OK so planes are now back in the sky and everyone is busy counting the cost of the Ash Cloud (or Ashmagedon as I heard it referred to by Evan Davies on this morning's Today Programme).
Business will have done particularly badly out of this and the difficulties facing schools have been highlighted but what about universities? Emails have been sent out to students about missing deadlines, alternative plans have been put in place whilst the School Research Director is stuck in Spain and the sector-specific magazine 'Times Higher' has documented some of the problems. However, I think this asks some more fundemenatal questions of Universities.
If natural events such as these cause the suspension of flights then the impact of restricted flights through global warming could have a wider impact. Could this mean fewer international students? Or more students on remote campuses or learning electronically? Could this mean fewer international conferences and 'flying professors'? Could video conferencing become the next big thing to hit universities? The financial impact could be huge - the technology is not widely or cheaply available in many Higher Education Institutions - and the academic impact of less face-to-face interaction could be interesting.
And what about schemes like Erasmus Mundus which are founded on physical mobility? When changing mobility patterns (due to environmental issues) was raised at a recent meeting of Erasmus Mundus co-ordinators it was dismissed as 'Erasmus Mundus is a physical mobility programme' but the concepts and impact of virtual mobility must be also discussed now?
So was the Ash Cloud just a hint of the world to come?
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