Former executive director James Turk is joining Ryerson University’s school of journalism as a distinguished visiting professor, effective Sept. 1, 2014. He will organize a seminar series addressing questions and issues around freedom of expression.

The term “tenure” can be ambiguous, as when former University of Saskatche­wan president Ilene Busch-Vishniac warned her team that if they disagreed publicly with the process or findings of Transform-US, their “tenure would be short.”

These are certainly interesting times in which to take on the presidency of CAUT. News broke that the dean had been fired and forcibly removed from the University of Saskatchewan for having had the audacity to publicly voice his concerns.

The presidential search committee at the University of Alberta has received some unusual applications. In addition to the typical individual job seekers, 14 groups of four and one of three have submitted an application.

Capilano University seized and removed a sculpture lampooning the university president, Kris Bulcroft, on the grounds it constituted a form of harassment of a university employee.

In a resounding victory, academic staff at Simon Fraser University have voted for union representation. Plans are now underway to begin negotiation of a first collective agreement.

The National Union of the Canadian Association of University Teachers has elected a new slate of leaders for 2014–2017. George Davison, secretary-treasurer of the Federation of Post-Secon­dary Educators of BC, was reelected president.

Margaret Munro, senior science writer for Postmedia News, and former Ubyssey news editor Jonny Wakefield have picked up CAUT’s 2014 excellence in education journalism awards.

Despite the ubiquitous nature of certified academics in Canada, persistent myths and unfounded fears about unions ran deep in the BC profes­sorate until recently.

All advanced democracies are facing the pressures of globalization, technological change, and new family forms, which have had the effect of generating higher levels of inequality in market incomes.

Many today do not recognize the word, but “philology” was for centuries nearly synonymous with humanistic intellectual life, encompassing not only the study of Greek and Roman literature and the Bible but also all other studies of language and literature, and more.