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On creativity, innovation and systems thinking
Here are some videos, podcasts, magazine articles and blogs on creativity, innovation and systems thinking, and also some reviews of my recent book, Creativity for Scientists and Engineers: Videos and podcasts Author spotlight with Dennis Sherwood (IOP Publishing, 11 October 2022) Â Creativity for scientists: how to build an innovation culture in your university, company or research group (Physics World, 23 February 2023) Â The Role of Creativity in System Dynamics and Syst


School exam grades in England can't be trusted
In England, every year, more than a million high school students take GCSE (age 16), AS (age 17) and A level (age 18) exams. The grades those students are awarded are important. Good grades open doors. Poor grades slam them shut. So it's vital that those grades are reliable, and can be trusted. The truth, however, is that about 1 grade in every 4 is wrong. Without any right of appeal. That means that of the approximately 6 million grades awarded each summer, about 1.5 million


CAGs, TAGs and mutant algorithms
In 2020 and 2021, formal 'sit-down' school exams in England were cancelled because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Students, though, still needed to be recognised for their learning over many years of schooling, and to be able to progress to their next stage of education, or employment. How could students be awarded fair grades? That's a question that, with hindsight, the government botched. Many of the problems, though, were evident at the time, and far better answers were quite p



















