Kingston University London Dissenter's Blog

There was no prewarning. At first, it just seemed like one of KU’s usual anodyne staff announcements and was quietly placed on the Uni website with no fanfare. But this is not surprising, because the few staff who spotted it and read it the same day soon realised the enormous implications of what it said. And the clue was in the title: ‘Achieving our ambitions in a challenging national context’.

Although he had kept his distance from it, the grubby hand of Spiersy could easily be seen behind it. The first few paragraphs struck a positive note and sought to present a sunny and optimistic message about how well things are going with the Vice-Clown’s ‘Future Skills’ and Clown House Strategy, how Kingston is being ‘transformed’ and so on. In other words, how well Spiersy’s pet project – the dimunition of the University into a Polyversity or glorified technical college – is progressing.

But, halfway down the announcement, the real purpose behind the warm words emerged, like a sudden dagger plunged into staff hearts. Caroline Harries, the new ‘Chief Operating Officer’, had also been forced to attach her name to it, as the VC, characteristically, was too cowardly to want to have his own name associated with bad news and admission of failure (for that is the only way it can be interpreted). So Spiersy had press-ganged his new ‘Operating Officer’ to do his dirty work (and, according to insiders, she was not very happy).

And, according to the announcement, how is the Uni ‘navigating a way forward’? (the Vice-Admiral just so loves those nauseating nautical terms). Over the next two years, we were informed, the Uni needs to ‘achieve’ £20m in savings across the University i.e. it needs to cut money and lots of it. There will also be a ‘review’ of KU’s course portfolio (again!) and a review of Faculty Budgets.

These have already started. Insultingly, in FBSS, staff were invited to a meeting where they were told the Faculty needs to save over £8m, and staff were ‘invited’ to come up with ideas on how to do this (no, we are not kidding). As one member of staff commented, it was like being asked to build your own scaffold for the public hanging. In KSA, pressure is also now being put on certain subjects to start cutting down module choice and find ways to ‘combine’ courses. Managers have also been told in other Faculties to start looking for ‘efficiency’ savings.

Dissenter warned back in March that the ‘Axeman’ was coming, but few seemed to take our warnings seriously. After all, so some said, the departmental and subject closures of recent years, and the culling of staff through VS or enforced redundancies, surely meant that there would be no more financial squeezes? There seemed to be the complacent attitude among some staff that they were now ‘safe’ and there would no more cutbacks. This was reinforced by reassurances by the Senile Leadership Team around Spiersy. But it was all a lie. We need to face the harsh reality that Spiersy and his gang have well and truly mucked up. The so-called ‘challenging national context’ has been made much, much worse by the inept and frankly useless leadership shown by the Vice-Clown and his Senior Dalek Team. The ‘Town House Strategy’ won’t save the sinking ship.

The multi-million pound costs of the Town House, the huge sums spent on Holmewood House, the ‘transformation’ of Knights Park, the ‘Penrhyn Road Transformation project’, the Uni’s ‘Website Transformation Project’,  yet more sums spent on the John Galsworthy Building (to replace all the heating infrastructure) and, now, a proposed multi-million pound ‘high specification building’ for KSA’s Middle Mill site (Spiersy is determined to have his ‘legacy’ building before he retires), have all sucked in, and will continue to soak up, enormous sums. The Uni’s marketing strategy has also been an embarrassing affair, and has failed to attract the numbers of new students KU so desperately needs. The Uni has also gone backwards, not forwards, in recent national Good University league tables. By any measure, the Town House Strategy is simply not working. So something has got to give, and in Spiersy’s mind, culling courses and loyal staff is the only option (no matter how reassuringly it is dressed up). Despite how loyal or hardworking you may be, you are not safe. Spiersy and his overpaid acolytes will be more than happy to throw more staff under the bus to try and save their own skins.

A recent sign of how bad things have become were the changes made in the Summer to the ‘Academic Management Framework’ (Spiersy loves his pseudo-business terminology) and to Faculty leadership teams. This was sold to us a way of ensuring they continue to ‘best support the University’s ambitions’, in line (inevitably) with the VCs pet ‘Town House Strategy’. A host of new roles have been created, such as Deputy Deans and ‘Faculty Operations Managers’. There was also much B.S. about ‘Strategic Planning Partners’. You could hear the groans right across the Uni. Yet more changes to the senior managerial structure? How many have there been over the years since Spiersy has been VC? Yet more money dished out on new senior roles? In the meantime, at mainstream staff level, it is clear that this will all be financed through staff and course cuts, no matter how much the VC denies it.

As he sits in his Holmewood House office, when he can be bothered to appear on campus (don’t forget he has another job on the side) and gazes out on to ‘Striding full-length female nude’, the sculpture located just outside his office, and fantasizes about his ‘vision’ for the transformation of KU into a so-called ‘multiversity’ (yes, the latest sick-making buzz word), the Gold Commandant hates anything that exposes the reality of his poor and inept leadership skills. He likes to rant on endlessly about ‘Future Skills’ and how this has made KU ‘sector-leading’. To add insult to injury, a new staff handbook has even been issued on ‘Skills Development’ to ‘train’ staff for – yes, you guessed it – the Town House Strategy. But he refuses to face up to the fact that he has no managerial skills himself, and that the ‘Town House Strategy’ is really the Clown House Tragedy.

Kingston Uni Comms Team News Release: For immediate media distribution. No embargo.

After many months of creative innovation by a specially selected interim team, Kingston’s Gold Commandant, Admiral and Senior Vice-Clown Steven ‘Two Jobs’ Spier is very pleased to announce the adoption of a new Kingston University theme song, to be used at all graduation ceremonies and at all University-related special events and official occasions.

Based on the famous Eton Boating Song, the music and lyrics in Kingston’s version capture most eloquently Professor Spiersy’s truly transformative ‘vision’ for the institution, and has won full approval from the BOG (Board of Governors) after their latest celebratory dinner held in a hotel in Windsor Great Park.

As part of the ongoing Clown House Strategy, the new song will be used at all public events sponsored by the University, sung by our acclaimed Town House Choir (sadly now a Quartet due to recent efficiency savings in the Music dept). It will also be backed up vocally by our new University mascot, Poly the Parrot, which has been trained to squawk loudly at the end of each 8-line stanza, thus bringing pure joy to the Senior Leadership Team and any members of the public who have the University’s unique gold earmuffs to hand.

Do bear in mind that it is traditional at Eton that the song is best sung while in a boat on the Thames and, to meet this convention, Kingston will now have an old rowing boat on hand to float past the Rose Theatre on graduation days, which parents will be able to join for a modest £1,000 fee, or a simple large donation to the Town House lift repair fund.

Ordinarily, only the first, sixth, seventh and eighth stanzas are sung, and Kingston will abide by this quaint olde English tradition.

The Eton Kingston Boating Song.

Stanza 1:

Jolly boating weather,

Will KU sink or swim?

Swing, swing together,

But our future’s looking grim;

Skirting past the rushes,

Of the smelly Hogsmill stream,

I am your Vice-Clown,

The cat that’s got the cream.

Stanza 2:

Let’s be dim together,

And exercise ‘Future Skills’,

We’re in this mess forever,

And it gives me lots of thrills;

Let’s navigate together!

And transform your tiny brain,

‘Future Skills’ are lovely,

I’ll repeat this again and again.

Stanza 3:

Our skills are ‘sector-leading’,

A claim I like to instill,

But since every Uni is doing them,

Our competitive advantage is nil;

Yet I remain your Leader,

And ‘Gold’ Spiersy is my name,

My ego is gigantic,

And all I want is fame.

Stanza 4:

So pull, pull together,

’cause your VC is a great chap,

I’m desperate for a Knighthood,

Even though I am really crap;

I think I’m really clever,

But my staff think I’m really not,

We’ll suffer Future Ills together

’cause I’m just a massive clot.

Stanza 5:

I really like the Daily Telegraph,

The greatest paper around,

And in its very pages,

Lots of my ideas have been found;

Let’s ‘transform’ Kingston Uni,

With lots of business-style quack lit,

Even though much of this lingo,

Is plagiarized ’70s bullshit.

Stanza 6:

Sink, sink together!

Because we’ve hit the rocks,

But while your job is tanking,

I’ll still be earning lots;

I’ve spent loads of KU money,

On lots of shiny things,

But the Strategy is so risky,

The results are embarrassingly thin.

Stanza 7:

We’ve fallen in League Tables,

And thrown out lots of staff,

But our prospects remain unstable,

As my Leadership skills are naff;

So swing, swing together!

Keep my ‘future ambitions’ safe,

We just need to save £20 million,

And cut out all the ‘waste’.

Stanza 8:

Work harder for our future,

Until you are fit to drop,

And stop your silly questions,

Or I’ll ensure you face the chop;

If we sink below the water,

You can wave your career goodbye,

My ‘Future Skills’ won’t save you,

Whatever they really are.

Stanza 9:

For I am your Dear Leader,

And Spiersy is my name,

I’m transforming Kingston Uni,

Back to Poly status again;

So be really grateful,

That I am in control,

And please don’t tell the media,

That I’m an overpaid ar–hole.

 

Copyright: Spiermint Rhino Productions, London.

(Please avoid singing Stanza 9, or I will be very mad at you).

 

 

 

 

Another day, another leak: Dissenter has been given the original draft of the latest piece of Spier-spin and, in the interests of transparency, the text is reproduced below.

From: Gold Commandant and Vice-Clown Professor ‘Two Jobs’ Spier, Supreme Leader, Kingston Polyversity

Date: 11 July 2024

To: All Staff Types and other associate peasants

My Fellow Canadians Kingstonians,

As we put another terrible hugely successful academic year to sleep, I thought you would like to hear my thoughts on my achievements in 2023-24 and join with me yet again in celebrating what a wonderful institution Kingston Poly University has become since the advent of my enlightened and sector-leading Viceship.

I promise I will keep my thoughts short this time, as I note a considerable number of you made sneaky anonymous complaints about my last message, something I deeply resent and think was very unfair. It takes me many days of hard toil to write these messages to my staff. I also have a large team of up to thirty admin staff to help me with this task, so I am actually stimulating the local economy. If I ever identify the moaning culprits I will ensure they are demoted or, as per the traditional KU way, are subjected to compulsory redundancy. I have found the latter usually works wonders and quickly closes down such miserable voices. My close friend Dave ‘Axjob’ Macky the Tosh may have gone, but I take special pride in continuing the staff management strategy he pioneered (at my urging). To celebrate his major impact on KU managerial techniques over many decades, if not centuries, I can exclusively reveal that plans are being hatched to name a building after Dave, or at least a bit of a building, or perhaps a tree. Watch this space.

Anyway, as I approach the summer break and look forward to my many impending holiday trips to sunnier climes in all corners of the globe (I have already packed my KU branded gold-trimmed bathing trunks and my new vampiric contact lenses), I wanted to take a moment from my enormously busy schedule (holding down two jobs is very tiring, you see) to reflect on some of my many excesses successes this year and to again grudgingly acknowledge your contributions to my amazing achievements during the past academic year.

I think you will all agree that I have made further incredible progress in the transformation and reshaping of our institution, and that our reputation for innovation, entrepreneurship and speaking in embarrassing 1970s business style language has left all the other VCs across the whole sector simply green with envy.

As I have said before, there is no doubt we are still operating in a particularly challenging national context, which has nothing whatsoever to do with my poor leadership skills or failing Clown House Strategy. That is why my ambitious and truly visionary Clown House strategy is so important, and why we need to work even harder to maintain my unquestionably high reputation as the UK’s foremost V.C. and the world’s leading architect (and expert on Swiss cheeses and line-dancing). It enables us to work towards and deliver a better future, not just for your careers but also to save my job, rather than simply managing difficult circumstances with the very few resources I have made available to you.

A real highlight for me this year, especially as I am your Gold Admiral Commandant, was the award of an overall rating of Gold in the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF), as well as securing Gold for student experience, student outcomes and student debt. As you all will no doubt be aware, I had been working flat-out to achieve this award on behalf of yourselves, and it enabled me to spend a very welcome wad of thousands on nice big signs and banners placed around the PolyUniversity celebrating my our achievement, including some big ones at the back of the Uni on some old railings (which have now been removed). I also awarded myself a nice big gold pen and some natty little gold cufflinks, which I have already worn to BOG (Board of Governors) dinners. The BOG were very impressed, or at least most of them were.

As I told the BOG, our transformative mission and four supreme values in the Clown House Strategy – inclusive, innovative, ambitious and enterprising – far from being silly words that I merely plagiarized from an old textbook I found at Kingston Hill, fundamentally drive what we are delivering. It is a drive to deliver, driven with all the deliberation that drivel drive can achieve. Just look at how the Uni is being transformed (a favourite word of mine – good, eh?): during 2023-24 you have been dumped with given a new Curriculum Management System, which took us years to develop (oh, alright then, days); the new ground-breaking KERIs (our four Knowledge Exchange and Research Institutes) are taking shape and will simply dazzle the world, even though many of you have no idea what the hell they will do; and our equally amazing Pen Road buildings ‘transformation’ project, which will include extensive use of fake glass panels and the creation of three dedicated Future Skills Learning Areas, complete with some vending machines, is about to enter its second amazing stage after all the noise, dust and disruption caused by the first stage (cough).

As a further sign of this sector-leading transformation, staff and students can now go and see the newly built environmentally-friendly pavement garden area at the back of Pen Road, which we have poured many thousands of pounds into creating, and which I confidently, and modestly, predict will quickly become the new Hanging Gardens of Babylon, an eighth wonder of the world right here in the Uni’s own backyard former Fasset Road car park. You can now enjoy looking at some greenery and sitting on some concrete seats, modelled on the concrete seats available in the courtyard of the Clown House. You can even test how long you can sit on them before your backside goes numb – it is another sure way to pick up a Future Skill: the art of endurance and the surefire knowledge that your bum will inevitably harden over time. Cheeky, eh? In fact, I predict that KU will contribute many new hard bums to the economy of the future. Bums the word.

This is certainly something I will emphasise when I am next interviewed in the Daily Telegraph, my paper of choice. As I gaze daily on ‘Striding full-length female nude’, the beautiful little sculpture I have had placed just outside my office door, I am able to ponder at great and tedious length on the enormous strides KU has made under my superior skills. By the way, there is nothing pervy about my choice of sculpture, and I completely reject the underhand comments that have been made by the woke types in UCU. The sculpture has given me many hours of visual pleasure. Simon Moron-Worthless, our innovative Professor of Sleeping (Around) Studies, has also praised this celebration of the female form, and has even suggested the image could be used in all our recruitment and marketing material in the future, something I will reflect upon carefully (Simon did seem a bit too excited when he urged me to adopt this).

So, staff types, it is glaringly obvious that the Senior Leadership community (as we now refer to ourselves – good, eh?) is committed to transforming Kingston Polyversity, er, University – under my truly inspired leadership – to a position where we can invest yet more cash in future inspierational (get it? Good, eh?) buildings and cut down on burdensome waste-of-space staff. If we take the correct approach as set out by me (with a bit of advice on wording from Simon Moron-Worthless), and have our Future Ills Skills programme at the very heart of everything we do, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, we should be able to beat off all our rivals and become, quite simply, the most innovative and transformational Polyversity University in the whole of the United Kingdom, if not the Universe. If we don’t achieve this before I retire, and I don’t become Sir Steven (as I am so desperate to be), then I am afraid I will have to hold all of you responsible, and take action accordingly. Even better, I will insist that one of our new buildings is named after me, so that, as with Axjob Macky, my name will also be up in bright lights, a true legacy for the University and our shrinking pool of students. Blackpool eat your heart out.

We have overcome all the great challenges and failures that have happened on my watch in the past year and, through our Future Ills Skills programme and Clown House Strategy, many great things still await us. Just you wait. Success ahoy!

Prof. Steven ‘Two Jobs’ Spier,

Vice-Admiral and CEO,

Kingston Technical College University.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Whatever will the Gold Commandant do now? In a short news item quietly slipped out on the Uni website it has been revealed that Dave ‘Mack the Knife’ Mackintosh, the oldest man in the University, if not the Universe, has finally decided to retire after almost 360 – er, correction, 36 – years with Kingston University. There have been jubilant cheers across KU, as many staff have been waiting for this moment for a very long time, and can’t wait to finally see the back of Crappy-Macky Tosh.

Mack the Knife, otherwise known as ‘Axejob’ by many staff, has been the loyal bagman to Steven ‘Two Jobs’ Spier, Kingston’s Vice-Clown, for a very long time. He was the epitome of KU arslikhan, always eager to please his boss and massage the Gold Commandant’s fragile ego. Tosh has served as Deputy VC, as a Dean across a number of Faculties, and more recently was the PVC for Strategy, to name just a few of the numerous roles he took on. He also was given responsibilities for planning and portfolio development, ‘quality’ assurance and enhancement (what a joke!), home and international student recruitment and support, and so on. You name it, he was given it. Spiersy off-loaded and dumped a ton of work on to Mackintosh, who obediently took on the roles with little protest. In many ways Macky became the Uni ‘go for’, fetching and doing everything and anything asked for by Spiersy. He could often be seen wearily trudging up the stairs in Holmewood House to visit the VC’s first-floor office to get yet more instructions.

And the instructions came thick and fast. The Telegraph-reading VC, who hates to deal with the Unions and refused to meet them face-to-face, often sent along Mac the Knife as his representative instead. In order to cover up his own financial mismanagement of the Uni, he would often use Mackintosh to do his dirty work and chair committees. Most notoriously, however, ‘Axejob’ was used by the Vice-Clown as the man who would meekly implement subject and department closures, order enforced redundancies, make ‘efficiency’ savings, and impose ‘temporary’ suspension of student recruitment on selected Schools (which was always a prelude to further axing of subjects). And there have been plenty of these severe cuts in recent years. Many staff careers have been trashed and talents lost. As an added incentive for his loyal bagman to wield the axe, Spiersy also ensured that ‘Mac the Knife’ was paid a secret financial bonus. When news of this was leaked, it led to a lot of moans and expressions of disgust by certain other members of the SLT (Senile Leadership Team) when they finally realised what was going on.

Mackintosh knew he was grossly unpopular with other SLTers, who were pissed off at the blatant favouritism always shown to him by the Gold Commandant, but Axejob batted all this away, and told his very few mates that he was looking forward to trousering a nice big pension. Above all, Mack the Knife became loathed by other Kingston staff for his forked tongue – he would say one thing to some and the complete opposite to others. Tosh by name and Tosh by nature. He would renege on promises and reassurances, and he told loads of porkies week by week. If you were told by Mac that you were ‘safe’ and your subject secure, you knew immediately you were doomed. While Spiersy has been the chief architect in converting the Uni into a hollowed-out Polyversity which is laughed at by its rivals, Axejob helped cause serious reputational damage to the Uni through the trashing of targeted subject disciplines. No student worth their salt will now take the risk of studying at KU, fearful that yet more closures could come and their Degree might close halfway through their studies. KU has been really struggling with recruitment, and we should not be surprised, given the short-sighted antics of Spiersy and his now departing bagman.

Spier and his SLT mob have been in complete denial over this, and as far as he is concerned everything is still rosy in the KU garden. The recent event held in Town House to ‘celebrate’ the Future Skills programme, where the VC bored his small audience into deep comas yet again, merely reinforced for those who attended how desperate Spier has become to persuade staff that the Clown House strategy is making ‘progress’ and has ‘really started to deliver’. As the audience numbed their bums on the cold concrete seats, the Vice-Clown rambled on about how his Future Skills nonsense is ‘positioning us way ahead nationally on this crucial agenda’. Oh yeah? Welcome to Spier-land, where pink pigs fly and students will ‘Navigate’ and ‘Explore’ their way through their Degrees. The Vice-Admiral certainly loves his seafaring terms, and as the ship slowly sinks ever deeper into the muddy waters, expect more of this embarrassing BS.

The departure of Axejob is, frankly, a big blow for Spiersy. He had hoped to hold on to him much longer, and wanted Mac the Tosh to do further public relations work on the Clown House strategy and the ‘Future Skills’ programme, which are failing to deliver the major ‘sector-leading’ promises the VC announced three years ago. But it seems Axejob has finally had enough and wanted to desert the sinking ship, much to Vice-Admiral Spiersy’s frustration. In fact, the whole Clown House strategy is obviously in serious trouble, and all the BS about its objectives that was sold to the BOG (Board of Governors) has not lived up to the ‘transformation’ and huge League Tables success Spiersy said it would.

In a panic to replace his obedient bagman with another lap-dog, Spiersy has announced the appointment of Dr. David Ashton as ‘Interim’ (in other words, temporary) Pro-VC for Strategy. Ashton will ‘assume the role of leading on the delivery of the Town House Strategy’, said Spier. Ashton was recently a Pro-VC at Leeds Beckett Uni, and prior to that was at Royal Holloway for 6 years. But wait! Is this man a fresh face for Kingston Uni? Does that name not sound a little bit familiar? Is this the man who was once the Academic Registrar at Kingston? Yes, the very same. It’s resurrection time again. In order to plug the gaping hole left by Macky the Tosh, the VC has decided to replace a near-dead man with an old zombie from the distant KU past. Isn’t it great to be at Kingston Uni? (if you can hold on to your job, of course).

Feeling peckish? Hungry after a lecture? In need of a meal? As well as its Clown House and Future Ill’s programme, Kingston University is pioneering another ‘sector-leading’ strategy to make its rivals blue and green with envy: quick-bite cheese rolls and ‘transformative’ vending machine drinks to help enhance your Future Skills.

When two scientists recently took a visitor for a coffee in the Picton Room at Kingston University’s Penryhn Road campus, they were surprised and clearly disgusted to find that the popular ground-floor meeting and eating room had been closed. In an announcement quietly slipped out on 27 April, and hardly noticed by staff at first, the Uni suddenly revealed radical changes to KU’s catering and hospitality provision, not just at Penryhn Road but across the whole Uni. The Picton Room was closed the very next day.

While the announcement said that other Pen Road outlets ‘continue to be available for food and refreshments’, the now former Picton Room will be incorporated into the money-gobbling ‘Main Building Transformation Project’, which has left the campus looking more like a permanent building site since the middle of 2023, and is part of the VC’s ‘legacy’ big-build projects he loves to spend millions on. Trying to sound enthusiastic, the message added: ‘To complement the existing catering outlets at Penryhn Road, the Transformation Project will add new vending machines offering quality hot drinks and snacks as well as a kitchen space with microwaves and sinks providing more choice for students’. So that’s alright then. Staff will be able to use super efficient ‘vending machines’ to obtain ‘quality hot drinks and snacks’ for themselves and their guests (such as External Examiners), while students will be able to eagerly cater for their own catering needs with a few microwaves and even some sinks to wash up in.

No doubt all this was sold to the BOG (Board of Governors) at their January meeting as ‘ground-breaking’, ‘sector-leading’ and ‘transformational’, all the usual managerial BS terms so favoured by Steven ‘Two Jobs’ Spier, KU’s Vice-Admiral and a true legend in his own lunchtime. Never mind that serious money was invested in the creation of the Picton Room when it was first opened, and that the local connections to former Black slave Cesar Picton were exploited at length in Uni marketing campaigns. After all, it’s only money.

The Picton was a good alternative to sitting in the main and noisy canteen at Pen Road, and was also a rare space where staff could arrange to greet and meet, relax over a meal or coffee, or arrange to host external visitors. No longer. The message is now, er, ‘hard cheese’. Use a vending machine.

But it gets worse. From 15 April, KU staff found that the Town House cafe at Pen Road now closes at the radically revised time of 6.00pm. Think about that. When it was first opened, the Clown House, which cost over £4m, was proclaimed by Spier and his gang of overpaid Silver Leadership Teamsters as the new ‘jewel in the crown’ of Kingston Uni. Glossy images of the building, shining brightly in the evening, with happy staff and students active and busy on all floors, were a core part of the expensive marketing of the ‘award-winning’ project. The cafe, they said, was a ‘pioneering’ new public space, which would help ‘transform’ the image of the Uni, exemplifying (quote) a ‘refreshing and imaginative design culture’ that would (quote) unite ‘town and gown’ and leave visiting dignitaries in awe.

There was more to come. In more penny-pinching blows, the Knight’s Park Bar will now no longer open on Mondays or Tuesdays during term times. Kingston Hill library cafe will now close at 7pm instead of 8.30pm during term time, and will no longer open outside of term time (which is surely a big and surprising middle-finger to all those Management and Business Studies students who study at the Hill, especially parents and time-challenged part-timers who work in central London and have to commute and juggle their studies carefully). But wait! There’s even more. Kingston Hill Costa/Shop will now close at the earlier time of 4pm on weekdays and no longer be open on Sundays during term time and at weekends non-term time. In other words, staff and students at Kingston Hill, in need of a purchase or essential bite to eat, will now find themselves in the University catering services equivalent of a ghost town campus. No doubt the answer will be yet more lovely ‘vending machines’.

It all makes a mockery of Aramark and ‘Eat Central’, and adds insult to injury by the Uni’s SLT daleks. As Kingston University staff speculate about who will be axed in a new round of redundancies, all these short-sighted ‘economies’ are yet another sign of the deplorable financial mismanagement of the institution overseen by ‘Sir’ Steven ‘Two Jobs’ Spier, Kingston’s Gold Commandant, who is also an expert on Swiss cheeses and the world’s leading architect. It will further demoralize both students and staff. Hunting down some decent food and drink at Kingston Polyversity in the future will be the only ‘Future Skill’ needed. Home-made cheese-roll, anyone?

Ten years ago today (16^th April 2014) the first two posts appeared on Dissenter’s Blog. Who would have expected it to lasted so long? The anonymous originators of the Blog have long moved on to, one trusts, better things, along with many other Kingston staff, some through choice, some with little choice. For many on the academic staff, aside from family and other personal considerations, there are too many alternative employment fires out there to risk the leap from the Kingston frying pan. A university career has even worse prospects than a decade ago, especially for the arts and humanities as the moneymen and a hostile government get going with their philistine scythes. Philosophy is the latest discipline under threat at KU.

Needless to say, Kingston management has improved not one jot. Naturally the University is constrained by government underfunding, falling student numbers, especially international students, and now cuts to widening participation in HE, always a Kingston selling point. Yet the alacrity with which management pursues the numbers game means it is held in widespread contempt by the staff, not a good recipe for any well functioning institution, let alone a university.

Recently an old-school academic, Peter Higgs, died, a theoretical physicist famous for his predicted eponymous particle, since discovered, the Higgs Boson. He expressed doubt that he would be able to do such work or hold down a job in today’s paper-churning academic environment. Indeed, he learned that Edinburgh would have sacked him but for his prospect of winning a Nobel prize, which he eventually did. Such work could never be done at Kingston, nor Higgs believed, anywhere. Perhaps there are a few pockets in the system left but in general no university is prepared to accept the risks of supporting real research of this kind, preferring to keep the churn going with an eye on league tables.

So, there is still scope for a blog like Dissenters, the only place where you will find true academic freedom. If there are any current Kingston employees who feel they would like to contribute, please leave a comment below with a contactable email address (anonymous of course). As long as you do not use an email already used to comment, your message will not appear below.

Many thanks to all the readers who follow this blog. We trust it has offered amusement, solace and some enjoyment over the last decade. We also trust it continues to annoy the management and remind them all what academia should be about.