Hidden curriculum

We started to discuss the hidden curriculum in academia this week, something akin to ‘Easter Eggs’ in movies: unless you don’t see the movie, you don’t know. Similarly, unless you experience it yourself at a university or a research institute, it is difficult to understand the hidden curriculum. For example, before coming to Virginia Tech, I had no idea that football games are a huge deal and that the whole town is either closed or stuck in traffic and it’s best not to venture out those weekends for a bite or a drink (or even order takeout!). As someone coming from an entirely different country having barely an idea of how the US university system works, my peers helped me when I came here. I often thought of writing a ‘hidden curriculum’ document after coming here to help my upcoming peers but the volume of work made me forget about it after a while.

Hidden curriculum is not necessarily meant to be for grad students or incoming researchers. Often upon promoted, professors come to know more about the university often by interacting with more people. Dean Surprenant pointed her own example- as a professor of cognitive science she would interact with people from her own field and now as the Dean of Graduate School, she interacts with people from other disciplines thus helping her understand the experience of her students and researchers from other fields. I often wonder if it is possible to hand down the hidden curriculum to othe rpeople regardless of the position or to someone who just got in to ensure ‘ease of transfer’ , something like what the former President leaves for the next incoming President on their first day of work. But I then remember, the person who gets the memo gets it after being elected the President: that is, the person must reach to such an elevated status to receive the hidden curriculum.

Although hidden, this social and cultural values must be learnt by the individual in order to function properly for their official duties. And methods to learn them other than avoiding a faux pas is to talk- talk with colleagues, seniors, junior colleagues, friends who are there from the same culture (something that I did!). It is a bit of a Catch-22 because in order to ‘behave well’ in a social setting, you need to know the hidden curriculum but you need to attend these settings to understand it. But, there are and always should be no judgement areas where incoming researchers should be free to discuss their dilemmas about the social, cutlural and academic settings and learn more about the hidden curriculum at the place. That’s all for today!