Oppose Cuts to International Education and Foreign Language Programs

Today I received multiple email alerts from disciplinary associations participating in the National Humanities Alliance.   The issue is threatened cuts to international education programs, specifically Title VI and Fulbright-Hays. The proposed cut would slash $25 million (35%) from Title VI and Fulbright-Hays, and it has already been passed out of the Senate Appropriations Committee. This…

Trigger Warnings Triggering Memories of Teaching From Long Ago

Guest blogger Steve Krause published this on August 18, 2015 on his blog stevendkrause.com: A different kind of Trigger… There are two articles making the rounds about trigger warnings of late. There’s “The Coddling of the American Mind” in The Atlantic by Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt. And there’s (at least one) response to it, “The…

HILLARY CLINTON AND PHYLLIS WISE: SIGNS OF BETTER THINGS

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…

Steps Toward Making Censure History at MD Anderson?

Just over a month after being censured by the AAUP annual meeting, the administration of the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center took steps toward instituting a shared governance model and improving academic due process. The Cancer Letter reported this past Friday that UT System Chancellor William McRaven directed MD Anderson President Ronald DePinho in a July 23 letter…

The Assessment Myth

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…

The High Cost of Not Educating Our Very Large Prison Population

When state governments began cutting state support for public higher education, one of the first casualties was the federal and state funding for providing college educations to prisoners.  It was politically unsustainable to compel American families to bear much more of the cost of higher education while providing such an education free of charge to…

Higher Educating Trustees

One of the most glaring weaknesses in American higher education is the strength of its governance group. There is a celebrated tradition within higher education to portray governance as a kind of three-leg stool. Led by the president as CEO, the administration manages the operation, works with the faculty, and reports to the Board of…

The Slow Demise of Another Much Ballyhooed Digital Education Venture

Last week, in the New York Times, Michael J. de la Merced reported on News Corp.’s plan to sell off its unprofitable education unit. _________________________ “Amplify, a much-heralded push by News Corporation into digital education, led by Joel Klein, a former New York City schools chancellor, is nearing an inglorious end. “News Corporation, controlled by Rupert Murdoch, said on…