Postgraduate and early career

Attempt to balance interests of employers and researchers pleases no one, and weekend Twitter storm forces the plan ‘back to the assembly hall’

Postgraduate training likely to be concentrated in larger universities as EPSRC and Wellcome make cuts

Telling precariously employed literature scholars to just hang in there doesn’t cut it in a job market as bad as today’s, says Chris Townsend

Belated moves to mitigate precarity are welcome but may come too late for one scholar exhausted by insecurity

Lengthy government security checks on STEM postgraduates are causing chaos for university research as doctoral candidates go elsewhere, says Russell Group

Students often have no choice but to include professors who have had no input into papers as co-authors, says Roohola Ramezani

European universities outline blueprint to improve doctoral training but acknowledge some professors can’t or won’t change their ways

As NIH pushes for improvement on racial and gender measures, drag attributed to growing segment of non-diverse principal investigators

University admits it could have been more flexible when making decision that affected postgraduate’s right to stay in the UK

Maria Toft sparked national conversation about exploitation with #pleasedontstealmywork campaign, but she says it came at the cost of her Copenhagen fellowship

Leading institutions switching from exams to interviews for admission, but students from many universities are excluded from this route

Graduate student workers energised after record walkout, though meaningful improvements remain a long slog for majority still in economically precarious contingent teaching

Vocational institutions are winning the right to award PhDs, while professional doctorates are also expanding. But how compatible are academic and vocational focuses in research degree provision – and how easily can status disparities be overcome, asks Ben Upton

Early taste of academic precarity reported in biggest-ever survey of student-employees, although rectors’ conference questions reliability of a union-commissioned study

Government took away scheme ’hastily’ and ‘without convincing reason’, according to critics

Lacklustre employment for doctorate holders betrays ‘disconnect’ between academia and private sector employers, scholars say

Living allowances become key part of the recruitment pitch, as universities battle for research students and students wrestle with inflation

Working in the academy reminds Duncan Money of his brief time on a market stall. Time to swap it for a stable job that pays the bills

Fraud and fabrication are not rarities, suggests Australian survey of early career scholars

Agreement on pay hikes and better benefits for graduate student instructors would end biggest-ever job action in US higher education, although many workers dissent

Scholars split on whether reforms – part of a wider relaxation of rules on doctorates – will tackle research fraud or whether they aim at the wrong target

Broader coalition arrives without answers on a missing DKr300 million for humanities and social sciences, as universities prepare to debate lifelong learning reforms with a “gun pointed at us”

House of Lords Science and Technology Committee also criticises ‘unjustifiably high’ visa costs 

Political scientist Jack Williams’ debut novel draws on his experiences as a PhD student at Princeton and Zurich

Joint programme eyes trifecta of research skills, disciplinary knowledge and business acumen

Top research universities have long cited their value in growing local economies, but massive graduate student walkout suggests a critical need to better protect the people who make the magic happen

Experts agree with vice-chancellor that financial support for doctoral candidates should be increased

Survey finds strong recovery in overall satisfaction with courses masks unease among some students about impact of big global recruitment drives

Tentative pact covers postdoctoral scholars and academic researchers, but leaves 300,000-student system in turmoil as talks continue with graduate students in teaching and research roles

Biggest-ever job action in US higher education reaches third week with hundreds of California professors promising to observe picket lines, and system suggesting it may halt their pay

Postgraduate researchers respond positively to online-offline support packages but purely online contact is less valued, finds Advance HE survey

Incoming staff and students risk losing jobs and funding over delayed checks in ‘sensitive’ fields

Data hint at progress in ‘improving the pipeline’ of female researchers

Experts warn shrinking pool of postgraduate researchers would be ‘pretty disastrous’

Walkout over wages and benefits – biggest in any US job sector this year – snarls 300,000-student system just weeks before autumn semester exams

One-off payments to those in need also among multimillion-pound package of support

PhD students with encouraging mums and dads less likely to be plagued by feelings of inferiority, survey suggests

‘Short horizons’ of grant-givers holding back early career researchers from disadvantaged backgrounds, says Glasgow principal

Survey of Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting attendees shows even those tipped for glory feel insecure and underdeveloped

Demand and quality questioned by businesses and universities as reforms leave majority of STEM courses at full length

The standardised test is graduate schools’ ideal measurement tool for the personality traits they seek in applicants, says John Gomez

New wave of funding schemes aims to counter ‘parachute research’ and brain drain

Median age at degree completion shrinks, although share of field’s graduates with job commitment does too, American Academy of Arts and Sciences finds

Huge study by Colorado researchers finds one in eight academics studied for their PhD at just five institutions

Riham Sheble claims she had to battle Warwick for study extensions

Government accused of moving goalposts over pre-election messaging, with social sciences and business master’s also set to lose out

First postgraduate students start at new HKUST campus, signalling beginning of huge changes in the area

Academics debate whether spike in interest is down to draft dodging or career reckonings prompted by upheaval

Salma al-Shehab given 34-year sentence over critical posts on Twitter

‘Under the radar’ practice of charging students to secure their places a sign of ‘increasingly deregulated admissions process’, says Jo Grady

Karl Andersson has long attracted controversy over his interest in sexually suggestive images of teenage boys, so did university investigate this?

University hopes to build more diverse faculty by enriching PhD process with skills typically acquired in prolonged postdoc slog

‘Wanking is not a research method; it is just wanking,’ says professor, as doctoral candidate chronicles how he ‘enjoyed’ provocative cartoon images of boys

While many early career academics are preoccupied with job security, the factor that most correlates with job satisfaction is a helpful boss

Post-92s and private universities more likely to offer incoming students the option of when they begin their course while Russell Group stick to traditional autumn start

Institution’s party chief dismissed in controversy over lecturers sent overseas to get doctoral qualifications

Giving adjuncts biweekly payments, internal status for permanent vacancies and tenure on promotion would all help, say Lisa Carver and Samantha King

Doctoral training centre sorry for email suggesting doctoral students work in fields and sell cosmetics to make ends meet

The doctorate must remain an apprenticeship. Better to cut PhD students’ teaching load by hiring more teaching staff, says Ruth Machen

Royal Netherlands Academy says extra funding and time cannot ‘truly compensate’ those who began their research careers in lockdown