European research policies and national research systems encourage researchers, especially PhD and post PhD, to relocate and change institutions. However, discussing new research, Marco Seeber identifies a broken pipeline between those moving instituti…
Category: academic mobility
Putting the brakes on professional nomadism? Prospects for long-distance commuting in a post-pandemic world.
Until now, academics have accepted that professional nomadism is part of the job. However, as the global pandemic puts a brake on unnecessary travel, Dr Emily Yarrow and Dr Julie Davies explore the challenges and opportunities that new working patterns mean for commutes, campuses and careers. For many academics, the journey to work is a long one. … Continued
Visa applications: emotional tax and privileged passports
Researcher-artist Bathsheba Okwenje contrasts the visa requirements for a Ugandan national visiting the UK with a UK national visiting Uganda. While highlighting how some passports carry certain privileges, more hidden is the emotional tax non-privileged passport-holders pay by wanting to explore the world, by needing to prove they are worthy of travel in a country that is not their own. […]
Do the best academics fly more?
Academic flying is often justified on the basis that international conferences and travel are important to the production of new knowledge. As such, travel brings researchers into contact with new ideas, allows them to share and refine their own ideas and therefore improves the quality of their research. However, in this post Seth Wynes argues that beyond a certain level […]
Charting the rise and fall of North American leadership in global science: Insights from the population of Nobel Laureates.
For the majority of the last century North America has been at the epicentre of global scientific research. However, through the course of the 21st century other countries have begun to close this gap in a number of ways, notably China is now the global leader in published research and is on course to overtake the US in research spending by […]
Running a ‘nearly carbon neutral conference’ – Lessons from the Feral Conference
Previous posts on the Impact Blog have argued that academic conferences are bad for the environment and can present a barrier to increased diversity and inclusion within the research community. Digital communication media are often recommended as a potential solution to these issues. In this post, Nicholas Holm, Sy Taffel, Trisia Farrelly and Lisa Vonk describe how they organised the […]
Reimbursement Culture and Widening Participation in Academia
The cost of academic travel is often covered with upfront payments by researchers that are subsequently reimbursed by their institutions. In this post Sarah Thomson argues, that in order to develop a culture of widening participation in higher education, it is time to rethink this practice and the tacit assumption, especially with regard to PhD researchers, that they have access to the funds […]
Don’t let your academic career determine your every move – Should early career researchers be expected to relocate regularly in order to land a permanent job?
To secure a permanent academic position, it has become an increasingly common requirement for early career researchers to work in a number of institutions, often across a number of countries. In this post, Eva Krockow weighs the benefits of an international career against the costs of constant mobility and suggests that fostering more stable working environments will ultimately prove beneficial […]
Academic travel culture is not only bad for the planet, it is also bad for the diversity and equity of research.
Responding to Jürgen Gerhards’ post on the ecological damage being done by excessive academic travel, Race MoChridhe observes how the financial and social burdens of academic travel add an additional barrier to participation in research and argues that if academia wants to address issues of diversity and equity in research, it must first acknowledge the effects of academic travel culture. […]
Internal vs. external promotion, part two: seven advantages of internal promotion, plus some general tips for both
In the second and final part of a series considering the relative merits of pursuing internal or external promotions, Anne-Wil Harzing sets out why seeking advancement internally might be a more attractive option, again highlighting seven specific reasons. The series concludes with some more general tips for promotion applications, including how to harness your experience submitting to academic journals. The […]