Is Christmas really necessary?

Planning a relevant, thoughtful, challenging but accessible learning experience for HE students in UK Universities is a skilled passtime.  Carefully navigating the strictures of institutional "norms" on contact hours, timetabling, blended inputs, assessment types and weights have to be balanced with programme outcomes and intended learning goals.  To top it all the material, the engagement and the enthusiasm have to be maintained at a high level to ensure "good" feedback and to avoid that awkward conversation with the Dean over a "sub-standard" score of 3.9 on the Richter scale of academic value.

Now add in the generosity of Church, State and tradition to engineer a 4 week "break" at Christmas and another at Easter.  The former divorces the learning experience from the assessment in many Universities, whilst the latter splits the teaching into two unequal parts but, at least, presents assessment opportunities fairly close to the end of the teaching.

The answer?  Ban Christmas and ignore Easter?

No. Simply allow for flexibility in planning teaching and assessment so that the barriers and hurdles are seen as opportunities and so that the student journey is dictated more by good learning design than by religious festivals.

Happy Christmas.