What’s Inside October 2012 : • • •
Educational transitions Social exclusion and education Education and technology
requests, gives examples of good requests and contains an appendix relating to FOI and the UK National archives.
HIGHER W EBSITE
EDUCATION : NEW
Language knowledge in the EU http://languageknowledge.eu/ Really interesting site which visualises with graphs extent of language knowledge in different EU nations. Data is taken from the Eurobarometer survey http://ec.europa.eu/public_opinion /archives/ebs/ebs_386_en.pdf published in July 2012.Europeans and their languages. Find out how many people answering the survey speak French in UK The visualisation has ben completed by Jonathan Van Parys. see data on individual nations or the EU as a whole.
Making Freedom of Information Requests: A Guide for Academic Researchers http://www.ucl.ac.uk/constitutionunit/research/foi/foiuniversities/academics-guide-tofoi.pdf has just been published by the UCL Constitution unit. The 24 page booklet provides advice on when and when not to make FOI
REPORTS:HIGHER EDUCATION RANKINGS.
http://www.timeshighereducation.c o.uk/world-university-rankings/ THES world university rankings Here is the ranking for Europe. http://www.timeshighereducation.c o.uk/world-universityrankings/2012-13/worldranking/region/europe It considers international outlook research, citations and teaching. Also available are rankings by subject discipline. Also released ESRC national student satisfaction survey http://www.hefce.ac.uk/news/new sarchive/2012/name,75522,en.html THES comment on the results There is now a special UNISTATS site http://unistats.direct.gov.uk/ where you can compare universities. This has now added the key information set criteria from the student survey. http://unistats.direct.gov.uk/findout-more/key-information-set#kis One of the criteria is ' are the
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library resources are good enough for my needs?'
HIGHER EDUCATION : FUNDING/ ECONOMICS
REPORTS: EDUCATION AND SOCIAL EXCLUSION.
The cost of the Government’s reforms of the financing of higher education http://www.hepi.ac.uk/4662094/The-cost-of-theGovernment%e2%80%99s-reforms-ofthe-financing-of-highereducation.html HEPI report,
University Challenge: How Higher Education Can Advance Social Mobility http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/r esource-library/independentreviewer-report-higher-education The Milburn report looks at what universities need to do to address the social inequalities in who gets into university and what Government needs to do to reduce the risks that its higher education policies pose to its social mobility strategy.
Jobs and growth: the importance of engineering skills to the UK economy, http://www.raeng.org.uk/jobsandgr owth draws on many different sources to conclude that the UK does not produce enough engineers. Royal Academy of Engineeering
What do graduates do? 2012 http://www.hecsu.ac.uk/current_pr ojects_what_do_graduates_do.htm The new version of What do graduates do? is out now, exploring graduate destinations six months after graduation. It’s Different for Girls The influence of schoolshttp://www.iop.org/education/teac her/support/girls_physics/page_415 93.html An exploration of data from the National Pupil Database looking at progression to A-level physics in 2011 from different types of school at Key Stage 4. Institute of Physics report records under-representation
HIGHER EDUCATION : QUALIFICATIONS
Bringing it all together: introducing the HEAR http://www.universitiesuk.ac.uk/Pu blications/Pages/introducingtheHEA R.aspx Universities Uk report Recommends the introduction of a new system for recording students’ achievements during their time in higher education. a 4. A new website has been launched to provide detailed information and guidance about the HEAR:
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http://www.hear.ac.uk/ EDUCATION
AND ACADEMIES
Competition meets Collaboration, http://www.policyexchange.org.uk/ publications/category/item/competi tion-meets-collaboration Policy Exchange presents evidence showing that not only do academies work when it comes to raising standards, but that academy chains can be even more effective at improving results than single academies
EDUCATION AND TRANSITIONS From learning to earning: understanding the school-to-work transition in Londonhttp://www.cegnet.co.uk/newslett ers/sep12/web/page13.html?dm_i=1 92K,10K3P,71JKT7,33GTK,1 IPPR paper on careers needs. A more strategic approach is required to ensure that local educational provision is joined up and caters to the diverse needs of young people.
EDUCATION&
TECHNOLOGY
Exploring How Smartphones Supports Students’ Lives written by staff at Alabama state university. 8 page report Published in Issues in Information Systems Vol. 13 No. 2 (2012) Really interesting study which explores the extent and nature of use of smartphones among American students. Statistics include membership of social media sites, number of tweets and messages sent per day.
Preparing for Effective Adoption and Use of eBooks in Education http://blog.observatory.jisc.ac.uk/t echwatch-reports/ebooks-ineducation/ JISC sponsored report. It is in a draft format at present.The 52 page reports considers a number of interesting issues for academic staff and libraries. It begins by examining the fundamentals of eBook technology, reader compatibility with different formats. Page 20 has some interesting eBook scenarios for use in an academic context. alos online this week an inspirational talk from NetworkED: Technology in Education from Centre for Learning technology at the LSE. Teaching as a design science: developing reliable knowledge of learning technology. The seminar uses the findings from a recent ESRC-EPSRC research project to show how the right learning design tools could help the professional teaching community develop reliable knowledge of how best to deploy new kinds of digital technology. http://clt.lse.ac.uk/events/network ED-seminar-series-06.php
Compiled by Heather Dawson h.dawson@lse.ac.uk