Note to University Officials: Elevate Marketing Above Ideology
Several years ago, when I headed marketing at a major public university, a colleague suggested we needed our own “moonshot” to stem the tide of declining enrollment. I took the…
UNC Wears Its History Well
It is today widely acknowledged that face-reading—the belief that you can work out the character of a person from the look of their face—is impossible. But what about institutions? Can…
Prestige Must Die
Anyone involved in higher education reform might recognize a very particular pattern—an “elite” university, often one of the Ivy League schools, does something inane. Reformers, usually but not exclusively conservatives,…
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…
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”…