It’s been a funny old month. With only a few weeks left at Teesside before I leave and start my exciting new job at Maynooth University, it quickly became time to start thinking about how I was going to shift my research over to Ireland. The thing about being in one place for so long, …
I like to think that I know something about innovating. After all, I used to work for Woolworths, a company which, when faced with the rapidly changing high street sector, quickly pivoted – oh no, hold on. Hmmm. Okay, so. After all, I used to work for Blockbusters, a company which, when faced with a …
Back in the day when I was a fresh-faced PhD student at Sheffield, I had written a paper on research ethics in forensic anthropology. It was an off-shoot of my PhD work, and I felt it was an important piece to write. It was my first paper. I nervously submitted it to Medicine, Science and …
Read more “President Elect of the Chartered Society of Forensic Sciences”
There’s a well-used trope in sitcoms, in which the protagonist manages to arrange an evening where they go on two dates at the same time! Hilarity and humiliation always ensue. Well, that was basically me last Friday. I had been asked by two sets of conference organisers if I’d give a Keynote talk. It’s always …
Last week I was over at our National Horizons Centre meeting with Dr Jen Vanderhoven and Prof Vikki Rand, our Director and our Bioscience Research Centre lead. We were talking around various topics, including what to focus our efforts on over the next year. I keep saying that the School of Health & Life Sciences …
Look. I don’t want to do this. You don’t want me to do this. But we have no choice. It’s the New Year, and as such I am compelled to write some sort of ‘year in review’ type reflective piece. Especially since the year in question is 2020 and has been so, well, you know… …
Now I’ve done a fair bit of media work in the past (Shock! Academic known for being a bit of a show-off has history of being a bit of a show-off…) but nothing to the intensity of this past week. Our paper reinterpreting the context of death for victims of Vesuvius at Herculaneum has finally …
Read more “BREAKING NEWS: Only I could make a 2000 year old volcanic eruption all about me…”
Well, it’s official. Tim Thompson has left the building. And entered another one. 100 metres away. On the same campus. This seemed more dramatic when I started… As some of you may know, the School of Science, Engineering and Design is no more. We’ve had a bit of a restructure here at Teesside, and the …
So, I almost knocked over both Emily Thornberry and Floella Benjamin in one day… Forensic science is in a challenging place at the moment. The well-publicised closure of the national Forensic Science Service and the rapid marketisation of forensic provision has left the sector a little winded. Combined with the complexity of contracting out forensic …
Read more “House of Lords Science & Technology Committee – Inquiry into Forensic Science”
The biggest event this week is not the start of Season 7 of Game of Thrones, it’s not the discussion of the new Avengers Infinity War teaser, it’s not even the announcement of a female Doctor Who (which, by the way, has generated a staggering amount of whining). No, the biggest, most hotly anticipated event …