Dr. Venie Martin chaired the plenary session in the afternoon. She summarised her vision of the events of the day using three main headings. Two of these headings she drew from the title of the conference, Vision and Challenge. To these headings she added a third, the way forward, or ‘What are we going to do’. She emphasised the importance of having a vision of higher education as we head into the new millennium. She stated that without a vision there can be no change.
She reiterated the importance of reflecting on the role of higher education and in particular of reflecting on people’s needs and the manner in which those diverse needs can be addressed. She commended the OECD on their data and reports on how to effect change and highlighted the link with historical thinkers on education that had been referred to throughout the day. In this she emphasised the importance of learning from insights and knowledge gained throughout different historical eras. Dr. Martin drew delegates’ attention to addressing diverse needs throughout the educational establishment, including addressing the interests of the community of scholars in higher education, the need to maintain academic freedom, and to address fears as well as challenging established orthodoxy within the institutions of higher education. She stressed that the way forward must be based on a sound value system based on justice, equity and human relations.
She referred to the oceanic metaphors used in the course of the day to emphasise the role of higher education in showing leadership through charting partnerships between providers and communities. She drew people’s attention to the tensions that there may be in diversity and stated that the job of the higher education sector is to find a balance between competing tensions in order to move forward.
Dr. Martin referred to the particular challenges facing higher education, those of empowerment of the learner and the agenda of power sharing inherent in this concept. She stressed the importance of fully resourcing higher education to meet this challenge and to allay any fears regarding standards related to a diversity of student population. She looked ahead with interest to the challenges raised by linking targets to funding and highlighted the anxiety she felt had been present through the day. In particular, she referred to anxiety regarding meeting the needs of and reaching out to adapt to the needs of a new community of students. She hoped for a coherent national approach in addressing issues of access and diversity and reiterated the importance of working within organisations, as well as in partnership on the issues raised in the course of the day, and of creatively mapping the way forward to address the new issues identified.