Capital (ism) in action

Walking back to Kings Cross after the HEFCE/AoC Additional Numbers workshop yesterday, I passed the latest tented village to spring up on the streets of our capital: the one apparently welcomed by Giles Fraser, the Canon Chancellor of St Paul’s Cathedral when the Occupy London Stock Exchange protesters gathered at the start of the week.

Now though, with the Evening Standard claiming that this national icon could be closed due to health and safety issues, he's not quite so keen. The position has rapidly moved on from his only telling the police to go away (Monday) to complaining that tourists are no longer visiting his Baroque masterpiece (Thursday) and therefore aren't contributing to its upkeep. Or to put it in free market terms: no visitors equals nothing spent in the gift shop, no food bought in the restaurant, and no donations from those with change to spare.

The free paper also includes an interview with Naomi Colvin, spokesperson for the protesters, who says that money might be raised to compensate the church for its losses, but she's obviously not bothered to think through how much needs to be put into the collecting tin to balance the lost income of one of the ten most popular tourist attractions in the country.

This is capitalism in action: it's not slogans, protests and collective sleepovers, it's a businessman (for that's effectively what Canon Fraser is) unable to predict the effect of 200 demonstrators outside his door on passing trade, customer access and turnover, and a well-meaning motley crew closing him down because of his naivety.

Leads me to wonder, that since neither of the parties involved seem to understand what they've got themselves into, maybe they ought to start charging the likes of me to take photographs of the tents and possibly sell some refreshments while they're doing it?
Then, they could simply give the money raised to the church and everybody would be happy; except possibly protesters protesting about protester's profiteering...

Roses, grants and Guildford signs ahead

Having just spent 5 hours driving down to Surrey in readiness for tomorrow's Funding Applications workshop, I'm now sat in a country hotel's beautiful rose garden looking up at the dozens of vapour trails criss-crossing what would otherwise be a completely clear blue sky while reading the travel information pages of the BBC website.
Apparently, Eyjafjallajökull, Iceland’s second-least pronounceable volcano (where to even start with Þeistareykjarbunga?) is still moderately active, and later today, due to an expected change in wind direction, it's ash plume will drift over Irish airspace and close Dublin, Cork, Waterford, and Shannon airports.
Although it's understandable that jet planes will be again be affected since they travel at the same height as the ash cloud (around 30,000 feet with lower altitudes not feasible on many levels : fuel usage, thicker air = overheating etc) and would suck volcanic dust through turbines which could theoretically heat it to glass-forming temperatures, what I can't find an explanation for is why are propellor planes also grounded when they fly much lower, or helicopters which fly lower still?

Show me the Money!

17 March 2009
As one of three "Dragons" at a workshop for FE colleges about bidding for project funding in Wellington (ish), Somerset (the others were from the local RSC and the HELP CETL), I gave a 30 minute talk outlining my own experiences of scrutinising funding applications both for JISC and the HEA, and the opportunities available for third party funding.
The delegates then formed groups to critique anonymised bids the local RSC had acquired from JISC under the Freedom of Information Act and report their findings while the presenters and local RSC staff operated as roving "experts".
After an excellent lunch (where I overate on cheesecake to allow for the 6 hours plus journey home - don't tell the wife: she thinks I'm slimming), and giving out some funding application guides, the 6 delegate groups generated bids which were theoretical but nonetheless pertinent to their current institutional agendas e.g. e-Assessment, Repositories etc and presented them to the three of us plus the local JISC HE Support Coordinator in a “Dragons Den” style format for constructive criticism and advice.
Feedback on the day, particularly with regards to the format, was all very positive, so I'm now going to formalise the delivery model and offer it with a variety of presenters to colleges on demand (well on request anyway...).

Bid Writing - to bid or not to bid?

Presented (& facilitated two workshops with the local HE Advisor) at a JISC RSC event in York on bid writing regarding a current JISC e-learning funding call to 20+ colleges (and two HEIs) in the Yorkshire & Humber region. Outlined my experiences as both marker & panel member, what the process is, what we (the markers) look for, how final decisions are reached etc..