AI can bring a third digital divide in terms of educational inequality: where the rich have access to technology, increasingly powered by artificial intelligence, and to teachers to help them use this technology as part of their learning, while poor kids just have access to the technology?

AI and the next digital divide in education

Cultural Environment contributes disproportionately to educational inequality in Ireland

https://cepr.org/voxeu/columns/inequality-opportunity-educational-achievement-western-europe-contributors-and

Economic inequality has been associated with reduced educational intergenerational mobility:

https://cepr.org/voxeu/columns/inequality-opportunity-educational-achievement-western-europe-contributors-and

World ‘going backwards’ on equal access to higher education

Universities told to spend 5 per cent of total income on equality programmes after report finds UN 2030 goal ‘highly unlikely’ to be met

https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20231006075137584

Class and Wealth, not merit, determine success in Ireland’s education system – Kathleen Lynch

https://www.thejournal.ie/readme/education-inequality-class-divide-5216581-Sep2020/

New UNESCO Report shows how online education during Covid-19 created staggering educational inequalities:

https://www.unesco.org/en/digital-education/ed-tech-tragedy

The debate on the Irish Government’s funding of private schools rages on:

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/2023/10/24/should-fee-paying-schools-get-state-support-labours-aodhan-o-riordain-vs-former-principal-arthur-godsil/

One in five students at top universities consider dropping out over cost of living
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2023/mar/12/one-in-five-students-at-top-universities-consider-dropping-out-over-cost-of-living?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

GRADE INFLATION: 9 out of 10 students in top universities get firsts or 2.1 degrees

New research shows that it doesn’t really matter what you do in university. What matters is getting in to the top universities. This is the hard part. If you get in you have a 90% chance of getting a first or a 2.1 degree.

https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/nine-out-10-students-get-first-or-21-leading-universities

Education is no longer the key factor when it comes to social mobility in Ireland. Family wealth and inheritance play the most significant role when it comes to social mobility and home ownership.

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/2023/01/14/fintan-otoole-the-better-educated-each-irish-generation-is-the-worse-its-chances-of-home-ownership/?

Wellcome Trust study aims to use  peer-delivered problem solving and behavioural activation – two strategies found to help improve symptoms of mental health problems – as standalone early interventions for young people with depression.

https://wellcome.org/news/university-students-depression-mental-health-interventions

There is no patient-provider confidentiality with AI Therapists!

https://theconversation.com/your-ai-therapist-is-not-your-therapist-the-dangers-of-relying-on-ai-mental-health-chatbots-225411

In 2022, 18% of children aged 7-to-16-years-old and 22% of young people aged 17-to-24 had a probable mental health condition. 

https://www.york.ac.uk/news-and-events/news/2024/research/urgent-childrens-mental-health

Yale-NUS introduces a for-credit “Resilience and Success in College” elective course for first-year students to help them with wellbeing

https://www.universityworldnews.com/post.php?story=20240415151821371

Students in Ireland are left “lost” to deal with their own mental health illness

https://www.irishtimes.com/ireland/2023/01/23/camhs-left-more-than-100-children-without-care-for-up-to-two-years-report-finds/

Charities are paying College Fees during the Cost of Living Crisis:

https://www.irishtimes.com/ireland/education/2023/01/22/hundreds-of-third-level-students-in-receipt-of-charity-to-pay-fees/

PhD students discuss how to deal with anxiety

https://www.insidehighered.com/advice/2022/12/19/mental-health-issues-among-grad-students-shouldnt-be-taboo-opinion

Iranian students continue their protests for greater freedoms

https://www.timeshighereducation.com/opinion/iranian-students-are-protesting-never-academics-are-wary

The Most Popular article in Times Higher Education in 2022 tells us something needs to change when it comes to academic research: https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/masturbation-journal-paper-exposes-deeper-problems-research

Liberal Arts Degrees must change to meet Business Needs AGAIN!!

https://www.timeshighereducation.com/blog/liberal-arts-degrees-must-change-meet-industry-needs

Lawyers and legal academics working on human rights issues are leaving Hong Kong:

https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/china-lawyers-crackdown-exodus/

Maureen Ruprecht Fadem on Academic Freedom in the United States:

https://www.insidehighered.com/views/2022/12/08/educational-gag-orders-are-student-rights-issue-opinion

Hong Kong University is to “punish” students who bring the university “into disrepute”

https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/education/article/3175599/university-hong-kong-proposes-disciplining-students

How Self-Censorship works in China

https://www.timeshighereducation.com/depth/can-academic-publishers-resist-self-censorship-china?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial-daily&spMailingID=23150698&spUserID=MTAxNzcwNzE2MTc1NAS2&spJobID=2132295733&spReportId=MjEzMjI5NTczMwS2

The Great China Lockdown Novel:

Lockdown Lovers

The Psychological Effects of Lockdown in China

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3202120/mass-mental-health-crisis-looms-young-chinese-after-3-years-lockdowns-home-school-and-zero-covid?module=lead_hero_story&pgtype=homepage

Covid-19 and Humanities Research

https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/what-can-humanities-offer-covid-era

CASUALISING ACADEMICS: the new buzz phrase for the future of academic life

As more and more universities and colleges try and cope with the fallout from the Coronavirus Pandemic, lecturers and junior staff fear for their academic futures. While universities are eager to get more and more high achieving PhD and research students into their departments, very often the lecturers that teach and inspire them are slowly being shown the back door.

A recent OECD report asks universities not to “casuals” academics:

https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/dont-casualise-academics-says-oecd

Prestigious Art College Closes in Hong Kong

One wonders how this is related to the pandemic. Colleges and universities with huge deficits like Savannah College must be wondering whether it is viable to maintain large physical campuses with exorbitant rents.

Students shocked as prestigious art college SCAD closes Hong Kong campus

State Universities in California prepare for another online term:

PLANS OF US UNIVERSITIES FOR THE NEW TERM:

https://www.chronicle.com/article/Here-s-a-List-of-Colleges-/248626

After COVID-19 will students come back?

Job losses:
https://independentaustralia.net/life/life-display/australian-universities-suffer-job-losses-over-coronavirus-concerns,13692

Half of UK University Workers nn temporary contracts:
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2020/apr/02/lecturers-went-on-strike-over-insecure-jobs-now-we-fear-coronavirus-cuts

COVID 19 could result on higher student numbers at Universities:
https://www.timeshighereducation.com/opinion/covid-19-could-be-curse-graduates-boon-universities

Job losses:
https://independentaustralia.net/life/life-display/australian-universities-suffer-job-losses-over-coronavirus-concerns,13692

http://www.scmp.com/comment/letters/article/2063961/people-should-thinking-about-self-funded-phds-hong-kong-universities

Nicholas Kristoff argues there is liberal privilege in academia with one report finding that only 2% of English professors in the US are supporters of the Republican Party.

The image of the university is tarnished: this book examines how recent philosophies of education, new readings of its economics, new technologies affecting research and access, and contemporary novelists’ representations of university life all describe a global university that has given up on its promise of greater educational equality.

 

Here is my new book on the topic. Chapters and more available on request:

http://www.palgrave.com/br/book/9781137547606