Review of Saving Higher Education: The Integrated, Competency-Based Three-Year Bachelor’s Degree Program

Reviews of Recent Books Concerning Current Issues in Higher Ed: No. 5 Bradley, M. J., R. H. Seidman, and S. R. Painchaud. Saving Higher Edu­cation: The Integrated, Competency-Based Three-Year Bachelor’s Degree Pro­gram. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2012. This book proposes an idea previously treated at some length by Robert Zemsky in his book Making Reform…

Review of Embracing Non-Tenure-Track Faculty: Making Change to Support the New Faculty Majority.

Reviews of Recent Books Concerning Current Issues in Higher Ed: No. 4 Kezar, Adrianna. Embracing Non-Tenure-Track Faculty: Making Change to Support the New Faculty Majority. New York: Routledge, 2012. A faculty member at the University of Southern California, Kezar has written several books on the issues currently confronting higher education. In Embracing Non-Tenure-Track Faculty, she…

American Higher Education in the Twenty-First Century: Social, Political, and Economic Challenges.

Reviews of Recent Books Concerning Current Issues in Higher Ed: No. 2 Altbach, Philip G., Patricia J. Gumport, and Robert O. Berdahl, eds. American Higher Education in the Twenty-First Century: Social, Political, and Economic Challenges. 3rd Edition. Eds. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins U P, 2011. In selecting the essays included in this collection, the editors…

Remarks on Benjamin Ginsberg’s Fall of the Faculty

Reviews of Recent Books Concerning Current Issues in Higher Education: No. 1 Ginsberg, Benjamin. The Fall of the Faculty: The Rise of the All-Administrative University and Why It Matters. New York: Oxford U P, 2011. Ginsberg’s book has very quickly become a seminal work in the growing body of scholarly literature dedicated to higher education’s…

Student Debt, By the Numbers: Part 6: Factors—For-Profit Higher Ed

Sources: National Center for Education Statistics, Bloomberg News, Chronicle of Higher Education, Blumenstyk and Fuller Number of post-secondary institutions newly accredited between 2005 and 2009:  483. Percentage of post-secondary institutions newly accredited between 2005 and 2009 that were private for-profit institutions:  77%. Percentage of total accredited post-secondary institutions in the U.S. that were private for-profit…

Student Debt, By the Numbers: Part 4: Factors—Changes in Student Financial Aid

Source: National Center for Education Statistics Percentage of those enrolled in public four-year institutions who received financial aid in 2009:  79%. Percentage of those enrolled in private not-for-profit four-year institutions who received financial aid in 2009:  87%. Percentage of those enrolled in private for-profit four-year institutions who received financial aid in 2009:  86%. Percent of…

Student Debt, By the Numbers: Part 3: Factors—Increases in Tuition

Sources: National Center for Education Statistics, Goldwater Institute, New Republic Average annual tuition at public four-year institutions in the U.S. in 2010:  $7,605. Average annual tuition at private four-year institutions in the U.S. in 2009:  $27,293. Average annual tuition at public two-year institutions in the U.S. in 2009:  $2,713. Percentage increase in tuition and room-and-board…

Student Debt, By the Numbers: Part 2: Factors–Increases in Higher Ed Enrollment

Source: National Center for Education Statistics Total number of degree-granting colleges and universities in the United States in 2009:  4,495 Post-secondary enrollment in 2009:  20.4 million Percentage of the total U.S. population enrolled in 2009:  5.7% Enrollment by percentage in four-year institutions in 2009:  62% Enrollment by percentage in two-year institutions in 2009:  38%

Student Debt, By the Numbers: Part 1, The Scope of the Problem

Sources: National Center for Education Statistics, New Deal 2.0, Nation of Change Total student loan debt in the U.S. in 2012: $1 trillion. Total student loan debt in the U.S. in 2011: $830 billion. Total credit-card debt in the U.S. in 2011: $826.5 billion. Total value of the federal student loans taken in 2010:  $100…