Use and abuse of abuse
Following the news that an English lecturer from the University of Nottingham has apologised for describing a third-year student as an “idiot” and “semi-literate” on Facebook, our Deputy Head of...

Following the news that an English lecturer from the University of Nottingham has apologised for describing a third-year student as an “idiot” and “semi-literate” on Facebook, our Deputy Head of...

Weekly transmissions from the blogosphere

We speak to the professor of computer science and dean of the Faculty of Physical Science and Engineering at the University of Southampton

N8 Research PartnershipShare options pay dividendsA consortium of universities in the North of England has built a toolkit to help guide institutions looking to share equipment. The N8 Research...

United StatesHarvard mistake hits 11,000A US university accidentally overtaxed thousands of its employees for four years in a payroll error. Owing to a mistake in the way it reported its employees’...

Leverhulme TrustInternational Network GrantsSocial sciencesAward winner: Mary BosworthInstitution: University of OxfordValue: £123,210The Leverhulme international network on external border...
When I was a tutor at Open University psychology summer schools in the late 1980s and early 1990s, my weeks on the University of Sussex campus often coincided with those of Stuart Hall, who taught on...
Sir John Savill exposes the moral bankruptcy of those UK research funders who object to proposed European legislation on personal data (“Data privacy change could be a bitter pill”, News, 13 February...
I enjoyed Dale Salwak’s thoughtful and thought-provoking article about his experience of teaching an online course (“From chalkface to interface”, Feature, 13 February). It’s worth noting, however,...
The delayed annual grant letter was received by the Higher Education Funding Council for England on 10 February. Annex 3 (Conditions of Grant on Regulated Fees) seems to raise an important and...
The article on the plight of graduate teaching assistants (“Ignored and forgotten”, Opinion, 13 February) was painfully true. I was a GTA for three years. I basically had a year when I did almost no...


Could working in a ‘team of rivals’ encourage academic creativity - and turn out better equipped graduates, too?

But estimate puts cost of Russell Group-led redesign at £10 million a year

Workforce efficiencies study is about best practice, not cuts, body says