Musing on Post-Secondary Education
A very optimistic look at the future of undergraduate education and a refreshing change from the catalog of books on this subject that are convinced that universities are finished.
The authors (Peter Felten, John Gardner, Charles Schroeder, Leo Lambert and Betsy Barefoot) hail from US universities and colleges of various shapes and sizes. The book is easy to read and crammed full of examples of undergraduate innovation at a multiplicity of institutions.
This book by William Massey, former VP at Stanford is a bit of a difficult read. It appears to be a compilation of thoughts that the author has had over the years on how universities need to managed.
If starts of with a thoughtful chapter on what it means to be a not-for-profit university and why that is vitally important. The for-profit rule is that an enterprise expands until –
I have just finished reading Volume 46 of the Emerald series “Research in the Sociology of Organizations”. This 500 page tome relates some 15 different academic perspectives on the pressures on the European and US university systems. It is a heavy but very well written analysis.
In one of our recent faculty discussions the usual subject of student quality raised its ugly head. However, the conversation took an interesting turn when we started to discuss the qualities that we would like to see in a student. Obviously academic ability plays a part but faculty were more interested in teaching students who were motivated to learn. Continue reading “Screening Applicants for Success”
Perhaps you have read about Bhutan and its measurement of Gross National Happiness an idea that definitely has my support. At a recent visit to Technologico de Monterrey in Mexico as well as its sister institution Universidad TecMilenio, I was somewhat surprised to find that they have taken institutional ownership of the concept of happiness in a serious way. A brief search on happiness reveals a mixture of results from fairly serious articles on positive psychology to some shall we say less peer reviewed views on what makes for happy people. However, no doubt that many people are taking the whole concept of happiness very seriously indeed. Continue reading “Undergrad Curriculum Based on Happiness?”
I recently visited Quest University in Squamish, BC. Aside from the most beautiful setting Quest is an interesting university on a number of fronts. Here are a few:
I must admit to reading this book with some trepidation. As a university administrator (and male) I expected to come out of this read feeling pretty bad about myself. As it turned out this was only partially true. Continue reading “The Slow Professor”
Rethinking American Higher Education by Richard Keeling and Richard Hersh is yet another book describing the train wreck that is higher education and demanding change. I have to admit to being somewhat tired of reading about the dreadful state of higher education but this book goes beyond that with a detailed prescription of what we need to do (which is also subject to some debate.
All the talk these days is about interdisciplinary studies. Not new, in particular, but the volume seems to be increasing. The disciplines are accused of producing graduates that too narrowly focussed and unable to think particularly critically. The poor old engineers seem to have been particularly pigeon-holed, especially by the humanities (who have of course been likewise scoffed at by the engineers) – good old academic disciplinary rivalry one might think. Increasingly this is seen as a bad not a good and I am tempted to agree. Continue reading “Disciplines RIP?”
It is a favourite pastime these days for universities to gripe and complain about the heavy hand of government in their day to day activities. Granted the reporting requirements have increased significantly over the years and also granted that there seems to increasing concern that universities are doing a poor job of preparing their graduates for the modern work force (whatever that means) and in the right applied subject areas. Continue reading “Government Assessment”