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| DCA Staff and Union Report |
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| Statement by College Staff and Union Members | |
A document published and composed by members of the University and College Union (UCU), Unison, and Dartington College of Arts Student Union (DCASU) on behalf of College students, support and academic staff, is a comprehensive rebuttal of the Trusts arguments for their decision to evict the college from the Dartington Estate.
As well as setting the record straight on a number of important issues central to this whole affair, it questions the true motivations behind the trust's actions, not only over the past few weeks, but over a number of years.
The document is printed in full below:
"Dartington College of Arts and the Dartington Hall Trust"
Past, Present and Future: Telling a Different Story
For the last three months the Dartington Hall Trust has offered the public and the College its own narrative on the proposed relocation of Dartington College of Arts. It has been felt by many of the staff and students at the college, that the account given by the Trust of the current situation does not accurately represent the circumstances which have led to recent news that the college is looking at alternative arrangements away from the Dartington estate where it has been sited for over 40 years.
This short bulletin attempts to present a clear and unambiguous statement about the College, and the reasons why it is now being obliged by the Trust to seek a future elsewhere in the South West.
Three crucial things to understand before you read this document
• That the College is seeking to relocate in the South West is an act of last resort. It is not our choice and is the consequence of the inability of the Dartington Hall Trust to support our sustainable future here on the estate.
• The College is a successful and highly regarded higher education institution in Britain and across the world. It is not in financial difficulties, is not a “loss maker” to the Trust, but it does need to upgrade and extend parts of its built environment.
• The College has never sought to expand massively on the Dartington estate. Until the current breakdown in our relationship with the Trust, the goal was to increase student numbers over an agreed period of time to a maximum of 690. This figure was arrived at and agreed in consultation with the Trust.
What is Dartington College of Arts?
• We are a specialist higher education arts college with a reputation across the world for innovative teaching practices, research and fostering experimentation in theatre, music, dance/choreography, writing, contemporary visual arts, and arts and cultural management.
• Currently we have around 600 students including taught and research based postgraduates
• Dartington degrees are currently awarded (and validated) by the University of Plymouth, but we are not linked to Plymouth in any way beyond this.
• In common with many universities the College suffered a slight drop in student intake in 2006 due to the introduction of top-up fees. However, in 2006/07 the continuing success of the College means we have the largest overall number of students enrolled since the institution was founded in 1961.
• We do not own our own buildings, but lease them from the Dartington Hall Trust. This is a very different situation from all other universities and makes borrowing money against our assets very difficult.
• The College is not a department of the Dartington Hall Trust, but is by far the largest single organisation within the estate.
• We are funded, like all university sector institutions, by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), student fees, research and other project or target-specific grants. The College currently receives ‘Premium funding’ for each student and this is approximately 50% higher than the base line funding across the university sector.
• The College currently makes a small surplus and its financial planning for coming years builds in an increased surplus in recognition of the need for maintenance and refurbishment of teaching (and other) spaces. Although technically our landlord, the Trust has not invested sufficiently in the upkeep of its own buildings. We are not in financial difficulties, although need some refurbished and/or additional teaching spaces and residences for students (See below).
• Over the last 5 years the College, with the help of the HEFCE, has spent over £5m on refurbishment or new-build dance, theatre and music studios and seminar spaces. If the College is forced to leave the estate, the Trust will benefit enormously from this investment.
• In terms of dance and theatre studios, Dartington is the envy of the higher education (HE) sector. We have more and better-equipped studios for dance and theatre than almost any university in the country. Music, too, benefits from brand new flexible performance and rehearsal facilities.
• Our spaces for writing and fine art, while adequate, need investment, and we need a larger learning resource centre (library).
• In 2005/06 the College emerged very successfully from a Quality Assurance Audit (QAA) – the university equivalent of a school’s OFFSTED inspection. The QAA affirmed the quality of the College’s provision and noted several areas of exemplary practice.
• Although almost the smallest specialist HE institution in the country we have the support and backing of HEFCE, providing our long-term sustainability can be secured.
• Expansion: contrary to comments often articulated by the Trust, the College does not seek major or unlimited expansion, but in conjunction with HEFCE, would like to grow to a maximum of 690 students. As suggested above, the Trust itself proposed and agreed this target. If attained, it would help the College to generate the surplus needed for reinvestment in both the built environment and in additional jobs.
• Early in 2006 the College employed Jim Port of JM Consulting to evaluate and outline the College’s options for sustainability. After considering Jim Port’s 5 options for sustainability the College unanimously agreed that its future plan for sustainability should be on the Dartington Hall estate.
• The Chief Executive Officer of the Trust has made statements in the press about the extent to which the Trust subsidises the College. This is to misrepresent what is a much more complex situation, and fails to take account of the many ways in which the Trust benefits financially, both directly and indirectly, from the existence of the Dartington College of Arts on the Estate.
What is the situation regarding investment needed for new buildings?
• Because of the growth of DCA over the last 10 years, lack of investment for repair and upkeep by the Trust, and due to a decline in availability of all-the-year-round rented accommodation in the Totnes area, the College needs updated and extended student residences. Currently, about one third of all students either live in 1960’s halls of residence in Higher Close, or at Foxhole, the old school building. The accommodation at Foxhole, in particular, is not up to the benchmark standard of other universities.
• Whilst facilities for Theatre, Dance and Music are of the highest quality (see above) we need to enlarge and diversify the teaching spaces for Writing and Art.
• Our specialist library and learning resources centre is very well equipped both in terms of books, journals and information technologies, but due to expanding collections, a developing archive and a recognised national and international role the library is running out of space. Because of new technologies the issue of student numbers is secondary to the growth of our collections.
• Over the last 3 years both College and Trust leaderships have explored different strategies to fund the building of new student residences. Such residences would also, of course, be of great benefit to the Trust for its own conference and summer school projects.
• Initially, The Trust was apparently prepared in principle to consider a major investment in new residences from its own finances. This was during the period when the College was attracting public money onto the Dartington Estate for capital investment in Trust buildings. At some point over this two-year period, when most of the major building/refurbishment had been completed, the Trust changed its mind about such a commitment. After at least 3 possibilities for construction projects were considered and rejected – for a variety of reasons – the building company, Robert McAlpine, presented a private finance initiative (i.e. McAlpine’s would pay for its construction) to the Trust and College in September 2006 for a 350 bed residence. This was rejected, apparently on the grounds of the difficulties entailed in underwriting the risk.
• It is very difficult to be precise about the total cost of funding new residences and extensions/improvements for the library and teaching spaces on the Dartington Estate. Figures of around £20m have been proposed, although the Trust has regularly claimed that more money would be needed. The Trust has a vested interest in inflating the potential cost of these building projects so that the risks entailed in supporting a sustainable future for the College appear greater than they actually are.
A number of points need to be made about projected costs:
- Defining the nature of these building projects (apart from residences) – and hence accurate costing - has still to be undertaken and depends on the size of the College, the nature of the curriculum and its goals and objectives.
- There has been no detailed debate around the nature and purpose of these new builds, apart from the residences.
- If the cost is around £20m it is not money that would need to be raised at one time. Different parts of the overall project could be sequenced over several years.
- If the McAlpine proposal – or a more favourable version of the original - had been accepted, the cost of the build itself would not have had to be met by the Trust.
- Although HEFCE no longer has a ‘poor estates’ budget to fund such buildings, evidence suggests that it may have to return to some kind of funding mechanism of this sort over the next few years in the face of pressures from universities across the country.
- If the Trust was prepared to consider a DCA future on the estate, then other sources of funding and/or funding partnerships could be explored. Because of the current situation this has not happened.
What has been the relationship between College and Trust over the last 3 years?
• Considerable time has been spent by the Trust and College over the last two years exploring the idea of ‘One Dartington’, an idea originally initiated by DCA. This unified goal would have allowed continuing independence for each institution, but would have explored a range of productive strategies – both visionary and pragmatic - to ensure that both organisations worked far more closely together than ever before and to their mutual benefit.
• At some point over the last 18 months it became clear that the Trust was no longer interested in the ‘One Dartington’ goal. A wide range of events have subsequently revealed that the Trust had been imagining and exploring a post DCA future for some time. For example, the Trust’s registration of a number of domain names [web sites] including ‘Dartington College’; the Trust’s continued refusal to sign leases on the refurbished building on the Lower Close site, and the marginalisation of the College from serious collaboration over the proposed arts park.
• The final and explicit breakdown in the quest for funding of new residences within the context of ‘One Dartington’ occurred in September 2006 with the rejection of a bid by construction company, Robert McAlpine, to build a 350 room residence through a private finance initiative (PFI)
• At the point of the rejection of the McAlpine proposal it became absolutely clear that the College had no sustainable future on the estate within the parameters of HEFCE rules and expectations. Then, and only then, did the College Executive begin actively to explore relocation options, the first of which was with University College Falmouth in Cornwall. Since then the University of Plymouth has made a bid for the College to become part of its project. Currently both options are being explored with considerable urgency.
• Day to day relationships between the College and certain departments of the Dartington Hall Trust have continued to function, and in some respects remain a model of good practice. An example of this is the close collaboration between Theatre and Choreography departments and Dartington Arts. Indeed, the productive relationship between the College as whole and Dartington Arts is a quality we would be distressed at losing.
• The College is only exploring the Plymouth and Falmouth options for relocation because the Trust has now made it completely clear that its middle and long-term plans no longer include Dartington College of Arts.
• Neither Falmouth nor Plymouth options are guaranteed, and it is quite possible that both will be unacceptable in terms of sustaining Dartington College of Arts’ identity and unique vision for practice based arts education.
What if the College somehow managed to raise the cash needed for the improvements to buildings identified above?
• Over the last 3 weeks the Dartington Hall Trust has made it absolutely clear that even if the College could resolve questions about building projects which would not require the Trust to invest its own resources, it would still not support the College’s future on the estate.
• Despite protestations of sadness and regret about the end of the College on the Dartington estate, the Trust has clearly been making plans for its long-term future without the College. Although the College will be on the estate for at least another 2 - 4 years, the Trust is already making arrangements with American (and other) funders for replacement activities.
• There is plenty of circumstantial evidence that the Trust has been anticipating and preparing for life without the college for many months, and long before the rejection of the McAlpine proposal in September.
Why will the Trust not support a long-term future of the College on the estate if other (funding) problems were resolved?
• The Trust articulates two concerns about the long-term future of the College:
- It has doubts about whether the College could survive if its specialist funding premium (see above) was withdrawn when it comes up for review in 2009.
- It feels that the lifting of the tuition fee ‘cap’ (currently set at £3000) in 2009 would place the College in an unfavourable recruitment market position in relation to other universities.
• Both these concerns are difficult to disprove, as they are speculative readings into the future. However, we make the following observations in relation to the Trust’s caution:
- The lifting of the tuition fee ‘cap’ will place all university sector institutions in an unknown position. This is not particular to Dartington, and there are many arguments which suggest that a well-resourced Dartington College of Arts (at Dartington) would be better able to withstand these uncertainties than many universities. There is no special reason why Dartington would be more at risk than any other university.
- An energetic and committed ‘One Dartington’ model of this estate would be well placed to find time and good will to identify solutions to problems that might occur in the middle and long term future
Some conclusions
• Despite the protestations of regret and sadness, and questionable interpretations of financial information/ projections, the actions of the trust appear to suggest that they are actively seeking to be rid of DCA from the estate.
• There is considerable evidence that the Trust leadership has been planning this outcome for at least a year while going though the motions of considering solutions to the residences issue.
• The Trust is now energetically pursuing replacement activities to put in place if (when) the College leaves.
• It is clear that certain parties within the Trust do not understand or recognise what the College represents and does in relation to contemporary arts practices. Such individuals have no commitment to the College and its acknowledged contribution to the teaching and making of contemporary arts. Furthermore, such people are suspicious of our work here at the very time that hundreds of renowned artists and academics from across the world are testifying to the extraordinary contribution Dartington College of Arts has made – and continues to make – to arts education and practice nationally and internationally.
• Ultimately, and with momentous consequences for everyone connected to Dartington College of Arts, it is a failure of vision and imagination.
This statement has been composed by members of the University and College Union (UCU), Unison, and Dartington College of Arts Student Union (DCASU) on behalf of College students, support and academic staff.
15th December 2006 | |
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