FlyTheNest

Nathalie Allport-Grantham says an airport employee told her, 'If you want someone to carry your bags, you have to pay £50’

http://www.independent.co.uk/travel/new ... 38051.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

My granddaughter has Ehlers-Danlos syndrome and although not yet in a wheelchair, she suffers dislocations so regularly we don't even go to hospital now. She just sits quietly for a while then grabs her knee cap/shoulder joint & twists/pushes it back.
Her pain is awful to witness at times.

Articles like this make me see red

PorFavor wrote:Night night.

Goodnight, PorFavor
The wind and rain got quieter

howsillyofme1 wrote:Why is criticising the massive pay of the VC and others dismissed as 'populist'? It is being criticised because VC pay seems to rise at a much higher rate than everyone else whilst the academic staff (apart from the ones who are on tv a lot) get their pay frozen or small increases

We hear this 'if we don't pay them more then they will go to the US' all the time from the private sector and now it seems to be prevalent in this sector - I think this is probably one of the weakest arguments with very little to back it up - and are we so pisspoor at succession planning that we cannot replace these self-identified ubermenschen?

It may be a difficult job (although I am not convinced it is as difficult as you make it sound), but so are many others and they do not get large pay increases

I think the "US" argument is overdone with lots of stuff. I mean, the UK isn't regarded as world class in many things, so the US (or whoever) in most fields doesn't bother with the UK. I expect in most cases the US thinks "Wow, that's nice you did well in the UK".

But we've got lots of world class universities, and there are lots of established links- David Blanchflower, for one, made the America point. I think it's something we have to watch out for, but I wouldn't say no VCs are overpaid, for sure.

Criticising VC pay isn't populist necessarily, or in most cases, and wasn't in your case, or the UCU's. I think there is an element to it, on which the Times are picking up on. That's what I'm calling "populist", and the UCU have to be a bit careful.

RogerOThornhill wrote:

howsillyofme1 wrote:[
Are you sure about this when he was at university? - I know higher degrees have changed since my day but when I did my PhD there was no requirement for a masters....the ones who did masters first where usually ones who had struggled for funding and used is as a holding place

There were some universities that asked for masters to be submitted at end of first year but it was rare and actually pretty pointless as well unless you were a weak candidate that was not going to complete the degree

It may have been different depending on the subject done, and now more universities seem to be by-passing bachelor degrees to go straight to masters as the first degree

It is possible that requirements have changed over the years - one of the most outstanding academics in my field went from BA > PhD but he's in his late 70s now.

This was the 90s and it definitely hadn't changed around 2000.....after that things started to change as more universities started offering 4 year masters degrees as the entry point and so it became more the norm to have a masters before a PhD - it is also more common on the continent I have seen - but depends on which country

If a masters is a pre-requisite to a PhD it is something that would have only come about since the start of the millennium.....

I am talking here about chemistry which is my subject

Tubby Isaacs wrote:

howsillyofme1 wrote:Why is criticising the massive pay of the VC and others dismissed as 'populist'? It is being criticised because VC pay seems to rise at a much higher rate than everyone else whilst the academic staff (apart from the ones who are on tv a lot) get their pay frozen or small increases

We hear this 'if we don't pay them more then they will go to the US' all the time from the private sector and now it seems to be prevalent in this sector - I think this is probably one of the weakest arguments with very little to back it up - and are we so pisspoor at succession planning that we cannot replace these self-identified ubermenschen?

It may be a difficult job (although I am not convinced it is as difficult as you make it sound), but so are many others and they do not get large pay increases

I think the "US" argument is overdone with lots of stuff. I mean, the UK isn't regarded as world class in many things, so the US (or whoever) in most fields doesn't bother with the UK. I expect in most cases the US thinks "Wow, that's nice you did well in the UK".

But we've got lots of world class universities, and there are lots of established links- David Blanchflower, for one, made the America point. I think it's something we have to watch out for, but I wouldn't say no VCs are overpaid, for sure.

Criticising VC pay isn't populist necessarily, or in most cases, and wasn't in your case, or the UCU's. I think there is an element to it, on which the Times are picking up on. That's what I'm calling "populist", and the UCU have to be a bit careful.

I see the point you are making but I am still not at all convinced about this US argument - the universities where the pay is highest do not seem to be ones that I would necessarily consider to be 'world class' and the greatest advantage we have is that we speak English which is why the UK has always been a magnet for foreign students - the rest of the world has caught on to this now and I see this being more and more difficult to maintain

The fact that we are seeing this US argument wheeled out suggests to me that there is not much else to back it up....

@AAW that must be the 21st Century view of disability the Governments keeps prattling on about in the need for reform (ie reduction/more contingency)

Anyway, off to bed.

Night all, as ever enjoyed discussion today.

Good night Tubby.

Theresa May's Brexit team is 'mad, ludicrous and clueless about the economy,' ex-trade minister claims


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/01 ... g_share_tw" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

With that - good night

Seems to me that university vice chancellors are getting corporate pay because the Tories have restructured higher education in a way that is turning universities into corporations. Funding universities via loans to students to pay fees rather than primarily through direct funding has skewed the function and accountability of universities. Where once they were beholden to taxpayers and expected to serve wider society they are now beholden to students and expected to deliver degrees. The focus should be on the politics around university provision and funding, that has been evolving along this path since the 80s. Focusing on individual VCs being paid the kinds of money people are often paid to run businesses is almost like missing the point whilst making the point. It isn't so much that the pay is wrong for the job as the job is no longer what people would expect it to be. Universities have more private paid courses and hired out facilities these days as far as I can tell and it has hardly happened "by accident" or by the actions of individual VCs alone.

Hidden away down the page in the telegraph (but one they haven't put behind their premium paywall (yet))

Number of pupils in grammar schools at highest level for two decades

The latest study shows that number of grammar school pupils, aged 11 to 15, has risen by seven per cent in seven years to almost 120,000 in the school year ending in 2017. The analysis shows there were 110,600 grammar school pupils, aged 11 to 15, in 2010 and that increased to 118,200 by 2017. The figures do not include burgeoning sixth-form numbers.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/201 ... ter-crisis" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Segregation very much on the increase in a variety of ways..

http://press.labour.org.uk/post/1692395 ... t-fears-of" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;