Belarus boots out the orals
A revolution in the transition between school and university is underway in Belarus, where a British-backed experiment to introduce formal written exams in place of traditional oral testing is taking...
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Report ignores part-timers
Amid the widespread chorus of praise for Dearing, few have paused to notice its signal failure to address the disadvantages under which part-time students have laboured for so long. Contrary to what...
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Smothered voices
I support fully the sentiments expressed by Michael Kelly in Phil Baty's report on the funding crisis looming before departments of modern languages (THES, July 18). It seems perverse that the...
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Wise up before you dumb down
The lucky university departments which, having managed to please their friends in the research assessment exercise, are now enjoying disproportionately generous research funding, ought perhaps to be...
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Wise up before you dumb down
The notions of academic autonomy, of academic freedom, of institutional autonomy and of the maintenance of standards are very different and very difficult but clarity is not aided by the multilayered...
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Wise up before you dumb down
While delving into Dearing I came across some interesting information about the survey preferences of academic staff for methods of pay determination. In the pre-1992 universities 72 per cent of...
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Will Labour follow where Sir Ron leads?
Apres Dearing, le deluge: staff cautiously optimistic, part-time sector and Europeans feel neglected, free-marketeers blow a big resberry "Wait for Dearing" has been the response to any ideas for...
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A faraway continent of which we know nothing?
I CONFESS that I have not read the whole Dearing report. I have a niggling doubt and a faint hope that I may be wrong in asserting that the 1,700 pages ignore a key aspect of higher education in a (...
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Spitting with anger
"The Welsh language will, should and must die out." I was astonished to read this sentence in the THES (July 4) by Christie Davies, professor of sociology at the University of Reading. It was...
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Dearing's outdated dirigisme
THE unthinkable thoughts of the "right-wing" think-tanks have become new Labour orthodoxy again. Dearing and the government's response have made acceptable student contributions towards tuition, and...
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Don's Diary
Wednesday. After feverish weeks supervising project students, invigilating and script-marking, I come to work hopeful of uninterrupted weeks in the research lab. This is what brought me to Bradford...
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From career path to rite of passage
BEFORE I left the University of Sussex, a senior member of faculty made a good point to me. "It seems that most of our graduates are happy with the time they have spent here," he said. "But the...
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Threat to global outlook
PRESSURE to publish and the limited recognition given to work on international projects is forcing British academics to consider halting their international activities, according to the international...
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Tax fears alarm scientists
SCIENTISTS are being caused "considerable anxiety" by proposals that could force non-profit making research and technology organisations to pay corporation tax, writes Julia Hinde. Liberal Democrat...
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Battle gives no promises
THE GOVERNMENT'S premier technology transfer scheme is to be extended beyond universities, but there are no assurances of additional money for major expansion. Science minister John Battle said that...