Lapping lives

So, we have a vice-chancellor with leather suites and his own en-suite bathroom; a head of school who seems to connive with the idea that it "may be difficult" for students to read three books in their entirety for a seminar programme; a professor whose preparation for a postgraduate session involves getting her notes out an hour beforehand and then having to check with a colleague what one of the slides means; and an anonymous lecturer who has so little control over his students that the "girls (sic) in the front write notes to each other" (All in a Day's Work, THES , November 1, 8, 15 and 22).

Never mind art holding up a mirror to life: life in higher education seems to be holding up a mirror to art in the shape of Lapping, Piercemuller et al .

Janet Fraser
University of Westminster London