Writing for the World Socialist, Patrick Martin reports the findings not only of UC-Berkeley economist Emmanuel Saez report on recent income growth for the Washington Center for Equitable Growth, but also a report from the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce: “A second report issued this week, by the Georgetown University Center…
Writing for the Washington Post’s Wonkbook blog, Jim Tankersley reports some good news for the American middle class, but it is wrapped inside some continuing bad news about growing income inequality: “The vast majority of American workers are finally seeing their incomes rise from the depths of the Great Recession, a new analysis from…
Yesterday, the U.S. Supreme Court, by a 4-3 vote, upheld the constitutionality of the University of Texas at Austin’s affirmative action admissions program. AAUP had joined an amicus brief in this case, Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin (Fisher II), supporting affirmative action. Due to Justice Kagan’s recusal from the case and with the…
Reporting in “CNN Money,” Heather Long notes that college enrollments have been dropping since 2010. By the fall of 2014, there were more than 800,000 fewer students than in 2010. Ted Mitchell, US Under Secretary of Education, suggests: “Historically, as the economy improves and Americans get back to work, college enrollment declines.” Ms. Long notes…
BY HANK REICHMAN Two days ago I posted a piece about the University of Chicago’s ill-considered attempt to discipline graduating senior and student body president Tyler Kissinger for his leadership of a peaceful and brief sit-in advocating, among other demands, a $15 minimum wage for campus workers. Kissinger’s disciplinary hearing was held yesterday and The…
BY HANK REICHMAN Jonathan Cole, professor and former provost at Columbia University, is a distinguished advocate for academic freedom whose work I have long admired. Last year he and his Columbia colleague, Akeel Bilgrami, edited an important collection of thoughtful essays, Who’s Afraid of Academic Freedom?, which I review along with several other titles in…
BY HANK REICHMAN The University of Chicago has earned well-merited praise for its powerful 2014 “Statement on Principles of Free Expression,” a document that has been endorsed by a growing number of institutions. That statement, authored by a committee chaired by Geoffrey R. Stone, Edward H. Levi Distinguished Service Professor of Law and former Provost…
BY KELLY HAND Parents and teens worry a great deal about what it takes to get into college, but as they prioritize advanced courses, SAT prep, and extracurricular activities, it’s easy to forget about what it takes to succeed in college. In his new online May–June Academe article, “An Open Letter to High School Students…
BY HANK REICHMAN Last December, in response to the wave of student protests about racial injustice on campus, some of which advanced demands that could threaten academic freedom, I published an essay “On Student Academic Freedom.” In that essay, I wrote that student protesters have made and will again make mistakes. They will offend others…
BY AARON BARLOW Maybe we can blame it all on Sputnik. Sixty years ago, next year, the Russians panicked the Americans via satellite… literally. Suddenly, research had to be sped up in new ways, and consolidated. Suddenly, the centers of the scholarly world were physicists and others whose thought could have practical application for military…