NEW on Wonkhe: Was there a freedom of speech breach at Bangor? bit.ly/4aGRCQv

We've had 6 incompetent PMs in a row. It's surely statistically improbable that this is pure bad luck and has nothing to do with our political culture/system or capitalism. But that's what we're being invited to believe.

"Eluned Morgan rules out loan threshold freeze for Welsh students"

I’m not sure ‘our national security developed vetting technique can be beaten if a candidate is prepared to lie’ is an especially helpful line to push.

New article! On the Epstein files, the cruelty of the release, and the crimes that came before: sarahkendzior.substack.com/p/jackhammer...

we broke the redaction on this government-commissioned Rothschild report in 2013. www.theguardian.com/money/2013/j...

This article has some good info but ignores Ghislaine Maxwell, who is as key as Epstein. She was the daughter of Robert Maxwell, an Israeli spy and Russian mafia operative. Maxwell got key mafiosos out of the USSR by providing them Israeli passports. This allowed them to build a global network (1)

This is pages 49-50 of The Great University Gamble - written in 2012, published 2013.

I used to play sport at a high level when I was in my teens. Had professional coaching on running - had decent form. I analyse every single jogger I see on the streets criticising their poor technique. I am overweight, lazy and haven't run at all in 25 years.

Hell of a set of top BBC politics stories for the government

Well i am sure they will all learn some lessons from this

Mandelson commissioned the Browne review which led to the current mess in English HE ...

Young professionals are bitterly angry about the student loans system, protesting that agreements they were encouraged to sign up to as 18-year-old school pupils are blighting their financial futures. Do they have a point? ft.trib.al/vzP0xgI

A reminder: basic finance tips for activists. andrewmcgettigan.org/2022/05/01/s... #2 is always pertinent: don't misread "unrestricted reserves" as c a s h reserves. Cash is in there, but so are book valuations of other assets.

😘 👌

NEW on Wonkhe: Jim Dickinson gets across a candid Welsh Government document that identifies problems that others are less willing to confront – from market redistribution to the graduate brain drain buff.ly/0xdkxht

a herd of remorseless wild pirates and inhuman atheistical devils were infernally cheering him on with their curses

Labour's record so far on HE is pretty terrible. But this is really a nadir wonkhe.com/blogs/gradua...

This is an example of politicians' professional deformation. They are selected and indoctrinated to be overconfident about the possibilities of top-down control: chrisdillow.substack.com/p/weird-poli...

She's just sacked a police chief for believing in the power of AI.

In any other context, requiring a high-productivity sector to offshore the production of its highest value-added exports would be seen as the economic illiteracy it so obviously is... www.ft.com/content/a23c...

🇳🇴 Donald Trump a déclaré au Premier ministre norvégien qu'il n'avait plus besoin de penser "uniquement à la paix" après avoir échoué à remporter le prix Nobel de la paix, dans un message publié lundi.

This isn’t as mysterious as some seem to find it. It’s not so much about the actual individuals (or the government as such) but how they have come to embody/exemplify a ‘class’ of affectless, rule & procedure bound people we encounter at work (especially) & who are also ruining sport, TV etc.

The government's keenness to protect "good jobs" in manufacturing contrasts with its inaction in the face of the destruction of "good jobs" in universities. What's going on here is something other than economics.

Today is the 55th anniversary of the official opening of the silliest pub the world ever saw, the Windsock in Dunstable

if you are trying to reach me on chat here, please use my email instead.

NEW on Wonkhe: Weekend courses can’t get student loans bit.ly/4pZ9FX3

Last week on Wonkhe: Seventeen years after its hopeful launch, Southend’s university campus is closing. Jim Dickinson examines what this tells us about the failure of place-based planning in UK higher education

FOR THE LOVE OF GOD USE HYPHENS

Very sad news. Plenty of times in the early 90s he was the one batter England could rely on

"Hamish saw boys punched in the head during fights or whipped with belts during initiation rituals... staff said they didnt need to know about such incidents, encouraging them to physically fight it out." How the army treats teenagers, by @sianushka.bsky.social www.opendemocracy.net/en/british-a...

As expected - Greenwich is applying to change its name to ‘London and South East University Group’. www.officeforstudents.org.uk/publications... Kent is being absorbed into Greenwich. OfS label it a "merger" The new setup wants to keep the brands - "University of Kent" and "University of Greenwich"

Actually, seeing a man of color, getting scared, and calling The Police, is pretty typical racist behavior

🧵I've posted them before, but here's my thread of horror/kids' TV double-bill cinema posters. Happy Halloween... #halloween #cinema #graphicdesign #poster

🛩️ Une équipe américaine a volé directement dans l'œil de l'ouragan Melissa qui dévaste les Caraïbes. L'Administration nationale océanique et atmosphérique (NOAA) a publié les images impressionnantes depuis le cockpit, secoué par les turbulences⤵️

Small businesses being notoriously immune to cash flow squeezes.

Maybe I have been out of the HE policy loop too long, but this White Paper looks much like something from 2016-18. Even "learning gain" & reviewing external examiner practice reappear. I previously argued that the logic of English HE policy was to reduce research activity

Also, for all that we enjoy the comedic stylings of Kemi Badenoch, a party leadership which is only three percentage points ahead of her, having been at 45% as recently as 18 months ago, might want to have a look in the mirror and ask what it is doing wrong

the important thing is that they let this go on for a long time and humiliated their ministers for no reason in the mean time

Mandelson predicts fresh revelations about Epstein friendship on.ft.com/4nn5ov7

This entire book is a nightmare

Japan's oldest professional player of the board game Go retired on Wednesday aged 98, saying that she can no longer handle "six hours without a break". u.afp.com/SQLZ

Amongst all the fun of this it’s, once again, worth pointing out that I couldn’t convince a single university in the UK of the value of this sort of public history work or the benefits of a REF impact case study built around computer games and Lucasfilm. Worth reflecting on for academia I think. 🗃️

I had a life-sized poster of the Flukeman from this episode in my freshman dorm and for some reason my roommate moved out