Happy New Year!

I would like to wish all readers and contributors a very happy New Year, and every good fortune and happiness for 2011. I hope that this coming year will provide us with new confidence and optimism. Skidby Mill in East Yorkshire, December 2010

University debts

As governments disinvest in higher education, and in the absence of student contributions, major financial issues will begin to arise. A few months ago the Principal of Glasgow University, Professor Anton Muscatelli, declared that the university would run out of cash by 2013. And now the latest institution to sound a warning is Trinity College [...]

When stupid people become dangerous

I am a great admirer of the United States of America, but one of the things that distinguishes the US from Europe – and not in a good way – is the American attachment to the private ownership of firearms. Where this can lead is shown in this wholly weird news story. Yesterday, December 30, [...]

The amygdala and world affairs

I hope I’m not underestimating you if I suggest that many of you may not know what the amygdala is. In fact, it is part of the brain, and its size may determine all sorts of things and may influence various mental conditions such as autism. Recent research has also discovered that larger amygdalas may determine the [...]

Arguing the higher education case

As the argument around tuition fees and higher education funding has got hotter over recent weeks, it has not necessarily become more sophisticated. I fear there is a feeling right now in some circles that the volume of the shouting is more important than the compelling nature of the case being made. As readers of [...]

Academic lefties, pinkos and liberal do-gooders

Are universities and colleges full of left wing radicals, ready to undermine the establishment at every turn? Well, that’s pretty much the view of a US organisation called campusreform.org., which says that it is ‘designed to provide conservative activists with the resources, networking capabilities, and skills they need to revolutionize the struggle against leftist bias [...]

A university president counting the pennies

There is an interesting report in the US media about the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Before I go into the details, let me just say that this is a well-known and highly respected American public university. It has over 40,000 students, and so by our standards on this side of the Atlantic we’d consider [...]

It’s a banker’s life

Just over 38 years ago I embarked upon a brief career as a German banker, which in the end lasted only two years; at the end of that period I moved back to Ireland and became a law student at a Dublin university. But during those two years I sat behind a bank counter and [...]

Remembering

For some reason December 26  appears to be a bad day for entertainers and actors: an unusually large number have died on this day. There are three I want to mention, briefly. My family home is in County Westmeath, Ireland, and so I have to mention singer Joe Dolan, who died on this day in [...]

Gathering or distributing the university?

Here’s a topic, perhaps, to distract you as you recover from your Christmas dinner. This last week the UK’s Quality Assurance Agency (QAA) issued a recommendation to the Privy Council (to whom the task of deciding the matter is entrusted) that the UHI Millennium Institute should be awarded university status. In many ways UHI (which [...]