Fancy being a Cambridge Professor of PLAY?! Yes, so do we. But hurry, time is running out – you only have three more days to land yourself the most eyebrow-raising business card ever.
The world-famous English University that has produced alumni including royalty, William Wordsworth, Hugh Laurie, and Stephen Fry, will take applications for the newly-created post until this Friday.
The University says that the ‘Professorship of Play in Education, Development, and Learning’ is a result of a generous grant from the LEGO foundation:
“The Faculty of Education at the University of Cambridge is consistently ranked in the top five in the world and now seeks to appoint a new Professor in the Faculty arising from an endowment to the University from the LEGO Foundation…the Board of Electors now invites applications for this Professorship from outstanding scholars in the field of educational or developmental psychology in early years development and would particularly welcome applications from those working in the field of play and playfulness.”
Professor Anna Vignoles of Cambridge University’s Centre for Research on Play in Education, Development and Learning (Pedal), told The Guardian:
“The value of play is relatively under-researched. You have people who are claiming that it enhances learning, that it’s important, that it’s good for children’s wellbeing. All of that might be true, but actually there’s remarkably little evidence for that. The aim of the Pedal centre is to conduct rigorous research into the importance of play and how playful learning can be used to improve students’ outcomes.”
Bo Stjerne Thomsen, the global head of research for the Lego Foundation said they are looking for a candidate who is:
“Playful, extremely curious, open-minded, imaginative and creative – someone who can think of new ways of doing research and work across different disciplines.
We hope the Lego professor will speak to the needs that exist in education right now – and we can point to what the attitudes to play are, how teachers teach and what parents expect from education. New research studies may fulfill gaps in academia, but we help our academic partners to address the question of how it would make sense for a government or teacher to use that research.”
Sounds like a plan. Here’s hoping they don’t end up hiring a blockhead…
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