Music education notably influences cognitive development and the acquisition of psychomotor, social and emotional skills. Research carried out in the field of neuroscience has also demonstrated the numerous benefits on brain plasticity of constant musical practice from the infant stage. However, for the digital-born generation, the early stages of conventional music learning, which typically focus on repetitive, […] … learn more→

State and local tax dollars cover the bulk of U.S. public school funding. The federal government spends just under US$55 billion per year on K-12 education, in addition to outlays for early childhood education and post-secondary programs like loans and grants for college tuition. That’s just 8% of the total $720 billion it costs to run the nation’s public schools during the […] … learn more→

Doctoral students show high levels of stress in comparison to other students, and ongoing uncertainty in terms of graduate career outcomes can make matters worse. Before the pandemic, one in five research students were expected to disengage from their PhD. Disengagement includes taking extended leave, suspending their studies or dropping out entirely. COVID-19 has made those statistics far worse. […] … learn more→

Applications to universities in the UK have increased during the COVID-19 lockdown. UCAS, the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service, has reported a 1.6% increase from last year, and over 40% of all UK 18-year-olds have now applied to university. This rise may come as a surprise. The university experience for those starting in autumn 2020 will be very […] … learn more→

Why would anyone start a blog? It’s a big commitment. A blog can be seen as an “extra”, as a “vanity project” as “not scholarly”, particularly if it doesn’t directly hit a “public engagement” or “impact” target.  It’s so much easier to write for other blogs. So why bother with your own? Well, I can […] … learn more→

Defending your doctoral thesis should never be an overly comfortable affair for candidates. After all, those seeking academia’s highest award should expect their research to be thoroughly tested by experts in their discipline. But too often, UK PhD vivas are recalled as frightening and upsetting encounters that many spend their careers trying to forget. I […] … learn more→

As leaders of an executive MBA at McMaster University’s DeGroote School of Business, we felt the burden of expectations as we discarded our established game plans in March and started again with a virtual delivery model. This is, after all, an EMBA in digital transformation, designed to develop leaders for an age of technological disruption. […] … learn more→

It was possible when I was a graduate student in the mid 1980s to have read every article in my field of study, bacterial chemotaxis. I did so, and I was known among my colleagues at the University of California, Berkeley for having achieved a feat that would be impossible now. At a Gordon conference […] … learn more→

The coronavirus pandemic has brought many unexpected changes – including a sudden prime-time role for government scientific advisers. What has until recently been rather a niche area within both government policymaking and university activity has now found itself centre stage – with not a few pitfalls along the way. As well as exposing some of […] … learn more→

In a column recently published by the Washington Post , a mother explained why she would continue to publish blog posts about her daughter, despite protests from her daughter. She said that, although the situation made her uncomfortable, she had not finished “exploring motherhood” in her writings. One commenter lambasted parents who, like this author, “use their family’s daily dramas to make […] … learn more→