International
The Time to Reform India’s Education System is Now | The writing is on the wall. India’s higher education system is in crisis and everyone is paying a hefty price for it: students, parents, industry, society and the nation.
Looming crisis over university student fee hike plan | Kenya’s university students are facing a defining moment following a stand-off between the government and university administrators over a plan to raise tuition fees from next year.
Budget cuts to higher education sabotaging Israel’s existential strategic asset | The heads of academic institutions warned on Tuesday that the opening of the upcoming academic year was in jeopardy if planned budget cuts to the higher education system were to pass.
Check the data, drop the dogma | To modern cosmopolitans the way we finance universities is almost as strange. OECD statistics suggest our rate of public spending is too low: second last in the OECD in 2011 and behind Spain in 2012. In 2013 a Greens policy said that compared to the OECD average of 1.1 per cent of GDP, Australian universities were underfunded by $10.3 billion a year.
Making information about students work for everybody | All the government needs to do is legislate to allow the data linkage that already exists between the Department of Education and the Australian Taxation Office to be used for these purposes.
U.S. National
THE to partner with Wall Street Journal on new US college ranking | The inaugural The Wall Street Journal/Times Higher Education College Ranking will be released in September 2016 and will include more than 1,000 colleges and universities in the US.
27 is the new 18: Adult students on the rise | NCES points out that even though the number of degree-seeking students under the age of 25 has grown at a higher rate than the adult population, future projections show the adult population growing at a higher percentage.
How Much Does Living Off-Campus Cost? Who Knows? | Nearly 60 percent of colleges significantly underestimate or overestimate off-campus living costs, according to continuing research by the Wisconsin HOPE Lab (for Harvesting Opportunities for Postsecondary Education), which studies barriers to college access and completion.
Diverse Conversations: Is the Federal Government Behind the Rising Cost of Higher Education? | According to Sen. Elizabeth Warren, the government is partly to blame. In 2015, she wrote a blistering letter to U.S. Department of Education Secretary John King regarding how the department handles student loan fraud. In the letter, Warren accuses the department of not having a proper handle on student loan contractors, and specifically cites its relationship with Navient, formerly known as Sallie Mae.
Racial Gaps: Does the Public Care? | New study documents continuing gaps (and some progress) in educational attainment of black and Latino students compared to white and Asian students. Another study suggests most people aren’t that worried about the issue.
U.S. States
College prep: Out of reach? New study compares college costs, average income by state | Nothing seems to be stopping the trend of exceedingly high college expenses, and a new study finds that the cost of college has gone from simply expensive to unaffordable for most low- and middle-income families.
Institutional
Disrupting Higher Education | Disrupting existing models meant starting with design thinking and design process focusing on improving the student experience – from the moment they research the university on the web to the moment that they graduate from the university. This is intentionally student centered to ensure an experience that will help student’s reach their full potential.
No Longer a Lounge of Their Own | Michigan State has closed its women’s lounge. A male professor at another university complained about it, but many female students at the university want it back.
College Drops Black-Only Course Sections | Moraine Valley Community College will stop offering sections of orientation course restricted to specific racial groups.
The Liberal Arts in the Real World | The addition of a “diversity requirement” to the curriculum at Hamilton College has gained considerable attention and prompted lively debate since it was announced in May.
Digital, Verified and Less Open | More colleges are issuing digital badges to help their students display skills to employers or graduate programs, and colleges are tapping vendor platforms to create a verified form of the alternative credentials.
Defining the Relationship | Dear Students: I think it’s time we had the talk. You know, the one couples who’ve been together for a while sometimes have to review boundaries and expectations?
Helping Faculty ‘Get It’ | The provost of Birmingham-Southern College, which has had a rough decade, talks with professors about the changing higher education environment, hoping the context will help them better understand the college’s situation.
DC-UP Seeks Top Students Through Generous Scholarship | But when Charles learned from his high school principal that the University of the District of Columbia—or UDC—was offering a full ride to a select group of top students such as himself, plus a $6,000 housing stipend, Charles scrapped his plans to go out of state and settled on going to college close to home.
Messy Breakups Make More Noise | Presidents are facing more scrutiny and capturing headlines as they fight publicly with boards for their jobs.