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Category: Data

Cool-hunting at the NBER

If you’re trying to keep abreast of the latest behavioural economics research on education, it’s worth popping in every so often at the Social Science Research Network (SSRN) to check out the latest from the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER). It’s mostly about K-12, but when it does tackle higher education, it’s unfailingly interesting. Maybe the most interesting piece published recently is called The Effects of Student Coaching in College, by Rachel Baker and Eric Bettinger (who is, IMHO, a

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October 4, 2011 No Comments

Data Point of the Week: StatsCan Gets it Wrong in the EAG

So, as noted yesterday, the OECD’s Education at a Glance (EAG) statfest – all 495 pages of it – was just released. Now it’s our turn to dissect some of what’s in there. Of most immediate interest was chart B5.3, which shows the relative size of public subsidies for higher education as a percentage of public expenditures on education. It’s an odd measure, because having a high percentage could mean either that a country has very high subsidies (e.g., Norway, Sweden) or very low public expenditures (e.g.,

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September 14, 2011 No Comments

Education at a Glance

By the time you read this, the first headlines should be coming through from Paris on the 2011 version of OECD’s annual publication, Education at a Glance (EAG). We’ll be taking a deeper look at some of the statistics tomorrow and over the coming weeks, but today I wanted to offer some thoughts on the product itself. Over the 16 years since EAG was first published, it has had a considerable effect on policy-making around the world. By drawing direct

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September 13, 2011 1 Comment

Why is there an “S” in STEM?

Governments love to talk about STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) programs. They were given prominent space in the last Canadian federal budget, and the acronym permeates U.S. educational policy discourse. It’s conventional wisdom that increasing the number of STEM graduates is essential to economic growth. You might think that the chief purpose of the modern post-secondary institution is to churn out graduates in STEM fields – and that as a corollary, arts students are some sort of vestigial leftover

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August 31, 2011 1 Comment

Anticipating Demographic Shifts

I was in Regina last week speaking to the university’s senior management team about challenges in Canadian post-secondary education, when someone asked a really intriguing question. “Given the changing demographics of Canada, with fewer traditional-aged students, are there any examples of good practice of universities altering their programming serving non-traditional students instead”? I have to admit, I was stumped. You’d think, for instance, that maritime universities, who have been facing demographic decline for quite some time, would have some experience

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August 30, 2011 1 Comment
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One Thought to Start Your Day is our founder and CEO Alex Usher’s popular daily blog, brimming with up-to-the-minute insights and informed opinions on today’s higher education industry.

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