Michelle Shipworth
associate professor, Bartlett School of Environment, Energy and Resources, University College London

Michelle Shipworth is an associate professor in the UCL Bartlett School of Environment, Energy and Resources and was the director of ethics in that department for 10 years. Before joining academia, she worked in Australia’s overseas aid programme. She specialises in the human dimensions of the energy transition and founded and taught the innovative and acclaimed ‘Data Detectives’ module for a decade.

When a student challenged a long-standing critical-thinking exercise titled ‘Why are there so many slaves in China?’, the module was removed, prompting Michelle to whistleblow the curtailment of her academic freedom. She then submitted written evidence to the UK’s Joint Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights inquiry into transnational repression in the UK and recently published an article in Times Higher Education disagreeing well with UCL’s provost regarding whether government action to protect the UK from an authoritarian state could be misinterpreted as a form of racism.

In a recent keynote, she explored humanitarian and security aspects of an energy transition dependent on the People’s Republic of China. She is a founding member of the London Universities Council for Academic Freedom. The secretary of state for education recently recognised her contribution to the secretary’s decision to introduce the Higher Education free-speech complaints scheme.

Follow Michelle on Twitter/X: @mshipworth

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