The Center for College Affordability and Productivity today completed the release of its 240-page report, 25 Ways to Reduce the Cost of College. It offers a dizzying overview of the possibilities for increased efficiency in college operations, both on an individual and collective scale, and serves as a sure retort to the notion that current […]
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The first remarkable aspect of the case intriguingly captioned John Doe, Father of Minor Daughter H.S. v. Silsbee Independent School District, are the facts: Administrators at a public high school in Texas threw a female student off of the cheerleading squad because she refused to cheer for one particular member of the basketball team—a fellow […]
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“What’s Happening Off the Field”, a new report on the Big 12 from the American Council of Trustees and Alumni suggests that all is not well beyond the playing fields. First, in a sure gauge of misplaced priorities, it’s no surprise that athletic expenditures appear to have grown at a higher rate than other expenditures […]
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Video of our Capitalism on Campus event last week is now available here on on the Manhattan Institute site. The first two videos feature panels on the state of instruction in capitalism and political economy, showcasing a diverse range of academics from Jeffrey A. Miron, professor of economics and director of undergraduate studies at Harvard, […]
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Steven Pinker, noted Harvard psychologist and linguist delivered an address to mark Boston’s Ford Hall Forum’s presentation of their Louis P. and Evelyn Smith First Amendment Award to the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education. Pinker’s speech draws valuably upon two of Pinker’s hats – as psychologist and FIRE adviser in offering a sharp analysis […]
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Ideas In Action, which airs on PBS, recently featured a half-hour program on the Globalization of Higher Ed, featuring Ben Wildavsky, Senior Fellow at the Kauffman Foundation and recent author of The Great Brain Race: How Global Universities Are Reshaping the World, Peter Stearns, Provost at George Mason University, and Beth McMurtrie, Senior Editor of […]
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Forbes has issued its 3rd annual College Rankings, delivering its crown to Williams College. Comparison to the U.S. News and World Report list is inevitable so let’s not delay in getting to it; this result, and most of the top 20 rankings on the Forbes list aren’t that dissimilar from the similar U.S. News list […]
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In the epilogue of a new compendium volume, Mark Bousquet notes that, “In July 2007, the American Sociological Association reported that one-third of its members felt their academic freedoms were threatened, a significantly higher figure than the one-fifth ratio recorded during the McCarthy years.” Sounds dire, doesn’t it? Well not if you’ve spent the prior […]
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Those of you in the New York City area may be interested in an upcoming Manhattan Institute event featuring Ben Wildavsky, author of The Great Brain Race: How Global Universities are Reshaping the World and Senior Fellow at the Ewing Marion Kaufman Foundation. Introductory remarks will be provided by John Leo, MindingtheCampus editor. If you […]
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Sparks were few at this season’s commencement speeches, and so were remarks inspiring much enthusiasm or objection. Protests arose, as they always do, whether of New Jersey Governor Chris Christie at Monmouth College (for state Education budget cuts), Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren at Brandeis (for assorted Israeli actions), or Citigroup CEO Vikram Pandit at Columbia’s […]
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The long-term decline of graduation rates is one of the most intractable problems facing American Higher Education. Trustees at the University of Arkansas are now mulling what appears to be the most popular solution to the problem – simply lower requirements. Under a current proposal, a requirement for 66 core credits would be reduced nearly […]
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The Wall Street Journal features a piece on notable college rejection experiences, from Warren Buffet to Lee Bollinger to Tom Brokaw. An encouraging story should temporary misfortune find you or someone you know.
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AEI recently released a fine compendium volume The Politically Correct University, edited by Robert Maranto, Richard E. Redding, and Frederick M. Hess, featuring an excellent slate of essays and contributors: here’s a sampling: Do take a look; there’s much of worth here: – “The American University: Yesterday, Today – and Tomorrow” James Piereson – “Linguistics […]
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Should the American Anthropological Association “denounce the current human rights violations in Honduras” and “support Hondurans that… continue to resist the June 28, 2009 military coup in their country”? This question, put to a vote of AAA members, passed by a margin of 656-166 in online voting that ended last Friday. Taking a stand on […]
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In these days of 6-year degrees and students graduating at 25 if at all, it’s encouraging to see stories of far more intrepid matriculation – consider “The 10 Youngest College Graduates in U.S. History” at Online Degree. Number 1, Michael Keany, current holder of the Guinness World Record for “Youngest University Graduate.” “At the age […]
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Take a look at ISI’s latest civic literacy survey “The Shaping of the American Mind: The Diverging Influences of the College Degree & Civic Learning on American Beliefs.” One finding: more than half of students polled did not know the three branches of the federal government.
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Roger Clegg writes on a shocking new University of Massachusetts set-aside program over at Phi Beta Cons: The Boston Globe reports that the University of Massachusetts is setting up a med-school set-aside program: “Under an initiative set to be finalized today, the state’s only public medical school [i.e., at UMass] will partner with UMass campuses […]
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The New York Times’ “The Choice” blog is running a helpful question and answer series on the Free Application for Federal Student Aid. Take a look if you’re puzzling through the process of filling the thing out.
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Take a look for yourself.
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Matthew Levinton, a student at the University of Texas at Austin, wrote us with some encouraging news about a new book club at that school, which he currently serves as President. Read his account: Last fall at the University of Texas at Austin, a new great books program began its mission to realize Thomas Jefferson’s […]
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Thanks for reading and check back in with us in the new year for more coverage of pressing academic questions.
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The Gates Foundation has just released a report “With Their Whole Lives Ahead of Them” on why students fail to finish college, which might seem a timely topic amidst recent hand-wringing about our persistent failure to actually get students to a diploma. The problem, as with about all studies on this topic, is that it […]
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“Weighing The Value Of That College Diploma” in the Wall Street Journal. Take a look.
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Last Sunday, the New York Times’ “Ethicist” column featured a letter from a lawyer loath to hire internship applicants that belonged to the Federalist society. Randy Cohen, the “Ethicist” suggested that disqualification on the grounds of their membership was unfair. The lawyer went ahead and rejected all applicants who were members anyway. Ilya Somin, at […]
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“Did A College You Visited Liken Itself To Hogwarts?” – New York Times.
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Our friend Patrick Deneen of Georgetown posted an evocative comment today on an Inside Higher Ed item concerning the President’s hopes for higher education as a source of job creation. It’s very much worth a read. The nation’s universities have already implicitly justified their existence – and expense – to a generation or more of […]
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At the Volokh Conspiracy, Todd Zywicki outlines the latest in the Dartmouth alumni suit against Dartmouth College. The current case, like the previous case, arises from the 1891 Agreement between the Dartmouth Trustees and the alumni of the College, acting through the Association of Alumni, that gave the alumni the right to elect half of […]
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Some happy news via Eugene Volokh at the Volokh Conspiracy – Duke University’s Voltair Press is not only printing a book on the Danish Mohammed cartoon controversy that features the cartoons (imagine that!) but also includes a Statement of Principle that decries Yale University’s censorship of the cartoons in their own volume on the matter. […]
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Tomorrow KC Johnson will receive the fifth annual Phillip Merrill Award for Outstanding Contributions to Liberal Arts Education from the American Council of Trustees and Alumni. The award honors honors “individuals who advance liberal arts education, core curricula, and the teaching of Western civilization and American history.” KC has undoubtedly advanced these goals. He follows […]
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ACTA’s latest publication, “For the People: A Report Card on Public Higher Education in Illinois” has unearthed more of the usual disappointments. In a series of rankings, General Education requirements earned an F, with only three public universities (out of eight) indicating a foreign language requirement “and not a single institution received credit for Literature […]
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