At the first-year Joint Course, supervisors from both Tromsø University College and the University of Tromsø participated. Supervisors represented two institutions with different educational outlooks and different approaches to the task at hand. In my view, deep-seated professional disagreement was allowed to affect the course throughout without being properly dealt with. The disagreement applied not only to the methods used, the themes and learning objectives, but to the very justification of the first-year Joint Course.