Empty Lecture Theatres for Empty Ideas

If universities want students back in class, they should make turning up worthwhile

THE Daily Mail ran a story last week about empty lecture theatres at Sydney University.

Students are preferring to watch lectures from home on Zoom rather than make the effort to get to campus.

The story was inspired by a photograph of a deserted lecture room posted on social media by Professor Jan Slapeta.

He captioned the picture:

“Should I be shocked again? 1 pm lecture - no one! I lectured empty chairs,”

The article went on to lament the fact that work-from-home habits adopted during Covid lockdowns meant students now thought it optional to physically come to class.

They prefer to learn via video from the comfort of home.

Queensland University of Technology senior law lecturer Peter Black replied by posting a photograph of his computer screen showing students Zooming into his lecture, but with their cameras turned off.

He wrote:

“This was almost just as depressing, teaching to unresponsive blank screens on Zoom.”

But are habits learned during lockdown the problem here? Or is there something greater at play?

I would argue there is little reason for students to bother turning up to lectures anymore.

No debate is allowed.

No contrasting or comparing of ideas is permitted.

Anyone straying from the pre-approved narrative is cancelled.

So why would anyone make the effort to attend?

The science is settled. The patriarchy is to blame. Racism is systemic. Intersectionality rules. Fossil fuels are evil. Christianity is oppressive. Socialism is the answer. And all of these things apply, no matter what subject you are studying.

A university lecture has become a Formula One race - a procession of colourful ideas where everyone at the track knows the result before it has even begun.

Lockdown didn’t do this. Weak, scaredy-cat academics, cowering to the demands of fragile students who demand a safe space from hurty ideas, did this.

Dare to say there are differences between the sexes and you’ll likely never lecture again. Dare to say gender is not fluid and you’ll likely be out of a teaching job. Dare to say pregnant women have a human being growing inside them and you’ll likely be cancelled. Dare to say not all cultures are equal and … no-one would dare say that.

May point is, if you want to get students back to university, make it worth their while turning up.

Get back to old fashioned openness.

Allow old fashioned argument.

Permit old fashioned debate.

Engage in old fashioned discussion of ideas without fear or favour.

Return universities to their glorious origins - as places where ideas are wrestled with and where truth is prized, rather than as hollowed out buildings where academics pour forth neo-Marxism to empty seats.