April McMahon: Creating a blended experience for our students
At The University of Manchester we’re mainly not designing and providing wholly online programmes. We can make the online components higher-quality, with better production values, based on appropriate pedagogy for working with online learners – and our students are guiding us on how to do this. But we also believe passionately in an on-campus experience, and we miss the buzz of our campus full of students.
Patrick Hackett and Beth Dodd – Emerging from a crisis
Key to how we deliver our Vision, are our Values. Especially when needing to make difficult decisions, how we deliver will be as important as what we deliver.
Jonathan Winter: A time of learning
For the first time in my life I feel I could ask anyone if they have learned anything new in the past few weeks and the answer would be 100% “Yes”.
Ian Bruce: Our research response to Covid-19
It is hard to find superlatives to describe the past few weeks. The COVID-19 emergency is an historic event and one has to go back exactly a century to the ‘flu pandemic post World War I to see anything like this on a global scale.
Andy Westwood: Imagining a higher education system beyond Covid-19
Andy Westwood sets out the not-insignificant challenges that the government now faces in deciding what it wants from universities after the pandemic.
Sir Cary Cooper: Staying positive in a lockdown – the seven rules
We have lost a lot of freedoms in the past few weeks. But remember, we still have some control over our lives.
Lisa Murtagh: Home Educating during the COVID-19 Pandemic ‘Tears and Treats’
All of a sudden, many of us have found ourselves in the novel position of being a home-educator. From a personal perspective, the past few weeks have been fraught with tears (mine and my son’s) and the reward of lots of treats (movies and sweets). I am currently the Head of Initial Teacher Education at the University of Manchester and have been involved in education for over 25 years. On that basis, you may assume that I have got this home education lark ‘nailed’. I haven’t!
Julian Skyrme: Bringing out our best in a crisis
Theories of disasters point out that during major societal crises the needs of individuals and society move closer together: we develop a greater sense of belonging and commonality and we tend to bring out the best in ourselves and our organisations. All of this has been evident across our University community since the extraordinary events brought on by the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
Patrick Hackett: A personal perspective on the current situation
These last few weeks, particularly the last week or so, have undoubtedly been some of the most unusual and challenging of my entire career, and I am sure many of you feel the same way. These events are truly unprecedented, and moving at an astonishing pace.
Sir Cary Cooper: The seven rules of home working
Sir Cary Cooper, 50th Anniversary Professor of Organisational Psychology and Health, shares his top tips for working from home.
