How do people manage to generate ‘theory wars’ out of teaching a basic skill that should be learned before university?… Read the rest
Student Consumers 
Mar 14th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Spot on. John Sutherland on student evaluations: ‘the one criticism which is never made is: “This professor is just an entertainer”.’… Read the rest
Competing Goods
Mar 14th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Targets or no targets? How does one increase university admissions for excluded groups without discriminating against currently-included groups?… Read the rest
Discrimination Against Men?
Mar 14th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Women’s colleges are ‘all full of lesbians now,’ is one rumour. ‘And what if they are?’ asks Joan Bakewell.… Read the rest
Liberty Letters
Mar 13th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
In The Great War we had liberty cabbage, now it’s…Freedom Toast? What planet is this again?… Read the rest
How to Make Bloody-Minded Women
Mar 12th, 2003 7:42 pm | By Ophelia BensonThe last women’s college in Oxford has just voted to remain a single-sex college. I’m always interested in these campaigns to keep women’s schools single sex, and the idea (which I tend to believe) that single sex education is good for girls and bad for boys. I went to a single sex school myself, one that combined with a boy’s school the year after I graduated. I regretted it at the time but later decided I’d been lucky. If nothing else, I derived the benefit (at least I think I did) that it never crossed my mind for an instant that women were supposed to shut up and let men do the talking. So when I went to a double-sex … Read the rest
Single-sex Education Good for Women
Mar 12th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
‘Women benefit from a single-sex education, whereas men benefit from a mixed one,’ a former student at St. Hilda’s says.… Read the rest
Single-sex Education
Mar 12th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
St. Hilda’s college votes not to admit men.… Read the rest
Missionary Formulas
Mar 11th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Historian Jackson Lears suggests ‘providence’ might not be all that predictable.… Read the rest
One in Four of Everyone Has Something
Mar 11th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
So if one in four has something, and one in four has a different something, and the number of somethings is large and growing…… Read the rest
Rorty Reviews Dewey Biography
Mar 10th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
More about events of his life than resonance of his ideas, Rorty says.… Read the rest
More on ‘Honour’ Killing
Mar 10th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
An Iranian woman writes for the Institute for the Secularization of Islamic Society on the murder of insubordinate women.… Read the rest
‘Honour crimes’ and cultural relativism
Mar 10th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Is political correctness to blame for a lack of awareness about honour crimes?… Read the rest
Better than nothing
Mar 10th, 2003 | By Julian Baggini"Although conditions in many of the [sweat]shops are admittedly wretched,
people chose to work in the shops of their own free will, experts point out,
because a lousy job is better than none at all. If major U.S. retailers stop
doing business with countries where exploitation is a fact of life, maquila
production will decline further in Central America and thousands of workers
– children and adults – will join the ranks of the unemployed, experts warn."
(Source: National Center for Policy Analysis, Month In Review, Trade June,
1996) (http://www.ncpa.org/pd/monthly/pd696r.html)
Sweatshops stir the consciences of all but the hardest of westerners who become
aware that most of their clothes come from them. We know that conditions in
these … Read the rest
Education and Inequality
Mar 9th, 2003 | By Ophelia BensonInequality is an old and vexed issue. Isaiah rebuked Israel for grinding the faces of the poor, Thersites got himself beaten up for complaining about Agamemnon, and so it has gone ever since. From Marx to Rawls to Michael Young, equality and meritocracy, justice and opportunity, class and race, money and taxes, jobs and immigration, education and tuition and top-up fees, have been debated and re-debated.
Education, especially higher education, is one area where tensions and disagreements about inequality play themselves out with extra passion. Many citizens, parents, students, employers, thinkers would like to see higher education available to more people and especially to a wider range of people: more women, more non-white people, more poor people. The difficulty is … Read the rest
Green Welly Image
Mar 9th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
The Independent on Bristol’s admissions policy.… Read the rest
Tinpot Trotskyists Running Bristol Admissions?
Mar 9th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
The Observer samples press coverage of the row over Bristol’s acceptance of lower marks for students from state schools.… Read the rest
Bristol University, social class and meritocracy
Mar 9th, 2003 |
Filed by Ophelia Benson
Can a university have too many well-off students?… Read the rest
I Win I Win
Mar 8th, 2003 8:37 pm | By Ophelia BensonSometimes I find myself in an odd sort of competition with friends from other countries, specifically the UK: we argue over which of us lives in the more anti-intellectual culture. I say I do, they say they do, and so we improve the shining hour.
But I have a nice little piece of evidence here. Specifically this remark:
One reason people trained as philosophers press so hard for academic jobs is that the United States offers few other opportunities to use their training. Television here, unlike its counterparts in Europe and Asia, almost completely ignores university and intellectual life. So do radio and print journalism, devoting far more airtime and space to sports.
I rest my case. Who can … Read the rest
