Leader: It's time to show some audacity
Blue-skies research could help lead the UK out of recession, but only if ministers give scientists the freedom to operate
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From where I sit - Beggared by our own universities
The current economic crisis proves everything leftists have ever said about the follies and cruelties of utopian capitalism - truly enough, anyway, to afford a moment at Wall Street's expense, and a...
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Roy Anthony Becher, 1930-2009
Roy Anthony Becher, a founding father of higher education research in Britain, has died.He was born in Poona, India, where his father was officiating director of artillery at Army Headquarters, on 19...
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Oxford tutor accused of professional jealousy
A popular biographer has accused her former University of Oxford tutor of "potent professional jealousy", in a row over credits in her work on Jane Austen.
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Oxford's two v-cs happy to discuss access difficulty
The vice-chancellor of Oxford Brookes University this week welcomed a question from MPs about why her university missed its target for recruiting state-school students.Janet Beer said she was "really...
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Burdens of proof in a media-driven world
The question of what constitutes evidence clearly presents major problems of positioning for academics and their work ("I can't hear you ...", 26 March). The field of psychological therapies is a...
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Instant feedback
"Students and tutors ready to embrace the Twitter bug" (26 March)? Certainly lecture audiences are, as I discovered when giving a talk in Florida last week.As I left the podium, the organiser handed...
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Opaque methodology
The department of political science and international studies at the University of Birmingham had 5 per cent of its output rated "world leading" by the research assessment exercise. While this was...
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Money talks 1
It is extraordinary that Keith Hamill, president of the University of Nottingham council, should write without embarrassment to protest that you reported the salary of Sir Colin Campbell, former vice...
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Money talks 2
Sally Hunt's protest about staff salary increases is perplexing (Letters, 26 March). Higher Education Statistics Agency data compare average salaries across the whole population of academic staff, so...
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Respect is due to Roper
I noted with some concern the distasteful tone of David Hardman's letter about the departure of Brian Roper, vice-chancellor of London Metropolitan University (26 March).Whatever the rights and...
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Short-sighted decision
At a recent meeting of the Academy of Social Sciences' College of Learned Societies, great concern was expressed about the research funding allocated to social sciences after the 2008 research...
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Avoiding the questions
According to John Brewer, president-elect of the British Sociological Association, "sociologists' subject matter has moved away from issues of class, power and inequality" towards concerns like "the...
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Excuses, excuses
The UK Border Agency (UKBA) now requires all private UK-based collaborative partners of British universities to be further accredited by one of a small number of designated private bodies, even if...
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Well put
You report Peter Williams, chief executive of the Quality Assurance Agency, saying that "a lot of our power is the power of influence and fear" ("MPs call for toothless watchdog to be put down", 12...