Confessions of a Community College Dean

It’s entirely normal for a tenure-track faculty search to take the better part of a year. The same holds for upper-level administrative searches. Within higher ed, it’s easy to take that for granted. It’s the way things have been for a long time, and some of us have never seen it any other way. But in most industries, a timeline like that would -- rightly -- be considered insane. So why do our searches take so long?

I have to admit finding the “fiscal cliff” debate a little bit silly, given that the “cliff” in question is entirely artificial. But if you start pulling that thread, it’s not clear where it ends. And even if the cliff is a figment of the collective political imagination, the harm that cliff-driven decisions could do is very real. If you swerve your car to avoid the unicorn you’re hallucinating, the tree you crash into isn’t a hallucination, and the damage done is real and potentially terrible.

As regular readers know, I have a bone to pick with the “credit hour.” Although it’s nearly ubiquitous in American higher education, its origins were pedestrian and it tells us nothing about actual learning.

This one’s a little bit self-indulgent, but I hope my wise and worldly readers will bear with me. I think the answers will be of wider interest.

What could public higher education do with a significant, sustained funding source dedicated specifically to innovation?

This just in: well-connected rich white kids who drop out of Princeton can still do well in life, and the New York Times is ON IT.

his did my heart good. Apparently, the academic major outside of STEM fields with the highest lifetime salary payoff is government. As a poli sci Ph.D., I say this news should be shared far and wide.

The headline to this article pretty much tells its story: “Student Advising Plays Key Role in College Success -- Just As It’s Being Cut.” It goes on to detail the rollout of an automated advising program at Arizona State.