ABSTRACT

This paper explores the underlying processes of initiating academic engagement, seen from the university perspective. We do so through a longitudinal case study, of the university, Chalmers, and specifically around the engineering subjects, and the development of such relationships with a sector with few such traditions, namely equestrian sports. In terms of how the chosen university has worked to initiate academic engagement, we find, in contrast to existing literature, how, what we call researcher-teachers, primarily used students to engage with a variety of external organisations, rather than relying on research excellence. University management offered support and made small investments. In terms of perceived benefits, the researcher-teachers, university managers and students all stressed positive reputational benefits, especially attracting female students into engineering and diffusing engineering knowledge in society. Acknowledging the limitations of our study, three propositions for future research are to conceptualise the university as providing knowledge-intensive services, to explore the potential involvement of university management, and to articulate different phases of academic engagement.

摘要

从大学的角度来看，本文探讨了发起学术参与的基本过程。我们通过对查尔默斯大学，特别是围绕工程学科的纵向案例研究，以及与很少有这种传统的部门（即马术运动）之间的这种关系的发展来做到这一点。在所选大学如何开展学术参与方面，我们发现与现有文献相比，我们所谓的研究老师是如何主要利用学生与各种外部组织进行互动，而不是依靠卓越的研究。大学管理人员提供了支持，并进行了少量投资。在感知收益方面，研究人员，教师，大学管理人员和学生都强调正面的声誉收益，特别是吸引女学生进入工程领域并在社会上传播工程知识。认识到我们研究的局限性，未来研究的三个命题是将大学概念化为提供知识密集型服务，探索大学管理的潜在参与以及阐明学术参与的不同阶段。