"Hear our voices": a collective arts-based self-study of early-career academics on our learning and growth in a research-intensive university

Abstract

IntroductionSince 1994, the South African higher education sector has faced significant changes and challenges in its attempt to build an education system appropriate for a democratic society (Department of Higher Education and Training [DHET], 2013). Some key changes include the merger and integration process that occurred between 2002 and 2005, resulting in 46 universities and technikons merging to form a total of 23 (now 26) universities (Harrison, Pithouse-Morgan, Conolly, & Meyiwa, 2012) as well as the establishment of the DHET in 2009.A key challenge faced by the sector in its transformation process is the attraction and development of new and inexperienced academics (Balfour & Lenta, 2009; DHET, 2013). Flowing from this challenge, the DHET (2013, 2015) established, as one of its key priorities, the expansion of the academic profession and development of early-career academics (ECAs) through mentorship and support. Through this priority, DHET hopes to respond to the National Planning Commission's (2013) National Development Plan (NDP) 2030, which indicates that an estimated 4,000 academics from South African higher education institutions (HEIs) will retire by the year 2018. This requires focused strategies for creation of the next generation of researchers.To align itself with the priorities of DHET and the NDP and to address the challenge of retiring seasoned academics, our university has embarked on a process of employing ECAs. As stated earlier, attracting these academics is a challenge-but a further pressing challenge is their development and nurturing into productive researchers (Balfour & Lenta, 2009). In this article, we demonstrate through the literature that there are different meanings of what it means to be an ECA but research on how to address the challenge of developing and nurturing ECAs, especially within the South African context, appears to be at the periphery. To address this research gap, we share in this article our personal experiences and challenges that we face as ECAs in a research-intensive university. The article shows how, through a collective arts-based self-study project, we learned to form and position our learning and growth within the changing university setting.The article begins with conceptualising ECAs and justifying the need for prioritising their professional learning and development. After the conceptualisation of ECAs, we explain the nature and purpose of the collective arts-based self-study project though which we explored our experiences as ECAs. We use a social constructivist lens for understanding our experiences, and how we learn and position our growth within a transforming university environment. We then explain the methodology informing our research, and our experiences are thereafter presented in the form of data presentation and interpretation.To conclude we offer some lessons for other ECAs and university communities about how professional learning and development of ECAs can be understood and enhanced, given that they contribute to the future performance of all HEIs and knowledge production in the country.The Context of ECAs and Professional Learning and Development for ECAsThe professional development and support needed by ECAs has become an attractive phenomenon in local and international scholarly conversations (Geber, 2009; Geber & Nyanjom, 2009; Hopwood & Stocks, 2009; Price, Coffey, & Nethery, 2015; Remmik, Karm, Haamer, & Lepp, 2011; Thomas, McNaught, Wong, & Li, 2011). To fully understand the needs of ECAs, however, it is first necessary to identify who constitutes an ECA. In this regard, Price et al. (2015) argued that there is no agreed definition of what characterises an ECA, and they regard this as one of the major challenges for institutions trying to provide support to ECAs. In this article, we draw on Hemmings' (2012) definition, which states that ECAs are those academics who are within their first five years as members of staff in HEIs under a sessional, part-time, or full-time load. …