Students can be interdisciplinary too

By Don Nutbeam. A growing emphasis on interdisciplinary research is not matched by university learning and teaching, says Don Nutbeam. Such is the success of collaborative research in our universities that it is now almost second nature for specialists from different disciplines to choose to work together. Cross-disciplinary collaboration helps usresolve some of the most challenging issues facing society; in areas ranging from sustainable energy to global health, climate change to cyber-security. What is remarkable is that this increasing emphasis on interdisciplinary research not been matched in university learning and teaching. The curricula offered by the UK's research intensive universities remain largely discipline-based and designed to deliver a set of subject-based outcomes – of great depth but increasing narrowness. This status quo is, to a large extent, upheld by the requirements of the many professional, statutory and regulatory authorities responsible for accrediting courses for the different professions; and to a lesser degree by conservatism in the academic community. More...