Newyddion

Framing the Geographies of Higher Education Participation: Schools, Place and National identity

How young people make choices about university, where and what to study has been a question asked by many social researchers, policy-makers and practitioners alike. Research has shown that when young people make choices about going to university, a range of factors come into play including peer influences, their families’ experience of university and their…

Stress, Environment and the Human Body

What effects do different environments have upon stress levels in the human body? What affect does it have upon our well-being and health? In order to test this in June 2014 WISERD’s biomapping project was invited by BBC Coast to ‘stress-test’ its presenter Nicholas Crane. The WISERD funded biomapping research project, led by Professor Chris Taylor(WISERD) and Dr Jon Anderson (CPLAN), ‘stress-tested’ the BBC…

WISERD Toasts Another Successful Annual Conference

Last week the 6th Annual Wales Institute of Social & Economic Research, Data & Methods (WISERD) Conference took place at Cardiff’s iconic Millennium Stadium. The WISERD Conference is the largest of its kind in Wales, and brings together practitioners, policy makers and social scientists to discuss and debate a range of topical themes such as health; social care; wellbeing;…

Wylfa Workforce Redundancies: “Mind the Gap”

On May 21st 2015 Magnox announced that 1600 jobs would be lost across its 12 UK nuclear sites. This news came as no great surprise to the workforce at Wylfa on Anglesey, which has been facing decommission for the last few years. The timeline for the final decommission of the plant has stretched considerably, originally anticipated in 2012 and…

Storied Lands

Our lives, and the landscapes in which we live in, are storied in nature. These stories come in many different forms: from policy materials, census data, media reports, official documents and scholarly insight, to authorial fantasy. According to Piatti and Hurni (2011: 218), these stories form a ‘rich geographical layer’ that ‘hovers… above the physically…

Assembling Newtown and Everyday Globalization

This week the WISERD blog is delighted to host a guest blog relating to the ‘Global Countryside: Rural Change and Development in Globalization (GLOBAL-RURAL)’ – a major research project funded by the European Research Council. This study aims to advance our understanding of the workings and impact of globalization in rural regions through the development and application…

Giving, saving, spending: What would Welsh children do with £1 million?

WISERD Education has been exploring children’s responses to a single question: ‘If someone gave you £1 million today, what would you do with it?’ Although such an exploration might seem trivial, we argue that their responses provide important insights into children’s values and priorities. The data from which this paper draws derive from a self-completion survey…

Furlong Report stresses the importance of WISERD Education’s Research

The Furlong Report, published this week, has highlighted the invaluable work undertaken by WISERD Education, and calls for further funding to be injected into the project. The report was written by Emeritus Professor John Furlong, of the University of Oxford, who was appointed by Welsh Education Minister Huw Lewis last year as an adviser on initial teacher…

Census debate to take place at Wales’ largest Social Science Conference

Delegates join distinguished keynote speakers for special Census debate   A unique opportunity to discuss the Census will take place at the Annual Conference for the Wales Institute for Social & Economic Research, Data & Methods (WISERD). Now in its fourth year, the WISERD Annual Conference is Wales’ largest social science conference; bringing practitioners, policy…