping both charts, but sorry to see my former employer, University of Birmingham, down at a sorry 24 in both lists. Heythrop College, another former employer, is at an honourable 14 in the Religious Studies and Theology list. One obvious success story is the ranking of the Scottish Universities, with St Andrews, Edinburgh and Glasgow in the Religious Studies and Theology Top 10, and Aberdeen bubbling under at 11. Oxford Brookes is impressive at 12, and I suspect that Sheffield, Manchester and Nottingham will be disappointed to miss out on the Top 10.

Where to study Theology in the UK

Jim West links to an interesting article in today's Independent on Theology in the UK. It is aimed at sixth-formers (the British equivalent of junior / senior high) who might be considering where to study Theology and is part of The Independent's Getting Into University Guide:

Theology
Tim Walker

It's a useful piece, but I think it is a bit over-ambitious, attempting to summarizing the top qualities of too many places, and inevitably showing stronger knowledge of some departments than of others. Lancaster and Sheffield are mentioned repeatedly, and rightly so because they are fine insitutions, but others are rather cursorily passed over. It's good to see my former institution, Birmingham, getting a few mentions, but it's perverse not to say anything special about Oxford (or even Cambridge for that matter) other than to list them where they have to.

Update (Saturday 2 February): it seems that this Independent article is seriously oudated, and the new date on the article is misleading. Nathan MacDonals helpfully emails (excerpted):

A close analysis of the article shows it to be a slightly dated composition. The future tense in "Lancaster will also be offering a new BA course for 2004" suggests the article was composed in 2003. The five centres at Sheffield no longer correspond to the centres that are on their website, and the asking grades are also out of date (many, e.g. Durham and Manchester) are now considerably higher. In addition the 'where's best for teaching' that is deemed fascinating by Jim West relies on QAA and TQA data, which could go back up to 6-7 years before the article. Robert Segal has been in Aberdeen (not Lancaster) since 2006, and David Clines is Emeritus, so I hope
no young readers of the Independent expect to receive too much tuition from him.

No doubt it will have some value for those outside the UK. Though they might also want to note that Westcott is no longer at Cambridge and Robertson Smith has been removed from his chair at Aberdeen.

I should have realized. Another clue is that the article sings the praises of Hugh McLeod who moved from the Theology department to the History department while I was still there. All in all, the article is of even more limited usefulness than I'd first realized.

PhD: UK or USA?

Correspondent Zerihun Dula asks about the respective advantages and disadvantages of PhD programmes in the UK and the USA. I have some experience now of the USA via Duke University, and more experience of the UK via the University of Birmingham, and other universities where I have studied (Oxford) or examined (Glasgow, St Andrews, Aberdeen, Surrey, London), and this brief sketch is based on that limited experience.

Each country has its own advantages, and I can see why individuals prefer one over the other. The major difference between the two countries is the presence of course work in the American system. Each Duke PhD student has at least two years' course work under their belt before they embark on their dissertation. This contrasts radically with most British Universities, where there is no course work requirement. The typical British PhD student in Religion or Theology will spend most of their time as a PhD student on intensive work for their dissertation. I am convinced that the American system is superior here, especially with respect to preparing students for employment as academics. They have a much better grasp of a greater range of materials, and the necessity for the submission of papers to individual course tutors means that graduate students are often preparing research-quality work that is outside their ultimate dissertation topic. It is now common for the best PhD students in America to get pieces of course work accepted for publication in major journals. This provides a major leg-up in the hunt for jobs. By contrast, I had published nothing by the time I had finished my PhD thesis in 1994. I had still published nothing until I got that thesis published in 1996. And of course that broader range also helps with preparation for teaching -- American PhD students are not getting launched into course preparation in subjects they have never studied.

One of the down sides, though, with the American system is that the two or so years of course work can seriously prolong the business of getting your PhD. Let's say you leave school at 18, take a standard American four year degree, a two year Masters and then at least four years PhD, and you are at least 28 before you can even get started on your career. In the UK, your BA is three years, your Masters sometimes only one year (sometimes two, depending on the programme) and your PhD can be done in three years. If you left school at eighteen, you are now 25 or 26. Those couple of years you have on your American counterparts you could use to travel the world, or to get some experience doing something completely different, and so improve your career prospects that way.

One of the things that has happened in the UK over the last generation is realization of the importance of PhD students getting a bit more grounding in the subject outside of the area of the PhD dissertation, which is why most universities now insist, as far as possible, on students coming in at least with a Masters. This did not used to be the case. And incoming PhD students will rarely jump straight into the PhD programme but will instead begin on "probationary" status and only be upgraded when the department is persuaded that the candidate has the ability and application to complete successfully.

Another major difference between the USA and the UK, as I have experienced the different systems in the two countries, is the presence, in the US, of the "committee". All the way through the American graduate student's life, s/he has the guidance of a three or four person committee. This committee has to approve the dissertation proposal, provides differing degrees of advice throughout the process, and is the ultimate examining body. In the UK, your supervisor is the ultimate authority until you get to the submission of your thesis, at which point you will be examined by an internal examiner and an external examiner. The internal is recruited from within the university and the external will be someone recruited from outside specially to read your thesis.

Both systems have strengths here. The involvement of an external is a strength of the British system, ensuring quality control across the different universities and providing expert comment in a way that can be greatly to the candidate's advantage, especially if s/he is looking to get a version of the dissertation published at some point in the future. It is perhaps worth adding, though, that American universities seem sometimes to recruit academics from outside the university to sit on dissertation committees, e.g. I am sitting on two committees at different universities in the US.

Having spoken in favour of the British external examiner system, I should add that I am very impressed so far with the committee structures here in the US. While it can mean that everything is all rather "in house", it has the advantage of exposing the student's ideas and writing to a greater number of a people at a much earlier stage. More pairs of eyes, more guidance, extra wisdom can greatly help the student to refine his or her project, and problems can get picked up earlier. The system feels rather more community based too; several faculty members in a given area have stakes in a given individual's research, and among other things that can also help in the process of scholars providing strong and informed references for job applications.

The big question, though, is the one about finance. There is a major differences here between the two countries, not widely understood. Many American PhD programmes come with money attached, so if you apply to somewhere like Duke, you are applying not only to be accepted into the programme but also to receive a scholarship. And the scholarships can be generous, paying not only your fees (which are massive) but also a stipend. As far as I understand it, it is not universally the case that being accepted equates to getting a scholarship, but the two things are closely linked. By contrast, this sort of thing is rare in the UK, and one should think about the process of application for a place as quite different from the business of getting financial help with the place.

For British PhD applicants, the process is in fact twofold. You apply to the university course and, if successful, you get your place. At the same time, you apply to the AHRC (Arts and Humanities Research Council) for funding. This is highly competitive, something like as competitive as getting a place to do a PhD at an elite American university. It used to be the case that anyone with a First would get funding, but that is no longer the case. (A "First" is a first class degree, received by only a fraction of students. Most students get a second class degree, either a "2:1", second class upper division, or "2:2", second class lower division; a minority get a third class degree). Now you need an exceptional First and exceptional references to get the AHRC funding. AHRC funding is only available to British citizens, so if one is applying from abroad, the big questions about funding remain, questions that are sharply focused given the current exchange rate, which is not at all favourable to American travellers.

I spent two years as Post-Graduate Admissions Tutor in the Theology and Religion Department at the University of Birmingham and during that time the most common question I received from international applicants was "what about money?" It was always pretty depressing because I was rarely able to give any good news about scholarships or financial aid for international students. The only good news is that the fees for a standard PhD programme in the UK are substantially less than their American equivalents, in spite of the fact that international fees will be double the home fees. Let me try to put some actual figures on this. When I was in Birmingham, international students paid roughly £8,500 a year in fees. Even at the current exchange rate, that is $17,000, much less than the $30,000 plus you will pay in top American universities. But if it is $17,000 a year you don't have, that is not exactly good news, is it?

I should underline that this is just a sketch based on personal impressions of what I have seen so far of the two different countries, and no doubt others' experiences and reflections will differ.

Update (7.48): Christopher Spinks comments on Katagrapho, adding some useful reflections from his experience at Fuller, in PhD: UK, USA or hybrid?.

Update (14.07): Kevin Wilson comments in Blue Cord.

All Things Considered on Lampeter

One of my regular BBC podcasts is BBC Wales's weekly religion programme called All Things Considered. This week's episode was wholly devoted to a feature on and interviews with the Department of Theology and Religious Studies, University of Lampeter. It's not often (ever before?) you get an entire radio programme devoted to a Theology or Religion department. According to the programme, the department at Lampeter is the largest in the UK, with 49 academic members of staff. We used to say in Birmingham that we were the biggest, with almost 40, but it looks like Lampeter are now winning on the size front. The documentary is found here, either for download (podcast), or streaming. It begins with an excerpt from a class on the Gospel of Thomas:

All Things Considered