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subtext ***************************************************** 'Truth: lies open to all' ***************************************************** Issue 144 3 March 2016 ***************************************************** Fortnightly during term time. All letters, contributions and comments to: subtext-editors@lancaster.ac.uk subtext does not publish material that is submitted anonymously, but will consider requests for publication with the name withheld. subtext reserves the right to edit submissions. Back issues and subscription details can be found at www.lancs.ac.uk/subtext For tips to prevent subtext from getting swept up into your 'junk email folder', see: www.lancs.ac.uk/subtext/dejunk/ CONTENTS: editorial, privy speak more kindly, eat your greens, big printer, global news, wall's sausages, democracy, more democracy, senate report, management speak, feedback, shart attack, concert review, no letters. ***************************************************** EDITORIAL Term after term, subtext has cause to argue against various university policies. While we are idealists, we are very much resigned to the fact that our hollering will usually come to nothing – that we should accept the monolithic nature of things and instead be complacent simply with documenting events as a matter of public record. However, while we never involve ourselves in institutional policymaking and therefore cannot claim TOO much credit on the rare occasions when something goes our way, we can be forgiven for adopting unbearably smug expressions and say; "we told you so!" every once in a while. Just over a year ago, we reported that the Council of the University had chosen to end the automatic conferral of continuing membership to retiring members of staff. After receiving lots and lots of letters about it; pointing out that the cost savings were so marginal as to be unworthy of recognition; and watching as long serving members of the university parted on bitter terms with an institution to which they had devoted their entire lives, subtext is happy to report that WE have won a glorious victory. At the most recent meeting of the Senate (see the report below for more detail), the Vice-Chancellor clearly sensed the disastrous effect that this policy has had on the community here at Lancaster, and bowed to the inevitable. Admittedly, this did involve some rewriting of history and a glossing over of some uncomfortable truths, but the outcome was a positive one. If retiring staff wish it, they can now arrange for their email access to continue, and if they want to remain active members of the university community they can be granted 'staff alumni' status. About time, an' all! We can only thank our subscribers who shared our outrage when we initially reported on the policy – it just goes to show that, just occasionally, the good fight is not a lost cause. ***************************************************** HER MAJESTY'S PRIVY COUNCIL RIDES TO THE RESCUE subtext's constitutional experts were intrigued by the announcement at yesterday's Senate that the Privy Council had refused permission for the University to change the statute provision relating to the constitutional position of the Students' Union (see Senate Report). Clearly, this must have been an embarrassment to the University and in particular to UMAG, where this proposal originated. What could have gone wrong? Every time a "simplification of statutes" proposal has been made to Council and Senate in the last 10 years, members have been assured that the government is clear that it does not think it should be getting involved in the minutiae of university governance. As such, the less detail that can be left in statutes, the better, and within reason, the Privy Council can be expected to approve more or less any simplifying process which meets this end. For the Privy Council to overturn UMAG's proposal in this way means that at least one, and possibly all, of the following is likely to be true: - UMAG didn't check in advance whether the Privy Council would be happy to delete reference to our students' union; - Contrary to UMAG's repeated assurances, the Privy Council does still see a role for itself in overseeing universities' governance processes; and - Given how rare it is for it to intervene in this way, it seems that the Privy Council must have formed a low opinion of the scrutinising abilities of the Council and the Senate at Lancaster. And what does it say about the docile nature of LUSU's current officers that Lancaster students have to rely upon the Privy Council to safeguard their union's constitutional position within the university? ***************************************************** STAY HEALTHY, PEASANTS! Many subtext readers were slightly bemused by the missive to all staff sent by the Director of HR on Monday 29 February, announcing "The Big Lunch". HR, it seems, has finally noticed that many staff work long hours, often taking their lunch break at their desk. This is causing problems for some people's wellbeing and mental health. It's great that HR seems to have noticed the problems many people have with their work-life balance. What measures are proposed? Well, on 3rd March, "HR Division and Facilities are planning THE BIG LUNCH. The idea is that on this day you are encouraged to take a lunch break away from your desk, have a nutritious meal and spend that time with a colleague. Taking positive steps to refuel, have some downtime and using it in a social context is good for mental health." Oh. subtext suggests that sending slightly patronising "eat your greens, you antisocial slobs!" emails to everyone is not going to be great for morale. Perhaps the Director of HR should think a bit more about why so many of his staff cannot spare the time to have a proper lunch break, and spend less time trying to promote on-campus eateries with dismal marketing campaigns. But maybe subtext is just being as cynical as ever. ***************************************************** PUTTING THE CARTRIDGE BEFORE THE HORSE ISS has made good on its New Years' resolution to provide shiny new printing and photocopying devices. By and large this process has gone smoothly; the devices are in place, they seem to work and, by carefully following the detailed instructions provided by ISS, it has been possible for the geekier members of the subtext collective to actually print things. The ability to send a print job and only release it when one is actually standing by the printer should prevent the awkward dash from office to print room to ensure that one's carefully crafted epistles will be printed on University House-approved new logo letterheaded paper, and not the pink card someone left in the tray from a previous print job. Unfortunately, while ISS deserves plenty of credit for the way it has rolled out the new printers, it doesn't seem to have carried out much market research into the needs of its end users (to wit - us). subtext was in attendance at one of the recent training sessions on how to use the new things. It was all going well, until... "And how do you get the stapler to work?" "Oh, there's no stapler." "What about the sorter?" "Oh, there's no sorter. It just all comes out here (points)." (Aghast silence for 10 seconds.) subtext thought it would be pretty obvious that, given the new printers are replacing our entire stock of photocopiers, and given that a very high proportion of photocopied handouts, agendas, notes and the like are destined to be sorted and stapled, it would be ridiculous not to equip all the new printers with a sorter and a stapler. Clearly we underestimated ISS here. Fortunately, one third of the new printers include a stapler. It's difficult to find out where they all are, because ISS has no plans to issue a single list of their locations, but it's reassuring to know they're out there somewhere. So, if you're in one of the departments lucky enough to have a copier with built-in stapler, it's possible you'll occasionally see admin staff from other, less fortunate departments furtively searching your corridors, trying to find your copier room. Be nice to them. They're probably trying to avoid having to individually collate and staple 50 sets of handouts. Coming soon: in an effort to save money on IT equipment, ISS orders a batch of PCs without any keyboards. Alongside these problems of functionality, some of the bigger financial and ethical issues around printing are still in flux. Currently all printing costs incurred by staff are billed to the department's main cost centre, so we need not be overly concerned as we watch our print accounts get further and further into debit on the LU Print portal. This may cause problems for staff who are involved in multiple activities beyond core teaching and unfunded research activity however, such as externally funded research projects, conferences or summer courses, which have their own income streams and also their own budgets, and which sometimes require careful and detailed accounting for all costs. It seems strange that the printers have been rolled out without a clear process for managing departmental print budgets. A further concern for staff may be that every individual print job is now logged including the filename, and this record is preserved in LU Print. Perhaps this information was already collected, but it seems to have become a lot more visible. Big printer is watching us? ***************************************************** MORE GLOBAL NEWS: TRUMP UNIVERSITY TRUMPED? With morbid fascination and growing terror, we observe the ever growing rap sheet of failed business ventures of a certain candidate for the American presidency – one such fascinating calamity was the 'Trump University', an unaccredited 'education company' which has had lawsuits alleging fraud filed against it by its students, been accused of extorting vast sums of money from students for an inferior educational experience, run by a megalomaniac suffering with severe denial. Let's talk about COMSATS. In subtext 143, we reported on the litany of incompetence, disorganisation and questionable ethics which have plagued many of our international partnerships. In particular, we outlined the living nightmare that has been our partnership with COMSATS in Pakistan, with its various education bodies refusing to acknowledge the validity of the Lancaster degree, leading to students taking us to court and imposing a moratorium on fees collection whilst the two sides thrashed out their differences. We can now reveal, following discussions at Council being made publicly available (see Senate Report), that Lancaster intends to 'teach out' the students who remain on the dual degree programme – essentially, wrapping the whole thing up by 2018 and getting the hell out of there. The University has acknowledged that the undermined validity of its dual-degrees may(!) deter our students in Pakistan from wanting to stick it out. To that end, they are being offered the option of paying up early and receiving a Certificate in Higher Education or a Diploma in Higher Education, neither of which are of any use to anyone in Pakistan. Given that the lifting of the fee collection moratorium has led to the thin end of sod-all money being repaid to the university, it seems highly likely that Lancaster is likely to be writing off yet more unpaid debts. This whole sorry affair raises a few important questions: what sort of damage will our reputation sustain in light of the fact that we are viewed as complicit in messing students around, giving them the academic equivalent of a dodgy drivers' licence? What does it do for Lancaster's international reputation when a major Asian power like Pakistan is questioning the value of our degrees? Word gets around. And, most importantly: why? Why do the Pakistani educational authorities want nothing to do with us? Was it something we said? These are the sorts questions that our students in Pakistan, who have wasted their formative years trusting a broken promise, deserve to have answered. ***************************************************** OFF THE PIG! Following our editorial in subtext 142 on 'no platforming' individuals holding unpopular views, we have been contacted by one of our older readers about what used to happen in the University's early days. This was before the NUS had adopted its 'No Platform for Racists' policy and it was left up to individual student groups to decide how they should respond to controversial speakers who had been invited on campus. At Lancaster this usually took the form of raucous engagement as it was felt that it was better to expose their views through argument or ridicule than to ban them outright. This led to some very lively meetings. On one occasion the then Secretary of State for Employment, Barbara Castle, addressed a packed Great Hall on the subject of 'trade union reform' following the publication of her White Paper 'In Place of Strife' in 1969. This was not popular with the Left (who renamed it 'In Place of Trade Unions'), who turned out in force to heckle Mrs Castle. However, she was an old hand at this sort of thing, gave as good as she got, and the audience was treated to the sort of public debate that is so rarely seen in universities these days. On another occasion the Conservative Association invited the young Ken Clarke to give a talk on 'progressive conservatism'. Again, the Left turned up, intrigued to see what a progressive Tory might look like. The event turned out to be a fascinating discussion on class struggle, with Clarke displaying an unexpected knowledge of Marxist thought (his grandfather had, after all, been a member of the British Communist Party). He received far more abuse from the Young Conservatives in the audience, one of whom accused him of 'spitting on the grave of Lord Salisbury'. Perhaps the most controversial speaker in those early days was Major Patrick Wall: Tory MP, Monday Club founder, war hero, apartheid apologist and all-round right-wing nutter. He had been doing the rounds, making outrageous statements and revelling in the publicity caused by the militant opposition which invariably ended up in a fight with the police. Lancaster students decided on a different tactic. They would attend the event and heckle as usual, but at a certain point a pig, painted with a Union Jack, would be released into the Lonsdale Small Lecture Theatre (now the Marcus Merriman) where the meeting was to take place. It was all meant to be very symbolic. A small pig (locally sourced) was obtained, art materials were borrowed from the Street Theatre make-up bag and all was set to go. However, the perpetrators had reckoned without the obduracy of the pig. Putting lipstick on a pig is not as easy as it sounds. The young porker demonstrated its indignation in the way that pigs usually do and, taking advantage of the ensuing disgusted confusion, made good its escape. It was last seen legging it up the Spine towards the wastelands then surrounding The County College. However, all was not lost. The anti-Wall coalition had another trick up its sleeve. They assembled meekly in the lecture theatre, politely applauded the speaker when he was introduced and then, just as he was about to begin, stood up and sang the first verse of 'God save the Queen'. Looking somewhat nonplussed, the good Major stood to attention and some of the invited audience, thinking this was all part of the proceedings, joined in the singing. Then they all sat down and the Major began his speech, only to be interrupted after a few seconds by another rendition of the National Anthem. And so it carried on for the next half-hour, with each rendition being delivered with increasing gusto ('Come on, comrades, sing it like you mean it this time!') and each time the Major having to wait for the singing to end. But alas, there is always a spoilsport, in this case someone who phoned in an anonymous bomb warning, and the meeting came to an end. Strangely, neither Major Wall nor the Monday Club attempted to gain publicity from the events of that night. ***************************************************** DEMOCRACY Anyone who has noticed the reams of bedsheets and bits of cardboard smothering the spine could be mistaken for thinking that our campus has turned into a refugee camp. But fear not – it is merely the annual LUSU Full Time Officer elections. Your correspondent was fortunate to witness the hustings for the various posts taking place in Barker House Farm. Attendance was disappointingly sparse – continuing the downward trajectory in recent years due in large part, we think, to holding them on a Sunday afternoon in a cavernous barn with a rubbish acoustic and a cacophony of food preparation distracting from everything the candidates are saying. O, for the heady days of a weekday evening in the Minor Hall, rushing to County Bar for drinks in between speeches and getting very rowdy. The most interesting moment came when two former officers asked some searching questions of the presidential candidates: what do they think of the TEF? What do they think of our international campuses? Should the President sit on UMAG? It was a significant departure from the usual questions ("How will you support societies?" "How will you make the Sugarhouse better?" "I'm an ephemeral being composed solely of sound, am disabled, and live in a different time stream – how will you engage me?"), and perhaps unsurprisingly, the candidates struggled to answer. Afterwards, they consulted with the people asking the questions, smartened up, and wrote responses on social media. All good. What was startling, however, was the general reaction to this cross-examination on social media. It is 'bitchy', and an attempt to 'trip up' candidates to ask about things that they would have to have 'spent a year in office to know anything about'. Apparently, expecting the lead representative of over 15,000 students to have rudimentary knowledge of HE policy and how the university works is some obscene act of cruelty, done only to show off one's superiority. If people expect so little of their representatives, do they really have the right to complain that LUSU 'does nothing for them'? ***************************************************** BY THE WAY At the time of publication, voting is still open, although we're sure the candidates are pulling out all of the stops to remind you of this. Any students wishing to vote (and we strongly recommend that you do) can do so by sifting through their university inbox for the clearly marked email and following all instructions. Good luck to all candidates! ***************************************************** SENATE REPORT: 2/3/2016 A new location for Senate for its first meeting of 2016: George Fox Lecture Theatre 1. Its size and formal layout is not exactly conducive to discussion and it is hoped that this was just a temporary displacement from the usual venue in the Management School. As usual, we started with Questions to the Vice-Chancellor and a query from Dr Steve Wright (FHM) on how might the University make life easier for retiring staff members by enabling them to maintain email access and a continuing involvement with the University. The fact that this question was allowed at all was a new departure, as previous attempts to raise this matter had been ruled out of order by the University Secretary on the grounds that it was none of Senate's business (see subtext 134). Nicola Owen (Chief Administrative Officer) answered on the VC's behalf, explaining that Council's original decision to abolish 'continuing membership' was because of constitutional difficulties caused by these continuing members retaining rights in matters of University governance. This was new information and certainly had not been spelled out at the time the Council made its decision. She went on to state the having one's University membership discontinued did not automatically mean the end of IT rights. Oh yeah? Again, this was news to most of us. Still, when in doubt, blame ISS. Responding to some more probing from Dr Wright, the VC admitted that this issue had been the cause of 'some unhappiness' among staff and he had received many messages to that effect. Accordingly, he would be looking at how the service of retiring staff could be 'more warmly' recognised and their ongoing relationship with the University facilitated. This was an unexpected and welcome U-turn on this issue and for this Dr Wright deserves to be congratulated and to receive the much-coveted subtext award of 'Senator of the Month'. Next came the forward schedule of Senate business which puts on the agenda for the next meeting in April an intriguing item called 'Beijing Jiaotong Lancaster University College'. subtext will be there to report. On then to the main Agenda and a brief statement from the VC that the Privy Council had approved the statute changes agreed at November's Senate (see subtext 138), apart from those relating to the Students' Union. These had been passed by Senate despite opposition from a handful of Senators who argued that it weakened the position of LUSU in the University's Constitution. In the event, the Privy Council agreed with the dissenters and the Students' Union remains in statute. There followed the VC's oral report in which he surveyed that current, uncertain HE landscape and where Lancaster stood. The 'opening up' of the sector, the Green Paper, the Nurse Review of Research Councils, the Stern Review of the REF among other things all contributed to a degree of instability never seen before. Added to this was the uncertainty surrounding the outcome of the EU Referendum. But there was also good news: the University had received yet another Queen's Award, this time for its linguistics centre, and the staff and students had responded magnificently to the results of Storm Desmond. The first item requiring a Senate decision was a report of the Review of the Role of the Head of Department presented by FHM Dean Professor Neil Johnson. The report recommended a clearer and more structured appointments process, a more generous remuneration package, better admin support, and more time and resources to enable outgoing HoDs to get their research careers back on track. One HoD Senator regretted that the opportunity had been missed to find ways of helping current Heads to do their jobs but in general the recommendations were met with cautious approval. However, what was not commented upon was that the remuneration would be performance-related. This doesn't always turn out well for the individual. Just ask the VC (see subtext 143). This was followed by a paper from HR Director Paul Boustead seeking approval for revised criteria for senior academic promotion. Speaking confidently and fluently (only one 'going forward'), Mr Boustead highlighted one of the key changes which opened up a route to a Chair via 'teaching excellence' and service in addition to the traditional research excellence pathway. He was strongly supported by the VC who stated that this would put Lancaster ahead of most other institutions in this regard. There were some questions relating to how 'teaching excellence' professors were to be designated but in general the recommendations were warmly approved. Next up was a series of proposals from PVC (Research) on 'Enhancing Research' by establishing a system of annual reviews of individual research activities, encouragement of greater interdisciplinary research, and a formal review every six years (with external input) for each discipline. This would put the University in a good position to deal with the next REF in 2020/21 and would, of course, be 'light touch'. Sadly, his detailed and well-argued case did not go down well with the HoDs in Senate who would be expected to carry the weight of this new enhancement process. There was widespread criticism of the proposals and in the end the VC had to come to the rescue. He acknowledged the concerns, stated it was not the intention to add to the burdens of the HoD, that much of the criticism related to the details of the proposals rather the principle behind them, and that the paper would be taken away for further work. Just a whiff of mutiny was all that was required to bring about this change. This was followed by another paper from Professor Decent on establishing a review of Postgraduate Research provision at the University where, still groggy from the previous exchanges, he agreed to a LUSU demand to increase the number of students on the review group from two to four, all of whom to be postgraduate research students. Next came approval of the institutional action plan resulting from the recent QAA Review (duly given) and then Senate was asked to deal with the fallout from the collapse of the dual degree scheme with COMSATS in Lahore (explored in detail in last subtext). The Pakistani authorities had ruled that the Lancaster degree would not be considered valid and the immediate issue was how to deal with students who were part way through their courses and unwilling to continue with a degree which was worthless in their own country. Former Academic Registrar Lesley Wareing (brought out of retirement to help deal with this) proposed that such students be awarded Certificates or Diplomas of Higher Education, depending on how much they had achieved on their programmes. Unfortunately, these too would not be valid in Pakistan but would be legal tender in the rest of the world. In answer to a question Ms Waring assured Senate that the loss of recognition applied only to Lancaster qualifications obtained through the dual programme and all other Lancaster degrees would be recognised. Senate approved the proposal but there was a strong sense that there were many questions yet to be answered about this affair. Then to round off a very busy afternoon there was a report on Research Income Performance Indicators, an update on the NSS results, and the final report of the Transparent Allocation Model Working Group. This latter has all the potential for massive ructions when it is implemented in departments next year. And finally, there was a big thank you from the VC and Senate to early-retiring University Secretary Fiona Aiken. She has worked at the University for nearly 17 years and deserves our thanks for her service. subtext writers over the years have been critical of some of her actions but we have always appreciated her professionalism and dedication, and we wish her well in her retirement. ***************************************************** LET'S TALK MANAGEMENT One dark and rainy night a long time ago, a member of the subtext collective was in a hotel bar after a conference, networking with a group of Human Resources professionals. As the Irish have it, drink had been taken. The talk turned to management-speak. Someone drew a distinction between professional-speak, which is the language that people of the same occupation use in order to communicate swiftly and efficiently, and management-speak, which is designed to make simple things sound complicated and to obscure meaning and intention. Another HR man nodded. 'What you have to understand,' he said, after promising that he'd deny having said what he was about to say if it was repeated, 'is that good managers use language clearly – it's how you can tell a good manager. But managers who aren't confident in themselves will use language to disguise their shortcomings, and they are terrified that they will find themselves working with someone who listens to them for a minute and then says "But that's actually cobblers, isn't it?'" HR man took a pull of his pint. 'So those job ads you see that make no sense, they are the management equivalent of a Masonic handshake – only people who talk like that will apply for the job, so there's no chance of being pulled up on it. People like to employ people like themselves. So it's a closed self-perpetuating circle.' Another pull. 'And the worst of it is that quite sensible people get caught up in it and think that in order to sound like a Proper Manager, that's how you have to talk.' Which brings us all quite neatly to a recent job advertisement placed by the Faculty of Science and Technology for an 'Associate Dean for External Engagement and Internationalisation'. We note that these 7 words all have generally accepted meanings, and their import seems quite clear. But we're not Managers. Let's see what the advertisement says. 'The role combines two important themes (external engagement and internationalization) into a single external-facing function.' One could assume that a Dean for External Engagement and Internationalisation might indeed have something to do with the themes of external engagement and internationalisation (never mind the flitting between the English 's' and American 'z'), but let's allow that some things bear repeating. One might also have assumed that external engagement and internationalisation would both individually and collectively be by definition 'external-facing', insofar as that phrase means anything at all. (Here we may apply the Hoggart test – if the opposite of a statement would be meaningless then the statement is itself meaningless. Would we speak of an 'inward-facing external engagement position'? No.) The next is the best bit. 'The role holder will be a member of the FST senior management team working closely with the other Associate Deans (UG Teaching, PG Studies, Research, and Resources) in a matrix fashion, adding another vertical theme in External Engagement that sits alongside "Research" and cross-cutting "horizontally" across each vertical portfolio in terms of Internationalization.' Um, right then. So, if we've got this right, the 'role holder' will be required to know their job and work well with others. The rest is details. One feels that C Northcote Parkinson may well be rolling in his grave… ***************************************************** FEEDING BACK On 25th February, the VC and chums contributed the following piece to the THES - http://tinyurl.com/zpm77dh In preparation for the TEF, subtext is striving to improve the quality of its feedback, and we are pleased to return the following (well within four weeks, we hasten to add!). ******** Student names: Mark E. Smith, Nicola C. Owen and Andrei E. Ruckenstein (study abroad) Essay title: How can we make UK higher education sustainable? Word Count: 2,700 Course: Times Higher Education (comment piece) Degree programme: Journalism.101 Grade: B- - General comments: addresses the question set, overall consistency and coherence of work, conformity to academic conventions. This was a good attempt at answering the question, just let down by your structure and use of evidence. You also seem to draw two slightly contradictory conclusions, which confuses your argument: can you negate the damaging effects of competition and give staff more control while also encouraging more private sector funding of research? You needed to explain this better! - Identification and understanding of relevant issues, appropriate and pertinent critical analysis, balance of arguments, quality of conclusions. You've certainly identified a key issue in the higher education sector: you're very right to point out that the current funding system is unsustainable. However, you never quite build up to a conclusion that would have really addressed the question. You end with a series of juxtapositions: should universities empower staff more to set budgets, or must the government "provide incentives for greater collaboration and sharing of facilities among research-intensives, and support universities in their efforts to incorporate private sector partners into their fabric". These two might be compatible, but you needed to spend a bit more time explaining how. - Sources and evidence: use of relevant theory/data, accurate referencing, suitable bibliography. Adherence to academic conventions. We sense you've drawn quite heavily on the Chicago School: universities "must seek dialogue with both industry and government in a bid to forge a shared vision of a long-term, sustainable funding model for higher education based on a more diversified and robust portfolio of resources" – you probably should have cited the CBI here. You also talk about the "model academic, whose working life is split in a 40:40:20 ratio between teaching, research and "service": some primary data would have been good here rather than working off assumption! Also, it is not clear what you mean by 'service'? - Written communication: Format and structure, clarity of communication, creativity/originality. Your writing is not always clear. For example: "To implement fundamental and sustainable solutions, they must share in the ownership of the change process and become the main conduit in communicating its rationale, building a consensus within the entire community." What does this mean? Maybe go and speak to the SLDC to get some tips on oh-no-wait… - Suggestions for further improvement: This was a good attempt, but it lacked an original insight. Maybe a bit more research would have given you a better foundation to build, rather than just the usual suspects like the Green Paper, HEFCE. ***************************************************** SHART ATTACK FROM: Mike M. Shart, V-C, Lune Valley Enterprise University (LuVE-U). TO: All staff. CC: Beau Studd, Head of Workforce Contentment Facilitation. SUBJECT: Mental health awareness. Dear all, In light of our decision last year to sign the 'Time to Talk' pledge, I am very excited to announce a new initiative to ensure the mental wellbeing of all staff at LuVE-U. In support of Mental Health Awareness Day, we will be running 'THE BIG WORKING DAY.' All of the research indicates that our mental health and sense of personal fulfilment are at their best when we are productive – it gives us a sense of achievement, and what better way to ensure a healthy work-life balance than combining the two into one? How does it work? The idea of 'THE BIG WORKING DAY' is that we all show up to our offices earlier than usual. This means getting up earlier, as research shows that lethargy and the sense of having 'wasted the day' can lead to a downward spiral of poor mental health. Staff can then work continually throughout the day, and truly feel that they are maximising their potential by pushing themselves harder to achieve their targets and deadlines. Come lunchtime, staff will be encouraged to eat at one of our on-campus cafes, where a motivational seminar on techniques on productivity maximisation will be taking place – this means that staff can truly feel as though they are continually developing their skills and fulfilling their potential even during periods that society deems to be 'downtime.' After that, it'll be back to work for a second crack at getting the day's work out of the way as quickly as possible. But it doesn't stop there! Staff are encouraged, on this day, to work well beyond the working day, which historically has placed restraints on our productivity. By the end of it, you should all hopefully feel so exhausted by such a busy working day that you can truly feel like you've earned a relaxing night's sleep. Beau tells me that the recent staff survey indicated that many members of staff work at this rate already, so it is my fervent wish that every member of our community can get on board with this initiative and see if we can't introduce a competitive element to it! I hope to see you all there, bright and early! Best wishes, Mike. ***************************************************** REMARKABLE PERFORMANCE BY 17-YEAR-OLD VIOLINIST Composed in 1947-48, a time of Stalinist repression when his exile to Siberia was an entirely realistic possibility, the first violin concerto by Shostakovich is a deeply-felt reaction to the suffering and tragedy of the Russian people. The concerto was given an astonishingly mature performance by the 17-year-old violinist Coco Inman with Chetham's Symphony Orchestra in Lancaster University Great Hall on Thursday 18 February. Rising easily above the substantial technical demands of the writing for the soloist, Inman was able to convey the emotional depths of the piece quite remarkably. The heart of the piece is the third-movement passacaglia: literally, walking along the street. This musical form, which originated in the baroque era, uses a repeating bass figure like the sound of footsteps, above which a series of variations are worked by the upper parts. The repeating bass can generate a feeling of suspense and tension, whose reference to the Russian situation is only too clear. The orchestra and soloist collaborated very effectively in what proved to be a heartfelt performance of this fine piece. In the second half of the concert, the orchestra played the two symphonic poems The Fountains of Rome and The Pines of Rome by Respighi. Depicting features of life in and around Rome, these works call for large orchestral forces, a call that Chetham's responded to with great success - there were over 100 musicians on the stage. ***************************************************** LETTERS We haven't got any. ***************************************************** The editorial collective of subtext currently consists (in alphabetical order) of: George Green, James Groves, Lizzie Houghton, Ronnie Rowlands, Joe Thornberry, Johnny Unger, and Martin Widden. |