The World of Higher Education Podcast Listen now →

The World of Higher Education Podcast Listen now →

Category: Teaching & Learning

No Disruption Here, Folks

Dear God, save us from Margaret Wente. Someone handed her a copy of Clayton Christensen’s new book and the rest of us got this ludicrous piece of nonsense in our Saturday paper. This has to be the worst meme in higher education this year. I know I’ve gone off on this before, but just to re-iterate: There. Is. No. Great. Disruption. Coming. In. Higher. Education. Period. Yes, there are some very interesting educational experiments going on out there. But does

Read More »
February 8, 2012 4 Comments

Faculty Productivity

It’s easy to get distracted by arguments about whether faculty are paid too much or too little. The better question is: why does everyone get paid on more or less the same scale when the massive differences in productivity between staff are so obvious? Some interesting evidence about this came recently from Texas. Last year, Governor Rick Perry (yes, him… the one who makes Herman Cain look Presidential) asked the state’s public universities to make data available on each professor

Read More »
December 7, 2011 5 Comments

The Benefits of Liberal Arts: Are Humanities Fit for Purpose?

The “liberal” in “liberal arts” derives from the latin root for “free,” but not the way that most people think. The medieval Liberal Arts were not free in the sense that they promoted freedom or free thinking, but rather in the sense that it was the education that “free” people (i.e., the rich) chose to pursue. The term connotes conspicuous consumption rather than freedom. Because Liberal Arts – and in particular the humanities – were always the preserve of the

Read More »
December 6, 2011 1 Comment

Liberal Arts: A Global Trend?

One of the really interesting mini-trends in global higher education these days is the recent spread of Liberal Arts colleges into parts of the world where there is no tradition of such institutions. Singapore has invited Yale to set up a Liberal Arts college at National University Singapore, with the stated aim of creating an Asian model of Liberal Arts. In Europe, the newly-created Amsterdam University College has brought a new and very structured approach to Liberal Arts. And, as

Read More »
December 5, 2011 1 Comment

Beyond Co-op (Part One)

One perennial topic of interest in Canadian higher education (particularly during recessions) is the subject of Work-Integrated Learning – that is, work experience which is organized by an educational institution and which is incorporated into a student’s educational programme. Today, HESA is releasing a paper by Miriam Kramer and me on how students’ work experiences stack up in terms of learning outcomes that contain some interesting results. We asked a little over 2,100 students about a variety of work experiences:

Read More »
November 23, 2011 1 Comment

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.

Subscribe

Search Posts

Search Publications

Social Media

Linkedin Youtube Spotify

Recent Posts

More thoughts on...