A Promising Chance at Reform with Congressional Higher Ed Bill
In 1965, President Lyndon Johnson signed the Higher Education Act into law, inserting the federal government irrevocably into the inner workings of America’s colleges and universities. The bill increased federal…
What Can We Do About Degree Inflation?
In his recent book The Case Against Education, Professor Bryan Caplan argues that most Americans derive little benefit from their years of schooling in terms of skill and knowledge. What…
Carnegie Classifications—What’s All the Fuss?
“Dartmouth falls out of an exclusive group,” declared a 2016 headline in The Washington Post just days after the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education released its 2015 classifications…
Mitch Daniels Has the Right Stuff for Purdue
Higher education does not produce many flashy, innovating entrepreneurs like Mark Zuckerberg, Steve Jobs, Peter Thiel, or Elon Musk. The non-profit, highly subsidized, and low-incentive culture that universities operate in…
What Future Journalists Should Know About Journalism School
It might have been drilled into your head from a young age that the only way to be successful in life is to get a college degree. You might have…
How to Stop Student Aid from Driving Up Tuition
The Department of Education’s method for awarding college students financial aid has many perverse effects. It contributes to rising tuition, keeps students in the dark about their aid eligibility for…
North Carolina’s Universities Are Affordable—But There’s Room for Improvement
Each year, higher education seems to become less and less affordable: As tuition prices continue to rise, an increasing number of students leave college with crippling amounts of student loan…
Why Conservative Policymakers Should Support Community Colleges
In the first installment of this series, I offered several reasons why conservative families ought to consider sending their kids to the local community college. This time, I would like…
Fun with Numbers: UNC-Asheville’s Economic Impact Study Is Marketing, Not Fact
Too often, universities use studies about themselves as marketing opportunities rather than a chance to understand reality. This is especially true with “economic impact” studies that purport to examine a…
The Conservative Case for Community Colleges, Part I: To Parents
For many parents, the prospect of sending their kids off to college can be daunting. If the price tag alone doesn’t scare them silly, there are more than enough stories…