This is a re-post of an article by Chris Newfield dated August 17, 2015. It originally appeared on Remaking the University: The Democratic candidates public college plans are more interesting than most coverage has implied (brief comparisons are here). They are all variations of “Debt-Free College”proposals, to use candidate Martin O’Malley’s term, structured in part as federal…
One of the ways faculty are intimidated and coerced into accepting codified curricula is through the specter of not living up to assessable “outcomes” (I use the scare quotes because the word has become one of those cant words of educational “reform”—another word in the category—that have become so popular in some quarters, especially administrative…
Vincent J. Roscigno, a Professor of Sociology at Ohio State University, has published a clever and insightful piece under the above title in the online magazine Counterpunch. The entire article is worth reading, but here are some choice excerpts: Equating the administrative bloating of public universities and the harm it has caused as akin to…
Yesterday I posted an entry about the AAUP Colorado Conference’s efforts to organize part-time community college faculty, who represent the overwhelming majority of community college teachers in that state. Central to these efforts has been the work of Caprice Lawless, President of the Front Range Community College AAUP Chapter and Vice-President for Community Colleges of…
Today’s Inside Higher Ed includes an exceptionally perceptive essay by Christopher Newfield, professor of literature and American Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, cosponsor of the Remaking the University website, and a member of the Academe magazine advisory board, calling for a new strategy in defense of tenure. Everyone should read it. “So…
In a comment on a post of mine yesterday, someone wrote: “Adequate teaching” of any subject (humanities and social sciences included) requires: – decent texts; – teachers who understand their subjects and can explain them to students in lectures, quiz sections and seminar discussions; – relevant homework assignments and reviews; and – being perceptive to…
The rampant exploitation of contingent faculty—in particular, of part-time or adjunct faculty—is one of the more disgraceful developments in American higher education over the last quarter century. It ranks with the rampant abuses committed by online for-profit colleges and universities as one of the most pernicious effects of the corporatization of higher education—and, more broadly,…
What follows is a letter sent today by 32 Instructors in the Writing Programs of Arizona State University (further information can be found at the asuagainst55 website): June 8, 2015 Dear Dr. Mark Lussier, English Department Chair, and Dr. George Justice, Dean of Humanities in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Arizona State University: The…