Could Distributed Peer Review Better Decide Grant Funding?
The landscape of academic grant funding is notoriously competitive and plagued by lengthy, bureaucratic processes, exacerbated by difficulties in finding willing reviewers. Distributed […]
University Coeducation Is Not a Triumph for Feminism
From sexual abuse to pay and promotion gaps and beyond, coeducation has not kept up with the promises which with it was introduced, argues the author of a new book on the subject.
Intellectual Autonomy, Intellectual Property and the New Enclosures
If the public institution is committed to public interest, then privatization of research and teaching cannot be allowed. Work done should be seen, heard and critiqued. Innovation in knowledge can come when people take away ideas from us, just as we did. Research should be made public, accountable and responsible. The data commons in public interest cannot be sacrificed at the altar of intellectual autonomy.
What’s ‘World Class’ About University Rankings?
Higher education is a globally competitive market and institutions with a high rank can claim exceptionalism that brings in students and funding, acknowledges our Michelle Stack. But are rankings genuinely useful for students or for research?
The Never-Ending Audit®: Questioning the Lecturer Experience
The never-ending audit makes a crucial point about the ways in which power structures have shifted within universities, argues our Daniel Nehring. In effect, it suggests the death of the ideal of the autonomous scholar-researcher-teacher.
Take Away Tenure, and Professors Become Sheep
Alice Dreger says shecan see clearly that universities in which the majority of the faculty feel unsafe in terms of job security become places where no one feels safe to do anything that might risk upsetting someone.
Existing Career Incentives Are Often Bad for Science
A culture of bad science can evolve as a result of institutional incentives that prioritize simple quantitative metrics as measures of success, argues Paul Smaldino. But, he adds, not all is lost as new initiatives such as open data and replication are making a positive difference.
The Soviet System, Neoliberalism and British Universities
Craig Brandist compares aspects of British higher education to the old Soviet Union, with a similar tendency towards stagnation and strategies that workers adopt to absorb managerial pressure.
How Statistics Are Twisted to Obscure Public Understanding
We likely all remember the maxim about statistics and lies. Statistical data do not allow for lies so much as semantic manipulation, explains Jonathan Goodman. In short, numbers drive the misuse of words.
