Oxford’s tutors and other academic staff will have to justify why they want to keep their jobs past the age of 67.
The introduction of this ‘Employer Justified Retirement Age’ (EJRA) comes after the government’s decision in October to do away with the mandatory retirement age, unless the employer has justification. Oxford’s new policy will run for 10 years.
The decision followed a consultation exercise which, according to university representatives, received “broad support”.
However, students appear undecided about the issue. Rebecca Newman of Trinity said, “While the University should stress new blood coming in to allow students a wide range of views on their subject, older tutors are likely to have accumulated more knowledge, simply because they are older.”
The new policy does not aim to force out all those who want to carry on working. A representative from the Admissions and Educational Policy Office told Cherwell that academic staff who want to continue their employment past the age of 67 “can request to continue working if they have specific reasons for doing so.”
When asked why the University had chosen to keep a retirement age, the representative said that it would be a of “promoting inter-generational fairness (i.e. making sure there are jobs available for young people, for example early career academics), promoting diversity, and facilitating better academic and personnel planning”.
While the University’s justification seems to be ‘pro-youth’ rather than ‘anti-age’, Anna from Somerville told Cherwell that she wants the University to clarify why exactly older tutors would be considered worse or less competent than younger ones. However, she sympathised with the University’s aim for making new positions available in the current job market, commenting, “I imagine it’s really difficult to get an academic position. The system can stagnate very easily.”
The University’s Personnel Committee and Council have been discussing the potential impact of the government’s decision from as early as Michaelmas 2010. Once proposals for an EJRA received positive feedback, a second consultation took place in Trinity to iron out details for considering requests from members of staff who want to keep their position once they have been deemed too old.
Brasenose student Louise Meredith defended older tutors and thinks that the idea of a specific cut-off age of 67 is “unfair”. “There should be some kind of performance-based assessment. It is not as if someone at the age of 67 is somehow less capable than they were the previous year. Older tutors have a lot more experience.”
Katie Coleman of St Hugh’s is of a similar opinion. “The fact that the scheme is confined to academic staff only is unfair to them. Provided that tutors are not under-performing, they should be able to keep their jobs. Someone older can perform just as well as their younger colleague; they have the advantage of having accumulated more knowledge.”
It appears that Oxford may have started a trend. Cambridge is also considering implementing an EJRA of 67 for its academic staff. Sue Jenkins, the head of the employment and pensions groups at DAC Beachcroft, said that, in light of this, she wouldn’t be surprised if “we see retirement ages coming back”.
