Items tagged with "Academia"
Articles
Why should we value new communications?
Many communications and technologies can be described as 'new', but are already mainstream and common-place in our work. This area is also very fluid, making it impossible to give anything other than a subjective snapshot. In doing that, I will address a few ideas as to how we can use these technologies to enhance our research practice, and also wider career. In terms of conducting research, I think the two the primary values of new technologies are: Sourcing references and material: A strong community of fellow researchers can be extremely useful as a means of keeping abreast of developments in your field, and perhaps more importantly in related areas where you can't hope to keep abreast of the conventional literature. The key here is the right mix of people. The medium used is secondary - whether it is a social bookmarking site (such as Delicious or Diigo), a small Twitter cro... read more
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Blog Posts
Staying in Academia for the Prestige?
In days gone by it was part of the role of academics to advise and inform on public policy. But many commentators feel that since the 1980s the influence of academics on government decision making has decreased. Some people say that this decline occured when the higher education sector expanded in the 1960s, others say it was Margaret Thatcher's ascent to power. However, this article from the Times Higher Education refutes these claims, stating that the social prestigate of academics hasn't declined that much - even if the wages have. What Dr. Griffiths of Stirling University, who undertook the research, says is that even though there have been a steep decline in academic wages relative to manufacturing jobs, the influence held by top academics at the top universities is still powerful. By top universities, he refers to the Russel Group since more than two thirds of academics o... read more