Students

The Austrian economist Friedrich Hayek, in the Road to Serfdom, warns against centralised planning and control. He also warns of the conceit evidenced by bureaucrats and politicians that they can regulate and manage the myriad, complex relationships and transactions underpinning an open and free society.

One doubts whether Minister Garrett or the educrats responsible for the draft Australian Teacher Performance and Development Framework have ever read Hayek’s book – if they had, they would realise how dangerous and counter-productive it is.

The teacher performance framework, released last week, represents the most recent milestone in the Rudd/Gillard education revolution and the mania the Commonwealth Government has to micromanage schools. Even though Canberra neither owns any schools nor employs any staff, all roads lead to Canberra.

Continue reading "Education revolution? Pah! It’s a bureaucrat bonanza" »

Dry ice. Wrong in so many ways. Wrong in an 80s dance floor sort of way. Wrong in a dodgy magic tricks sort of way. Yes, it keeps things super cold. But it can also be used as a bomb.

And as a casual teacher found out the hard way, it can also burn students’ hands if you make them hold it. The NSW casual teacher has been sacked after he dared his science students to hold the -78.5 C highly compressed carbon dioxide for as long as possible. Two students were hospitalised with minor burns. One may need a skin graft.

Teachers do great work. Well, some teachers do great work. But for every barbaric YAWP, Joe Clark, and Louanne Johnson there’s someone who’s a stale bikkie short of a staffroom tin.

Continue reading "Teachers that need to be taught a lesson" »

Right now, there are thousands of brand new PhD candidates entering universities around the country. Many of them will be highly anxious, knowing that they have a long, difficult journey ahead of them which, statistically speaking, they have less than a 75 per cent chance of completing successfully.

Emma Jane last year described doing a PhD as “childbirth for the brain”. And, while I liked her sentiment, I don’t agree that the whole process really has to be so “mind-meltingly, stomach-churningly, sleep-deprivingly difficult”.

Just as there are many things expecting or labouring mothers can do to make childbirth easier and more bearable – epidurals, controlled breathing exercises, gym balls, warm baths, happy gas, umm… taint massage – there are some simple rules Doctoral students should follow in order to deliver their baby without recourse to forceps or an episiotomy.

Continue reading "Eight simple rules for losing your doctoral virginity" »

In a previous life, I was a chef. Not a great one, but I do have the little certificate and scars to prove it.

The hours were long. I am sure we have all heard the horror stories of 16 hour days and 80 hour weeks so there is no need to discuss that at length. Anyhow, I decided that my future wasn’t in the kitchen, so university beckoned.

Fast forward a couple of years and university holidays have come around again. On the 11th of November last year, I went on university holidays. I will not go back until the end of February. That’s around 110 days. It is a long time. Even so, it’s apparently not quite long enough.

Continue reading "We’re all going on an endless uni holiday" »

Victoria might well be the Garden State but the Premier, John Brumby lives is a state of denial and it’s becoming serious.

Not content with flying off to New Delhi to placate furious Indians who fear for the safety of their kids being educated in Melbourne, he managed to anger the Indian Government by cancelling a visit to Mumbai, citing security concerns, which it seems the Indians hadn’t heard about.

That was for starters.

Continue reading "King Brumby’s tin-pot Raj" »