Death before dishonour

Only quick thinking by one of our campus security patrols has halted a mass suicide bid by 22 Poppleton academics.

According to well-informed reports, the academics were seen climbing the laddered side of the university cooling tower early last Thursday with the apparent objective of hurling themselves to the ground from its topmost platform.

However, before they had reached the first stage, they were intercepted by security patrolman Jake Henshaw, who succeeded in returning all 22 dons to the ground.

Henshaw told The Poppletonian that he¡¯d questioned several of the group about their motives for such a drastic action. As far as he could tell, it was all about someone called Fred Inglis, who¡¯d written an article in last week¡¯s Times Higher Education about the manner in which the moral and intellectual values of the university were being forgotten and forsaken in the new market-driven world of higher education. After they¡¯d read that, they had decided that the only way forward for them was the cooling tower.

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Our Director of Corporate Affairs, Jamie Targett, confirmed that ¡°the cooling tower 22¡± would be subject to ¡°disciplinary proceedings¡±. Action would also be initiated against the person named ¡°Inglis¡±, although Targett pointed out that he might be difficult to trace within the academy as his reported references to ¡°moral and intellectual values¡± suggested that he must be ¡°on the elderly side of things¡±.

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REF rejects: are you among them?

With the REF submission deadline looming, we are pleased to bring you a new weekly column in which our Deputy Head of REF strategy, Brian Bryan, evaluates some recent submissions.

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• Submittee: Professor Gordon Lapping (Department of Media and Cultural Studies).
• Submission: After-dinner talk given to Poppleton Rotary Club: ¡°My Big Welsh Holiday Adventure¡±, March 2013.
• REF evaluation: Rejected. Lacked international perspective.
• Submittee: Professor Loab (Head of Department of Neuroscience).
• Submission: ¡°Love of Oral Sex May be Hard-Wired¡±, Poppleton Evening News, 18 January 2013.
• REF evaluation: No evidence of peer review.
• Submittee: Ted Odgers (Department of Media and Cultural Studies).
• Submission: ¡°Smash the Bosses Now¡±, public tannoy address to 14 people hanging around outside Gregg¡¯s pie and sandwich shop, Lower Poppleton, last Thursday.
• REF evaluation: Insufficient impact.
• Submittee: Georgina Smite (Artist in Residence).
• Submission: Unmade Tutorial Room, an installation featuring academic detritus: used lecture notes, coffee-stained register, empty vodka bottle, two Prozac tablets, unsigned letter of resignation and a bare bodkin.
• REF evaluation: Rejected. Indistinguishable from reality.

Next week. The role of confabulation in impact maximisation: new perspectives.

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Thought for the week

(contributed by Jennifer Doubleday, Head of Personal Development)

Please note that the university doctor will be in attendance next week to deal exclusively with all those female members of staff who have suffered serious bruising after repeatedly colliding with glass ceilings.

lolsoc@dircon.co.uk