The New Extension Service: Urbane, Ubane | Scott Carlson | Chronicle of Higher Education | 30 November, 2012
The 98-year-old program, designed to bring university research to farmers, is adapting its mission for city folks.
Transfer of powers: legal question hangs over University of Law | John Morgan | Times Higher Education | 29 November 2012
Legal expert identifies ‘unclear’ structure of landmark in coalition policy. The creation of the UK’s first for-profit university has left a legal expert asking whether the government has allowed degree-awarding powers to be sold or transferred – a move that is not permissible.
New National Tally of College Completion Tries to Count All Students | Katherine Mangan | Chronicle of Higher Education | 23 November, 2012
For years, higher-education leaders have argued that dismal college-completion rates fail to capture the single mother who could squeeze in only a few classes per semester or the serviceman who started at one college and finished years later at another. On Thursday, the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center released a report that takes account of the circuitous but ultimately successful routes that students often take toward a college degree.
The report, “Completing College: A National View of Student Attainment Rates,” concludes that when such nontraditional but increasingly common patterns of enrollment are considered, the national completion rate jumps to 54 percent, from 42 percent. Among full-time students, 75 percent earn a degree or certificate within six years.
‘Buffer’ body revival fails to sway Universities Australia | Andrew Trounson | The Australian Higher Education | 21 November, 2012
THOSE pushing for revival of an independent “buffer” body between sector and government appear to have lost the battle of ideas within Universities Australia.
The proposal for such a body as a way to cut reaqd tape and promote coherent polcy is expectd to be abandoned or wwatered down in UA’s policy platform after most vice-chancellors were left unconvinced.
Need 3 Quick Credits to Play Ball? Call Western Oklahoma | Brad Wolverton | Chronicle of Higher Education | 16 November, 2012
You’ve probably never heard of Western Oklahoma State College. But call almost any major athletics department, and staff there know it well.
Its name comes up whenever athletes get themselves in a jam: They’ve failed a class. They’ve dropped another. Maybe they’re just short on credits. But they still want to play.
Tertiary figures fall short of target | John Ross | The Australian Higher Education | 14 November, 2012
AUSTRALIA’S population is not becoming qualified any faster than it was in 2008, when governments agreed to halve the proportion of adults without tertiary qualifications — a target they now appear to have little chance of achieving.
The Council of Australian Governments Reform Council said the slow increase in the level of post-school qualifications since 2008 had been “consistent with the historical trend”, with no obvious impact from the 2008 agreement.
Adjuncts Build Strength in Numbers | Audrey Williams June | Chronicle of Higher Education | 9 November, 2012
“We do a lot of teaching,” says Caroline Meline, an adjunct instructor of philosophy at Saint Joseph’s U. “That’s just the way it is in our department.” She is among adjuncts pressing for higher pay and a voice in governance on a campus where two-thirds of the faculty are off the tenure track. Ten years ago, less than half of the faculty were off the tenure track.
Resource training backed by taskforce | John Ross | The Australian Higher Education | 07 November, 2012 12:00AM
A DISUSED TAFE campus could become the home of a new “training delivery and brokerage operation” in which the Queensland Resources Council had a commercial interest, according to a taskforce chaired by QRC chief Michael Roche and asked to give the state government independent advice.
The government “might contribute all or part of a surplus TAFE campus” to the new entity, according to the report from the Skills and Training Taskforce, released yesterday.
One Tiny College’s Lessons for Higher Education | Scott Carlson | Chronicle of Higher Education | 02 November, 2012
Jordan Motzkin graduated from the College of the Atlantic in 2010 with a passion for growing lettuce. It’s not what you think. Given the groovy reputation of a place like COA—a college founded in 1969, where students sport dreadlocks, natural fibers, and outdoorsy attire—you might assume that Mr. Motzkin wound up as an organic farmer somewhere in Maine. So many past graduates have done something like that.
Instead, Mr. Motzkin, dressed in business casual, meets me at his office in an architecture firm in New York City’s garment district. His venture—started through COA’s latest pedagogical experiment, an entrepreneurship program called the Hatchery—could turn industrial agriculture on its head: growing crops hydroponically in warehouse spaces near food-distribution centers, cutting down on the land, chemicals, and fuel needed to put romaine on people’s plates. He already has formed a partnership with the nation’s third-largest food distributor and has entertained offers in the millions from venture-capital firms.
Higher Education in the Headlines 