Universities’ league table obsession triggers mental health crisis fears

June 11, 2018, 11:15 pm

≫ Next: How to support friends through their mental health struggles

≪ Previous: Fake news: Teaching children the difference between Trump and truth

Academics urged to open up about stress and anxiety over high-stakes research audit

Academic researcher John Banks (not his real name) still has big personal regrets about bowing to pressure from his former university in the run-up to the government’s last high-stakes audit of research.

Universities obsess about the government’s Research Excellence Framework, known as the Ref, with good reason. The four-yearly exercise determines not only where around £2bn a year of public funding will go, but where universities and individual departments will rank in league tables.

↧

How to support friends through their mental health struggles

June 12, 2018, 5:41 am

≫ Next: University guide 2018: league table for law

≪ Previous: Universities’ league table obsession triggers mental health crisis fears

If someone you know is finding the going tough, here’s what you can do to help help them

Bristol University students and representatives have spokenup about the student mental health crisis and the state of provisions at the university. While student activists continue to push for better support, there are things we can do on the ground to support our friends who are struggling.

As Cambridge University Students’ Unions’ welfare and rights officer, a big part of my job is training students not only on mental health and wellbeing, but also on peer support. Alongside services, friends are well placed to help. We know each other better than service providers. We can be easier to open up to, serving as a bridge to getting more formal support.

↧

University guide 2018: league table for law

May 15, 2017, 11:00 pm

≫ Next: Oxford and Cambridge university colleges hold £21bn in riches

≪ Previous: How to support friends through their mental health struggles

The study of criminal legal systems – includes criminology and jurisprudence

↧

Oxford and Cambridge university colleges hold £21bn in riches

May 28, 2018, 12:00 pm

≫ Next: Dreaming spires to Ladbrokes: Oxford college owns 300 properties in Brent

≪ Previous: University guide 2018: league table for law

Guardian study reveals how wealth of nearly 70 colleges is held in estates, endowments and artworks

Britain’s ancient universities of Oxford and Cambridge have access to a staggering pool of wealth totalling almost £21bn, analysis by the Guardian has revealed.

Using a combination of freedom of information requests and audited accounts to piece together the estates, endowments, investments and other assets – including artworks and antiques – held by nearly 70 colleges and institutions shows the full extent of Oxbridge’s remarkable wealth.

↧

Dreaming spires to Ladbrokes: Oxford college owns 300 properties in Brent

May 29, 2018, 6:56 am

≫ Next: Oxford and Cambridge university colleges own property worth £3.5bn

≪ Previous: Oxford and Cambridge university colleges hold £21bn in riches

All Souls College has a large real estate portfolio in London area where 33% live in poverty

Willesden High Road is a far cry from the dreaming spires of Oxford, but a number of the properties on this street in Brent, north London, are owned by All Souls, one of the university’s wealthiest colleges. All Souls owns more than 300 properties in this part of London, an area where 33% of households are living in poverty.

The vast majority of the properties are residential houses, but the college also owns the freehold of the Ladbrokes branch. On Tuesday the betting shop had two customers, one watching horse racing and the other tracing his bet at a terminal. The staff declined to comment except to say they were unaware of who owned the site.

↧

Oxford and Cambridge university colleges own property worth £3.5bn

May 29, 2018, 2:10 am

≫ Next: Back to school for UK judges in bid to raise courts awareness

≪ Previous: Dreaming spires to Ladbrokes: Oxford college owns 300 properties in Brent

News of bigger portfolio than Church of England comes after £21bn in total assets revealed

Oxford and Cambridge colleges collectively own more land than the Church of England and have a portfolio of properties across the UK worth £3.5bn, a Guardian investigation has found.

From a Scottish castle conquered by Robert the Bruce and the O2 arena in Greenwich to a betting shop in Brent, north-west London, the land and buildings owned by the universities’ colleges encompass ancient and modern possessions amounting to 51,000 hectares (126,000 acres) – an area more than four times the size of Manchester.

↧

Back to school for UK judges in bid to raise courts awareness

June 12, 2018, 11:58 am

≫ Next: To tackle student cheating, we need to reimagine university assessment | Jon Scott

≪ Previous: Oxford and Cambridge university colleges own property worth £3.5bn

Plan may see students holding mock trials, as lord chief justice seeks ‘future judges’

Traditionally, judges issue summons to court but the lord chief justice of England and Wales has decided to allow judges to be summoned to the classroom.

On a visit to a school in Ipswich, Lord Ian Burnett has urged schools to invite judges into their classrooms so that children can learn more about the justice system.

↧

To tackle student cheating, we need to reimagine university assessment | Jon Scott

June 12, 2018, 11:30 pm

≫ Next: Oxford University official links rough sleeping to students' generosity

≪ Previous: Back to school for UK judges in bid to raise courts awareness

Essay mills are becoming increasingly normalised. The only way to beat them is to design assessments they can’t reproduce

Ghost-writing academic work is nothing new but until relatively recently it was out of reach of most students. Now essay mills have started rolling on an industrial scale. Their sophisticated websites offer production of a whole range of assignments up to and including dissertations and theses. If required, a typical undergraduate essay, on pretty much any topic, can be turned around in less than 24 hours.

↧

Oxford University official links rough sleeping to students' generosity

June 13, 2018, 5:28 am

≫ Next: Students don’t get ‘value for money’. But we shouldn’t expect to | Micha Frazer-Carroll

≪ Previous: To tackle student cheating, we need to reimagine university assessment | Jon Scott

Email claiming end-of-exams ‘trashing’ adds to distress of homeless angers students

Oxford University is facing criticism after officials suggested the generosity of students had led to a rise in the number of rough sleepers in the city.

In an attempt to rid the university of its Bullingdon Club image, Oxford sent an email to students in an attempt to curb the practice of “trashing”, an undergraduate tradition involving covering each other in champagne and food after final exams.

↧

Students don’t get ‘value for money’. But we shouldn’t expect to | Micha Frazer-Carroll

June 13, 2018, 7:05 am

≫ Next: Hicham Benohoud's best photograph: the boy with the cardboard feet

≪ Previous: Oxford University official links rough sleeping to students' generosity

We’ve debated refunds for teaching missed during university strikes. But such a marketisation of education is dangerous

So students don’t feel as though they get good value for money at university? The survey results released by the Higher Education Policy Institute (Hepi) last week are hardly surprising. Getting our “money’s worth” is impossible when there’s no simple way to calculate exactly what we pay for. Dissatisfaction should be expected as tuition fee hikes, pension cuts and the teaching excellence framework push higher education as a product students purchase. But beyond this, the very concept of “value for money” is harmful. In utilising it, we buy into all the damaging effects of marketisation.

↧

Hicham Benohoud's best photograph: the boy with the cardboard feet

June 13, 2018, 7:43 am

≫ Next: Girls more likely to be bullied than boys, English schools survey finds

≪ Previous: Students don’t get ‘value for money’. But we shouldn’t expect to | Micha Frazer-Carroll

‘I was bored teaching art in Marrakech, so I started taking photographs of my students instead’

For 13 years, I was an art teacher in Marrakech, teaching 11- to 15-year-olds, and I was very bored. An art class lasts an hour. The teacher spends 10 minutes explaining what the students have to do, then they spend the next 45 minutes doing it. And while they’re cutting out, drawing and colouring, the teacher just sits there at his desk. That repeats hourly, from 8am until 6pm, every single day.

So about four years in, I started making work in the classroom. I first became obsessed with hyperrealistic drawing. My students were what I had in front of me, so I started taking passport-style photographs of them, which I would copy. Within a few months, people thought my drawings were photographs. I then moved on to colour photographs and oil painting, before realising that the photographs were what was most interesting.

↧

Girls more likely to be bullied than boys, English schools survey finds

June 13, 2018, 9:12 am

≫ Next: Graduation – a guide for parents

≪ Previous: Hicham Benohoud's best photograph: the boy with the cardboard feet

Government study finds violent bullying down, cyberbullying and social exclusion up

Girls are much more likely than boys to be bullied at school, with almost twice as many on the receiving end of cyberbullying and social exclusion by other pupils, according to a government study.

The figures from a survey of 10,000 pupils at schools in England in year 11 – children aged 15 or 16 – revealed a decline in reports of bullying overall and particularly in incidents of violent bullying, which mainly affects boys.

↧

Graduation – a guide for parents

June 30, 2015, 1:49 am

≫ Next: Dear Sir, I'm sorry: letters of apology to former teachers

≪ Previous: Girls more likely to be bullied than boys, English schools survey finds

From sorting out practical arrangements to avoiding faux pas, follow our guide to graduation day

“At my first graduation I got my boyfriend and best friend to pretend to be my parents,” says doctorate student Lindsay Jordan. “My friend dressed up like Jackie Onassis. It was pretty funny, but I’d rather my real parents had been there.”

Jordan’s parents didn’t attend either her undergraduate or master’s graduation ceremonies, as “they hate travelling and formal occasions”. While they may not be for everyone, graduation ceremonies are a chance for parents to celebrate their child’s achievements – and mark the end of university life. But they can also be expensive, stressful and the cause of family arguments. Here’s how to make your student child’s graduation day a happy one.

↧

Dear Sir, I'm sorry: letters of apology to former teachers

October 23, 2012, 12:00 pm

≫ Next: New-style exams may distort A-level and GCSE results - Ofqual

≪ Previous: Graduation – a guide for parents

Education secretary Michael Gove has written a letter to an old teacher, expressing regret for his behaviour at school. We asked some writers who they would apologise to and why

Brien McMahon High School, Norwalk, Connecticut

↧

New-style exams may distort A-level and GCSE results - Ofqual

May 24, 2018, 7:56 am

≫ Next: Would you get into grammar school? Try the 11-plus exam

≪ Previous: Dear Sir, I'm sorry: letters of apology to former teachers

Regulator warns schools of more variation than usual after reforms in many subjects

The head of England’s exam regulator has warned schools to expect volatility in their pupils’ results this summer, as new figures showed the impact of government reforms in the subjects being studied.

With hundreds of thousands of pupils in England sitting their A-level and GCSE exams, the regulator Ofqual signalled that results could be distorted by the new-style exams, especially at GCSE level, with grades now more dependent on exam marks than coursework.

↧

Would you get into grammar school? Try the 11-plus exam

September 9, 2016, 8:53 am

≫ Next: Words you can write on a calculator

≪ Previous: New-style exams may distort A-level and GCSE results - Ofqual

Theresa May’s resurrecting grammar schools so how would you fare in a test to get in one?

Theresa May has proposed a shakeup of the education system that could lead to an expansion of grammar schools across England. Many people object to the categorisation of pupils at age 11 on the basis of an exam. But how would you fare in such a test? Here’s a selection of 11-plus questions from sample tests produced by the educational publisher CGP. (To complete all the questions please view on desktop or mobile browsers rather than the app.)

↧

Words you can write on a calculator

January 10, 2014, 3:48 am

≫ Next: Should you study something you love or a degree that will get you a job?

≪ Previous: Would you get into grammar school? Try the 11-plus exam

If you were ever bored enough in a maths class to turn a number on your calculator into a word you may have only been scraping the surface. There is much more to this art than meets the eye

I own a Casio fx-85gt plus. It can perform 260 functions in less than a second, it can tell me when I've got a recurring decimal and it has a slide-on protective cover so that the buttons don't get pressed when it's in my bag. And even if the buttons do get pressed, I've got two-way power – solar and battery – so I'm sorted.

But as soon as I bought it I was disappointed. If I happened to be bored in a maths class, typed out 0.1134, turned my calculator upside down and slid it across to a friend I wouldn't get so much as a smile. The numbers look too much like normal typeface.

↧

Should you study something you love or a degree that will get you a job?

August 27, 2014, 2:40 am

≫ Next: Eton College pupils told to hand over their mobile phones at night

≪ Previous: Words you can write on a calculator

Two students debate whether you should follow your head or your heart when it comes to picking your degree

• Visit our Students and employability hub

Choosing what to study at university is one of the biggest decisions you'll make as a young person. So how do you decide what's right for you? Should you follow your heart and study something you're really passionate about, regardless of where it might lead you, or should you instead opt for a degree with a more secure career route? Here two students argue both sides of the debate.

↧

Eton College pupils told to hand over their mobile phones at night

June 13, 2018, 10:42 am

≫ Next: UK university figures show up to fivefold rise in first-class degrees

≪ Previous: Should you study something you love or a degree that will get you a job?

Boys’ boarding school brings in policy to combat social media pressures and improve sleep

Boys in their first year at Eton College have been ordered to hand over their mobile phones at night because of concerns about the pressures of social media.

Simon Henderson, the headmaster at the boys’ boarding school, said the policy had also been introduced to reduce the amount of screen time pupils are exposed to and improve their sleep.

↧

UK university figures show up to fivefold rise in first-class degrees

June 13, 2018, 11:40 am

≫ Next: Teenage knife possession offenders do worse in GCSEs – report

≪ Previous: Eton College pupils told to hand over their mobile phones at night

Wolverhampton handed firsts to five times as many students in 2016-17 as 10 years earlier

British universities have been handing out higher-class degrees at an unprecedented rate over the past decade, according to detailed figures released by the higher education regulator.

The figures, from a selection of universities taking part in the government’s latest teaching excellence framework, known as Tef3, show huge variation, with at least one university issuing five times as many first-class degrees last year as it did a decade before.

↧

Latest Images