Fundermentals Top 10 2016

2016. What a year. At the beginning of the year the largest issue we had was what NERC would call their new research ship; by the end all the heroes were dead, climate scientists in the USA are desperately backing up data for fear that the new President will scrub it all, the UK is committing economic suicide and withdrawing into itself, and the one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world is being bombed into oblivion. 

In higher education, it's been a busy year too. The Stern Review was published, the HE White Paper was reshaping the sector, and the Global Challenges Research Fund was launched.

Fundermentals has been on hand to comment, highlight and, occasionally, laugh. Here are the most popular posts from the last twelve months.

AHRC Serves up Masterchef

Last week the AHRC announced an exciting link up with Masterchef to take forward its Creative Economy programme.

In a move which shocked the sector, the AHRC has appointed Gregg Wallace as its Creative Economy Champion. 

'Gregg is the ideal appointment,' gushed a spokesman for the AHRC. 'His focus will be on enhancing and extending the AHRC’s reach in the creative economy, emphasising the importance of arts and humanities research in generating impact across the sector.

'Oh, and improving its buttery biscuit bases, That will be essential.' 

Any relation to Prof Andrew Chitty is entirely coincidental.

Wallace

Chitty

Using Social Media to Support your Research

I’ve written before about social media, and about some of the sessions we’ve run on research and social media (such as those led by Nadine Muller and Becky Higgitt), but there seems to be an insatiable appetite amongst academics to understand them better, to participate fully and - in time - benefit from them.

The Early Career Researcher Network session in Medway on Wednesday went some way towards satisfying this demand. It was led by three academics from very diverse disciplines, who together gave an overview of the way in which social media can be used to talk about your research and engage with others beyond your School, to recruit research participants and manage a project, and to disseminate research, track impact, and improve citations.