Dr Linsey Hunter

Historian, Charter-botherer, tired. she/her

[UHI Centre for History @UHIHistory]

Join us on Mon 27 October at 7-8pm for a celebration & a discussion with Drs Nicola Martin & Lucy Dean, to learn about their journey from research to publication. This is a free, online-only event. For further details & to join the event, visit https://t.co/UOwyypFctT

@ThinkUHI

[Alex Vacca @itsalexvacca]

BREAKING: MIT just completed the first brain scan study of ChatGPT users & the results are terrifying.

Turns out, AI isn't making us more productive. It's making us cognitively bankrupt.

Here's what 4 months of data revealed:

(hint: we've been measuring productivity all wrong)

[UK HE News @HigherEd_UK]

Voluntary severance is not a source of savings. It is not intended to be. It is a political decision, one which precedes the true restructuring plans that SMT has had in place for years,* which can then be implemented as a 'last resort'.

[UK HE News @HigherEd_UK]

Why do senior managers pretend to run universities 'like a business' when this inevitably leads to financial collapse?

Because this means a higher salary for them compared to what they would get at a sustainable institution with academic credibility.

[UK HE News @HigherEd_UK]

Fun fact: the more focused your senior managers are on 'unis are a business' and 'income streams' the more likely your university is to go bankrupt.

[21group @21percentgroup]

Arson of @cardiffuni

"In an all-university meeting with Vice Chancellor in the hall, we were told that we should engage with the ‘proposals’. Security staff stood along the corridor as we left the hall"

Ugly scenes of power, money & muscle

https://t.co/8jTAFoMFAG

[YUFA @YUFAyorku]

“If you cut a program just because its number of majors doesn’t meet some kind of an accounting threshold, you’re being very short-sighted about the academic perspectives that are offered by the university as a whole,” said Ellie Perkins, YUFA President. https://t.co/zZVY5Tqf2F

[21group @21percentgroup]

As you reflect on the late nights & lost weekends, you realise -- like most academics -- you never had any work-life balance

The university senior manager on 2 or 3 times your pay who is sacking you goes home on Friday afternoons

[21group @21percentgroup]

"Financial mismanagement created biggest crisis institution has ever seen while university court failed to provide oversight & scrutiny of gargantuan failure of management"

No accountability of senior management @dundeeuniv

Common in entire HE sector

https://t.co/GssOEgwyv1

[UK HE News @HigherEd_UK]

Claiming to immediately cause 'growth' has been exactly what UK universities have been doing for 15 years, failing miserably.

Actually supporting future growth is what they did for the decades before that, which was undercut, exacerbating the economic failure the UK sees today.

[21group @21percentgroup]

The Vet School at @Cambridge_Uni is now under real threat

Even the wealthiest universities are now cutting

“Staff are worried about the future of their jobs & students are worried they may not be able to finish their course"

https://t.co/k8j6kpC7U7

[UK HE News @HigherEd_UK]

The UUK model of managed decline -- VS used politically to 'avoid CR', followed by inevitable long-planned CR/restructure around the VC's 'strategic priorities' -- is really the absolute worst thing the sector could do right now.

Management is accelerating over the cliff.

[Prof. Lopa Leach @LopaLeach]

👌🏽analyses @illdoitanyway “It took only a decade for the system to go frm boom to bust. Last year, VCs started..redundancies on a mass scale, reaching  >10,000 ..This yr, pace …is only increasing. The scale of destruction hitting HE is immense.The economic models.. are imploding

[UK HE News @HigherEd_UK]

The UK HE model was based on the Tesla model: pump up the perceived degree value, market based on the hype, lie constantly about true decline, try to cash out before reality hits.

It actually worked out for those who orchestrated it.

[21group @21percentgroup]

Inferno of UK universities continues

Even top of @RussellGroup is looking to make lots of redundancies

@durham_uni announces £20 million in cuts in staff costs, over the 2024-25 & 2025-26 academic years.

https://t.co/RoHv0T1KyT

[Colin Bingle @bingle_colin]

Just think of much leaner and agile they will be after, when the place is not clogged up with expensive staff teaching students, getting the grants, writing papers, administering/supporting the place and burnishing the reputation.
Research led teaching is for losers!

[UK HE News @HigherEd_UK]

Weird that seeking 'global talent' who was infamous for destroying a university didn't result in executives with much respect for Welsh public institutions.

[Kingston Dissenter @KingstonDissent]

Our VC's crusade to turn Kingston Uni into a glorified technical college continues down its grim path: despite student feedback complaining about their studies being 'swamped' by so-called 'Future Skills' (FS), KU have just announced 'further embedding' FS across the curriculum.

[UK HE News @HigherEd_UK]

There is a possibility that Cardiff's collapse might break through.

Within Wales, it is a source of national pride, as are Oxford and Cambridge in England. The VC may not have realised this.

Appeals to nationalism work in ways that appeals to education and research will not.