Time (ac)counts in higher education: The ECTS and changing ideas of desired student conduct

The European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System (ECTS) is based on a linear, functional and quantitative understanding of time, which increasingly frames academic practices and notions of learning in higher education (HE). With reference to recent Danish policy reforms, my presentation will explore the entanglements between the ECTS, new institutional practices to fast-track students’ degree completion, and altered ideas of student engagement and achievement. E.g., the analysis suggests that institutions in Denmark increasingly prescribe what activities the students should undertake, often down to an hourly basis, while learning is implicitly projected as a well-ordered and linear practice, which is determined by the clock. This calls for discussion of the nature of learning and the roles and purposes ascribed to HE by means of the ECTS.