Routledge Education Author of the Month November 2012: Gary Rolfe

On graduating in philosophy from Surrey University in 1977, Gary found himself working in a psychiatric hospital in Portsmouth, where he later trained as a mental health nurse. After several years of working in acute psychiatry, he was appointed to a lecturer-practitioner role before moving full-time into higher education at Portsmouth Polytechnic, where he held a number of grants for practice-based action research projects.

On obtaining his Masters degree and Doctorate in Education from Southampton University, Gary was promoted to Reader in Practice Development, and this was followed by a chair in Nursing at Swansea University, where he has worked since 2003. Gary has a passionate belief that the primary and most fundamental role of the university is to educate, and that education can and should be both an end in itself and a means to social and moral goods. Gary teaches reflective practice, action research and philosophical issues in health care to students at all levels and supervises PhD and professional doctoral students. He established and led the College's Academy for Learning and Teaching and plays a leading role in the Wales Centre for Practice Innovation in Health Care.

Personal Statement relating to Rolfe's newest book: The University in Dissent

Education is a deadly serious matter: education enriches and changes lives, and in my particular academic discipline, the quality of the educational provision to pre-registration and post-qualifying health care students can quite literally be the difference between life and death for their patients.

In my latest book The University in Dissent, I examine the changes in the role and functions of the university over the past two hundred years, culminating in the rise of corporatism which has, in Bill Readings' words, left the university in ruins. Many academics now find themselves working in institutions with mission statements that no longer include the word 'education', where the idea of quality has been replaced by quantity, and where academic accountability takes second place to economic accountancy. The two most common responses by academics to this situation entail either loud protest and opposition or active and opportunistic engagement with the new corporate agenda. I suggest that the former is infeasible and the second is unacceptable, and offer in their place a blueprint for a virtual community of scholars intent on undermining the corporate mission and replacing it with a renewed commitment to scholarship, collegiality and critical accountability.