BY ALEX SMALL Breathe easy, everyone. We physicists have a strategy to help all students pass tough introductory classes. Hear me out. An administrator recently said that more students would pass freshman physics if faculty gave more frequent and early feedback. Students could study more effectively if they had some way to gauge their understanding…
BY KEVIN HOWLEY Call me cynical, but any piece of legislation or policy prescription that receives bipartisan support these days gives me the willies. When Democrats and Republicans agree on anything, it usually involves bloated military budgets or, in the case of the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure bill, doubling down on roads and bridges in the…
BY TIMOTHY V. KAUFMAN-OSBORN In a bold move, sixteen faculty, staff, students, and alumni recently filed a suit calling on Washington’s attorney general to remove from office six trustees, including the interim president, of Seattle Pacific University (SPU). Given the real risks involved, especially for those currently on SPU’s payroll, we should applaud these plaintiffs…
BY HARVEY J. GRAFF Growing up was always hard to do. It’s getting harder, and universities now are doing little to help the new “lost generation.” Experts on children, youth, and college students never tire of superficial generalizations about the ease or difficulty of growing up over time. They seldom define terms, specify ages, present…
BY PAUL DILLER COVID-19 vaccine mandates have been in effect at hundreds of universities for more than a year now. The 2022–2023 academic year is the second consecutive year during which many universities require some amount of COVID-19 vaccination from students, faculty, and staff. As the Centers for Disease Control’s recent guide to COVID-19 prevention…
BY FRANK E. RITTER AND DONALD A. DONAHUE COVID-19 has disappeared from the headlines, but not from our lives or classes. What steps should we take this fall? We note thirteen. COVID-19 has been declared as endemic, necessitating continuing precautions like those taken against influenza. Campuses continue to be places of increased risk for communicable…
BY MARYBETH GASMAN Faculty are at the core of undoing systemic racism in faculty hiring. Within research universities—specifically those that are members of the Association of American Universities (AAU)—there are two factors that are most likely to determine who becomes a tenure-track faculty member. First, the institution a faculty candidate attends for their PhD and,…
BY HARVEY J. GRAFF Professors, lecturers, graduate teaching assistants, and especially presidents and provosts often repeat the word “literacy.” But they almost never pause to define or constructively criticize it. Why does it matter? That is a question I ask each of us to ponder. The Norwegian scholar Johan Galtung put it aptly: “What would…
BY ALEX ZUKAS In the latest act in a continuing coup against the faculty at National University that started in spring 2020, the interim president and board of trustees just imposed a faculty handbook that defines academic freedom and shared governance in ways that are unrecognizable to AAUP members as it completely hollows out those…
BY FELIX A. KRONENBERG AND VERNA CASE Recent events on campuses throughout the country, such as the coronavirus pandemic, innovations in technology and pedagogy, and changes in demographics, have created challenges for institutional leaders, faculty, students, and other constituents. We believe that such challenges can benefit from an understanding of the power of place in…