Loves the second amendment. Hates the first. #FakeFreeSpeech

East Asian Studies is being gutted at Sheffield - all staff at risk with 8.6 FTE proposed to go (a third of us). Biggest cuts in Chinese and Japanese Studies. We’ll be taking a few days to process. Solidarity to Materials and Chemistry colleagues who are also dealing with similarly bad news.

Meanwhile...

Interesting reflection on the policy successes of previius youth justice reforms. But is the evidence base for early intervention as strong as the new White Paper claims?

Great blog post from @profalexstevens.bsky.social on the challenges faced by professional service and admin staff at universities. www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-un...

Just got my first advert for an AI essay marking system. It will not be long before the circle is complete, with AI writing the lectures, the essays, and the feedback to students.

Thanks to Farage, the people of Woodhouse in Sheffield now have a Nazi as their councillor.

The fourth Reform councillor suspended, expelled or forced to resign since being elected on...Thursday

Is any keeping a list of all the Reform councillors who've resigned or been expelled, and why?

There are lots of questions I want to ask Reform people, mostly starting "about that five million quid", but it would be a shame to let this moment from Robert Jenrick slip past unnoticed. thecritic.co.uk/toda...

If you’re interested in Stakeholders in Swedish drug policy - Values, interests and involvement, you are welcome to attend Tuulia Lerkkanen’s public defence on May 8. You may also read the doctoral dissertation, fulltext link via www.su.se/enheter/inst...

No matter how resounding Sussex's win is, as David Kernohan reports in @wonkhe.bsky.social, the threat to universities have not gone away. Indeed a manifestly unfit regulator now has more extensive statutory powers than those used in this case. The OfS keeps failing up: share.google/nzrurRyaR6NW...

The OfS is not sufficiently independent of government to regulate free speech #FakeFreeSpeech www.theguardian.com/education/20...

Here's a school-night adaptation of the classic military marching song "The British Grenadiers" (popular in both 18th c. Britain and the colonies) wishing #KingCharles luck on his #statevisit - we're calling it: "The British King is Here!" 🥁 youtu.be/5gwB0i0HyB8 #royalfamily #USUKRelations

"Rather than trying to shut down universities, we should be restoring them to their true purpose. That starts by acknowledging that the experiment with marketisation has failed."

Yesterday, I was reminded that almost nobody knows that the homicide rate in England & Wales has halved since 2003. www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopula...

The punitive regulation of free speech in universitied is to be done by the OfS, which has been found to be insufficiently independent from government by a House of Lords committee. #Fakefreespeech lordslibrary.parliament.uk/office-for-s...

Can we not just focus on the climate crisis.

Serious Violence Reduction Orders (introduced in 2022) didn’t actually reduce serious violence – the people given an order in court were just as likely to commit further violent crimes as those who weren’t.

Reform manage to lose a county council seat on the coast. The Green Party victor is a recent winner of the Mr Margate Beard and Moustache competition.

Tomorrow we are drug checking in #Camden How does it work? 1. Surrender a substance 2. Tell us what you think it is & about your drug use 3. We do lab tests inc. a test for synthetic opioids 4. After ~1 hour, we have results & can give honest advice wearetheloop.org/drug-checking

My second biggest pet peeve (after people who use their phone's speaker on trains)

CRUK stop supporting open access fees Good step but there's definitely a more nuanced dialogue to be had. (I'd love to chat more about this with them too) news.cancerresearchuk.org/2026/04/01/w...

New rule: you can donate to universities, but you can't get your name on the building. When poor people do it, it's called tagging #richmansgraffitti

Spring has come to @sheffielduni.bsky.social

Great demonstration from Goodwin of how not to win an argument.

to walk the road of peace sometimes we need to be ready to climb the mountain of conflict

Will Starmer have the spine to explain this to Trump?

Government ministers should condemn this, as they did when P&O did it to their staff.

I sometimes see people claiming that drug prohibition is the 'greatest policy failure'. Greater than climate change, continual war, global povert, endemic violence against women and girls?

Rugby meets criminological theory: higher scores in the six nations were caused by shifting to more certain punishment (multiple yellow cards) rather than harsh punishment (rare reds), more effectively deterring infractions that kill attacks.

Rugby meets criminological theory: higher scores in the six nations were caused by shifting to more certain punishment (multiple yellow cards) rather than harsh punishment (rare reds), more effectively deterring infractions that kill attacks.

I wrote a blog on how universities have been reorganised into incompetence www.linkedin.com/posts/alex-s...

⌛️ There’s 1 week to submit an abstract for LEPH2026! Be sure to submit your innovative research, policy development, or practice-based initiatives by 16 March! leph2026.org/abstracts-pr...

This is superlative. theconversation.com/how-lessons-...

How can a rugby team go from beating the All Blacks in the autumn to losing three games in a row in the spring? #ITAvENG

This is a great game! #ScoVFra

Saw Alice Zawadski's trio play @sheffielduni.bsky.social this week. An absolutely magical show. #SheffieldJazz

Is there any way that Hegseth can be prosecuted for his war crimes, given that neither the USA nor Iran are members of the ICC?

"This attack on international students isn’t really about reducing asylum claims, it’s about aping Reform to try and win back votes." @drjogrady.bsky.social leftfootforward.org/2026/03/gove...

Opening of overdose prevention centers in New York City was not associated with significant changes in neighborhood foot traffic or consumer spending, suggesting no observed economic harms near these #HarmReduction sites. ja.ma/403HXgS

The Green victory shows what is needed to beat Reform: a positive message of hope and relentless door-to-door campaigning.

Anyone who's suffered at the hands of Reviewer #2 may enjoy this. www.linkedin.com/posts/alex-s...

England are playing like a bunch of amateurs #ENGvIRE

A retired British primary school administrator with a British passport and a valid visa was shackled, chained and detained for six weeks by ICE www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

New paper on "Impact of Scotland's first Virtual Consumption app". Thanks @catrionamath.bsky.social @hadidf.bsky.social for support and guidance. Thanks @sheffielduni.bsky.social for Open Access publishing. @profalexstevens.bsky.social for continuing supervision and support. doi.org/10.1186/s129...

New on Talking Drugs: www.talkingdrugs.org/how-internat... Summary of our recent article on how and why consensus fractured at the 2024 Commission on Narcotic Drugs.

CALL FOR ABSTRACTS for #LEPH2026 Abstracts should address innovative research, policy development, or practice-based initiatives that contribute to safer, healthier communities and relate to the conference’s themes: leph2026.org @vp-centre.bsky.social

A risk of overselling decriminalisation, by saying that it will reduce drug deaths, is that it may be reversed if it doesn't appear to do so.

Some good news from Portugal www.theguardian.com/world/2026/f...