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Category: History Lesson

Better Know A Higher Education System: Westeros

Although the politics of Westeros are widely discussed in North America (well, in HESA Towers, anyway, where we’re all getting ready for an office finale viewing on Sunday), relatively little attention has been paid to the role of higher education in the Seven Kingdoms.  Or rather, the ramifications of its lack thereof. Magic and dragons aside, Westeros seems like your basic high medieval economy/society – 13th or 14th century, by the look of it.   Europe at this point in its

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May 17, 2019 1 Comment

The May Fourth Movement

Tomorrow is the fourth of May.  In North America, this day has jokingly become known as “Star Wars Day” (i.e. “May the Fourth Be With You”).  But in China, it has a very different meaning.  For it was one hundred years ago tomorrow that one of the most important students revolts of all time began. China held together just barely after the Qing dynasty was deposed in 1911.  By outmaneuvering Sun Yat-Sen and (it is widely believed) assassinating Song Jiaoren,

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May 3, 2019 No Comments

From the Shelves of HESA Towers (II)

To continue with the occasional post on random books on the shelves at HESA Towers, today I want to talk about this book pictured below.  It doesn’t look like much, but it’s one of the most intriguing things kicking around the office.  It dates from the summer of 1967 and is called “The Gourman Report” Most histories of university rankings will tell you that the first commercial ranking of undergraduate institutions was in a 1983 edition of US News &

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May 1, 2019 2 Comments

From the Shelves of HESA Towers (I)

It’s Friday, so it seems like a good day to write about one of the crazy books I have on my shelves (which, as any of my staff can tell you, is a theme that could last for quite some time).  Here’s one that’s kind of relevant, given that it’s about an event that ended 50 years ago next week: Shut It Down!  A College in Crisis, which is about the strike at San Francisco State (SFS) College in 1968-1969.

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March 29, 2019 No Comments

Governance, Management and Balancing Acts

Higher education is a hard thing to generalize about. Superficially, universities look the same the world over, but scratch beneath the surface a little and you’ll see that there are enormous differences in structures, policies, and cultures. Nevertheless, it’s still pretty safe to say that over the last 40 years (in some countries longer) three major trends have emerged more or less the world over:  first, in every country, there has been pressure to expand systems and accommodate greater participation in

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March 27, 2019 2 Comments

One Thought to Start Your Day

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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