Why do academics blog? What do academic bloggers get from blogging? Discussions about scholarly blogging most often centre on the need for we academics to write in ways that attract new audiences. If we write blogs, we are told, we can communicate our research more effectively. Blogs enhance impact, they are a medium for public […] … learn more→

With the Paris climate conference taking place, we should be prepared for dissenters to pull out a few hoary old chestnuts to try to undermine the process. “Climate science isn’t settled” is a particular favourite, still repeated by various Republican presidential candidates as an excuse for inaction on global warming. It’s therefore worth remembering that […] … learn more→

Politicians lie. To varying degrees, they always have. But it is starting to seem that that truism is more true than it has ever been. In 2012, American political commentator Charles P. Pierce claimed that the Republican Party was setting out in search of the “event horizon of utter bullshit” at its national convention that […] … learn more→

I’ve spent decades in higher education, and there have been a few times I’ve been in danger of promotion. Part of the reason I’m in such little danger of being promoted is integrity: I have it, and it’s not wanted in higher education. Thus, when admin says they’re going to improve education by doubling the […] … learn more→

In August 1939, the operational head of Britain’s Government Communication and Cypher School, Alistair Denniston, wrote to the Foreign Office about the need to recruit “men of the professor type” into the wartime code-breaking hub at Bletchley Park in order to help combat the Nazi threat. Following the horror of marauding attacks in Paris, the […] … learn more→

Since the cost of going to college is an important concern for a large segment of voters, the 2016 presidential candidates are all advocating policies aimed at making a college education more affordable. The Democrats want to use government resources to offer more financial aid and lower the interest rates on federally guaranteed student loans. […] … learn more→

Since President Clinton first enacted tax credits for college tuition in the late 1990s, lawmakers have expanded these policies, which now amount to over $20 billion in annual aid. While these benefits are commonly described as helping families pay for college, which usually means a two-year or four-year degree, they also apply to graduate and […] … learn more→

There’s been much discussion about the needless complexity of academic writing. In a widely read article in The Chronicle of Higher Education last year, Steven Pinker, professor of psychology at Harvard and author of several acclaimed books including The Sense of Style, analyzed why academic writing is “turgid, soggy, wooden, bloated, clumsy, obscure, unpleasant to […] … learn more→

When Ashgate Publishing was bought last summer by Informa, a large corporation, some academics feared for its future. What would happen to the family-owned publishing house, which had spent four decades building a reputation for social responsibility and close relationships with its authors? In November those fears started coming true. According to a Change.org petition […] … learn more→

There has always been a multi-tier system in higher education. Everyone knows that, for example, a Harvard education isn’t quite the same thing as State U. On the other hand, less people know that within a typical state university, there is also a multi-tier system. There’s a mini-system just for athletes (the UNC scandal was […] … learn more→