By Chloe Spencer. We were surprised by their long school days, they admired our blazers and ties, writes pupil Chloe Spencer. Most days, most school pupils find themselves sitting in a classroom with the teacher presenting a lesson at the front. But recently at my school, a lesson appeared from half way across the globe. The teacher was trying a new educational technique: Skype. Our English class linked up with Chinese students from a language school on the coast of Qingdao in China. More...

By Anonymous academic. Collecting feedback on courses benefits neither staff nor students – often it's biased, sexist or simply unrealistic. Do students have something to teach academics? Student feedback, now a feature of most university courses, can be useful – but more often it's downright biased, sexist or simply unrealistic. More...

By David Kent. Today the Black Hole is delighted to launch a short series of posts dedicated to postdoctoral fellows with kids. Two current postdoctoral fellows (Jenn and Erika) who have recently had children whilst pursing science at the very highest levels have kindly agreed to share their experiences. We are really excited to be able to provide them a forum that will hopefully stimulate some changes in how we can do a better job of supporting the offspring of our best and brightest. We begin with introductions to Jenn and Erika and will continue over the coming weeks with their thoughts on what can be done. More...

By Jennifer Polk - From PhD to Life. What did you hope for in terms of employment as you completed your PhD?
As I was working on my PhD, I still had hopes of becoming a tenured professor. I did quite a bit of adjunct teaching during my PhD and thought that if I was lucky, and got my foot in the door, I would get a tenure track job eventually. Of course, that didn’t happen. Instead, I learned that most adjuncts never make it to the tenure track and they work for very little money. Once I realized that the odds of landing a tenure track job were low, and that adjunct teaching couldn’t support me financially, I started to think seriously about non-academic employment. I actually started blogging on this subject before I officially finished my PhD. By the time I had the degree in hand, I was well on my way down another career path. Ironically, I haven’t taught since I earned my PhD. More...