On June 15, the American Association of University Professors at its annual meeting voted unanimously to place National Louis University of Illinois and Southern University, Baton Rouge on its list of censured institutions for violations of academic freedom and tenure. AAUP First Vice-President Henry Reichman declared, “What happened at National Louis was ominous.” The AAUP…
Over the last four to five weeks, several fascinating examples of photo-journalism and photo-essays, graphic representations of scholarly research, and richly illustrated book reviews have been published online. The Atlantic publishes daily photo-essays in its In Focus feature. A recent addition to the series is “Welcome Back to Earth, Commander Hadfield,” which includes photos taken…
One of the tired adages about American higher education is that the role of the university president is “to live in a big house and travel the world with a tin cup in one’s hand.” The commentary on the implosion of Gordon Gee at Ohio State University this week picks up on this theme to…
Earlier this year, I posted a review of Saving Higher Education: The Integrated, Competency-Based Three-Year Bachelor’s Degree Program. The book describes an alternative to the two most common “three-year” baccalaureate programs: the Accelerated model and the Prior Learning model. In the Accelerated Model, students essentially take overloads and full summer loads in order to complete…
This is a re-post from the On the Issues blog maintained by the Campaign for the Future of Higher Education [http://futureofhighered.org/]. ************************* If you read the news, listen to legislators, or watch TED talks, you might think MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) are just about providing free access to high-quality courses for anyone who wants…
This is a re-post from the On the Issues blog maintained by the Campaign for the Future of Higher Education [http://futureofhighered.org/]. ************************* After a brief experiment in charging tuition, Germany—the strongest economy in Europe and one of the strongest in the world–is abolishing fees at its colleges and universities. Why? As quoted in a recent…
Here is another item from Futility Closet (http://www.futilitycloset.com/), re-posted with the permission of Greg Ross. ************************* It was British wordplay expert Leigh Mercer who coined the classic palindrome “A man, a plan, a canal—Panama” in Note & Queries on Nov. 13, 1948. He later said that he’d had the middle portion, PLAN A CANAL P, for a…
The IRS “scandal” has generated enormous outrage from conservatives and the mainstream press alike. According to Republican politicians, it is absolutely unacceptable for the government to target nonprofit groups based on their political ideology. And they’re right, as President Obama has noted. But an example of government targeting of a “liberal” nonprofit that works with…
Many college and university boards of trustees operate in a shockingly inefficient and counterproductive way. They are often an impediment to change and bastions of tradition, old boy networks, outdated practice and alumni parochialism. At other times, they may be testing grounds for new business models, consumer fads, or the will of the dominant trustees.…
I have been a faculty member at Wright State University since 1990. It has generally been a very nice place to work. Our AAUP chapter/bargaining unit has been a strong one almost since its establishment, and although we have not always regarded our administration’s decision-making as enlightened, the truth is that, especially in this corporatized…