2013 May

Imperial College London pulls auction of unpaid internship following student opposition

Tweet Imperial College London has pulled an unpaid internship which was up for auction at one of the country’s most expensive private schools.  Westminster School, which charges in excess of £7,000 per term, is running an online auction for internships … Continue reading

MAPPED: Department for Education spent more than £1m on hotels last year

Tweet MAP: The Department for Education’s spend across London hotels in 2012/13.  The Department for Education spent more than £1m of taxpayers’ money on hotel rooms for staff last year, including at 4* hotels in the heart of London.  The … Continue reading

Stoke and Huddersfield papers report on torch relay costs

The Stoke Sentinel and Huddersfield Examiner have reported on Freedom of Information requests from Help Me Investigate about torch relay spending. This is Staffordshire report on the £189,730 cost of the relay to Stoke-on-Trent City Council, while The Huddersfield Daily Examiner’s … Continue reading

What data does the Fire Service collect? Notes from a datablog meetup

On February 28 the Birmingham Datablog Meetup hosted a visit from Vikki Holland and Debbie Whittingham from the West Midlands Fire Service. They answered questions on how the Service uses data in both fire prevention and monitoring its activities. Here is a summary of the meetup. The Fire Service are one of the most advanced users […]

When is a leak not a leak?

Over on Help Me Investigate Education Beth Ashton writes about her experiences of discovering what appeared to be a data leak by the education regulator Ofsted – and the ethical decisions which followed: “In the end, this was a story about Ofted’s own rules not working retrospectively, or taking into account the permanence of the […]

When is a leak not a leak: An investigation into children’s home data

Tweet While working on a story relating to children’s care homes, Beth Ashton stumbled across some data that shouldn’t have been public. What she did next illustrates the ethical and legal issues facing journalists and public bodies dealing with sensitive subjects. A few … Continue reading

Useful education links for 3rd-10th May

TweetThese are some of the education stories we found interesting between the May 3rd-10th 2013. Michael Gove attacks ‘infantilisation’ of school curriculum which encourages pupils to compare Nazis to Mr Men (The Independent) Education Secretary Michael Gove attacked the school … Continue reading

Useful education links for April 26th-3rd May

Tweet These are some of the education stories we found interesting between the 26th April and 3rd May 2013. Universities veto adverts over unpaid internships (The Times) Some of the UK’s leading educational institutions are refusing to advertise unpaid internships … Continue reading