“The US Research Works Act would allow publishers to line their pockets by locking publicly funded research behind paywalls. This is the moment academic publishers gave up all pretence of being on the side of scientists …” (more)
[Mike Taylor, Guardian, 16 January]
“So, I have tried, again, today, for the n-th time, to get to grips with LaTeX, via Lyx. No go …” (more)
[Brian M Lucey, 16 January]
“University College Cork is suing the ESB for €18m arising out flood damage that occurred in November 2009. UCC claims it sustained significant damage to its property …” (more)
[RTÉ News, 16 January]
“NUI Galway has announced details of a new scholarship scheme for mature students. 30 new scholarships will be awarded, consisting of €2,000 per student for every year of their study …” (more)
[RTÉ News, 16 January]
“The National Union of Students has proposed 10 alternative uses for the £60m that ministers apparently wanted to spend on a royal yacht for the Queen’s jubilee. According to a report in the Guardian newspaper today, Michael Gove, the education secretary, wrote a private letter to fellow ministers urging them to consider paying out for a yacht to mark the Queen’s diamond jubilee later this year …” (more)
[John Gill, Times Higher Education, 16 January]
This is an interesting new record of bad behaviour, driven by bibliometrics: academic journals, asking academic authors to cite papers from their own pages, in order to make that journal’s impact factor look better …” (more)
[bengoldacre - secondary blog, 16 January]
“The London School of Economics is investigating claims a Jewish student was assaulted on a trip where a Nazi-themed drinking game was being played. The student suffered a broken nose after objecting to the game …” (more)
[BBC News, 16 January]
“Students enrolling at university in 2012-13 will have to earn salaries of £50,000 a year immediately after graduating if they are to pay off their student loan debt before the 30-year government write-off threshold, a new analysis suggests.This is over £30,000 more than the average first-year salary for a university graduate …” (more)
[John Elmes, Times Higher Education, 16 January]
“Philip asked me to comment on the recent media coverage of my person. The background is as follows …” (more)
[Richard Tol, Irish Economy, 16 January]
“Daily Mail online has a terrific piece which manages to conflate a host of different higher education issues within a single kick ass column. On the back of recent HESA data which shows an increase in the number of students achieving first and upper second class degrees the article moves on to plagiarism, league table corruption, commercialisation …” (more)
[Registrarism, 16 January]
“At the very start of the Higher Ed Tech Summit here this week, James Applegate threw out a challenge. Mr. Applegate, vice president for program development at the Lumina Foundation, told an overflow crowd that the United States needed 60 percent of its adults to hold high-quality degrees and credentials by the year 2025 …” (more)
[Josh Fischman, Chronicle of Higher Education, 13 January]
“I agree with Florence Craven (Letters, Jan 11) that many universities teach their undergraduates badly. True education should develop people’s ability to think. The particular field in which they choose to specialise is not important …” (more)
[Michael Mernagh, Irish Examiner, 16 January]
“This is the complete unedited video of the documentary film I melt the glass with my forehead, a film about £9,000 tuition fees, how we got them, and what to do about it …” (more, video)
[Research Blogs, 16 January]
