The week in higher education – 26 May 2022

For New York University’s graduating class of 2022, Taylor Swift had a simple message for dealing with life’s troubles: “shake it off”. Addressing a supersized university crowd at the Yankee Stadium, the pop megastar said that “part of growing up and moving into new chapters of your life is about catch and release”, the Daily Mail reported. “You can’t carry all things, all grudges, all updates on your ex, all enviable promotions your school bully got at the hedge fund his uncle started,” Swift said as she accepted an honorary degree in fine arts. She also urged graduates to “learn to live alongside cringe”. The 32-year-old related how she’d been shunned by friends at school, told she was too young to write hit records, and found fame difficult, particularly when “the world [treated] my love life like a spectator sport in which I lose every single game”. For NYU president Andrew Hamilton it must have seemed a world away from the staider Sheldonian Theatre where he once handed over scrolls in Oxford.

Donald Trump was the star turn at a conservative political rally held in Budapest but the appearance of Lord Wharton of Yarm, chair of England’s Office for Students, was maybe more surprising. The Tory peer told the Hungarian audience about the importance of right-wing values at the Conservative Political Action Conference, warning that the “left is as aggressive as it ever was” when it came to political campaigning. Other prominent speakers on the bill included Fox News host Tucker Carlson and Jack Posobiec, a far-right blogger famous for promoting the Pizzagate conspiracy theory, The Guardian reported, as well as a Hungarian politician known for his use of antisemitic language. Whether this is the kind of “viewpoint diversity” that the OfS will be tasked with encouraging if free speech legislation is passed remains unclear.

More than 30 years since she left office, there is still probably not a more divisive figure in British politics than Margaret Thatcher. According to The Guardian, it took a matter of hours after a statue of the ex-prime minister was unveiled in her hometown of Grantham for an egg to be thrown, with the alleged launcher identified from online clips as Jeremy Webster, deputy director of the University of Leicester’s Attenborough Arts Centre. However, could he face more trouble from his 87-year-old mother-in-law, who was quoted in the Daily Mail saying the egg throwing was “very childish”, than the university? Kerry Law, Leicester’s chief marketing and engagement officer, said that the institution did “not condone any form of defacement” and would be addressing the matter. But she also stressed that it had a “longstanding history of supporting art, fostering creativity and protecting creative freedom”.

Of all the political dynasties in the world, one of the least savoury is possibly the Marcos clan in the Philippines. For this reason, the University of Oxford may be keen to set the record straight about the academic record of Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr, the son of the late dictator who has swept to power in the country after a landslide election victory. According to The Guardian, he is facing calls from opponents to stop claiming that he completed undergraduate studies at Oxford in the 1970s, when a freedom of information request has shown that he left with a special diploma instead of finishing a bachelor’s in philosophy, politics and economics. It follows letters unearthed last year that suggested officials for Marcos Sr had been in contact with senior figures at his son’s college in the 1970s over ways for him to preserve his academic credentials despite failing exams. Marcos Jr’s spokesperson has stood by “the degree confirmation” he was issued by Oxford.

Of all the ways to get into the spirit of a “green week” at a university, serving roast sirloin of beef to senior academics during a formal dinner is probably not the most fitting. But that appears to be what happened at Emmanuel College, Cambridge earlier this month when fellows were served the beef at what was supposed to be a “vegan” dinner, according to student newspaper Varsity. In what was a commendably restrained reaction, one student said: “People thought it was weird and quite ironic that while we were eating vegan food, the fellows were being served steak. It seemed slightly in poor taste.” The University of Cambridge’s green week involves a series of student-organised activities including formal dinners where vegan and locally sourced sustainable food is used. However, Varsity reported that college rules generally mean fellows can have a different menu during such events.