Monthly Archive for June, 2011

Check out this article in The Chronicle, my favorite part:

That unquenchable thirst for resources, which is by no means unique to Harvard, has spread throughout the larger body of American higher education. Every state and city has its would-be Ivies now, striving for ways to build a heap of cash, not admit as many undergraduates as possible, and charge more tuition to those who remain.

Undergraduates are increasingly being used as decoration, passing strangers handy for photographs in brochures. That’s why admissions officers work so hard to get them in all manner of shapes, sizes, and colors. And that’s why nobody wants to admit more of them—you only need so many to fill out a brochure, and the more applicants you reject the more awesomely selective and unattainable—and thus attractive—you seem.

But, please, do go read the whole thing.

The Morning News again: Jeff Sandefer is making unproductive professors whine:

Vedder’s first analysis, which received wide news coverage in Texas, showed that 20 percent of the UT-Austin faculty taught 57 percent of the students and that the same proportion, 20 percent, generate 99.8 percent of the outside research funding.

I’m all for this sort of increased scrutiny on the professors of our public institutions.

I am not in favor of one strong proponent with money locking in his vision of education and forestalling all others.  It does not appear, yet, that Sandefer is trying to do what I would be against.  He has also put his money where his mouth is, he has opened his own school: Acton MBA.  It is interesting that he does follow some of the conventional aspects of higher education, having an arrangement with Hardin-Simmons for accreditation.

I would be money the accreditation arrangement is done only so that the students can get financial aid.