Holy

Universities, always ready to step up to the mark and do the wrong thing. www-bbc-co-uk.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.bbc....

😎

“Socioeconomic roots of academic faculty“ -IN THE USA ffs, other countries and systems exist. www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Graduation day for #1. Been quite a journey, proud dad moment.

So sad to learn of the sudden passing of Malcolm Von Schantz. Malcolm was a real gentleman and an excellent scientist, so kind, supportive, clear and insightful. A huge loss to chronobiology and sleep science. RIP.

Live footage of collecting drips of research excellence in a bucket.

Research excellence is a nebulous concept. For example, in our case it doesn’t seem to encompass fixing a months-old leak in the PhD student room that has caused the power to be cut off at their desks. 🤷‍♂️

So, the prophesy came to pass.

Get tae fuck

I talked to @seanmoncrieff.bsky.social about the relative merits of being a morning or evening chronotype. @maynoothuniversity.ie @mupsychology.bsky.social www.newstalk.com/podcasts/hig...

With the "Fall Back" clock change nearly upon us, re-upping this Light O'Clock podcast I contributed to about the science of these clock changes open.spotify.com/episode/0tOU...

On the show today: @cooganlab.bsky.social on getting up early (or late); @elaineburke.bsky.social on deepfake presidential candidates; @eesc-president.bsky.social on leaving school at 13; How Sudan is still ignored; gerry Adams doc; @drjoannafortune.bsky.social with parenting; (Not) raking leaves

59 years ago today the exquisite horror of the disaster at Aberfan played out.

Time for an act of attainder www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025...

Should be made to correct exam scripts for classes of 700 first years, but I guess that is “little people” work m.independent.ie/irish-news/f...

Historically, the problems of errant members of the British Royal family would be solved by just murdering them. news.sky.com/story/prince...

This morning my ChatGPT quota was inexplicably exhausted. It took a while but I pieced it together. Voice mode somehow got activated when I went to bed. The bot then engaged in a 10 hour conversation with my snoring dog, answering questions the pup wasn’t asking and praising him for his insight.

Just FYI if you are not familiar with Academia, it is at least 50% this

Peak University Coms here: “Our VC has resigned with immediate effect and there is absolutely nothing to see here, please move along” www.gold.ac.uk/news/2025/vc...

hahahahahahfuckoffhahahahah

“What is the clamping release fee?” www.irishtimes.com/ireland/educ...

It is always very revealing what does and does not "excite" a certain type of university leader.

I can count up how old I am by thinking about all the extra buttons and tabs I need to press on now just to open a Word document compared to when I started out.

Its THES World Rankings Day! Batten down the hatches for breathless press releases! Put aside any concerns about statistical rigour and measurement validity and embrace the grift!

Doing research, the science should be the hard bit, but somehow universities, funders and others have managed to produce a system where doing the science is no longer the hardest part of the process. Why do we even bother?

Apart from the financials, the public health aspect of this is so regressive, where half of this effective subsidy is going to go to the big fast food chains.

Budget 2026, for Higher Education and Research, was there a "PRTLI" allocation made? I cannot see specifics, there is a reference to a infrastructure programme, but capital allocation only increased by 90 million assets.gov.ie/static/docum...

630,000,000 euro subsidy from the public purse supporting McDonalds, Burgerking, Dominoes, Supermacs etc.

We pay 23% VAT for consumables for medical research, but for some reason the government priority is to cut VAT to 9% for this lot.

Aah, the glories of rural Ireland, where no wedding is complete without a bridal tractor.

Current status

"More!", cried the university manager. "Give me more of everything, you fools!" www.theguardian.com/education/20...

Just watched the first episode of House of Guinness. Wolf Hall it is not.

Chairing Academic Meetings.

“The core business of the university - teaching and research - is co-ordinated virtually entirely by ordinary non-executive staff”.

This is bound to play exceptionally well in Northern Ireland... www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/poli...

The university relies so deeply on its faculty to do our jobs with sensitivity and care, going far beyond the letter of our contracts to mentor and advise and assist our students. You would think that it would see the inadvisability of treating its entire teaching staff with contempt. And yet!

This is a new one for me, 0.95FTE? Like, 95% of a full time job? Where to next, 0.8275747 FTE? universityvacancies.com/university-c...

Having your country run by grifters, sex offenders and shitheads turns out to be a bad thing.

Start reading about statistical method X to be less of an ignorant methods fool. Find equal amounts of papers saying “Method X is never the right approach” and “Method X is always the right approach”. Runs t test.

People, please, I am begging you, if sending a document please just send it as an attachment, not as a link to the accursed OneDrive/Sharepoint leading to login, MFA, then oops you do not have permission to access the document then an e-mail "could you please send it as an attachment"

Just preparing them for life as faculty.

Another power cut in the town (and university) this morning, its like Heath's Britain circa 1973.

Someone has mysteriously left a feather duster outside my office. I wonder if it is a “Luca Brassi sleeps with the fishes” type of warning…