This evening's run was....delightful (dog went on strike shortly after this)

1.This is not the only known example we know of ChatGPT cheering on a vulnerable young person to die by suicide, this time it is a recent Texas A&M grad 2. Every single university that has invited OpenAI into our midst should be asked to account for their choices. www.cnn.com/2025/11/06/u...

As I'm currently in my own why-doesn't-the-NHS-do-something persistent low ferritin battle, this is all very familiar. Especially fun when mixed with hypothyroidism and endometriosis for a fatigue triple whammy 😩 www.theguardian.com/society/2025...

@dannyrobins.bsky.social Saw this on an ad. Nearly had a heart attack 😨 #EltonsPhone

Nope. No no no. Autistic students do not 'face growing challenges on campus'. They do however experience existing, entrenched, systemic barriers created and perpetuated by structural inequities that are baked into pretty much every element of the student journey from pre-applicant to graduate...

This is desperately sad as it is identical to the experience I had giving birth to my first daughter. I also haemorrhaged, my daughter also had to be resuscitated (twice). The difference is that we were in hospital, with two full crash teams, and we both survived.

"We learn early that “disabled” is a word that shuts doors. Employers avoid it, family members whisper it, clinicians rank it. So we start running from it, mistaking distance for dignity." Excellent from @lovettejallow.bsky.social Someone will always argue, but regardless: autism IS a disability.

This is a great article, and a very useful explanation wonkhe.com/blogs/everyo...

Gosh, who'd have thunk it, being packed off to isolation repeatedly, usually for very minor infractions of totally bizarre rules, and often publicly shamed, damages children's mental health and perception of school, and disproportionately impacts disabled, especially neurodivergent, children

It was probably overly optimistic to think that the Post-16 Education & Skills White Paper would contain anything of use/interest/help to the half a million disabled students in HE, or indeed any mention of inclusive pedagogies as a way to tackle the inequities it mentions www.gov.uk/government/p...

Wenn Lawson, one of the originators of the theory, writes about Monotropism for Frontiers in Psychiatry. "Uncovering how monotropism explains autism and Autistic experience takes the reader into the very heart of Autistic experience in ways not previously shown." www.frontiersin.org/journals/psy...

I've been doing some work with UCAS over recent years, aimed at improving the advice given to disabled students and their applicants. Some of this has made its way into the brand new Supporter Toolkits www.ucas.com/advisers/hel.... Essential reading for #SENCOs #ALNCOs, parents and supporters

Some of the communications we get are breathtakingly rude, especially (but not only) from parents. And it's getting worse as more parents feel more entitled to demand ever greater levels of service and expectation that simply aren't realistic and don't recognise the very stressed humans involved

Yesterday, the OfS published an Insight briefing into the experiences of disabled students in #UKHE. It tells us all the same issues that every report about disabled students tells us, year after year. What we need is enforcement, not another checklist of 'thinking points' wonkhe.com/blogs/why-is...

We are so pleased to announce next month's #CRAEwebinar. Jada Brown will be speaking on 'Understanding the embodied experiences of Black, autistic university students in the UK' Do join us: Thur 6th Nov 4pm

I'm giving away this signed 1st edition h/b of my new novel (it has a tiny jacket rip which means I wouldn't sell it) to one person who reposts this. You might like it if you like: Folkloric creatures Old records Intricate psychedelic stories The idea of circular time All shares much-appreciated.

"An English degree is a rip off" said by the people who are currently ripping everyone off. They don't want you to be literate, to understand the context, the references or the rhetoric they are using to scam you. A rip off for THEM. If you can read, write and parse meaning, you're harder to fool.

English graduate here, busily using the skills I learnt every single day in a job that requires careful, flexible communication, the ability to argue effectively, think critically, write convincingly in a variety of styles, parse text quickly and 'lay the track' when talking. And still love reading!

I do find it curious that the NHS will happily give me a vaccine for one highly contagious respiratory virus (weedy asthmatic) but not for the other. Last year I qualified for a Covid vaccination due to caring responsibilities, but that's gone this year too.

"compassion fatigue," much like "emotional labor" is real, but has been co-opted. it was coined to refer to the feeling that, say, ppl in medical fields get when they're forced to work in an unfair system so they don't have the means to alleviate the suffering of others despite having the knowledge-

Are there some sort of bonus points available for running to your flu jab appointment (and back) through a massive storm?

The mystery of medical diagnosis!

Our dog goes out once a week with our dog walker who loads him and his pals in a van and takes them to the woods and the stream for a couple of hours. She is, without a doubt, his absolute most favourite person in the world 😆

My recent emojis in Teams tell a story, I feel...Especially the top line

I was thinking about this recently when taking my eldest to the Oxford Open Day. She's at a northern state grammar school. She was amongst groups of kids who had been bused in by their schools, had stayed in college, where their schools had already been visited by various colleges...

Great article on an important topic that I've been discussing with colleagues recently, especially after the case of Adam Raine in the US wonkhe.com/blogs/higher...

Hey everyone! I'm extremely excited to announce that today marks the release of the 10th Anniversary Edition of Steve Silberman's ground-breaking NeuroTribes, with a new foreword by John Elder Robison.

Horrifying. It's not just the initial error but everything after that. BBC News - Student took his own life after 'tragic' university grade error www.bbc.com/news/article...

Good discussion with someone who was initially told he couldn't study computer science at uni because he is blind. Spoiler alert: he could, he did, and he is now employed as a computer scientist. #UKHE really needs to get better at understanding disability share.google/dGJSgCsHtvgy...

Forcing myself to listen to this even though it's deeply grim 🙁 share.google/iUiGbQs3By9a...

I am always deeply grateful for my annual mammogram for helping me manage my breast cancer risk but OH MY WORD why is it still so painful in the year of our lord 2025?!

I tend to avoid directly listening to Trump because it costs too many spoons. I saw confirmation today that Trump is saying young children should not be given Tylenol. You *cannot* *become* Autistic *after* you are *born* … You are born Autistic or you aren’t Autistic. Trump & RFK Jr are FoS.

Steve Silberman is so pissed about this Tylenol bullshit that he's screaming from the afterlife he didn't even believe in. Increased rates of autism are due to testing, a broadened definition, and greater awareness. It's not vaccines. It's not Tylenol. It's like his work never happened.

One of the extraordinary claims from the Orange Leader about autism, Tylenol and vaccines, yesterday, was that if people do as he suggests, there was no downside. "Nothing bad can happen". Just good things would happen, apparently. Thread/

Really enjoying this trip back to the forties and fifties, with all the refrigerator mother vibes and Rosemary Kennedy's 'curative' lobotomy

'Tylenol' is known in the civilised world as Paracetamol 2.4 million children born in Sweden between 1995 and 2019. Studied 186,000 children whose mothers were treated with paracetamol during pregnancy. news.ki.se/no-link-betw...

Paracetamol (Tylenol) does not cause autism, and it is a source of great dismay that autism researchers and Autistic advocates still have to spend so much time battling misinformation. Research on causes of autism systematically fails to control for the existence and behaviour of Autistic parents.

Shout out to everyone else sitting in their coat and scarf and gloves in the office because universities never seem to turn the heating on until there's actual snow on the ground

Yes, I know hybrid is harder to organise, and requires a bit more effort to ensure everyone is engaged, but if it ain't hybrid, it ain't accessible. If it's totally impossible, at the very least offer an online equivalent of whatever you're doing in person.

Here’s a poem called ‘English Roundabouts’.

I need you to understand what this country feels like right now for those of us who look different. I'm sitting here, trying to plan for Saturday, make sure I don't even need to go to the corner shop for milk, like it's Christmas Day or lockdown. Why? Because I live near where Yaxley-Lennon will 1/

NEW on Wonkhe: While new ONS figures show a lower suicide rate among students than their peers, Bob Abrahart warns this framing masks deeper inequalities and systemic failures within universities buff.ly/sjrrKLa

Just going to sit here and think about how on earth my team will manage a 56% year-on-year increase in students signing up with our Service when we've still not caught up with last year's massive increase 😭

We're recruiting up to 4 full time equivalent Disability Advisors on a temporary (3 month) basis to help us get through the first semester in our busy team. Experience in HE a must. Full details on my LinkedIn post (I know, I know) www.linkedin.com/posts/activi...

BBC News - Disabled NHS medic told she's 'not a real doctor' www.bbc.com/news/article...

It's a little galling to receive a notification saying that all staff have to do mandatory GenAI training in the next 4 weeks when I've been trying to make mandatory disability training happen for the last 18 years with zero success. Guess we know our priorities lie, eh.

I know it's tradition to complain about the NHS, but my GP just phoned me for a 4 week check in without me having to do a thing, just as he promised 4 weeks ago. This has never happened to me before. Good doctors are worth the world.

Interesting crossover between what is described here and neurodivergence

#USS pension: #UCU members received an email about 'Rule 10' revaluation at retirement or deferral. 1/4 If you are in USS this will probably affect you one day and for the rest of your life. Jackie Grant & I have written a blog about it here: josstification.wordpress.com/2025/08/18/t...