The US Olympic Committee has selected Los Angeles, San Francisco, Washington and Boston as finalists for the US bid for the 2024 Olympics, with a decision announced in 2017. While the pundits have already had their field day in the local press, the vast overruns that defined Sochi suggest that developed global cities with significant…

The Collegiate Employment Research Institute released findings recently reporting that hiring for new bachelor’s degree recipients will increase by 16 percent in 2014-2015. The Center based its findings on surveying among 5,700 employers. Commenting in the Chronicle of Higher Education, the Institute’s Director, Philip D. Gardner, believes that the brighter outlook is because “the economy…

Moody’s issued a report last week pointing to a basic discrepancy in how we view college admissions that underscores the collapse of the college tuition-dependent finance model. In its report, Moody’s noted that applications to private colleges rose 70 percent from 2004 to last year but the annual total of new high school graduates rose…

We have reached a tipping point in public opinion with forecasts by some that as many as one-third of America’s private colleges and universities may not survive the next ten years in their current form. While this represents perhaps three percent of the total enrollment in American colleges and universities, the impact on breadth, access…

Finding a good college president is a little like choosing the right college. You know it when you feel it. This is not to say that the best presidents are all things to all people. College presidencies are demanding jobs with multiple constituencies. A president’s calendar is much like the college’s budget – carefully rationed,…

Let’s assume that a Chinese family, anxious to provide their child with a world-class education, searches the web to determine where to start. They also base their search on anecdotal reports of friends, among numerous other factors. But the Chinese family is unlikely to visit the United States to participate in an extended college tour…

In a fascinating op ed in the Boston Globe recently, Andrew W. Lo, a professor at MIT’s Sloan School of Management and Tom Rutledge, chief investment strategist at Alpha Simplex Group, looked at how the area’s colleges and universities might support Boston’s bid to host the 2024 Olympics.   The reaction across Boston to the…

Last week, a group convened by the American Council of Trustees and Alumni issued a report examining the role of trustees in college and university governance. The report, titled “Governance for a New Era: A Blueprint for Higher Education Trustees,” suggested the trustees should take a more active role by establishing definable institutional metrics, promoting…

In most four-year college strategic plans, there is a good-faith statement calling for increasing diversity as an institutional goal. There are good – even noble – reasons for doing so. The principal one is that American colleges and universities must look more like the rest of America if they are to remain relevant in the…

Students come to the college experience through a variety of doors. Nearly half of them begin at two-year institutions. Millions more do not fall into the traditional pool of 18-22 year old first-time freshman. Large numbers also earn degrees on line or in some blended learning format. But when most Americans think about students entering…