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Category Archives: education policy
The strange education of politicians
It is well known in the UK that present Members of Parliament are drawn overwhelmingly from privileged educational backgrounds – 35% have attended independent fee paying schools, and 90% have undergraduate degrees. Since 1950 only three UK Prime-Ministers did not … Continue reading
Margaret Thatcher – Chemist.
No UK based blog about women can ignore the death this week of Margaret Thatcher. She has been too important for us all in the last 40 years, and not in ways that we enjoyed. For someone like me who … Continue reading
Last Exhibition at the Old Wash House
I am at the moment very ‘exercised’ about archives. I work in an institution that does not believe that academics – or anyone else for that matter- needs space for the physical storage of such things as print books and … Continue reading
Some girls get education, some get shot
It is too easy to slip into the frame of mind that thinks the battle for educational access and equality of treatment for girls and women is won when in many countries women are more the 50% undergraduates. They … Continue reading
Will the Finch Report kill off non-commercial open access journals?
I first wrote about open access publishing models last year in November. Because I work on two non-commercial open access journals that are produced almost completely by academic time, and a commercial journal that runs the usual subscription model I am … Continue reading
Posted in digital scholarship, education policy
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Universities are no place for libraries – especially it seems the Women’s Library
Libraries with physical books and archives where people go to research and study are becoming for, many universities, expensive non-core functions that are in the first line for financial cuts. The library in my own university – state of the … Continue reading
Its a girl thing- but is it a science thing?
I have been suprised at the almost universal condemnation of the short video produced by the European Commission as part of a campaign to attract more young women to ‘do science’. You can see it on YouTube if you missed … Continue reading
Gender equity gets closer but not for everyone
This last week I have been participating in an online forum run by UNESCO and IIEP (the International Institute for Educational Planning) on gender equality in education. It is very easy to sign up for online conferences and then never … Continue reading
Can face-to- face universities offer consistent high quality online and distance learning?
For some years those of us working in distance learning institutions have been encouraged to see ourselves as simply part of a continuum of ‘blended learning’. Our older siblings: traditional or face-to- face institutions, declared that they could use e-learning … Continue reading
Why Read?
I was listening to someone on the radio talking about why she read little when she was a child. Because, she explained, she was a black working class West Indian child and when she was young books for children contained … Continue reading