Digital Learning in ‘Inside Higher Ed’ This Week

Inside Higher Ed published several articles of potential interest to "Inside Digital Learning" readers this week. They include:

• In his new book, College Made Whole: Integrative Learning for a Divided World (Johns Hopkins University Press), Chris W. Gallagher argues against some of the hot trends in higher education. Among his targets: "unbundling," which he says makes learning fragmented and incoherent.
• A broad and ambitious attempt to understand what students get out of higher education, both experientially and intellectually, took an important step this week at the University of California, Irvine. Richard Arum co-wrote the high-profile book Academically Adrift, which evaluated the critical thinking skills students gain in college, with unflattering results for higher education. Arum is now dean of the university's education school, where he is leading a project to survey students’ experiences in college as well as learning outcomes that have in the past eluded measurement. Some of the study’s 1,000 randomly selected students began the survey process last Wednesday.
• A study released Monday by Ithaka S+R, the research arm of nonprofit Ithaka, found that students see libraries as a valuable space for services, including nonacademic services. The study focused on community colleges.