Are Students Addicted to Distraction?
A few years ago, something changed in class. I customarily taught classes where my students read multiple books, wrote thoughtful reflective essays, and came to class prepared to engage in…
The Chinese Don’t Like Academic Freedom, So American Schools Should Avoid Their Confucius Institutes
Academic freedom has long been a guiding principle for American colleges and universities: Neither faculty nor students should be told what to say or punished for saying whatever they think.…
The Uncertain Future of Coding Boot Camps
Students are enrolling in coding “boot camps” at record rates, with the number of graduates increasing from about 2,200 in 2013 to an estimated 23,000 in 2017. However, the booming…
Grade Inflation Just Got Respectable: The New Eligibility Rule Governing Georgia’s HOPE Scholarship
Georgia’s HOPE Scholarship is now in its twenty-fourth year of existence. Originally the brainchild of then Governor Zell Miller, since 1993 this merit-based scholarship program has distributed in excess of…
Closing the Gap at North Carolina’s Historically Black Universities
Earlier this month, the Triangle Business Journal revealed that graduates from North Carolina’s Historically Black College and Universities (HBCUs) are lagging their peers in terms of median salary after graduation.…
Contra the “McDonaldization” of Higher Education
The term “McDonaldization” was coined by sociology professor George Ritzer in 1993. He meant for it to describe “the industrial process of rationalization that [was] expanding beyond industry into the…
Segregated Student Housing: Exclusion in the Name of Inclusion
Irwin Holmes was in his living room, a laptop computer in front of him, a pile of reading materials stacked next to him, and his wife seated nearby when he…
How Higher Education “Studies” Men
In 2013, Stony Brook University (part of the SUNY system) revealed plans for a new “Center for the Study of Men and Masculinities.” Since I’m a Stony Brook grad, I…
Higher Education’s Diversity Obsession: A Bad Bargain
The obsession with diversity is so widespread among American colleges that it has become a normal part of campus life. Just what “normal” looks like is revealed in a new…
How to Fight the ABA’s Anticompetitive and Discriminatory Practices
Recently I urged top law schools to stand up to the excesses and abuses occasioned by the ministrations of the American Bar Association (ABA). These schools could band together and…