Ah, it’s summer time, the days when the perpetual deadlines during the semester don’t exist. It also means the insanity slows down a bit, so I have time for less serious things. Ultra Spiritual Life is a series of parody videos by a YouTube user with account name AwakenWithJP. The videos vary from beyond hysterical […] … learn more→

Dear Readers. Shaun Lehmann, Katherine Firth (of the Research Voodoo blog) and I are currently in the process of writing a new book for Open University Press called ‘Writing Trouble’. The proposed book evolved out of our work on the Thesis Bootcamp program, a writing intervention originally designed by Peta Freestone and Liam Connell. Over […] … learn more→

Urban Canadians are feeling the impact of climate change. Flooding in Quebec this spring damaged nearly 1,900 homes in 126 municipalities, causing widespread psychological distress. Summer heatwaves are predicted to become more frequent and severe each year, putting more people at risk of injury and death. Vancouver and Toronto are working to manage these risks. […] … learn more→

Recent measures taken at a number of UK universities – including cutbacks on modern languages staffing, redundancies and in some cases the closure of courses – show the unprecedented pressures that UK universities are facing (and the serious implications these pressures have for an already embattled modern languages community). Modern languages disciplines can exercise some control […] … learn more→

  Once upon a time, when I worked in schools, early childhood teachers routinely issued young children with a ‘pen license’. A pen license was much sought after as it meant that a child could ‘advance’ to using a pen instead of a pencil. Using indelible ink meant that the child was able to write legibly […] … learn more→

Young people get a huge amount of their news from social media feeds, where false, exaggerated or sponsored content is often prevalent. With the right tools, caregivers can give kids the knowledge they need to assess credible information for themselves. Being able to identify the trustworthiness of information is an important concern for everyone. Yet […] … learn more→

Intelligence is a tough thing to measure. We have all sorts of tests, and all of them are subject to various criticisms, many valid. Despite this, it’s clear the tests are at least a little reliable, because one ethnic group consistently comes out on top: Asians (statistically, which means very little when addressing a specific […] … learn more→

If you are hoping to get a degree in a field that will allow you to get a job right away, you need to focus on the industries that are in desperate need of graduates. Five of those industries are listed below, so consider heading to school with the intention of diving into these areas, […] … learn more→

Many students and other young people are tempted to travel, either on a gap year before college, while they study, or before starting work once they have graduated. Unfortunately, many put it off due to the cost or fears that it may harm their studies and they never get that chance again. Studying while you […] … learn more→

Like Shakespeare, Charles Dickens liked to invent new words. Along with flummox, abuzz, and whiz-bang, he is also often credited with ‘the growlery’, which he mentioned in passing in Bleak House. There is some debate about whether this word is his creation, and most dictionaries suggest it is an archaic term he adopted but that […] … learn more→