THREAD on universities and teaching in-person.
I respect that there are academics with good reasons for shielding as much as possible, and of course I will do whatever I can to help fill the in-person teaching that they cannot undertake during the pandemic.
At the same time

1/

I have no time for those who are documenting their social lives and extracurricular activities on social media, who are sending their children to childcare other than schools, or who are otherwise going about their usual business while also refusing to teach in-person.

2/

Moreover, the position of many of these people is to try to bully those of us who are willing to continue to do our jobs, to try to shame us, and to ignore the fact that so many students tell us what a lifeline in-person teaching has been (one last week told me that "even

3/

the walk to campus broke up the monotony of daily life.").

I am sick of the hyperbole, catastraphising, and hypocrisy of some academics who are quite happy to lead their normal lives while also claiming -- despite not having set foot on them -- that campuses are too

4/

dangerous for anyone to enter even though so many staff have spent months making them more secure than most places (restaurants, pubs, sports clubs, etc) that I have seen.

We have jobs, and we have responsibilities to our students, and unless we are genuinely shielding then

5/

refusing to come to work, let alone bullying those who are doing their jobs, is bang out of order.

To my students -- see you after Reading Week!

6/6