One of my posts this past week was on John Kasich’s appointment of Gordon Gee to explore ways of increasing affordability at Ohio’s public universities. Given Gee’s continuing status as the highest paid administrator at any public university in the United States, I expressed my skepticism about the appointment, a skepticism based in part on…
On Monday, the Columbus Dispatch reported that Governor Kasich has appointed Gordon Gee, President Emeritus of Ohio State University, to “lead a study looking for ways to make college more affordable and relevant for Ohio students.” More specifically, Gee will “spend the next year working with other college presidents, K-12 education leaders, and the business…
Promoters of MOOCs and online courses make big promises about the value of this latest trend in higher education. MOOCs and online courses, we are told, will both expand access to higher education and reduce its costs for just about every “stakeholder”–for institutions lacking the resources to provide needed courses, for governments hard-pressed to provide…
Online teaching remains one of the most talked-about topics of the day in higher education, and there are no shortage of studies on the topic. Do students learn more online? Do they learn less? Do they learn slightly less, but maybe it saves so much money that administrators will still find it appealing? But left…
Part 3: Reduce the Cost of a Degree by 40% by Reducing Labor and Capital Costs. [Explanatory lead to the first post in this series: Richard Vedder is distinguished professor of economics at Ohio University, director of the Center for College Affordability and Productivity, and an adjunct scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. In an…
Part 1: Three-Year Baccalaureate Degrees Richard Vedder is distinguished professor of economics at Ohio University, director of the Center for College Affordability and Productivity, and an adjunct scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. In an earlier post, I pointed out, as others have, that he is hardly an unbiased or objective commentator on the state…
Earlier this month, the Ohio House of Representatives announced the creation of the “Higher Education Reform Study Committee,” chaired by Rep. Cliff Rosenberger (R-Carksville), who also served as chair of the House finance Higher Education Subcommittee during the budget process. The committee has embarked on a “road show,” traveling all over the state to public…
A statement from the Campaign for the Future of Higher Education: http://futureofhighered.org/ Despite the praise heaped on California Senate Bill 520 by Phil Hill and Dean Florez in a recent panegyric published in Inside Higher Ed, the bill was not the right answer for California’s higher education access woes; and it is a poor model for other…
Last week, President Obama released a higher education reform proposal, citing the goals of making college more affordable and reining in student debt. While the AAUP applauded the President for raising these concerns – ones that we share – AAUP President Rudy Fichtenbaum called the plan “little more than a version of the failed policy of ‘No Child Left…
President Obama’s new “plan” for higher education is, of course, largely a sparely detailed sketch of a proposal, especially when one considers what any legislation that might actually result from it will end up looking like. In fact, many commentators on both the Left and the Right have expressed serious doubts about whether the “plan’…