ACTA's Must-Reads

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Boards Matter: You Heard It First From ACTA

ACTA has long been an advocate for strong, independent governing boards. That is why we communicate directly with over 10,000 trustees and regents around the nation. "Historically and philosophically a part of our democratic tradition, lay governance brings the perspective of informed citizens to the heart of the university." The vibrant creativity of American higher education flourishes when trustees, not bureaucrats, make informed decisions about the academic standards, campus culture, and financial health of their institutions. And it is for this reason that we emphasize that trustees are first and foremost fiduciaries. It is heartening to see that the model of American higher education governance has been a global inspiration. In an oft-quoted 2005 article, the British journal, the Economist, quipped, "America’s system of higher education is the best in the world. That is because there is no system." Now two professors from the University of Pennsylvania describe their conversations with higher education leaders from around the world in the Chronicle of Higher Education. When university presidents ask why they should share power with a board -- a question too often heard on these shores as well -- the answer lies in the choice between university self-governance and centralized state authority. And that choice ultimately determines whether academic freedom, service to society, and autonomy will flourish. But if this autonomy is to be maintained, governing boards must truly govern: when they fail in their fiduciary duty, it will be the state that will assume authority. Which brings us back to ACTA's call for active, informed governing boards that recognize the authority vested in them is nothing less than a public trust.

Posted by Michael Poliakoff on March 31, 2011 at 10:02 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Anne Neal on Inside Academia TV

Colleges are shortchanging students: core curricula and the vast gaps in knowledge, federal aid given to schools and their lack of transparency, teaching duties and campus culture, trustee responsibility, the dismal 6-yr graduation rates, and spending cuts that can be made to substitute tuition increases: these issues are on the lips of all education reformers, and ACTA's Anne Neal has been talking about them for years. See her interview with Andy Nash on InsideAcademia TV.

Posted by Jose Herrera on March 22, 2011 at 12:00 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Brooklyn College: Civility, Reason, and Academic Freedom

Brooklyn College, part of the City University of New York (CUNY), has had to do some hard thinking this past year about how it will protect reasoned, politically balanced dialogue and inquiry on its campus. Its trajectory seems to be upward.

The misstep of permitting the English Department unilaterally to select one of its own professor's polemical books (Moustafa Bayoumi's How Does It Feel to Be a Problem? Being Young and Arab in America) as the single, unchallenged orientation reading for all freshman has led to a high-level commitment to a more inclusive faculty selection process. The exceedingly odd decision to hire a graduate student with a history of inflammatory anti-Israel publications to teach a master's level course represents another reminder of the need for proactive policies to ensure appropriate academic standards.

Recently, the College scored a remarkable victory for reasoned, civil, and open discourse. The campus had, as in the past, a "Palestinian Week" and an "Israel Week," this time not simultaneously. Both groups had the opportunity to present their points of view with films and speakers. Official Brooklyn College communications properly kept their language neutral.

The moral of Brooklyn College's challenges can be found in the classic Report of the Committee to the Fellows of the Yale Corporation, chaired by the late C.V. Woodward. The Committee criticized the University for failing to ensure a podium for a controversial, though duly invited speaker. But it also reminded campus leadership everywhere of the need to think in advance about the policies it will enforce. Brooklyn College has achieved a fragile victory for civility, reason, and free expression. To protect these values, it needs to anticipate the inevitable challenges to the sanctuary it has struggled to create.

Posted by Michael Poliakoff on March 22, 2011 at 09:08 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Harvard Leadership

It is very encouraging to see the Washington Post editorial praising Harvard for reestablishing ROTC on campus. The Post writes: "Harvard has shown real leadership by expanding student opportunities for service and recognizing the critical role students with a top-flight liberal arts education can play in bringing informed and diverse perspectives to the officer corps." ACTA agrees, and we honor President Faust and the Harvard Corporation for its leadership. The Post properly continues: "Now it's time for other leading institutions -- Yale, Columbia, Stanford, Brown and Tufts -- to follow suit." ACTA looks forward to working with governing boards to restore ROTC on all of these campuses.

Posted by Jose Herrera on March 18, 2011 at 11:14 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

"Crazy U"

Throughout his new book, Crazy U, Andrew Ferguson, a senior editor at the Weekly Standard, turns a humorous but penetrating eye on colleges and universities. As the parent of a college-age son, he negotiates the shocking cost of college and roundly criticizes the weak core curriculum he finds in many of our institutions today. "You could get a degree in the humanities... without studying literature, or a degree in history without ever sitting through a survey class in American or European history," says Ferguson. ACTA's WhatWillTheyLearn? project, of course, is Ferguson's point writ large. Of the hundreds of colleges and universities in the project's online database, the great majority require few of the courses essential for success in career and community. Though light in tone, the book represents serious investigation and reporting, including interviews with many admissions officers, college coaches, and faculty.

Posted by Jose Herrera on March 18, 2011 at 11:12 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

The CUNY Approach

The City University of New York (CUNY) is building a new educational approach and a new community college. This new approach is designed to provide a broad liberal arts education and prepare students for successful employment. Whether students continue on to complete a Bachelor's degree or enter the work force, they will have a foundation upon which to build. The new community college, to be opened in the fall of 2012, will employ this innovative model. CUNY's recent efforts have increased graduation rates, and more importantly, the quality of graduates.

Posted by Jose Herrera on March 14, 2011 at 12:29 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

The Sound of a Bubble Breaking

It has been a hard week for those who insist that America's system of higher education is securely fixed as the best in the world. We know it is the most expensive in the world, but the quality factor is growing ever more doubtful. Academically Adrift, the meticulous study that demonstrated how little college actually contributes to many students' intellectual development continues to gain a wider and wider hearing. On Saturday, New York Times columnist Bob Herbert made it the subject of a hard-hitting op-ed, "College the Easy Way." Easy courses, lot's of partying, and grade inflation: it's all there.

On Wednesday, the online journal Diverse News, published an interview with North Carolina Congresswoman Virginia Foxx, in which she referenced Academically Adrift, with the conclusion: "Students in higher ed don't gain the kinds of skills that they need to continue in the work world. So I think higher education is going to have to prove its worth in the future."

Is it coincidence that the day of reckoning is at hand? On Tuesday, Pennsylvania Governor Corbett announced his plan for a 50% reduction in state funding for public universities, and Moody's reported that more public institutions will announce dire financial exigency, prompting such measures as the layoff of tenured faculty. Moody's added a curious note to its grim prediction: "financial exigency is likely to be a positive step in terms of credit standing because it empowers management to take aggressive cost-cutting steps." The crisis may be the catalyst that higher education needs for long overdue changes.

Academic quality can rise while costs drop if institutions properly embrace program prioritization and consolidation and a core curriculum instead of long menus of esoteric, boutique courses. Higher education can emerge stronger from this crisis.

Posted by Michael Poliakoff on March 10, 2011 at 03:31 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Barzun on Columbia

National Humanities Medal, Presidential Medal of Freedom, former ACTA National Council member, and Columbia legend Professor Jacques Barzun has an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal calling for the return of ROTC to Columbia.

He asks:

In the funeral oration of Pericles, still required reading in the renowned Core Curriculum of Columbia College, the Athenian leader reminds his embattled people that "when a citizen is in any way distinguished, he is preferred to the public service, not as a matter of privilege, but as the reward of merit." Do Columbia's administrators and trustees believe that the students in the college should live by the values they are required to learn?

And he concludes:

Pericles concluded his remarks in ancient Athens by reminding his people that in detailing the merits of their city-state (in contrast to the characteristics of neighboring Sparta) "we are contending for a higher prize than those who enjoy none of these privileges." A citizenry's willingness to serve in its defense makes a "government that does not copy our neighbors, but is an example to them." Most will choose not to answer the call—that is acceptable, the natural result of relying on an all-volunteer military. What is not acceptable is denying the army the opportunity to even make that call.

Columbia's president and trustees must act to restore the university's long-estranged relationship with the armed forces.

Read the whole piece. After the return of ROTC to Harvard, why is Columbia waiting?

Posted by Michael Pomeranz on March 09, 2011 at 08:03 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Quality and Worth in College Degrees

In "Degrees and Dollars," Nobel laureate and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman raised the unpleasant specter that college degrees overall have a declining economic value=="tickets to jobs that don't exist or don't pay middle-class wages." Krugman's dismal prediction runs counter to what leading voices in higher education have been saying. President Obama gave an inspiring call for America to lead the world by 2020 in the proportion of adults with college degrees , and the Lumina Foundation simultaneously announced its commitment to and significant funding for the "Big Goal" of 60% of American adults holding high quality college degrees by 2025. Is Krugman now confronting us with a most inconvenient truth?

Krugman's argument is important, but it is a half-truth. What we discovered in the WhatWillTheyLearn? study of core curricula is that too many institutions fail to require the kind of general education for which business and industry have called. This is the kind of college education that guarantees (not just hopes for) such core skills as college level mathematics, intermediate level foreign language, and laboratory science. The recently published Academically Adrift has demonstrated that in the absence of such rich liberal arts requirements, many college graduates achieve little cognitive growth. And here is the clincher: the longitudinal study on which Academically Adrift rests also reveals the not-unexpected finding that the students who failed to grow intellectually in college are the ones who have found it hardest to gain employment.

A workforce educated with high quality college degrees is the economic engine we need. And, for an excellent analysis of the obligation--and capacity--of higher education to educate for citizenship and responsibility, see Peter Wood's response to Krugman. The good news is that it is well within our capacity to make every college degree a high quality degree, and that a well-designed core curriculum is also more cost-efficient than the huge menus of over-specialized courses that too often substitute for fundamental core requirements.

Posted by Michael Poliakoff on March 09, 2011 at 09:47 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Excellence at the Texas Board of Regents

The University of Texas System Board of Regents has taken a step that other boards would well repeat: the Regents have hired an experienced Special Advisor to assist them with their task forces on excellence and productivity and on blended and online learning.

The Board chose well for two reasons. First, they will have an independent expert whose focus is on the Board's policy decisions and who reports to the board. It's important to receive information from a range of sources, not just the administration. Second, in choosing Rick O'Donnell, the Board appointed a policy expert with a long history of successful initiatives to increase academic standards, productivity, and accountability.

The UT System's Board leadership, which demonstrated impressive curricular standards in the What Will They Learn project, has well-positioned the system to go from strength to strength.

Posted by Michael Poliakoff on March 08, 2011 at 11:37 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Applauding Harvard

Navy ROTC is coming back to Harvard. Anne Neal is live on the Wall Street Journal praising this action taking by Harvard, talking about next steps for Harvard, and encouraging other schools to follow this example. Watch it here!

Posted by Jose Herrera on March 07, 2011 at 02:43 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Anne Neal discusses the return of ROTC

Harvard is bringing back ROTC, and Anne Neal is live on NECN discussing this great news report!

Posted by Jose Herrera on March 04, 2011 at 10:16 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

ROTC Back at Harvard

The AP has announced that ROTC will return to Harvard. ACTA's released the following statement, which has already been picked up at Education Debate, among other places.

AMERICAN COUNCIL OF TRUSTEES AND ALUMNI (ACTA) APPLAUDS RETURN OF NAVAL RESERVE OFFICERS TRAINING CORPS (NROTC) TO HARVARD

Leading advocate for high-quality, liberal arts education had campaigned for ROTC’s return

Now Encourages Columbia, Yale to follow suit

The Associated Press is reporting that Harvard will formally recognize NROTC (Naval ROTC) on the
Cambridge, Massachusetts campus Friday, establishing a physical presence for ROTC cadets, appointing a Director, and funding the program. This is a notable break with past practice where boards have deferred to faculty on this issue.

The decision comes just days after the American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) wrote the board, calling for immediate official recognition of on-campus ROTC. ACTA has urged Harvard to restore ROTC to campus for years, through written correspondence with the Corporation. ACTA represents alumni across the country concerned about this issue and has uniquely called upon trustees at several schools to take action in restoring ROTC.

"Bravo to Harvard. President Faust and the governing body of Harvard University did right by students when it invited ROTC back on campus," said Anne D. Neal, ACTA's president. "Itss time for our campuses to put the anti-military sentiment of the '60s behind them and properly support students who wish to serve our country and to defend our liberties."

"For too long, there has been a chasm between the nation’s elite schools and those who defend them," said Ms. Neal, who graduated from Harvard College and Harvard Law School. "Harvard has shown real leadership by expanding student opportunities for service and recognizing the critical role students with a liberal arts education can play in bringing informed and diverse perspectives to military planning."

"This is the first time since the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell that a trustee has taken concrete action on this issue. President Faust has done the right thing--she's not waiting for the faculty or for anyone. Harvard has done the right thing. Now it’s time for other leading institutions--Yale, Columbia, Stanford, Brown and Tufts--to follow suit," said Neal.

Harvard is one of numerous private schools that banned ROTC from campus during the Vietnam War--and has resisted ROTC's return to campus because of objections to "Don't Ask, Don't Tell." Harvard students wishing to participate in ROTC must commute to MIT to do so. Now, as military policy is beginning to change, Harvard is setting the standard by welcoming ROTC back to campus.

Posted by Michael Pomeranz on March 03, 2011 at 08:06 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Bill Gates

On Monday, Microsoft's former chairman asked some tough questions about public higher education at the winter meeting of the National Governor's Association.

In brief, Mr. Gates asked, "Where are the metrics?" and "Is funding based on performance?" The metrics on which he focuses are graduation and employment rates, and he properly called for a level playing field for non-profit and for-profit institutions. (Mr. Gates observed in regard to "gainful employment": "Those same types of questions, about outcomes and effectiveness, really should be asked of the whole higher-education sector.")

ACTA welcomes the discussion Mr. Gates presentation to the governors will prompt. ACTA takes up a wider set of metrics in its growing series of State Report Cardsin addition to graduation and retention rates, ACTA examines the core curriculum, alongside cost and expenditure figures, measures of academic freedom, and measures of effective governance.

The most recent Department of Education figures (2006-07) show that public institutions of higher education together spend $239 billion per year. Transparent metrics and performance based funding are more urgent than ever in these hard economic times.

Posted by Michael Poliakoff on March 03, 2011 at 02:43 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Advocating for ROTC at Harvard

A few weeks ago, ACTA President Anne D. Neal once again wrote to Harvard Corporation president Robert D. Reischauer.

"I know that you and other members of the Corporation take pride in Harvard's storied service to the nation," Neal, a Harvard alumna herself, began. She continued:

"No other school, outside the service academies, can boast of seventeen alumni who won the Medal of Honor and countless others who have risked their lives for America. With that in mind, we come to you now with a modest request. We ask simply that the Corporation commit Harvard to official recognition of ROTC. That can be done by the Corporation immediately--whether or not there is an official ROTC unit on campus."

Neal also encouraged the Corporation to increase participation in the Yellow Ribbon scholarship program for veterans. Read the full letter here.

UPDATE: Cheryl Miller asks, "Why is Harvard Not Restoring ROTC?"

Posted by Michael Pomeranz on March 02, 2011 at 10:05 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Uneasy Standards in History

In February, the Thomas B. Fordham Institute released an extensive review of changes in US History standards at the K-12 level since 2003. What they found was a crisis across the nation in US history education. The authors of the report, Sheldon and Jeremy Stern, observe, "As this report makes clear, today's crisis in U.S. history is fed by most states' indifference to this subject, demonstrated by the dismal condition of the academic standards they're using for schools, teachers, and students." Last August, ACTA released an expansion of the WhatWillTheyLearn project, with a similarly alarming finding: less than 20% of the 716 colleges and universities reviewed require a broad survey class in US government or history. The Fordham report quotes Pulitzer Prize-winning historian David McCullough echoing our common concern:

I don't think there's any question whatsoever that the students in our institutions of higher education have less grasp, less understanding, less knowledge of American history than ever before. I think we are raising a generation of young Americans who are, to a very large degree, historically illiterate.

Can a historically illiterate generation maintain a free society? Our Founders knew better. Let's take the advice of Thomas Jefferson who said, "Educate and inform the whole mass of the people... They are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty."

Posted by Jose Herrera on March 01, 2011 at 10:10 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack