Fifth in a Series on Research Good students, those academically inclined and motivated to learn, value opportunities for research as undergraduates. If you are an undergraduate who thinks that research is only for faculty and graduate students, you have noā¦
Fourth in a Series on Research Research creates interest and value for a university and its locale. “This atmosphere of excitement, arising from imaginative consideration, transforms knowledge. A fact is no longer a bare fact: it is invested with allā¦
Third in a Series on Research J.E. Lawrence, in The Nebraska State Journal in 1949 regarding pioneer life and character, wrote: “New land is harsh, and vigorous, and sturdy. It scorns evidence of weakness. There is nothing of sham orā¦
Second in a Series on Research To find excellence in a university, find the intent of the organization. What do the people who work there, and the students who study there, think the place is about? What do they wantā¦
First in a Series on Research Learning creates ideas grounded in the past but hopeful for the future. History is the basis for discovery, and it relentlessly repeats itself absent new ideas and insight: Forward focused investigation and research. Whenā¦
Knowing the genuine interests and educational needs of students is good business. Serving those interests well, with energized faculty, serves the institution. That too, is strictly business. “Listen, I want to congratulate you and Macy’s on this wonderful new stuntā¦
Universities systematically misrepresent the value of a degree. All degrees may have some value, but how much, to whom? University leadership should help students decide what works for them and why. The idea that any degree under any circumstances hasā¦
Service from universities to the extended community always has value. The best universities have codified a service imperative into their mission statements and are committed to providing insight and ideas to the community through individual students, faculty, and staff. “Theā¦
The work of higher education is fairly simple. Teachers teach, students learn and benefits accrue; individually, corporately, and socially. As student abilities, backgrounds, needs, and aspirations change, so too must our approaches to teaching. Or, there will be no learning.ā¦
Governance — leadership in a word — in the froth of forces at work in a contemporary public university seems unattainable. The job of mayor and Governor is becoming more and more like the job of university president, which Iā¦
Pride in a community effort is well-placed. Misplaced pride focuses on self. Well placed pride focuses outwardly towards something larger than self. This is ultimately what produces excellence in a university. When you look at a city, it’s like readingā¦
No matter how acute the acquired analytical ability, the craft in writing or the fluency in mathematics, if students leave universities with a sense that self is the only purpose of the university experience, the game is over. And itā¦
A university earns a reputation through thousands of acts of diligence from faculty and staff of every kind at every level. Clean toilets to good governance. Image cannot be persuaded into existence with a single effort, but is the resultā¦
Unsuccessful in meeting an aspiration? Easy, find somebody to blame. The challenging thing to do, individually and corporately, is to understand self and ability, purpose and action in such a way there is never a need to blame anyone forā¦
Universities donāt set out to do it. They donāt try to accomplish it, but nonetheless are successful in creating far too many victims, and it is not a state of mind. āPeople think that a liar gains a victory overā¦
Students benefit from an educational experience that requires rigorous analytical thought: the power of a sharp mind. The value of such a mind is real in the marketplace, with worth beyond measure for anyone who possesses one. The liberally educatedā¦
The idea of colleges raising tuition based on the willingness of families to pay is poorly conceived. Cost and quality must fit together. Any other viewpoint is wrong academically. And equally important, it makes bad business: It may work, butā¦
No two universities are the same. No university was the same last year as it will be next year. Ditto for students. “The only man I know who behaves sensibly is my tailor; he takes my measurements anew each timeā¦
Good universities create community. Places of learning create a sense of belonging when they are well led, not necessarily by people in formal leadership positions, but as acts of commitment from a communityās citizens and a deep yearning to connectā¦
Student loan default rates are three times higher at for-profit institutions than at public universities. Those borrowing the most, default the most. Disturbingly, non-traditional college goers based on race, gender, or age, subsidize higher education through bogus loan programs inā¦
Tenth in the series, Follow the money From Boston to Austin and Oxford, Mississippi, to West Lafayette, Indiana, big and small, prosperous or starving, universities are married to communities, for better or worse. When one hurts, both do. āThe relationshipā¦
Ninth in the series, Follow the money Confidence is like capital; it can be accumulated, invested or saved, and spent. When universities are well-tuned, a two-way flow of confidence occurs from outside the institution, inward, and from within the institution,ā¦
Eighth in the series, Follow the money Retirements trim budgets. Retirements without assessment of individual contribution to attaining mission may reduce operating costs. Important as that is in an environment of scarcity, budget trimming alone represents a wanting accomplishment ifā¦
Seventh in the series, Follow the money A campus is more than buildings, but nothing without them. An Internet address? Maybe. Campus buildings, monuments, stadiums, digs and castles, are worth little without collected cultural, scientific and artistic insight and aā¦
Independence Day What follows is a piece that was originally published in July 2009. Given the issues at many U.S. colleges, such as Mr. Jeffersonās University in Virginia, or the funding challenges at all public universities in the land, fundamentalā¦
Sixth in the series, Follow the money Research produces knowledge that changes the world. Its value, for the often slow result of careful investigation, is both difficult to forecast and impossible to calibrate. For, behind the scenes, halfway around theā¦
Fifth in the series, Follow the money Only a small fraction of the U.S. student population attends the 103 Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) universities. At other schools, college athletics is a whole different ballgame. Where does this focus on theā¦
Fourth in the series Follow the Money Giving is always the result of leadership, from giver and recipient. Private givingās absence results from a lack of university leadership. State funding is critical, but private giving separates the good from theā¦
Third in the series Follow the Money Any expert in efficiency will tell you the same thing: āDo it right the first time.ā Doing it a second time costs twice as much. 1 + 1 = 2 Perhaps the mostā¦
Second in the series Follow the Money Money flows into universities because it is good for the people who lend, and who profit from it. Sometimes, it is even good for the people who borrow. Sometimes. Money you’ve got lotsā¦
College costs are escalating for a number of reasons, but first among them is that there are resources available to pay for increases. Even that great baby-boomer sage, The Beaver, got it – Theodore “Beaver” Cleaver: I could use myā¦
Dear Graduating Senior, I must beg your pardon for a somber reflection amidst the joy of your accomplishment: not to be a wet rag on the festivities of graduation, but to shine a light on the realities of post-secondary education.ā¦
Leadership withoutĀ spine or vision, subject to political whim, fancy, flirtation, and subjugation, will compromise, and eventually enfeeble, U.S. higher education. To watch it occur, as universities are held up as the panacea for social ills, is reckless beyond measure. Realā¦
The university is a mirror of, or window to, the world. St. Paul suggested to the Church of Corinth that at times we āsee through the glass darkly.ā Things are not as sharp or bright as they should be. Soā¦
Our universities exist to educate and separate. Education is essentially a process of separation. Ignorance is separated and eliminated through insight. Students willing to submit to the process of an education should have the opportunity. This is a social obligation,ā¦
H.G. Wellsā Invisible Man, Griffin, demonstrated the chimera of ultimate transparency in his novella of 1897. Over and over we see leaders, in universities specifically but in corporate and public life generally, who act as though they can control whichā¦
I have seen Enterprise Rent-A-Car establishments on university campuses. Chartwells and other food providers are common sights at our institutions of higher learning. And, it has finally happened. Teaching is also being outsourced now. Ā Both Florida Atlantic University and Missouriā¦
Leonard Pitts, in an April Foolās Day editorial – no pun, just the facts – suggested that educational institutions are focused on the wrong issues. In New Yorkās public schools, dinosaur, birthday, pepperoni, and dancing, all make the NYC Departmentā¦
Universities have lost their mission. Education and academic performance take a back seat to reinforcing the inflated self-concept of students and their families. We have reduced admission standards, reduced standards to progress through courses, and reduced standards of performance requiredā¦
People are concerned about community colleges. Faculty and administrators at some universities see the two-year institutions as competition. Others look down their noses at transfer students. But we better quit grousing about it and address the real issue. Students enrolledā¦
University systems are political organizations. Universities are academic organizations. The two coexist symbiotically only with determined leadership. In a speech opening the legislative session, House Speaker Dean Cannon said Floridaās public university system is āracing toward the middle,ā a hodgepodgeā¦
Traditions, good and bad, are difficult to dislodge once in place. Change in universities occurs at glacial velocity. The nature of a university, like the character of a community, is determined, in large part, by its traditions and habits. āAllā¦
Universities are defined by their traditions. They can take many forms, some positive, and some negative, but all communities have traditions shaped by citizens who reside there, and a university is a community. Traditions cannot be regulated or imposed, butā¦
Unbridled, ill-conceived, or poorly implemented regulation often creates undesirable outcomes. Legislators refer to such results as unintended consequences. Sometimes, such consequences are the result of well-meant actions, imposed by parties unfamiliar with the underlying complexity of a situation. When assumptionsā¦
The absence of transparency and forthrightness can destroy organizations built on trust – churches, universities and the like. Lacking these, educational institutions become like Wal-Mart. Now, I am a Wal-Mart fan, but I find myself on guard every time Iā¦
In many cases, a college diploma has come to represent exposure to certain experiences rather than individual learning and accomplishment. Absent gross misconduct, everybody passes. The degree is simply a totem of club membership rather than an indication of aā¦
Competition for ideas is unlike competition for anything else.Ā If we compete to harvest the most gold, we find a limited supply.Ā Fastest person, physiology sets in.Ā Universities should compete for ideas, and those ideas will generate new resources. Weā¦
We tend to find what we look for. You know the old expression, if all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Those students who look for an intellectual challenge find it… most universities willingly oblige them.ā¦
The relationship of a student to the university is a bit like a marriage. The idea of that relationship is shifting as George Bernard Shaw predicted it would. As with marriage, the university experience is becoming a contractualĀ affiliation rather thanā¦
Well-meaning faculty members, university leaders, and groups of students and parents have always found that the most navigable and widely paved path to address increasing costs leads straight to the state house. That mindless āhair-of-the-dogā economic thinking is antiquated. And,ā¦
The best ideas confront common sense with a baseball bat. They defy logic because we cannot see beyond overly simplistic views of how things work. If you give something away it must have little or no value. Right? Wake theā¦
