Doing research is a key element of learning

Talk of education for a knowledge economy is hollow if students take no part in scholarly inquiry, argues Alan Jenkins.

Times Higher Education Supplement, 23rd February 2007
(subscription required for online version).

Professor Jenkins will be speaking at the LLAS conference Linking Teaching and Research in Languages, Linguistics and Area Studies on 10th July 2007.

Muslim focus for British Council

The British Council, which promotes British culture and education overseas, is cutting its budget for Europe to shift its focus to Muslim countries.

Source: BBC website

New journal: Journal of Employability and the Humanities

Call for Papers
The Journal of Employability and the Humanities is for everyone in the Humanities. As a bi-annual, refereed journal produced in collaboration with the Centre for Employability Through the Humanities (ceth), at the University of Central Lancashire, its intention is to create space for a dialogue between Humanities and employability. We want to hear your experiences of teaching, developing and researching employability and stress that prior knowledge of employability literature and models is not necessary. We do, however, also encourage contributions from the experienced practitioner or theorist. We also welcome contributions from students (undergraduate, postgraduate and mature) about their work and classroom experiences, especially for the student editorial, short discussion pieces or case studies.
See journal website for more details.

Migrants: The English challenge

Here, three people who came to Britain with little or no English language skills describe the challenges they would face learning English in their home countries and how lessons at London's Lewisham College have changed their lives.

Source: BBC website

Migrants 'should learn English'

People who are seeking to come to the UK to work or to join a spouse already living here should be required to learn English, an expert body says.
The Commission on Integration and Cohesion says language is the single largest barrier to community relations.

BBC news
21/2/07

In other words, get an education

If universities are to be more than just training institutions, degree courses should contain a foreign-language component, says Bob Brecher.

Times Higher Education Supplement , 16/2/07
www.thes.co.uk (requires subscription).