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Author Archives: Athene Donald
Shenanigans with the Railways
Rules about railway tickets have clearly always been mysterious, as this Punch cartoon of 1869 makes clear. “‘Station Master say, Mum, as cats is ‘dogs,’ and rabbits is ‘dogs,’ and so’s parrots; but this ere ‘tortis’ is an insect, so … Continue reading
Posted in Great Northern, refund, trains, travel
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How Long does it take to Gain Expertise?
Dominic Cummings, Boris Johnson’s right-hand man, currently is said to be set on shaking up the Civil Service. The three elements that are rumoured to be on the agenda are: Better training in data science, systems thinking and ‘super-forecasting; Staff … Continue reading
Posted in Civil Service, Dominic Cummings, Interdisciplinary Science, Science Funding, UKRI
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Post-Election Christmas Reading List
The general election is now done and dusted. The UK’s future is determined, for good or ill. Scientists (along with everyone else) now must work out how to interact with the new policies, new ideas and – if some of … Continue reading
Posted in ARPA, Brookings Institute, David Willetts, Further Education, Science Funding, Science policy
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Travelling Hopefully to 2.4% GDP
David Willetts, for a number of years the Minister of State for Universities and Science, now an FRS, President of the Advisory Board for a think-tank (Resolution Foundation) and writer (most recently, A University Education), has just published a pamphlet … Continue reading
Posted in David Willetts, Dominic Cummings, Fraunhofer Institutes, Richard Jones, Science Funding
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Working Together for Equity
This week I was honoured by the THE as the winner of their ‘Lifetime Achievement’ Award during their annual awards’ ceremony, for my work around gender equality issues. Photo courtesy of THE. With me are John Gill (L), their Editor … Continue reading
Posted in champion, complicit, Equality, Lifetime Achievement Award, UCU
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How Silly Are You (or Pompous or Forthright)?
What’s wrong with being called gutsy? The new book by Hillary and Chelsea Clinton use it as a term of approbation, but it didn’t find favour with Emma Brockes in the Guardian. Why? ‘It’s partly that descriptors like “gutsy” seem … Continue reading
Posted in adjectives, Equality, gendering, RateMyProfessor, Unconscious bias
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Doing Your Bit
When you have vulnerable people being harassed, what can you do? And I mean you. I have written a lot recently on my blog about the importance of bystanders. To learn more, I attended a recent training session regarding Bystander … Continue reading
Posted in Bystander, education, Equality, harassment, intervention, toxic
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Science and Government, Science in Government
Before pre-election purdah set in, two interesting reports got published, one with more fanfare than the other. The one with more publicity attached was the long-awaited report (Changes and Choices) on options for future international funding by Adrian Smith and … Continue reading
Posted in Adrian Smith, Areas of Research Interest, Jon Agar, Public Laboratories, Research, RSRE
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Bias in Publishing
You’ll have heard the story about women whingeing about how their proudly-submitted papers got rejected by a premier journal without being sent out to referees. Or that the comments they received from referees were unduly harsh, but a male colleague’s … Continue reading
Posted in editors, pipeline, Research, Royal Society of Chemistry, success rates, UKRI, Women in science
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