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Bullet point. 17th November 2008
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9th January 2009
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6th March 2009
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9th March 2009
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24th April 2009
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15th May 2009
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19th June 2009
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8th-9th July 2009
Conference dates

Professor Sir David Watson
Institute of Education, University of London

David WatsonMorale: towards an understanding of happiness and unhappiness in university life

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Why is so much discourse about contemporary higher education structure around (real and imagined) unhappiness? How does this connect with the realities of life inside (and just outside) the institutions? Does it matter and, if so, what should we be doing about it? David Watson offers an historical, sociological and philosophical perspective, based on primary and secondary research on unhappy students (and their sponsors), unhappy staff, and unhappy stakeholders.

David Watson is an historian and Professor of Higher Education Management at the Institute of Education, University of London. He was Vice-Chancellor of the University of Brighton between 1990 and 2005.

His most recent books are Managing Civic and Community Engagement (2007), and The Dearing Report: ten years on (2007). His current project is a book on "morale" in universities.

He has contributed widely to developments in UK higher education, including as a member of the Council for National Academic Awards (1977-1993), the Polytechnics and Colleges Funding Council (1988-92), and the Higher Education Funding Council for England (1992-96). He was a member of the Paul Hamlyn Foundation's National Commission on Education (whose report Learning to Succeed was published in 1993), and the National Committee of Inquiry into Higher Education chaired by Sir Ron Dearing (whose report Higher Education in the Learning Society was published in 1997). He was the elected chair of the Universities Association for Continuing Education between 1994 and 1998, and chaired the Longer Term Strategy Group of Universities UK between 1999 and 2005.

He is a Trustee of the Nuffield Foundation, a Companion of the Institute of Management and a National Teaching Fellow (2008). He chairs the national Inquiry into the Future for Lifelong Learning, which will report in June 2009 . He was knighted in 1998 for services to higher education.