Keepers of the olive grove
John Rear leads with his chin when he writes about managerialism and academic freedom in higher education (THES, October 21). He had realised that at the Council for Academic Autonomy he was being...
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Double trouble ahead
We are all familiar with what is happening to student grants. We are also told by the Government that higher education is already achieving the enrolment targets it set itself for the end of the...
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Obliged to stay silent for the group
Your editorial of November 11 makes a welcome call for the defence of tolerance in universities: yet, as it suggests, this will not be an easy argument to sustain. On the one hand, defence of...
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The all-new hot desk shuffle
How many hours a week do you actually spend at your desk? Research, lecturing, meetings and collaboration with industry are rarely desk-based. A lecturer may spend relatively little time at the desk...
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Common cause at Islamabad
On Sunday Commonwealth education ministers assemble in Islamabad for their 12th conference since Oxford in 1959. The gathering is a reaffirmation of the Commonwealth's continuing value to members. It...
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Don's Diary
MONDAY. This week I face redundancy at the tender age of 37 after 15 years in a research department at a provincial university, leaving me feeling disillusioned with the university system and its...
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On the slippery road to Roma
I left Italy last month, after three weeks of Florentine sunshine, as the dark clouds were gathering over the Alps. On the Brenner pass electrical storms lit up the valleys. Hours later, parts of...
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A little inflation could go a long way
Though shifted from its historic springtime niche in what may have been Norman Lamont's one lasting achievement as Chancellor of the Exchequer, Budget Day remains one of the great rituals of British...
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Call for minister at Pakistan meeting
Britain should raise grants to the Commonwealth distance-learning organisation and increase the number of Commonwealth scholarships and fellowships, according to the Council for Education in the...
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Ismaili centre for west
The Aga Khan University is to open an institute dedicated to the study of Islamic civilisations in an attempt to counter prejudice in the face of the spread of fundamentalism. The institute, to be...
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East is a cultural Eden
Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet." Rudyard Kipling was thinking of Europe and Asia when he wrote these verses. I quote them not just in continued amazement at what...
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The story of a beautiful molecule
Science is founded on principles of objectivity. Scientists seek to be objective in conducting their research, and claim to achieve that objectivity. They often extend the orthodoxy of objectivity to...
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Why say au revoir when adieu will do?
What really persuaded Jill Ker Conway to write the first volume of her autobiography was the persistent praise for Crocodile Dundee, the movie that captivated the public with its romantic portrayal...
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`How many lives was it worth?'
The name above his study door -- in neatly painted letters, white on black -- was T. D. Weldon and, although the initials did not actually stand for "Territorial Decoration'', they might well have...
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Redundancies loom
A fifth of English higher education universities and colleges expect to make staff redundant or encourage early retirement in the next four years, according to funding council returns. Their...