Readers of Ratty’s last (official) newsletter will know, assuming they got to the end, that Kingston was up for two Times awards, Widening Participation and Entrepreneurial University of the Year. The idea that Kingston should win an award for widening participation when the VC’s intention is to raise the A Level points bar for students will strike many as quite comic, although it managed to win one for its staff demotion scheme, so nothing is too ridiculous to come true. But to pre-empt the next newsletter: Kingston failed to win either. Sheffield and Anglia Ruskin won the two awards for those interested in such diversions. Note to Ratty: must try harder. How about a Deputy Vice Chancellor for Winning Awards? That’ll go down well with the staff.
Or maybe just make the staff feel valued, stop threatening them, stop making them reapply for their grades, jump through silly hoops, live in open plan offices, sit at their desks every hour of the day. Call us old fashioned at Dissenter’s Blog, but happy staff might just deliver the better university the Riverhouse Rat claims to want.
How’s that staff survey coming along by the way?