It’s pretty much an open secret that the government is going to try and raise tuition fees sometime soon – universities minister David Willetts hinted as much earlier this week, but even that was hardly a surprise. We can also be pretty sure that any moves in this direction are going to face some strong [...]
A few weeks ago we reported the closure of the Philosophy Department at Middlesex University, and since then the fight to keep it open has continued. Alongside many thousands of people signing petitions, there has been a two-week occupation of one of the large administrative centres on the Trent Park campus, and after that was [...]
Despite the fact that most of the people who write on this blog are Cambridge grads, we have (rightly, in my view), kept posts about matters Oxbridge to a minimum so far. So with that in mind, I apologise in advance for this post – given that it follows Dave Osler’s post at LibCon on [...]
Some excellent news from Leeds University. Students there have rejected a motion at the referendum which would have mandated their union to oppose lecturers strikes. Earlier this year Leeds UCU organised an extremely impressive campaign in defence of jobs and education, which ultimately won major concessions from their management. Strike action was threatened, with an [...]
BREAKING NEWS – PLEASE REPUBLISH!
Earlier this afternoon all staff in the Arts and Education section of Middlesex University received the following email:
Dear colleagues,
Late on Monday 26 April, the Dean of the School of Arts & Humanities, Ed Esche,
informed staff in Philosophy that the University executive had ‘accepted his
recommendation’ to close all Philosophy programmes: undergraduate, postgraduate [...]
As I was leaving a poker game at the School of African and Oriental Studies a week ago I saw some bloke removing a flyer from one of the trees outside. It was a manifesto for Clare Solomon’s election campaign for presidency of the University of London Union. Upon my questioning him he said something [...]
“We cannot take part in the work of education till we are ourselves deeply imbued with the Communist ideal and unless our thoughts and our desires are constantly turning towards it.” – Sylvia Pankhurst, 1918
On Saturday I went along to the ‘teach-in’ at Kings College London, organised by the London Education Activists Network. There were [...]
The so-called sexualisation of children has been all over the news this week with a report for the home office being published by Dr Linda Papodopoulos. Amongst recommendations are those about softcore men’s mags such as Nuts and Zoo being made to be top-shelf publications, as they are often seen by eight to fifteen year [...]
The whirlwind of cuts facing higher education is one of those things its hard to get your head round. The idea of entire departments, even colleges, closing, is one that few people have totally got to grips with. Richard wrote last week about the issues at King’s. Estimates vary wildly about how much they want [...]
The proposed equality bill has generated much debate – in particular the question of whether churches should be banned from discriminating on grounds of sexual orientation. Yet what strikes me is the sheer hypocrisy of these measures, from a government which has actively institutionalised such discrimination.
Under laws that went into force last year, the new [...]
