Kingston wins Guardian HE raffle

16 Responses to Kingston wins Guardian HE raffle

1. Academy woman says:

   July 20, 2018 at 9:15 am

   We have quite a lot to contend with at Kingston. I can’t see how this blog helps. It is hardly a constructive intervention and is as damaging as the poor management strategies it highlights. If this is what the blogger chooses to do with their musical “talent” I am not surprised that music at Kingston is always bottom of the league tables.

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   • Dissenter says:

     July 21, 2018 at 8:18 am

     We would be very pleased to hear your ideas for “constructive intervention”, although we are not sure of the relevance of music to this post, or indeed the majority of them.
2. Prof InSpire says:

   June 7, 2018 at 9:49 am

   What an impressive jump up the Guardian league table that is! Kingston is now going to be Highly-Rated by all prospective students. A cheque is on the way to you sir!

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3. Time to retire? says:

   June 6, 2018 at 11:09 am

   Odd, you chose not to publish my comment. Truth hurts I suspect?

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   • Dissenter says:

     June 11, 2018 at 8:43 am

     We published your other comment. No need to repeat yourself.
4. Spartacus says:

   June 5, 2018 at 6:59 pm

   Dissenter – to echo the sentiments of some colleagues: If you hate it so much why don’t you just leave? Move on! Go to another university and see if you can find your utopia there. Though I doubt very much you will, the bitterness you now seem to have has turned this once-amusing blog into a rambling trollathon.

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   • Dissenter says:

     June 6, 2018 at 8:59 am

     Spartacus
     Rather amusing you accuse this blog of trolling when you post three similar comments, which we won’t clutter the blog with. Management stooges (or the managers themselves?) will always try to abuse critics – and criticism is vital for a healthy academic environment. Kingston is not healthy, which is why this blog exists. We have always published satirical material; that has not changed. We suspect you’ve not read it. No one is looking for utopia, just competent and fair management. That you cannot see this is your benightedness.

     But we are cheered as observations like yours show the blog is doing its job, and the majority support it.
5. Danny boy says:

   June 4, 2018 at 1:03 pm

   Lest we forget – KU has some form when it comes to trying to fudge these rankings. Some years ago two members of the Psychology department, both still present in the department and now in promotional positions, tried inappropriately and illegally to influence students’ responses to surveys by pressurising them and providing them with disinformation:
   https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/1954847/Kingston-University-students-told-to-lie-to-boost-rankings.html

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6. SECophant says:

   May 31, 2018 at 7:00 pm

   Another The Graun load-of-twaddle puff piece.

   A waste of time event, celebrating the further erosion of academic standards in the UK with academics bullied into introducing and enforcing ridiculous liberal policies, on this occasion: ‘inclusivity’. One of the many liberal euphemisms for “dumb it down and make it easy (or else!).”

   Yes, Kingston ‘University’ certainly deserves an award for the utter shite that its so-called management spews, always keeping in line with liberal establishment policies. The sort of behaviour that gets one an honour’s day gong or even the top job at a quango for measuring educational standards in schools!

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7. Muckraker says:

   May 31, 2018 at 4:00 pm

   Yes, clearly not HPLs or fixed-term contract workers.

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8. Jack Dawson says:

   May 31, 2018 at 2:46 pm

   In trying to comprehend how a university that is obviously both a) badly run and b) in crisis such as Kingston, is somehow able to jump massively and implausibly up the Guardian league table, it may be relevant that Kingston’s Head of Planning, Matt Hiely-Rayner, Director of Intelligence Matrix, is responsible for compiling the Guardian’s tables ! As conflicts of interest go, this one is pretty impressive.
   https://www.theguardian.com/profile/matt-hiely-rayner

   https://www.linkedin.com/in/matt-hiely-rayner-37a4b682/

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9. Jack Dawson says:

   May 31, 2018 at 2:09 pm

   Our disgraced former Pro Vice-Chancellor for Research and Innovation, Martin McQuillan, has published a convincing article suggesting that the Guardian league tables for 2019 lack credibility, given the wild fluctuations in individual universities’ positions as against last year, and the change in measurements being used. I guess he’s still angry with Kingston for kicking him out, but in fairness to the scoundrel, he’s probably right in this instance. Nobody can seriously believe that Kingston’s huge jump in the table is a reflection of a huge improvement:
   https://www.researchresearch.com/news/article/?articleId=1375340#.Ww_zMa6nWvc.twitter

   
Some strange quirks in the League table: History’s scores for student satisfaction as regards courses, teaching and feedback are significantly higher than for the university as a whole. Why then is History being singled out for closure ?
   

https://www.theguardian.com/education/ng-interactive/2018/may/29/university-guide-2019-league-table-for-history

   Politics is still scoring poorly; student satisfaction with Politics teaching has unsurprisingly dropped significantly since the redundancies last year. Yet despite having got rid of over a quarter of their staff, Politics’ staff-student ratio has actually improved ! Either Kingston has found a way to fiddle the figures, or recruitment has tanked:


   https://www.theguardian.com/education/ng-interactive/2018/may/29/university-guide-2019-league-table-for-politics

   On a side note, our friend McQueezy is not happy with social media, accusing it of being “an aggressive, ugly and unregulated Wild West” and saying that “The darker fringes of social media involve anonymous accounts pouring out confected and often malicious opinion”:


   https://www.pressreader.com/uk/the-new-european/20180510/282084867439675

   Anyone would think he had a personal axe to grind !

   Finally, I’d just like to congratulate the Dissenter’s Blog on rattling our horrible management. Congratulations on your fantastic work, and please don’t be put off by the management stooges who turn up in these comments boxes to try to discourage you. A lot of us are really pleased that you’re doing what you’re doing. Please don’t stop.

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10. Danny boy says:

    May 29, 2018 at 8:08 am

    Ladies who lunch – none of them strangers to the sweet trolley by the looks of things.

    Reply
    • Academy woman says:

      May 31, 2018 at 11:26 am

      @Danny boy. Very clever…fat shaming women. As for you dissenter…shame on you for undermining the achievements of women. Both of you can go and fuck yourselves – how’s that for dissent?
    • Dissenter says:

      June 2, 2018 at 11:16 am

      Academy woman
      Always good to have a measured response to the blog. Try again.

      In response to your remark about undermining women, this blog only undermines the incompetence of management, male and female. We do not discriminate.
    • Danny boy says:

      June 3, 2018 at 6:27 am

      the incompetence of management, male and female, fat and slim …