What Do College ‘Chief Diversity Officers’ Accomplish?
Over the last few decades, the number of college administrators has grown far more than the numbers of students and faculty. Amid this administrative bloat, the greatest growth has been…
Answering the Perennial Question: Why Does College Cost So Much?
Last month, Amanda Ripley, writing for The Atlantic, asked a good question: why does higher education in the United States cost significantly more than in every other OECD nation except…
The Tangled Web of Scientific Publishing
Science Publishing Is Incoherent, Expensive, and Slow Communication is essential to science. The aim of scientific publication is to convey new findings as quickly as possible to as many interested…
How Women Can Avoid the Student Loan Gender Gap
Every year, the American Association of University Women (AAUW) releases a new report illustrating how women are disproportionately impacted by student loan debt. The average woman graduates with $2,739 more…
Gaming the System: How Kentucky Spends Funding for Students on Athletics
Kentuckians were forced to consider potential problems with intercollegiate athletics when both the University of Louisville and the University of Kentucky were implicated in the recent FBI probe into possibly…
PLUS Loans: Subtraction by Addition?
Student loan debt remains a burden for millions of college graduates and dropouts, but the federal government has not yet hit the brakes on its loan engine. Now, it’s becoming…
Can More Information Help Students Avoid College Debt?
The Department of Education is poised to replace Obama-era regulations on for-profit colleges and universities with more broad-based transparency measures. On August 10, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos revealed her plan…
University Foundations: A Convenient Way to Bypass Oversight
As public institutions funded by taxpayers, state colleges and universities are limited in the kinds of commercial activity in which they can participate. This is particularly so when it comes…
No, the World Doesn’t Need More Humanities PhDs
In May, The Chronicle of Higher Education asked four academics from across the country to weigh in on the “adjunct crisis.” The results were predictable, with most of the blame directed at the usual…
UNC Faculty Teaching Loads Report Is Insufficient for Making Policy
Reliable information is a prerequisite for good management. How can you make intelligent decisions if you are basing them on shaky information? This has been an ongoing problem for the…