Eligibility for an NHS Covid booster has been HUGELY restricted this Autumn. Studies show that both acute & long-term impacts of Covid are substantially WORSE than flu on almost every measure. www.thelancet.com/journals/lan... So why are the government offering so much LESS protection for Covid?

I really enjoyed 'Thirty two words for field' - sad to see that Manchán Magan has died: www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

'The affected staff, in the schools of foreign languages, history, religion and music, have been warned the university cannot rule out compulsory redundancy.'

The AfD qualified for three mayoral run-offs in cities in North Rhine-Westphalia today, and lost all by big margins. The lesson is not that we have overdone the AfD's rise, but that we do perhaps sometimes underestimate the counter-mobilisation effects - including in east Germany, incidentally.

Your age shouldn’t put you off learning a new language – what the research says theconversation.com/your-age-sho...

The vacuum at highest levels in talking about this dark turn in British life over the last few months HAS to end.

“Too often people go to university to ‘explore research and knowledge’.” - business secretary, Peter Kyle. What do they want knowledge for? Heaven forbid that students go to university to learn something!

Pretty much every word of this: www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Bear with me, I anticipate your disagreement. There is a clear pattern to the advice given to those who want to press back against rising racism. What it boils down to is that if you point out that racism is often being dressed up as “legitimate concerns” you will alienate people. /1

What owning a cat does to your brain (and theirs) theconversation.com/what-owning-...

'As universities close courses and departments in response to financial pressures...students in parts of the North, South West and East of England, as well as large areas of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, are losing access to social sciences, humanities and arts (SHAPE) courses.' 1/2

"leaving what is taught in our universities solely up to market forces undermines resilient subject provision and economic strategy, with lasting consequences for students and for universities’ ability to serve a public good.” 2/2

A tenet of Fascism is keep repeating lies and people will become so confused about what is the truth that they’ll start to believe them. We all have a responsibility to keep repeating the truth in the face of politically-motivated lying. Don’t just roll your eyes, speak up.

When parties with mainstream, liberal, or progressive identities try to stanch support for far-right parties by adopting conservative or authoritarian policies, it almost always fails. From @adambienkov.bsky.social bylinetimes.com/2025/09/02/r...

'I have additional ideas, beginning with better respecting the glittering diversity of languages emigrants bring to the UK. We wrongly dictate that assimilation in western countries requires shifting to English monolingualism' www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Not one mention of an opposing viewpoint. The idea asylum seekers should be treated with compassion or dignity is apparently beyond the spectrum of acceptable opinion. Balance simply does not apply in these circumstances.

Is language learning in the UK really in a state of crisis? It's not that simple – languages GCSE uptake across schools can vary very widely, write IOE researchers. #IOEBlog blogs.ucl.ac.uk/ioe/2025/08/...

This is just stupid now. Universities are a state asset and a facet of national power. Someone needs to get a grip on them immediately - like, today. www.ft.com/content/d949...

“It is a portrait of two Britains, one of which barely comprehends the challenges facing the other.” My ‪@theobserveruk.bsky.social column: observer.co.uk/news/opinion...

'We had no idea of what it would become': How Keep Calm and Carry On became a divisive 21st-Century phenomenon

What does it really mean to think like a linguist? Charlotte Ryland argues it's time to move beyond grammar drills and embrace creativity, culture, and collaboration in language education. 🔗 www.lspjournal.com/post/think-l... ✍️ Collection Edited by @wendya-b.bsky.social & @cforsdick.bsky.social

From June 23 to June 29, 2025, Freie Universität Berlin will be cutting out the letter e from its communication. Why? Because the university itself is facing cuts: around 37 million euros this year alone. Additional cuts are also planned for 2026 and 2027. (1/3)

Find out how to embrace the diverse cultural and linguistic perspectives of your students and prepare them to thrive in an interconnected world, with this guide from educators at @sfu.ca : ow.ly/NXMm50WaGUK #highered #language #inclusion #edusky #academicsky #teaching

Paul Ashwin makes a strong case for subject knowledge in HE. 'Addressing the challenges facing the world will require drawing on the diversity of these perspectives which cannot be gained through being taught generic skills or unconnected stores of specific knowledge.' www.hepi.ac.uk/2025/06/16/h...

A review by @uniofaberdeen.bsky.social into how their consultation on Modern Languages programmes has been handled last year, found decision-making was unstructured and dominated by finances. The university said it accepted there had been "missteps". www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Support languages colleagues at Bangor & sign the petition chng.it/yqLgGnZSR7

474% increase in complaints about substandard social housing in England since 2019/20. Despite the Grenfell fire substandard living conditions remain. New slums being built with planning deregulation and conversation of offices/warehouses into homes. People deserve dignity and security.

Have you signed up to the MFL teacher conference on 20th June? Registration is free but places are limited! Have a look at our programme! With presentations from Rasha Soliman, @joedale.bsky.social Antonio Martínez-Arboleda & many more!! artsoutreach.leeds.ac.uk/our-activiti... #mfl #mfltwitterati

'following a staff consultation, the university’s vice-chancellor Wendy Larner has said that the courses will be maintained “albeit with revised structures and with a smaller staff base” in new proposals that will be put to the university’s council for approval on 17 June.' 1/3

Good thing too www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

🚨 NEW: Opportunities for the poorest young people in London far outstrip the rest of England, we have found. Our new Opportunity Index reveals how the area young people grow up in shapes their life chances, with huge differences between constituencies across the country 🧵⬇️

“I woke up with a sense of dread…” A moving, deeply personal account from an EU citizen in Cambridge on how Labour’s new rhetoric is shaking people’s sense of belonging. Don’t miss this powerful open letter. 👇

I am proud of what immigrants like my mum and those across Luton North have given to our country. Many serve in our NHS, open biz, enrich culture/arts & much more. The best way to avoid becoming an ‘island of strangers’ is investing in communities to thrive - not pitting people against each other.

If a government with over 400 seats and 4 years left to govern cannot summon the courage to level with the public on social care then I despair at the capacity of our political system to ever deliver the change we need.

Hi Labour, rather than learning all the wrong lessons from this election defeat - what about taking some people out of poverty and improving some lives?

Obviously things have got dramatically worse in the US recently, and I don't want to diminish that, but I've been at *so many* conferences in the UK on topics like empire, humanitarianism and development where multiple speakers from the Global South have been denied visas or held at the border

New report from @britishacademy.bsky.social on language skills & capabilities in the UK research base Multilingual capabilities are integral to research excellence, impact and integrity www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/publications...

Word of the day: 'der Liz-Truss-Moment' www.handelsblatt.com/meinung/morn...

Seriously, if you worry that upholding the law might be politically bad for the 'optics‘, and could give a boost to the people you want nowhere near power, you have already given up on the principles you claim to be defending.

La loi is mightier than Le Pen (for the moment, at least):

'Many people in officially monolingual countries cling to the false notion that monolingualism is the natural state of humanity' CMP=share_btn_urlhttps://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/mar/27/swahili-mandarin-uk-increasingly-multilingual?CMP=share_btn_url

Thanks to @infoneari.bsky.social for an interesting evening's discussion of educational action research - quite thought-provoking on ethical issues.

Madrid plans to limit computer and tablet use in primary schools to two hours a week www.theguardian.com/world/2025/m...

Happy World Storytelling Day! To me, the "world" in "World Storytelling Day" speaks to three aspects - being celebrated around the world, celebrating stories from all over the world, but also celebrating the linguistic diversity in which stories are told. 🧵1/6

German Foreign Office just updated its travel advice to the US. Germans are explicitly warned for arrest, detention and deportation when traveling to the US. www.tagesschau.de/ausland/amer...

Exactly this. Austerity has had loads of opportunity to prove itself in the UK. It's failed miserably & has cost more.

NEW 🧵 Is human intelligence starting to decline? Recent results from major international tests show that the average person’s capacity to process information, use reasoning and solve novel problems has been falling since around the mid 2010s What should we make of this? www.ft.com/content/a801...

Excellent read: 'You only really start to process trauma when you stop ignoring it and begin to address it. That goes for countries as well as people' open.substack.com/pub/iandunt/...