| International |
Beware the dark side of university restructuring | Industry 4.0 has its counterpart in higher education, probably best referred to as Education 4.0. It will trigger a radical transformation of how universities operate and interact with their students and other stakeholders…Some institutions will not be able to make this transition on their own successfully. They need to be restructured, then maybe merged with other institutions or, in extreme cases, shut down altogether. With United States college closures markedly up and 32 English universities with operating deficits, up from 24 the year before, this situation may already be in the process of becoming a reality.
Towards higher education for a better civil society | Civil society can be defined as the third sector of society. Whereas the first and second sectors of society include government (that is, the public sector) and business institutions (that is, the private sector), civil society (that is, the civic or community sector) includes all other individuals, groups and institutions (for example, citizens, families, educational, religious, non-profit and non-governmental organisations) that operate, by and large, independently of the government and business sectors. As such, the main role of civil society is to represent the core interests of the citizenry. In a representative democratic society, civil society is critically important to the proper functioning of society since it helps create a more informed, engaged and well-functioning citizenry.
Leaders call for greater African HE collaboration | The common practice today is that African students are flocking to universities outside of Africa for postgraduate studies, partly because the programmes are well funded and universities out of Africa have forged collaborations with Africa’s universities, yet African universities have failed to collaborate with each other, he said. Yankah emphasised the need for collaboration on equal terms, and on the basis of reciprocity. For instance, two different universities in Africa could agree to waive tuition fees or some of the fees for a postgraduate exchange programme, largely negating the funding problem, he said.
African universities – Imitation or adaptation? | The vast majority of African universities and other higher education institutions imitate with a high degree of exactitude Western universities’ academic curricula objectives, content, assessment approaches and learning materials…It is not only the pioneering universities established by African former colonial masters that are guilty of academic imitation. Post-colonial African universities are equally guilty…Such academic imitation destroys human creativity and prospects of producing innovative curricula and pedagogies. It also leads to wholesale importation of academic programmes and courses that are grossly irrelevant to the development, expansion or enhancement of students’ capabilities.
| U.S. National |
The Free-College Fantasy | Any new federal free-college plan should be guided by four principles. First, help students who need help the most. Second, reward states that invest their own money in higher education. Third, create incentives for colleges to cooperate with one another. Fourth, make sure that college is good as well as free. At the same time, such a plan needs to avoid the pitfalls…which would reward the stingiest states and devote more money to four-year students, who are, on average, less needy. [NOTE: The subscription-based Chronicle of Higher Education has generously made the fantasy of free college freely available for everyone to read. In principle, one might think that readers should have to pay their own money to learn why college must not be free. The Chronicle‘s affluent readership easily can afford to pay for the subscription, which may have served to make this article good as well as free. Instead, the Chronicle grants a needless and gratuitous subsidy to all readers that threatens to diminish the quality of its journalism for the most needy.]
Will the student debt crisis be the next recession? | Currently, the national student debt is around 1.5 trillion dollars, shared among 44 million borrowers, and is rising at a rate of nearly 3,000 dollars per second. The average cost of yearly tuition at public state colleges is around 10,000 dollars for in-state residents, and more than double that for students from other states. For private institutions, the average yearly tuition at a four-year college is slightly under 50,000 dollars. Initially (circa 1965), student loan programs were intended to function as a way to increase the population of educated Americans, thus creating a more competitive nation, especially in technological innovation. Unfortunately, the classist barriers to higher education in the U.S. and the culture of uncontrolled capitalism quickly poisoned any noble intentions of funding higher education. The result was a more college-educated populace, but with more lifelong debt.
How Intellectuals Create a Public | Whatever the style, the public intellectual is always speaking to an audience that is not there. The problem with our public intellectuals today has little to do with their style. It has little to do with their professional location, whether they write from the academy or for the little magazines. It has little to do with the suburbs, bohemia, or tenure. The problem with our public intellectuals today is that they are writing for readers who already exist, as they exist.
Completion Rates Rising, Slowly | The National Student Clearinghouse Research Center found in its latest annual data report on college completion that, while completion rates have been on the rise for each cohort year beginning with the group who entered college in 2009, the growth is slowing…The report follows the pathways of first-time college students and stays with them even if they transfer. This year’s report analyzes the outcomes for students who enrolled in 2013, as well as the eight-year results for those who enrolled in 2011…Six-year completion rates are up across all sectors, but those who started in private, for-profit, four-year colleges had the biggest jump in completion, increasing from 37.3 percent to 42.4 percent.
Student Loans A Lot Like The Subprime Mortgage Debacle, Watchdog Says | Calhoun says the government needs to fix the programs that are already in place that could potentially help millions of people. One program in particular could forgive large amounts of debt for public service workers such as police officers and teachers, but Calhoun says it’s being badly mismanaged. He also says the government should lower interest rates to ease the burden on people. Millions of other borrowers, he says, could avoid defaulting on their loans if they were enrolled in existing “income-driven repayment” plans that allow them to make very small payments if that’s all they can afford. But many borrowers don’t get enrolled in them. Until those problems get fixed, he says, it may not wreck the economy, but it will be a drag on it.
Half in U.S. Now Consider College Education Very Important | About half of U.S. adults (51%) now consider a college education to be “very important,” down from 70% in 2013. Over the same period, the percentages rating college as “fairly important” and “not too important” have both increased, to 36% and 13%, respectively.
Democrats’ Divide: Free College for All or for Some? | The heated exchange exposed the potency of one of the sleeper issues of the Democratic presidential primary. College affordability may not get the attention of “Medicare for All” or carry the emotional punch of debates over race and gender, but it stands as one of the sharpest policy divides between the leading candidates in the race and one likely to have staying power. As their party’s electoral fortunes increasingly depend on college graduates, Democrats are under pressure to do something about Americans’ mountain of student debt — a $1.5 trillion behemoth. Their search for solutions is creating conflicts about how to best address inequality
| U.S. States and Territories |
Is California saving higher education? | It’s one example of the many ways that California is taking on seemingly intractable problems that are plaguing higher education nationwide. These include the longer-than-expected amount of time it takes students to graduate; high dropout rates; financial aid that doesn’t cover living expenses; courses that cost more than students will earn from what they learn; institutions that prey on veterans and others; financial aid applications so complex that many students never bother with them; admissions policies that favor relatives of donors and alumni; credits that won’t transfer; pricey textbooks; and “remedial” education requirements that force students to retake subjects they should have learned in high school, often frustrating them enough to quit.
New Community Colleges Catering to Needs of Next Generation of Students | The new schools that have sprung up in the past ten years are employing creative strategies to more holistically serve their communities, according to Dr. Karen Stout, president and CEO of Achieving the Dream, a nonprofit focused on student success at community colleges. “I think that we will always see new forms of community college options being considered to meet new needs,” Stout says. The schools surfacing now are designed to fill “different holes in what the ecosystems of support are to support students of all backgrounds: adults, traditional, nontraditional learners.”
Student success: A strategic challenge for Connecticut’s economic health | Consequently, graduation rate is an increasingly controversial metric because the FTFT cohort is not representative of the wide range of ages, backgrounds, enrollment status, and goals that characterize the current state of college student population. In other words, the graduation rate for a particular institution does not represent all portions of an institution’s student population. While graduation rate is still a good measure for the FTFT cohort, that cohort is now a smaller portion of the student population -– particularly within the Connecticut community colleges.
Reports Question Merits of Free Community College Programs | As the concept of free four-year college tuition gradually picks up steam, aided by spirited debate among Democratic presidential contenders, free tuition at community colleges has been spreading at a quicker pace. Currently 19 states offer free tuition at their public community colleges and several other states are in the process of establishing such programs. Scholars and education policy analysts are questioning whether two-year institutions and the students they serve — especially those most in need — are actually benefiting from free tuition programs.
Study Spotlights Outcomes for Community College Transfer Students | A recent report demonstrates that attending a community college increases the chance for low-income, underrepresented students to attend selective four-year institutions. In the research paper, “Does the Community College Pathway Influence the Selectivity of Students’ Destination 4-Year Institution?” authors Dr. Justin C. Ortagus and Dr. Xiaodan Hu answer with a resounding “yes.” When comparing minority, low-income and academically underprepared students who directly entered four-year institutions with students of similar backgrounds who went first to community colleges, the students who transferred from community colleges were 24% more likely to attend a selective college or university.
| Institutional |
Many Public Universities Refuse to Reveal Professors’ Conflicts of Interest | All too often, what’s publicly known about faculty members’ outside activities, even those that could influence their teaching, research, or public-policy views, depends on where they teach. Academic conflicts of interest elude scrutiny because transparency varies from one university and one state to the next. ProPublica discovered those inconsistencies over the past year as we sought faculty outside-income forms from at least one public university in all 50 states.
Busting Student Eval Myths? | The results show a “negative skew” for those who leave comments — and those who don’t. This suggests that concerns about “bimodal extremism” are unfounded, the report says. And among students who leave comments, a significant share rate professors above the median value. Also important is that many students who rate professors at the maximum end of the scale don’t leave any comments as to why. Over all, the study says, the data do spark questions about how to “better design instructor feedback systems to encourage more students to leave comments — along with helping to ensure provided comments are best utilized to assist faculty in better ensuring student success in subsequent semesters.”
The Truth About Learning Communities | Instead of treating teaching as a solitary, siloed activity, instructors must collaborate in defining learning outcomes, selecting content and readings, and designing assignments and assessments. Instead of thinking of themselves solely as instructors, faculty must envision their role and responsibility more broadly as mentors and architects of a broad range of learning experiences inside and outside the classroom. This vision is, of course, at odds with our training and our current incentive structure. It cuts against the Romantic image of professors as independent artisans and solo practitioners devoted to their craft, which is research and scholarship. But there are examples should inspire us. Honors programs typically include one or more core classes taught in multiple small sections. At Columbia, instructors in the core curriculum classes on political and moral philosophy and theology and literary masterworks take part in intensive multihour weekly pedagogy and content sessions. In these instances, instructors are expected to be mentors: motivating students, providing guidance and emotional support, sharing knowledge and expertise, and serving as role models.
How Mission-Aligned Analytics Questions Can Support Institutional Transformation | Analytics tools can be used to answer many different questions. By using analytics to address carefully considered questions, institutional leaders can better understand a situation, shine a light on a problem or challenge, and guide thinking. Developing strategic, mission-aligned questions allows institutions to more effectively use data and information to inform decision-making and achieve goals and objectives. And, as institutional leaders make a practice of requesting data and analytics to support decision-making, the use of analytics can become more deeply ingrained in the institution’s culture.
U student group: UMN should declare a climate crisis, divest from fossil fuels | A new University of Minnesota student group held a march Friday to demand the University divest from fossil fuels and do more to address the climate crisis. A group of more than 50 students and community members marched across campus to Morrill Hall, the location of University President Joan Gabel’s office, to bring attention to their demands. The University’s Minnesota Climate Strike student group, a branch of the statewide initiative, insisted the University declare a climate emergency, create a new climate and environmental justice major and cut ties with the fossil fuel industry, among others.
White Supremacy in the Classroom | Lauren Krapf, national policy counsel for the Anti-Defamation League, said it’s important for university and college professors to determine the effectiveness of such presentations in the classrooms and to spur thoughtful conversations and enhance learning. “While there is absolutely a First Amendment right to speech on public university campuses, the classroom is not an appropriate place for white nationalist recruitment,” she said. “It is incumbent on the university and professors to make determinations about how presentations, conversations and assignments on controversial topics are handled — with an eye toward advancing the educational purpose of a particular assignment or course offering.”
