International
No need for a ‘higher education ministry’ | Last month, the Education Ministry revealed that it planned to upgrade its Office of Higher Education Commission (Ohec) into a ministry to lift university standards citing the “crisis in the higher education system”, low rankings of Thai universities, budget restrictions, low standards of graduates, and governance problems in various universities.
Descent into ignorance as critical voices are silenced | Last year was difficult for Turkey in terms of academic rights and free speech violations and their possible consequences for the education system. Unfortunately, it seems 2017 will not be any better.
Future of outward higher education internationalisation | In this context, the international mission of a higher education institution is to learn from the world, not just to teach the world or experience it.
Providing Access to Higher Education for Refugees in Germany | To provide centrally organized, cohesive measures to the refugee crisis regarding entrance to higher education, the Federal Ministry of Education and Research supplied 100 million Euro for higher education programs for refugees for 2016-19.
Pacific Islanders suffer by being denied higher education loans | Rules preventing many Pacific Islanders living in Australia from accessing the government’s higher education loan scheme should be relaxed as they are effectively making university too expensive, new research has found.
U.S. National
Closing Students’ Achievement Gaps at the National Level | Karen A. Stout, president of Achieving the Dream, says the organization has fostered a conversation around data-driven decision making, and helped improve student outcomes, at the more than 200 colleges it has worked with since 2004. But she says much more needs to be done to close lingering achievement gaps and to move the needle at the national level.
The Conservative Approach to Student Loans | Right-leaning policy thinkers push agenda to simplify loan system, inject bigger role for private lenders. But proposals to eliminate PLUS loans likely to draw opposition from advocacy groups.
Don’t Blame Tenured Academics for the Adjunct Crisis | Faculty hiring has been outpaced by that of administrators and staff charged with managing a growing army of adjuncts and monetizing the university’s recreational and residential wings. Say what you will about Miltonists, but almost without exception this does not reflect their priorities and it was not their doing.
Large-Scale Assessment Without Standardized Tests | Are students really absorbing what they’re being taught, and will they remember it later on? How can that be measured and compared nationally? Those questions, among others, drive the work of the Association of American Colleges and Universities, which today released a report on what it calls a “groundbreaking approach” to assessing student learning.
Experts: Private Lenders Could Complicate Student Loan Program | If private lenders are allowed back into the federal student loan program — a program from which they were removed during the Obama administration under the Affordable Care Act of 2010 — it would preclude “universal access to student loans at universal terms,” a new paper released Wednesday states.
U.S. States
Don’t Blame State Disinvestment Alone | Nationwide, tuition and fee revenue rose by about $107 per full-time-equivalent student per year over the last 25 years. State and local appropriations fell by about $73 per student per year. In other words, only 68 percent of the increase in tuition and fee revenue can be explained as covering losses in state and local funding.
Higher Education: Student Scarcity | Central Ohio colleges and universities continue to compete and recruit aggressively, rebranding themselves and adding innovative new programs in an attempt to prove their value to sometimes skeptical students.
Money Woes Extend Beyond Tuition | A new report from the Center for Community College Student Engagement released during the 2017 Achieving the Dream conference today revealed that nearly half of community college students reported that a lack of finances could cause them to withdraw from their institutions.
New study finds tuition-free higher education possible with taxes | Reclaim California’s Master Plan for Higher Education seeks to restore the Donahoe Act of 1960, which recommended state colleges, including the University of California, remain tuition-free to in-state students.
Institutional
25 Years Without a Raise | You only turn 25 years without a raise once. That was the idea behind a tongue-in-cheek party adjunct instructors at Youngstown State University threw for themselves this month, to mark a quarter-century without any increase in pay.
‘Lower Ed’ | A new book argues that the focus on credentials and growing inequality led to the rise in for-profit colleges.
Committed to Affordability | The University of Dayton is building on its commitment to tackle the affordability of higher education with its lowest tuition increase in 45 years, just 2 percent for first-year students starting in the 2017-18 school year.