Entries will go onto the Times Higher Education’s campaign YouTube channel, and the best will be shown at an awards ceremony in London. See here for more details. Send entries to deputy news editor Rebecca Attwood, at rebecca.attwood@tsleducation.com, or by post to Times Higher Education, 26, Red Lion Square, London WC1R 4HQ.

He now hopes to come and talk to students in the autumn term.

The Observer’s mission statement from its inception in 1791 reads: “Unbiased by prejudice – uninfluenced by party. Whole principle is ­independence, whole object is truth, and the dissemination of every species of knowledge that may conduce to the happiness of society.”

The Observer was born during the age of enlightenment, as a new set of values emerged at the core of western societies – freedom, democracy and reason. Rationality replaced dogma, science trumped conjecture, empiricism bested speculation. Even more importantly for the Observer, the idea of liberalism – the ventilation of diverse opinions and a tolerance of same – took root at this time.

The world has changed, as has the Observer, but these beliefs are still at the centre of the paper.

The Observer remains an independent voice and one that is committed to liberal and social democratic values. We’re committed to other issues too. We like fashion and food and football, for instance, but what distinguishes the Observer are its values. These are the philosophical scaffolds holding the paper in place, which help create a ­distinctive (not better, or worse, but different) voice on a Sunday and build on the paper’s legacy and its proud history as the oldest Sunday paper in the world.

And what a history. The Observer supported the Chartist movements for political and social reform in the 19th century. It backed the rise of early trade unionism. It sided with the North against the Confederate slave states in the American civil war. It played a vital role in helping to establish Amnesty International and Index on Censorship and became the principal supporter in the British press of Nelson Mandela.

This is the paper’s legacy and we will be trying to build on it next Sunday, when the Observer will be published as a four-section paper, plus our monthly Observer Food magazine. News, Sport, the Observer Magazine and our New Review section have all undergone significant changes.

The paper’s new incarnation came out of a series of rigorous discussions that looked at the role of a Sunday paper in an age when newspapers have radically changed and in an age of digital revolution. What is the proper role of a Sunday paper in that changed environment?

That was the challenge and we had to emerge with a paper that was distinct from the competition, that played on the Observer’s core strengths and that took account of what we could provide in an age when readers are increasingly at the receiving end of a media tsunami. Amid that chaos there is a role for a Sunday paper that offers increased reflection, discursiveness and analysis. But it also has to offer engagement, passion and a commitment to highlighting issues in line with the founding principles of the paper. The Observer has to stand for something, and to stand out as a result.

The new-look Observer will devote no less journalism to the topics at its very core – politics, arts, science, culture, international affairs, education. Not forgetting food (with the brilliant Nigel Slater), football (with the award-winning Paul Hayward) or the sundry other diversions that we all expect from a Sunday paper. A reformatted and redesigned Observer Magazine continues to offer that diversion.

Arts, literature and cultural affairs will be at the centre of our New Review – with additional pages, improved newsprint and an elegant new design – which will further enhance the Observer’s reputation as the premier Sunday destination for discursive and thoughtful analysis of cultural, philosophical and artistic issues. The New Review will also include a new section devoted to ­science and technology, increased space for critics and the return of seven-day TV listings.

In the news section, we will tilt toward more news analysis and comment. We will continue to be driven by domestic passions such as the need for constitutional and voting reform but will give more prominence to international affairs. We will be internationalist and proudly European.

We won’t just provide news, but a context for news, too. More analysis, more reflection, more debate, and more discursiveness will mark out an Observer that will seek to interpret, analyse and, crucially, to offer different voices and opinions to help the reader make their own sense of the world.

The paper that appears next Sunday will be substantially changed from the first edition of the Observer on 4 December 1791. But we will also have a great deal in common. That first edition set out its blueprint for Sunday journalism as one intended to “apply the strictest attention and care to greater objects of general concern”, but also promised to report on “the fine Arts,­emanations (sic) of Science, the Tragic and the Comic Muse, the National Police, ­fashion and fashionable follies”. It still holds true.

The North East is packed with creative talent. You’ve probably played some of the video games designed here, visited websites built here, and seen the TV ads created here. Now you can meet the brains behind the big ideas.

Created for students, graduates and entrepreneurs looking to embark on a career within the digital sector, this one day conference and recruitment fair could be your first step into the industry.

Come to Thinking Digital: The Next Generation …tickets are FREE, but with limited spaces you’ll need to get your tickets quick.

Be Inspired, Be Creative, Be The Next Generation.

Guardian Careers is running a FREE online Q&A this Friday for people who want to make a career out of writing.
Between 12-3pm, a panel of experts will be fielding questions on how you can break into the lucrative business of professional copywriting.
Copywriting is an opportunity for journalists and writers to hone their skills and make some money in the advertising sector.
Don’t miss this opportunity to speak live with people behind some of the most successful ad campaigns in the UK.
The forum is open now at http://bit.ly/5GOcqw

Watch news:rewired all unfold here:

(and remember, if you’re interested in learning how to cover live events through these tools, get involved with the Transfer Deadline Day event in the Newsroom on Monday 1st Feb).

We’re teaming up with the Sunderland Echo to provide live coverage of the next transfer deadline day – and we need your help.

If you’re interested in getting involved then come along to find out more:

2pm on Wednesday, December 9 in the newsroom (room 106)

Here’s what Lee Hall, the Sunderland Echo’s Digital Editor, says about our plans:

• This will be real.  We’re creating a live transfer deadline newsroom to compete with the big players such as the BBC. We pulled in 7,000 punters last time around with just two members of staff. Imagine what we can achieve with a full team of eager student journalists.

• This will be professional.  As well as punters and our own sources we can track news aggreagators, fan sites, Sky Sports News, BBC and Press Association coverage to make this a comprehensive destination for fans on deadline day. We’ll be feeding live news to Spark FM for immediate broadcast too.

• This will be national.  As well as the thousands of users viewing your work via sunderlandecho.com, the Yorkshire Evening Post, Peterborough Evening Telegraph, several Irish titles, and plenty more weeklies are keen to host our coverage.

• This will be a valuable experience.  The day will be hectic – maybe even a little stressful, but fun and a      fantastic opportunity to experience a true live news day.

The transfer deadline day is on Monday, February 1 and you can get involved for all or part of the day.

if you can’t make next Wednesday’s meeting but want to get involved then contact john.price@sunderland.ac.uk to find out more.

rejected a complaint on behalf of a serving police officer about published comments in The People that he had made on Facebook about the death of Ian Tomlinson during the London G20 protests.

The article reported that the police officer had posted a message which said: “I see my lot have murdered someone again. Oh well, shit happens”. The complainant argued that publication of this comment – plus that of comments from two other social networking profiles – intruded into his privacy, as the profiles in question were not publicly accessible. The newspaper said that the comments had been drawn to its attention by a third party who was an online ‘friend’ of the complainant, as had one of the newspaper’s journalists whom the complainant had briefly accepted as a friend. In addition, it argued, there was a strong public interest in publication, as it showed how serving police officers viewed high-profile incidents such as the death of Mr. Tomlinson.

The Commission agreed with the newspaper that publication on this occasion could be justified by the public interest. Given that the death of Mr. Tomlinson had been “the subject of considerable media and public scrutiny”, there was, it said, a “clear public interest in knowing about police attitudes (whether publicly or privately expressed) towards the incident”. It also highlighted the element of risk that the complainant had taken in posting such comments to people who were “not obliged to keep the information secret”.

A complaint under Clause 3 (Privacy) about the publication of photographs taken of the complainant were also rejected. Further complaints made under Clause 1 (Accuracy) and Clause 10 (Subterfuge) were found not be in breach of the Editors’ Code of Practice.

To read the adjudication, click here.