Michigan Thinks Grades Are the Problem
The University of Michigan plans to exclude first-semester letter grades from students’ transcripts to “curb the mental health crisis.” What would seem like a mundane university-level grading change has become…
Articles
Articles
Conservatives Need Not Apply?
While I was in graduate school, I regularly participated in a research program that paid students to taste test food. Many social science disciplines conduct research this way. While these…
Foreign Languages Are a National Interest
Ever since Benjamin Franklin wielded his fluent French to persuade Parisian elites to support the War of Independence, foreign language knowledge has enabled American diplomats and representatives—not to mention spies—to…
What Biology Can Teach Us About History
Stephen H. Balch’s Naturalizing History: A Biocultural Theory of Human Progress (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2026) is a grand synthesis of biology and history that articulates many of the concerns of…
The Pirates Are Pillaging Their Own Campus
East Carolina University is going through a bad stretch. Sexual assaults. Hazing reports. Drunken student behavior. Religious-property vandalism. A dorm peeping case. Alleged drug and alcohol use among prospective members…
A PhD Built for the Real World
In late July, the White House and National Science Foundation announced in the right-leaning tech publication, Pirate Wires, that, beginning this fall, they would be establishing a $47 million program…
The Need to Reclaim Liberal Education
Peter Berkowitz is one of those rare public intellectuals who doesn’t mind being on the “wrong” side of hot controversies—which is to say, he’s willing to clash with the “progressive”…
UT-Austin Puts the “Core” Back in Core Curriculum
For decades, the American university has been drifting away from its most important purpose: giving students a common education in the knowledge and principles they need to become educated citizens.…
Not All Graduate Degrees Pay Off
Higher education has long included graduate degrees in the United States. But over the last decade or so, the number of students seeking degrees after earning their bachelors has been…
UNC Wins. The “Elite” Universities Whine.
The Department of War (DoW) has announced that the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill will be among 19 new hosts of the Senior Service College Fellowship. The ten-month…