Top Employers for Working Families Special Awards

This year LSE has been shortlisted for two awards: the Citymothers best for all stages of motherhood award, and the Cityfathers best for all stages of fatherhood award.

Less than two weeks until Houghton Street closes

In the first week of the closure, student stewards and helpers will be on hand in key locations across campus to help with orientation.

Julia Ziemer

Julia, POLIS, would throw a 'Heroes and Villains’ fancy dress party for the School: "I think it could make for some good ice-breakers".

 Research

 LSE in pictures

 Events

 Training and jobs

LSE is one of the biggest spenders on student outreach and bursaries, as a proportion of its undergraduate fee income, according to figures released today. The report for university access monitoring body ‘The Office for Fair Access (OFFA)’ shows the outcomes of all English universities’ 2013-14 access agreements, including the proportion of fee income spent on bursaries and the proportion of UK students who receive a grant.

The report shows that LSE spent nearly 50 per cent of its additional income from undergraduate fees on outreach work and bursaries for low-income UK undergraduates in 2013-14, a total of £2.73 million. This is one of the highest proportional spends for any English university. Over a third of all new UK students starting at LSE in 2013 were shown to have received a full or a partial bursary from the School.

As OFFA does not monitor university spending on postgraduate, European or international students, LSE’s total investment on all access initiatives is, in fact, significantly higher than outlined in the report. In 2013-14 the School spent £3.3million on outreach, bursaries and scholarships for all its undergraduate students and £13.1 million for postgraduate students.

Simeon Underwood, Academic Registrar and Director of Academic Services, said: "The School wants to recruit the best students regardless of their economic or social background, and to ensure they are able to thrive while studying here. This is why we invest in a range of outreach schemes, all of which seek to raise the aspirations and attainment of non-traditional students, and why we offer a generous package of bursaries".

LSE has been shortlisted for the annual Top Employers for Working Families Special Awards.

Awarded by Working Families, the UK’s leading work-life organisation, the awards celebrate and showcase the policies and practices of employers who offer exceptional flexible and family-friendly workplaces. This year, LSE has been shortlisted for two awards: the Citymothers best for all stages of motherhood award, and the Cityfathers best for all stages of fatherhood award.

This is not the first time LSE has been recognised for its family-friendly policies. In 2014, the School was awarded certification in the Top 10 Employers for Working Families for the second time.

Sarah Jackson, Chief Executive of Working Families said: "This is an exciting landmark year for the Top Employers for Working Families awards. The work-life and flexible working landscape is truly changing. In the last 12 months we’ve welcomed the extension of the Right to Request flexible working to all employees and the introduction of Shared Parental Leave for new parents. Employers who go the extra mile to offer support to parents, carers and flexible workers will attract the best staff and will reap the benefits of a loyal, engaged and productive workforce. The judging panel was impressed by the inspiring and innovative policies and practices in this year’s entrants and congratulate all finalists on gaining a hard-won place on the shortlist."

Class Teacher Awards are nominated by academic departments in recognition of the special contribution made by graduate teaching assistants, teaching fellows and guest teachers to their work. This year’s winners across all departments are listed below.

The School’s Teaching Special sent to all students and staff this week inadvertently included the names of last year’s winners rather than this year’s, so we apologise for this error. To view the full newsletter online, click here.

• Accounting: Rodney Brown, Nadine De-Gannes
• Anthropology: Clara Miranda Sheild-Johansson, Anna Tuckett, Martyn Wemyss
• Economic History: Flora Macher, Brian Varian
• Economics: Clare Balboni, Svetlana Chekmasova, Alexia Delfino, Thomas Drechsel, Jason Garred, Reka Juhasz, William Matcham, Stephan Maurer, Ana McDowall, Clement Minaudier, Niclas Moneke, Frank Pisch, Federico Rossi, Francesco Sannino, Luke Taylor
• Finance: James Clark, Alex Clymo, Alex Koriath, Paula Lopes, Luana Zaccaria
• Gender Institute: Jacob Breslow, Emma Spruce
• Geography and Environment: Alice Evans, Ashley Gorst, Ganga Shreedhar
• Government: Erifylli Bertsou, Moritz Schmoll, Maria Werdine-Norris, Gregor Wolkenstein
• International Development: Hazel Gray, Anna Macdonald, Silvia Masiero
• International History: Sarah Ashraf, Sajjansing Gohel, Cornelius Heere, Andrea Mason, Stuart Minson, Lauren Young
• Language Centre: Natasha Bershadski, Roser Martinez-Sanchez
• Law: Cressida Auckland, Anthony Jones, Manuel Penades-Fons, Simon Witney
• LSE100: Mark Hill, Natasha Marhia, Chris Parkes, Daniel Strieff
• Mathematics: Elisabeth Grieger, Matthew Jenssen, Philip Johnson, Tony Whelan, Georgios Zouros
• Management: Ahmad Abu-Khazneh, Rebecca Campbell, Enrico Rossi
• Media and Communications: Sally Broughton-Micova
• Methodology: Kevin Corti, Jack Cunliffe
• Philosophy, Logic and Scientific Method: Simon Beard, Alexandru Marcoci, James Nguyen, Nicolas Wuethrich
• Social Policy: Diana Quirmbach, Bert Provan, Liz Bailey
• Social Psychology: Satkeen Azizzadeh, Apurv Chauhan, Imara Rolston
• Sociology: Manmit Bhambra, Richard Seymour, Paul Thornbury
• Statistics: Anastasia Kakou, Milt Mavrakakis, Jose Pina-Sanchez
   

The new South Asia Centre (SAC) at LSE started work on Monday 1 June, and will be located within the Institute of Global Affairs.

It marks a step-change in the School's engagement with the region, with which it has had a relationship nearly since the start of LSE itself. The SAC will provide focus for LSE expertise on South Asia and will highlight academic research and public engagements of more than 70 academics, post docs and graduate students whose interests relate to the region, bring LSE expertise to engage with South Asia issues, and be focal point for the students who come from South Asia to study at LSE.

LSE’s Lord Richard Layard and Lord Nicholas Stern are part of a group of leading thinkers proposing an internationally coordinated research programme to make clean electricity less costly than electricity from coal within 10 years.

In their report, A Global Apollo Programme to Tackle Climate Change, the contributors, who bring together experience from business, academia and government, argue that anything less would make it impossible to contain the world’s temperature rise within the crucial 2˚C limit that has been internationally agreed.

The report says: "In the Cold War the Apollo Programme placed a man on the moon. This programme engaged many of the best minds in America. Today we need a global Apollo programme to tackle climate change; but this time the effort needs to be international. We need a major international scientific and technological effort, funded by both public and private money."

LSE Faith and Leadership students meet HRH the Prince of Wales

LSE students who completed the pilot of the Faith and Leadership Programme were presented with their certificates by His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales at a ceremony at Clarence House on Thursday 28 May.

The programme offers an extra-curricular certificate to students of any or no faith background, which combines religious literacy with leadership development.

The students were accompanied by LSE Director Craig Calhoun and the Chaplain, the Revd Dr James Walters, who created the programme. The Bishop of London, who was also present, described the programme as “a model of university engagement with religion in the 21st Century.”

A film about LSE Faith and Leadership can be viewed here.
 

New Gearty Grilling online

A new Gearty Grilling video, part of the series of short video debates between Conor Gearty, director of the IPA and professor of human rights law, and leading researchers at LSE, is now online.

This week John Hills (pictured), Professor of Social Policy, discusses the need to reduce inequality in Britain. More
 

Celebrating 120 years of LSE

Did you know? JFK enrolled on LSE’s General Course in 1935. But why did LSE have to pay back his fees?

Read more in our LSE history trivia series. Submit your own LSE trivia to h.reed@lse.ac.uk.

2015 is LSE’s 120th anniversary. Join in the celebrations at lse.ac.uk/lse120 #LSE120
 

From Monday 15 June, the pedestrian route through Houghton Street and Clare Market will be closed as demolition contractor Cantillon takes possession of the Centre Buildings Redevelopment (CBR) site, by erecting hoardings and setting up site accommodation in The Anchorage.

In the first week of the closure, student stewards and helpers will be on hand in key locations across campus to help with orientation.

Please return your empty crates

Estates urgently need any empty crates that you may have in your office.

To arrange collection of your crates please email Richard Allen, Facilities Manager, at r.allen1@lse.ac.uk.
 

LSE is taking part in a pilot programme run by start-up company Kudos, which provides a free, web-based toolkit to help researchers maximise the reach and impact of their published work.

Kudos is unique in that it brings together multiple metrics - downloads, altmetrics and citations - and maps these against the actions that researchers take to promote their publications to feed back on their effectiveness. In early phases of the pilot, publications shared through Kudos received an average 19 per cent more downloads than those in a control group.

Since it is free, easy to use and apparently effective in increasing engagement with published research, we encourage as many LSE researchers as possible to register with Kudos and have a go at using the toolkit. You can get started by signing up at growkudos.com/go/lse and following the step-by-step instructions provided.

More information is available on the Kudos website, or you can watch this short introductory video.

Room Booking and Timetabling Systems (RATS) Project

The RATS project to replace the IT system which manages teaching timetables and room bookings is progressing well and the School is on track to migrate to the new system at the start of the 2015-16 academic year.

Timetabling System
This is the system used by Timetables and the team are currently in the process of building the timetables for the 2015-16 academic year. Work is underway on the implementation of the new system, with the final system being ready for testing in July/August.

Room Booking System
This is the system used by Conferences and Events and they are currently inputting all room bookings for 2015-16. Staff and members of the Students' Union are working with the project team to help design and test the system to make sure that it meets our your needs. We are also discussing potential future uses such as being able to record office hours for teachers, entering detailed information about a meeting, etc. The new system goes live in September 2015, replacing the current booking system on LSE for You.

Students' Union shop relocation

Due to the redevelopment of the East Building, the Students’ Union shop is closing on Saturday 6 June and moving location.

The shop will re-open at its new location, 2-4 Portsmouth Street, on Monday 15 June.

Need a nursery?

Do you have young children (three months to five years) and need a nursery near the School?

If so, please take the very short survey at surveymonkey.com/s/Y9JBLN2. We are particularly keen to hear from staff and students who could use the LSE Nursery but don’t.
 

Computer Tip of the Week - Directing email replies to a colleague

Sending out notices of a colleague’s latest publication, but want replies to go directly to her? Organising a conference and want RSVPs to go to the colleague managing attendance? Here’s how to get Microsoft Outlook to automatically direct email replies to someone else:

1. In Outlook, create a new email message.
2. On the Options tab, select Direct Replies To. The Properties dialog box opens with the Have replies sent to box ticked. Your name or email address is shown in the box beside it.
3. Delete your name from the box.
4. Click Select Names. The Have Replies Sent To dialog box opens.
5. Use the drop down arrow in the Address Book box to select the address list required.
6. Search to find the person replies should be sent to, and double-click their name. Their name appears in the Reply To box at the bottom.
7. When all the addresses required have been added, click OK and Close.
8. Send the message. When a recipient clicks the Reply button, their message will be directed to the name(s) you specified.

Two, one....Less than two weeks until Houghton Street closes.

For more images like this, visit the Photography Unit.

Three-quarters of the world’s annual emissions of greenhouse gases are now limited by national targets, according to a new study published by the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at LSE.

The 2015 Global Climate Legislation Study, covering 98 countries plus the European Union which are together responsible for 93 per cent of global emissions, will be presented to delegates on Tuesday 2 June in Bonn, Germany, where the latest round of United Nations climate change negotiations is taking place. The study has been sponsored by GLOBE, the Global Legislators Organisation, and the Inter-Parliamentary Union, the world organisation of parliaments which was established in 1889. Its results will be distributed to policy-makers around the world.

Two new impact case studies have been added to the impact website:

Reviving British town centres and high streets
UK Business Improvement Districts, introduced as a direct result of LSE research led by Professor Tony Travers (pictured), have been instrumental in reviving town centres and high streets.

Making new drugs safer and faster to develop
Associate Professor of Statistics Wicher Bergsma (pictured) helped pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline to develop a better way to analyse vaccine trials.

For questions about the impact website, including the possibility of adding a case study about your own research impact, please contact Ellen at e.l.pruyne@lse.ac.uk.

Forthcoming LSE events include....

No Ordinary Disruption: the four global forces breaking all the trends
On: Monday 8 June at 6.30pm in the Sheikh Zayed Theatre, New Academic Building
Speakers: Richard Dobbs, Stephanie Flanders (pictured), and Jonathan Woetzel

Is the American Century Over?
On: Tuesday 9 June at 4pm in the Old Theatre, Old Building
Speaker: Professor Joseph S Nye

Misbehaving: the making of behavioural economics
On: Tuesday 9 June at 6.30pm in the Old Theatre, Old Building
Speaker: Professor Richard Thaler (pictured)
LIVE WEBCAST

Rhetoric and Reality: from Magna Carta to human rights today
On: Wednesday 10 June at 6.30pm in the Sheikh Zayed Theatre, New Academic Building
Speakers: Shami Chakrabarti and Professor Francesca Klug

Why People (Don't) Buy: the GO and STOP signals
On: Thursday 11 June at 6.30pm in the Sheikh Zayed Theatre, New Academic Building
Speaker: Professor Amitav Chakravarti
 

On: Monday 8-Wednesday 10 June from 11am-6pm at William Goodenough House, Mecklenburgh Square, London, WC1N 2AJ

Public Walkabout and Q&A with photographer Yusuf Agherdien
On: Thursday 11 June from 11am-12.30pm (booking is essential via Eventbrite)
On: Thursday 11 June from 3-4.30pm (booking here is essential on Eventbrite)

Double Vision is a photographic reflection on the resilience of memory in the face of swift and brutal changes to urban and social landscapes, as well as a deeply personal autobiographical narrative linked to urban space in a South African post-apartheid city. More
 

On: Wednesday 10 - Friday 12 June at the University of Glasgow, Scotland

This conference, co-chaired by LSE teacher Dr Meena Kotecha (pictured), is the first international conference of the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications (IMA) about approaches to teaching and learning mathematics.

The event will examine learning and teaching throughout the life span, from the most basic to the most advanced topics and for the full range of learners, including people with dyscalculia and other maths learning difficulties, gifted learners and mathematicians. This should lead to cross-fertilisation between different areas of learning and teaching.

The conference is also highly interdisciplinary and should be of interest amongst others to psychologists, teachers, pedagogical and educational experts, engineers, scientists and social scientists.

To register for this event and for more information, click here.
 

Podcasts of public lectures and events

In Conversation with Secretary Lew
Speaker: Jacob J. Lew
Recorded: Wednesday 27 May, approx. 55 minutes

When to Rob a Bank: a rogue economist's guide to the world
Speaker: Stephen J Dubner
Recorded: Wednesday 27 May, approx. 58 minutes

The Case for Europe: the Italian vision
Speaker: Sergio Mattarella
Recorded: Thursday 28 May, approx. 41 minutes

Can you get more out of your research?

Learn the skills which will help you communicate your research innovatively and effectively with LSE Shout!

LSE Shout! is back for a second year. Set in the beautiful surroundings of Cumberland Lodge, LSE Shout! offers a free series of interdisciplinary workshops designed to provide researchers with the skills that will enable them to engage people more effectively with their research through innovative communication channels.

Targeted at PhD students and early career researchers, the workshops are taught by a variety of industry practitioners from the fields of public speaking, filmmaking, and graphic design.

This year's LSE Shout! will take place from Friday 19 to Sunday 21 June. Applications are now open - you can apply via the applications page.

Please email shout@lse.ac.uk with any queries and find out more information on the website.
 

For all staff:

• Balancing Work and Being Mum
• Balancing Work and Being Dad
• Managing Under Pressure
• Fair Treatment and Respect for Staff
• Dealing with Difficult Situations

For managers:

• Fair Treatment and Respect for Managers

Producing a fours-star impact case study for REF
Tuesday 16 June from 12.30-2pm
In this workshop participants will learn about the nuts and bolts of producing an impact case study for the REF. It's intended for anyone interested in learning more about how to write or support the production of an impact case study.

RIIF Funds and PFR's
Wednesday 17 June from 1-2pm
This workshop will update staff on the LSE’s Research Incentives Policy which includes both the Personal Financial Rewards (PFR) and Research Infrastructure and Investment Funding (RIIF) schemes.

This policy provides financial rewards for staff who win research funding - to enhance their salaries, to buy out their time from teaching and/or to provide unencumbered research funding - and research funding for the departments and research centres which host them.

Panel Discussion: managing collaborative research projects
Tuesday 23 June from 12.30-2.30pm
Do you want to find out more about collaborative projects? This workshop will explore both the promise and pitfalls of collaborative research projects.
Jon Deer of the Research Division will present on collaborative agreements and other forms of contractual arrangements. Followed by a panel discussion of three LSE academics who have managed collaborative research projects. Speakers tentatively scheduled include:

• Professor George Gaskell (Pro-Director for Resources and Planning)
• Dr Panos Kanavos (Associate Professor, Department of Social Policy)
• Dr Ernestina Coast (Associate Professor, Department of Social Policy)

Fundamentals of Grant Writing: how to turn your research idea into an application
Thursday 9 July from 9.30am-4.30pm
Are you looking for funding for your research? Would you like to know what makes a successful grant application? In this full day programme participants will get individual and group feedback on an idea or draft. Bidding for research funds is becoming increasingly competitive and professional; this workshop will help you understand how to start developing a research idea into a funding application, engage with collaborators and identify potential funders.

You are invited to provide a draft or previously unsuccessful bid for discussion in confidence. This will be returned to you at the end of the workshop with colleagues’ suggestions. This workshop is aimed at academics and researchers and delivered by workshop tutor Professor John Wakeford, who runs the Missenden Masterclasses from Missenden Centre. Places are limited to 15 participants.

Below are some of the vacancies currently being advertised:

• Research Officer (Community Programme), Centre for Economic Performance
• Academic Developer, Teaching and Learning Centre
• Analyst Programmer, Information Management and Technology
• Centre Manager, Centre for the Study of Human Rights
• Coordinating Language Teacher (Mandarin Chinese), Language Centre
• Deputy Director (internal only), Centre for Women, Peace and Security
• Faith Centre Coordinator, Teaching and Learning Centre
• Financial Planning and Analysis Manager, Finance Division
• Hub Coordinator, International Growth Centre
• Policy Communications Manager, International Growth Centre
• Income Projects Administrator, Finance Division
• Fellow in International Political Economy (two posts), International Relations
• Fellow in Local Economic Development, Geography and Environment
• Fellow in Media and Communications, Media and Communications
• Fellow, Gender Institute
• Fellows in Accounting, Accounting
• Course Manager, LSE100
• Marketing and Recruitment Executive (internal only), Summer School and Executive Programmes
• Programme Coordinator, Management
• Programme Coordinator (MSc Management and Exchanges), Management
• Research Officer, Media and Communications