House Hearings on the Impact of the ACA on Education: Part III: Rep. Miller Announces eForum on Adjunct Faculty in Higher Education

Nov 19, 2013 Issues: Education, Higher Education, Labor, Jobs and Job Training, Worker Rights,Wages and Benefits WASHINGTON – Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), senior Democrat on the House Education and the Workforce Committee, today announced an eForum to investigate how an increased reliance on contingent faculty by colleges and universities nationwide has impacted the lives of…

Corporatization and Administrative Bloat: “Gilded Goodbyes”

In previous posts, I have detailed Gordon Gee’s extraordinary compensation as President Emeritus of Ohio State, as well as the fact that the only two public university administrators whose compensation exceeded his in 2012 were Graham B. Spanier of Penn State and Jay Gogue of Auburn, both of whom have also retired—Spanier under considerably more…

Small Business Saturday: The Community-Based Alternative to Black Friday

The following infographics provide some statistical sense of the economic impact on our communities of Small Business Saturday:

The Point of the Review

A couple of years ago, when writing a review of a rather thin offering by a respectable scholar, I found myself struggling to keep from becoming snide and catty. I had learned that writing a professional review is quite different from tossing off cutting remarks on a blog post; I felt I had a responsibility…

Your (Black) Friday follow.

If you’re on Twitter, you probably know about a ritual called “Friday Follow.” It’s a tradition in which people recommend to their followers other people whose Tweets might interest them. While I know this isn’t Twitter, I thought I’d bring the work of one of my tweeps to the attention of readers here because it’s…

Black Friday as a Spectacle of Rampant Materialism or of Economic Malaise

The phrase “Black Friday” originally derived from the fact that the sales on the extended weekend following Thanksgiving set the tone for the holiday shopping season and thereby determine whether a store will be profitable for the year—or finish in the “black.” Last year, stores began opening on Thanksgiving Day itself ostensibly so that shoppers…

Feeding the Less Fortunate after Thanksgiving

On this holiday, in almost every community across America, there are service groups and sometimes individual families who have made a tradition out of preparing and serving Thanksgiving dinner to anyone who would not have the means to provide such a dinner for themselves. In some communities, the same service groups have sustained this tradition…

Back When Celebrating Thanksgiving Meant Having a Good Smoke, a Good Beer, and Some Strange Side Dishes with the Turkey

The following are Thanksgiving-themed advertisements that demonstrate that the passage of time is, indeed, a mixed blessing. In our nostalgia, we often forget details that, when recollected, make us feel a little more positive about the present.

Real Thanks this Thanksgiving… Thanks to a Real Adult and Teacher

A couple of weeks ago, I posted a link on Facebook to a story on the high cost of higher education and student debt. Someone responded that he had worked his way through school so had no sympathy with struggling students today. I was not surprised. Often, the people unwilling to help those in need…

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