Anti-grunt technology

I am genuinely so glad that technological work is being done to protect the more sensitive television viewers; more precisely, to protect viewers of the Wimbledon tennis tournament who blush, or otherwise react in a way to suggest that smelling salts are called for, whenever a tennis player is heard to grunt. But first, let’s [...]

Tackling basic literacy skills

According to Patrick Kinsella, Head of the School of Communications in Dublin City University, journalism students enter the university with excellent final school results but with major ‘gaps in their grasp of basic English, including spelling, grammar, punctuation and word usage.’ According to a report in the Irish Times, DCU will now ‘allocate more time [...]

University governance review in Scotland

I have previously pointed out in this blog that I have been asked by the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning, Michael Russell MSP, to chair a review of university governance in Scotland. The remit of this review was published by the government on Wednesday. The key principles against which governance is to be [...]

Tuition fees in Scotland for students from England, Wales and Northern Ireland

Recent events in England have created an issue for Scottish higher education. While in Scotland the principle of free access to universities is a central part of public policy, English higher education institutions can now charge tuition fees of up to £9,000, and most as we know have chosen to set fees at or near [...]

The future of higher education: the outlook from England

The British government has now issued its long-expected and somewhat delayed White Paper on the future of England’s system of higher education. The title - Higher Education: Students at the Heart of the System – gives a clue as to how the government wants to present its new educational order. It is being presented more as a framework [...]

Good teaching is about passion

When I was a law student in the 1970s, we had one lecturer whose teaching was simply appalling. He sat while lecturing (with no physical reasons for doing so). He never looked at the class. He never asked questions, rhetorical or otherwise. He never encouraged analysis. His delivery was monotonous. He never showed or used [...]

The Ten Commandments of online teaching

I suspect that nobody is yet quite certain on how prevalent online teaching will become, and whether it is always the same thing as elearning. We know that there exists a fair amount of online material now to record or complement classroom teaching. We know that there are materials available online that are, in essence, [...]

From writer to reader, directly

Until recently one of the most basic pieces of advice given to any author was to avoid vanity publishing. In other words, if you have a book, make sure you publish it via the normal routes, usually with an agent and a publisher, and for money. The book will be printed and distributed to bookshops, [...]

Animal farms in global politics

Today, June 25, is the birthday of the English writer and journalist Eric Arthur Blair, better known as George Orwell. Known everywhere and chiefly for his books Nineteen-Eighty-Four and Animal Farm, Orwell in fact was a prolific writer of novels, documentary books, pamphlets and poems. A democratic socialist by conviction, he was also a strong [...]

Sporting a university ambition

The former Harvard University President, Derek Bok, commented in his book Universities in the Marketplace that the creeping commercialisation of higher education that he so disliked began with the development of sports in universities. As is well known, in the United States many universities give special prominence to athletes and sportsmen and women, and some of them are able to enter their chosen institution [...]