Writing plays a central role in academia – it is a way of communicating ideas and a means for assessment (Evans, 2013). The latter function is the focus of this blog, given that it concerns the legitimacy of the ways in which our ideas are expressed. One can hardly find a piece of academic writing […]

In March 2023, the UNESCO Global Convention on the Recognition of Qualifications concerning Higher Education entered into force. Four months later, in July, the First Intergovernmental Party of the State Parties (COP1) of this convention was held at UNESCO’s Headquarters in Paris. A Process Taking Over a Decade   These important milestones in 2023 are […]

Sjur Bergan* In the recognition of qualifications, the Council of Europe/UNESCO Lisbon Recognition Convention introduced a novel approach by committing parties to recognize foreign qualifications unless they could demonstrate a substantial difference between the qualification for which recognition is sought and the corresponding qualification(s) in their own system.  In 1997, when the Convention was adopted, […]

Neil Lent* It can be argued that in the last few years we have seen a few moral panics centred on perceived opportunities for academic misconduct by students. These panics include the use of essay mills for contract cheating, the change to remote assessment due to the pandemic, and, now, the use of technology such […]

Nidal Al Haj Sleiman*   The last few decades have witnessed increased ‘globalisation’ of educational leadership and administration frameworks (Samier, 2020), particularly those associated with narratives of effectiveness and improvement. Concurrently, there have been growing debates in educational leadership research in western (Anglo-phonic) contexts between functionalist and educative approaches and multiple perspectives in between. While […]

Daisy BAO* Student-staff partnerships have gained considerable interest from researchers and educational developers in higher education in the last twenty years (academic studies: Nesheim et al., 2007; Healey et al., 2014; Bovill, 2019; praxis regarding HE quality: Higher Eduacation Academy, HEA, 2014; The Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education, QAA, 2018; AdvancedHE, 2021). Evoked by […]

John Loewenthal*   Higher education may discursively promise the prospects of brighter, more mobile, global futures that are better paid and more fulfilling. Black and Walsh (2019) contrast this discourse to the disappointments, disillusionment, labour market struggles and debts that exist among contemporary university graduates. In this post, I share how the notions of ‘existential […]

Tiffany Pang*   With a focus on developing learners’ English communicative competence in a specific domain, the approach of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) has attracted worldwide attention for nearly half a century. While multiple benefits of the ESP approach have been uncovered and discussed, perhaps unsurprisingly, there have been numerous skeptical voices regarding its […]

Neil M Speirs* Classism on Campus ‘You know Neil, classism is all over campus – but nobody wants to talk about it’.  That’s what one of our widening participation students told me the other week – she wasn’t the first to say that to me either.  I have 20 years’ worth of stories that testify […]

Andrew Drybrough* Back in 2012, while a ‘Visiting Professor’ in a state university in South Korea, I was asked if I was interested in teaching a liberal arts course to a class of undergraduate students on ‘Global Citizenship’. This was a one-semester course through English medium instruction that I ended up designing and teaching on […]