Here's the serious bit for anyone who'd rather skip the 4000 words of jokes

We need to "transform our conception of higher education-pivoting away from the idealization of knowledge & truth toward developing young people’s conceptual, critical, affective & practical capabilities that better equip them to nurture rather than destroy human & non-human life & the planet"

In sampled HEIs (in a sample of unstated size [it's over 140] and % of sector), 38% are making compulsory redundancies, 79% voluntary redundancies, 31% cutting research, 44% are cutting courses. Link to the UUK report on the survey, which is open access, is below. 2/2

'Resources'. Continuity in the inequalities & injustices of resource extraction, connecting local to global scales.

A gem of a Google AI hallucination from a few weeks ago. Sounds like we have more to look fwd to. I'm increasingly using DuckDuckGo.

Sunday read: "Market" Jessica Whyte challenges the idea that markets are "natural," arguing that modern societies subordinate democracy, freedom, and collective decision-making to competitive economic systems. #Philosophy #Economics www.thephilosopher1923.org/post/the-new...

So geologists are...nice but disposable? 🤔 Struggling to think of any films with a geographer in. There must be some? As for geomorphologists...probably even less likely?

"Nature connection, belonging, and wellbeing of Black and Black-mixed heritage walkers’. Are you from a Black or Black-mixed heritage background? Please fill out the survey or pass on. If you have any questions, please email the researcher: Ceara Webster [email protected]

Dear Labour Party. Stop treating the role of Prime Minister like a football manager.

🧵My paper on "Uneven Datafication" just came out! It draws on literature on coloniality, uneven development and dependency. Uneven datafication operates through three interrelated dynamics: journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

A novel approach to navigating the academic prestige economy. Medals, prizes, awards are all inventions. This is just missing the 'social' element: they're supposed to be awarded by someone else.

City birds appear to be more afraid of women than men, and scientists have no idea why. Via @scientific_american #Conservation #WildLife #Zoology #Nature #Ornithology 🪶

This poem ⬇️🔥 #academicsky #education #AI

I want a movie about the poor untenured archaeologist who has to cover Indiana Jones' teaching and do his marking while he fucks off to do 'fieldwork'.

This certainly is well-articulated. I was writing last week (different context) about tacit knowledge, and the continuous shift between information and intuition, being a hallmark of subject mastery - hence the decades of 'grunt work' required.

AI and digital learning platforms furthering the alienation of knowledge from knower. I remain astonished at Lyotard's foresight (The Postmodern Condition, 1979).

More of this - if your platform steals, "AI summarizes' (plagiarizes), and re-digests someone else's journalism work, you need to be paying for it. A lot. www.npr.org/2026/04/29/g...

My lesson for the day: when visiting another uni & giving an after-lunch seminar talk, don't choose the falafel wrap with sweet chilli sauce. 😳 On the bright side, the blue & white patterned shirt hid some of it, and it has come clean in the wash. 😌

A highlight of my week: @jamiearathoon.bsky.social spotting this on the university library's student feedback board. #Geography rocks / #Geography is the best ❤️🌟🥰

Excellent piece on knowledge as practice. AI as having exposed, not caused, a problem. "What must be recovered is not an old curriculum for its own sake. It is a truthful relation between knowing and doing." The piece is focuses on Art & Design but it's relevant to all disciplines.

On AI and 'epistemological pollution'. "...these zombie references call into question the accuracy of the papers that cite them." ➡️ Don't cite anything you haven't read. ✅️ But: structural inequalities shape vulnerability to AI slop. ❓️How do we (the 'research community') address those inequalities?

"FERNS ARE THE ULTIMATE MENTORS...They have survived multiple mass extinctions...They survived the evolution of flowering plants...Ferns are patient. They have nothing but time." orionmagazine.org/article/cons...

“When the river bursts its banks, or drains are popping manhole covers, that’s the river talking to us. It’s telling us: Hey, you’ve constrained me, you’ve constricted me, and I’m screaming and shouting about that.” — Dan Hikuroa.

"Contrary to what some educators assume, the early stages of invention, such as brainstorming and idea mapping are not extraneous activity that’s fine to farm out to machines before getting to the “real work” of drafting." 👏 Interesting piece by Carla Arnell on LLMs and higher ed.

Looking to enhance your geography teaching? Explore our Higher Education resources for innovative teaching approaches, practical guidance, and best practice 🔗👇 https://www.rgs.org/research/higher-education-resources?filter=teaching-7536

It seems it's time to play.

Sadly, the post Covid attitude shift never happened. "Low Carbon Research Methods explores the epistemological & equity impacts of high-carbon research as well as the potential gains made possible through a transition towards slower, less mobile, & more collaborative forms of inquiry and exchange."

I don't see this said enough: the widespread use of generative AI is not only making our jobs as educators harder logistically, but also emotionally. It is genuinely sad to be suspicious of students when you have spent so much time building a pedagogy based on trust and not being a cop. It sucks.

What is the public purpose of the #University in an age of #AI everywhere? I had a go at answering this whopper of a question in the latest issue of the Journal of the British Academy @britishacademy.bsky.social #democracy #discernment doi.org/10.5871/jba/...

"There is such a stark divide between those who understand scientific complexity and those who urgently need or want to." Your secret weapon? The humble metaphor. 2nd plug for my latest blog post from yesterday #AcademicSky occamstypewriter.org/mindthegap/2...

Striking geographical insight from Salman Rushdie (1988).

On the impossibility of resisting being eaten by the monster* you already sit in. *academia decolonialdialogue.wordpress.com/2026/03/27/i...

This story really takes the biscuit! @rgs.org www.linkedin.com/posts/the-re...

The politics of publishing: On the ethics of academic co-authorship @uniworldnews.bsky.social www.linkedin.com/redir/redire...

I'd noticed that much university marketing is about "delving into" subjects lately. It seems researchers are doing it too. How LLMs have changed word use in biomedical publications. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

"The world is held together...by the love & the passion of a very few people. Otherwise, of course, you can despair. Walk down the street of any city, any afternoon, & look around you...You could be that person. You could be that monster... you have to decide, in yourself, not to be." James Baldwin

mill's dedication: this is a jointly authored work a century & a half of male editors: mill exaggerated out of a sentimental fondness for his wife mill's letters: no, really, most of "my" work was partly by her, i really could not be clearer on this

I feel seen. A history class when I was 12, something on the French Revolution. Teacher raised a question about voting: what would we do if ppl knocked on our door & told us how to vote? Picked on me. I paused, & she says "I know, you'd say yes, shut the door & do exactly what you wanted." 1/2

I met with AI data labelers in Kenya who are organizing their colleagues to fight the brutal working conditions and horrible pay given to the workers at the "bottom of the AI supply chain." They believe the NDAs they've signed are unenforceable so are speaking out: www.404media.co/ai-is-africa...

Everyday science communication matters: single-image representation of the day's weather forecast driving behaviours and spending. #scicomm www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

"References to anthropogenic climate change are disappearing from earth science departments. Historians are being told that they can only teach primary sources, with all second-order reflection on those sources — what we used to call “history” — being stigmatized or even banned."

"Higher education has a choice. We can continue to treat technology as a series of technical problems to be solved in a vacuum, or we can recognise that place and the solidarity found within it still matter. Knowledge is not a cloud-based commodity. It is a grounded, political and collective act."

Last semester I experimented with addressing AI with students. Won't go into detail here but I learned a lot, ending up with more questions and concerns than answers. Now finding much food for thought in @carlbergstrom.com's work, so for anyone who hasn't come across them... #academicsky #HigherEd

"Mountains are more than scenery: They are ecosystems, cultural landscapes, and homes. Treating them as empty canvases for spectacle normalises commodification and erases both fragility and meaning" blog.geographydirections.com/2026/02/17/c...

"More academics left roles than started them in 2024-25 for the first time ever.....About 60 per cent of Universities UK members saw a fall in academic staff numbers last year" @timeshighered.bsky.social www.timeshighereducation.com/news/number-...

"Assessment that is both authentic and accountable cannot be implemented through anonymous submission and blind marking alone. It requires relational engagement between students and assessors." Interesting piece on assessment in an age of genAI. #HigherEd #AcademicSky

I think “floaty boats murder monster” is how I’m going to refer to all bears from now on

I have some bad news. One, if you need to use ChatGPT for your graduate application letter, you are not ready for graduate school. Two, no, not "everyone is doing it" and those who don't do it aren't "losing out." ChatGPT is not an advantage.

Geology matters in Olympic curling. 2-minute video on the source of the stones. ⚒️ www.bbc.co.uk/news/videos/...

When AI was added to a tool for sinus surgery: “Cerebrospinal fluid leaked from one patient’s nose. In another… a surgeon mistakenly punctured the base of a patient’s skull. In two other cases, patients suffered strokes after a major artery was accidentally injured” www.reuters.com/investigatio...