Nigeria fears avian flu epidemic
SCIENTISTS fear the spread of avian flu in Nigeria after cases were diagnosed by three university-based doctors, Tunde Fatunde writes. This month 1.2 million birds contaminated by the avian flu were...
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American president for Beirut
THE FIRST American president of the American University of Beirut to be based on campus since his predecessor Malcolm Kerr was killed in 1984 takes up his post this month. John Waterbury, who began...
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Intimations of immortality
The "spontaneous reaction" to new developments in cloning technology described by Hilary Putnam in his Amnesty lecture (page 18) this week says much about human hopes and fears. The possibility of...
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The final smokescreen
THE WHITE paper on freedom of information, Your Rights to Know, published last month, was warmly welcomed, and rightly so. It seeks, in the prime minister's words, to break down "the traditional...
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Oxford lags behind old rival
The North Report on Oxford University was finally published this week. So long awaited, it could hardly help being an anticlimax. It scarcely, for example, discusses the all-important matter of the...
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Transparency gives lead in international market
Two groups of senior international educationists were in Britain last week to learn about reform and quality assurance. Rebecca Walton reports. THE UNITED KINGDOM is seen worldwide as a natural...
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The cash for references debate
Valentine Cunningham is so overwhelmed by the number of references he has to write he is considering charging for them. How valuable are they? he asks. After all, he never gets any feedback. THERE IS...
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Unhealthy to merge
The merger of the Association of University and College Lecturers into the Association of University Teachers is a success because both unions had very similar policies and were financially healthy....
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Medical solution
Undergraduate medical education is about to descend yet again into a period of turmoil and indecision. Clinical academics are concerned about the financial squeeze from the National Health Service...
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Peer review rejects the dissenters
The debate on peer review has to go beyond the way research councils distribute their funds. But your suggestions (THES, leader, January 9) for expanding the debate do not take it very far. The...
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Peer review rejects the dissenters
In the recent correspondence on peer review the arguments are all about club membership. "Change the rules, get in some new members (more like us) and all will be better" seems to be the prevailing...
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Peer review rejects the dissenters
The discussion on peer review and the role and scope of the RAE raises interesting questions for an applied scientist. After 15 years as an engineering geologist in industry, publishing one case...
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Cambridge promotion
Those of your readers who are familiar with our procedures in Cambridge will know that discussions of the Regent House are not always well attended. In fact the meeting you reported last week (THES,...
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The truth is out there
It seems that in almost every academic discipline there are those who either deny the existence of a reality "out there" or say that if there is a reality it remains inaccessible to us. For those of...
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Electing for complexity
Richard Clogg's piece on election of professors (THES,January 23) falls into the fashionable trap of proposing constant procedural complexity to deal with a rather infrequent problem. I have been an...