Webinar: "Plagiarism to Fraud: Tools to Reduce Cheating in Your Classroom "

For those concerned with preventing and dealing with academic misconduct, there will be a live, (60)-minute webinar conference: "Plagiarism to Fraud: Tools to Reduce Cheating in Your Classroom "
Friday, November 19, 2010 (1:00-2:00 p.m. ET)
http://www.highereducationhero.com/1BU/0/2/p4B26Jc/p5ACRBRFi/p0e


HIGHLIGHTS:
Creating a Truthful Atmosphere: Setting a Standard in your Class
Become an academic honesty role model: Guide students with action
Tips on communicating cheating rules and repercussions in your syllabus
How to integrate acad emic integrity standards into assignments & tests
Prevent Cheating through Pedagogy: Tips for Professors and Adjuncts
Instructional methods & technologies that prevent & detect cheating
How to adjust exam administration to deter dishonest activity
Methods to reduce plagiarism: Tips for conversation concerning citation
Responding to Cheating When it Occurs: Increase Awareness in Students
Steps you should take from moment of cheating to reporting the issue
Teachable moments: Dealing with occasional student cheating
How your institutional policy gives support for reporting cheaters


SPEAKER:
Tricia Bertram Gallant, Ph.D., is an internationally known author, speaker and practitioner of academic integrity. Tricia has authored many journal articles, as well as "Academic Integrity in the Twenty-First Century: A Teaching & Learning Imperative"(Jossey-Bass, 2008); co- authored "Cheating in School: What We Know & What We Can Do" (Wiley-Blackwell, 2009); and, edited "Creating the Ethical Academy: A Systems Approach to Understanding Misconduct and Empowering Change in Higher Education" (Routledge, 2010).


Dr. Bertram Gallant runs the Academic Integrity Office at the University of California, San Diego where she works with faculty and students in creating a culture of integrity on campus, and is the Past-Chair of the Advisory Council for the International Center for Academic Integrity. As a leader in fast-read, actionable advice on workplace issues, the conference gives you the opportunity to add immediate impact to your efforts to prevent academic misconduct in a manner that is:

FAST - No wasted time here. Get right to the heart of the matter in a 1-hour block designed to easily fit into your busy schedule.


CONVENIENT - No airlines. No travel. No time out of the office. Listen from the comfort and convenience of your desk.


EASY - A telephone and computer with access to the Internet is all the equipment you need. Just dial in, punch-in your access code, then click the link to access the website and you're in. That's it. Follow along with the Webinar handouts provided in advance.


ACTIONABLE - Our conferences provide cost effective tactics you can start using right when you hang up the phone.


IDEAL FOR MULTIPLE LISTENERS - Use a speakerphone and as many people as you want can listen in - at no extra cost to you. A projector is suggested for the video portion for multiple attendees. Many professionals use these sessions as a cost-effective, time-efficient means of training supervisors, managers, and staff while reinforcing key issues in a fresh, new manner that they will remember and act on.


AFFORDABLE - Priced at $199, it is a fraction of the cost of travel and attendance fees for other high- priced conferences or seminars.


"Plagiarism to Fraud: Tools to Reduce Cheating in Your Classroom"
Live 60-Minute webinar conference
Friday, November 19, 2010 (1:00-2:00 p.m. ET)
Register now for this exciting event by clicking the following link or calling 1-800-964-6033:
http://www.highereducationhero.com/1BU/0/2/p4B26Jc/p5ACRBRFi/p0e


We hope you'll join us.

Sincerely,
HigherEd Hero
384 Technology Drive
Malvern, PA 19355

Webinar: "Plagiarism to Fraud: Tools to Reduce Cheating in Your Classroom "

Diverse Issues in Higher Education: College Tuition Costs Climbing Again This Fall

Diverse Issues in Higher Education

October 29, 2010

College Tuition Costs Climbing Again This Fall

by Eric Gorski

http://diverseeducation.com/article/14339/

College tuition costs shot up again this fall, and students and their families are leaning more on the federal government to make higher education more affordable in tough economic times, according to two reports issued Thursday.

At public four-year schools, many of them ravaged by state budget cuts, average in-state tuition and fees this fall rose 7.9 percent, or $555, to $7,605, according to the College Board's “Trends in College Pricing.” The average sticker price at private nonprofit colleges increased 4.5 percent, or $1,164, to $27,293.


Massive government subsidies and aid from schools helped keep in check the actual price many students pay. But experts caution that federal aid can only do so much and that even higher tuition is likely unless state appropriations rebound or colleges drastically cut costs.


“Just when Americans need college the most, many are finding it increasingly difficult to afford,” said Molly Corbett Broad, president of the American Council on Education.


When adjusted for inflation, the tuition increases this fall amount to 6.6 percent at public four-year colleges and 3.2 percent at private ones, according to the College Board.


Many students are finding relief in expanded federal aid, including tax credits, veterans' benefits, and a record expansion of the Pell Grant program for low-income students. In 2009-10, 7.7 million students received $28.2 billion in Pell Grants—an increase of almost $10 billion from the year before, according to a companion College Board report, “Trends in Student Aid.”


Even so, the maximum Pell Grant covers just 34 percent of the average cost of attending a public four-year college, down from 45 percent two decades ago.


For now, government subsidies and aid from schools are helping hold down net tuition and fees the actual cost students pay when grants and tax breaks are factored in.


Estimated average net tuition and fees this fall at public four-year colleges were $1,540, while at private colleges they were $11,320. Both are up from last year, but below what students paid five years ago.


“Despite the fact sticker prices have gone way up, there is so much grant aid out there that many students are really paying less than they did before,” said Dr. Sandy Baum, a senior policy analyst for the College Board and a Skidmore College economics professor.


That's also contributed to a growing gap between those who receive aid and the one-third of full-time students who pay full freight for college, the report says.


Patrick Callan, president of the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, said it's important to note that tuition is climbing after a decade in which family income did not rise for 90 percent of Americans and at a time when many areas of the country face high unemployment.


“We're kind of on a national treadmill,” Callan said. “We're putting additional aid in that is helping to buffer some students from the severity of this. But the tuition increases and the bad economy are raising the need for financial aid much faster than our investment in aid is moving.”


The student aid report found that grant aid per full-time undergraduate student increased by an estimated 22 percent from 2008 to 2009, while federal loans increased 9 percent.


The Obama administration's restructuring of the federal student loan program this year will direct more money to Pell Grants and tie future increases in the maximum grant to inflation. But college officials say the impact will be minimal because next year's increase is small and tuition is rising faster than inflation.


Most students attend public schools, and states continue to cut appropriations. After adjusting for inflation, per-student state spending on higher education dropped by nearly 9 percent in 2008-09 and by another 5 percent in 2009-10 and that spending includes soon-to-expire federal stimulus money.


Community colleges, which educate about 40 percent of college students, remain affordable, with tuition averaging $2,713. Lower income students receive enough aid to attend essentially for free.


Still, tuition rose 6 percent at public two-year colleges. State and local budget cuts paired with skyrocketing enrollment have prompted some schools to cut courses and limit enrollment.


The priciest private colleges are creeping closer to shattering the $60,000 ceiling in total cost to attend.


Dr. David Warren, president of the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities, emphasized that net tuition and fees have declined 7.4 percent in the past decade in inflation-adjusted dollars because colleges are expanding student aid.


“Every institution that I talk to understands the absolutely critical role of aid, and it's going to be the thing they try to hold at the top of the list of priorities,” Warren said.


On average, about 55 percent of bachelor's degree recipients at public colleges borrow money, and their debt is $19,800 by graduation, the College Board found.

Diverse Issues in Higher Education: College Tuition Costs Climbing Again This Fall

Faculty Focus Special Report: Faculty Promotion and Tenure: Eight Ways to Improve the Tenure Review Process at Your Institution

http://www.facultyfocus.com/private/pdf_products/report_12.pdf

Faculty Focus Special Report: Faculty Promotion and Tenure: Eight Ways to Improve the Tenure Review Process at Your Institution

Council on Undergraduate Research (CUR) - Posters on the Hill Application Reminder

http://www.cur.org/

Please remember that the Application Deadline for the 2011 Posters on the Hill event is November 15, 2010.



Nothing more effectively demonstrates the value of undergraduate research than the words and stories of the student participants themselves. In the Spring of 2011 the Council on Undergraduate Research (CUR) will host its 15th annual undergraduate poster session on Capitol Hill. This event will help members of Congress understand the importance of undergraduate research by talking directly with the students whom these programs impact.


CUR is calling for students to submit an abstract of their research that represents any of CUR's disciplinary divisions (Arts and Humanities, Biology, Chemistry, Geosciences, Health Sciences, Mathematics/Computer Science, Physics/Astronomy, Psychology, and Social Sciences). In order to ensure proper review of applications, the above are the only disciplines that may apply. Should your research be inter-disciplinary, please select the division that most closely describes your research.


Abstract submissions will only be accepted by using our on-line submission form. Prior to submitting the form, students should gather the contact information for all co-authors, advisors and sponsors (if applicable), prepare a short vitae/resume, and poster abstract.


For more information, the link to submit an application, frequently asked questions, and a document listing the information required for submission, please visit: http://www.cur.org/pohcall.html


Please note that CUR membership is required to submit an application. Either the student’s home institution must have an institutional membership, or the faculty mentor or student must have an individual membership. We will not review incomplete applications. Please be sure that both portions (the electronic application and the electronic recommendation letter) are submitted by November 15, 2010.


Please forward this to anyone that you think might be interested. This is a highly competitive program, which makes for a very exciting experience for the students and their faculty advisors alike.

Should you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.


Sincerely,


Robin Howard
Senior Director
Membership Services, Operations and Information Technology
Council on Undergraduate Research
734 15th St, NW, Suite 550
Washington, DC 20005
http://www.cur.org/
robin@cur.org
(202)783-4810x203
(202)783-4811 fax

Council on Undergraduate Research (CUR) - Posters on the Hill Application Reminder

Innovative Educators Webinar 3-Part Workshop: Outcomes-Based Assessment for Student Affairs

http://www.innovativeeducators.org/retention_p/859.htm

This on-line workshop is a 3-Part workshop designed to facilitate your campus team’s learning as you design programmatic assessment plans. The ultimate intention of this workshop is for you and your institutional team to walk away from the 3-part workshop with a refined assessment plan and/or report, depending on where you are in your assessment process. The webinars are designed to be highly interactive with assignments that you complete and share with colleagues going through the workshop. Such a process ensures the sharing of ideas and solutions across institutions. How fun is that?

SESSION 1:

History and Importance of Outcomes-Based Assessment and Components of an Outcomes-Based Assessment Plan and Report (2 hours)


Participants will:
Describe the history of outcomes-based assessment (OBA)
Explain the purpose for OBA
Explain why OBA practice and documentation is so important
Identify the necessary components of an outcomes-based assessment plan and report (OBAP)
Align components of the OBAP with program review, annual planning, strategic planning, and budgeting processes.
Explain the importance of evaluating student learning
Distinguish between learning goals and outcomes
Identify characteristics of measurable and meaningful outcomes


Assignment:
Note: Participants will be able to post their assignments on a web site and view the assignments of the other participants.
A criteria check list will be provided so that participants can self-evaluate their learning and review the work of their peers. Although the speaker will not be able to provide individual feedback, she will review all assignments and base the following session’s content on the progress/learning that is reflected in the assignments.


Draft a conceptual framework for assessment
Identify a common language for OBA
Draft a template for OBA
Draft Mission/Purpose, Goals, and outcomes
Self-critique outcomes
Peer evaluate at least 2 other sets of outcomes


SESSION 2:
Mapping SLOs to Programs and Services and Designing Evaluation Tools and Criteria (2 hours)


Participants will:
Explain the mapping process
Identify at least two different ways to evaluate each outcome
Identify how outcomes need to be refined
Explain the most systematic place to evaluate learning
Explain the difference between methods and tools
Identify evaluation method/tool limitations
Articulate expectations for performance level for each evaluation method
Identify appropriate criteria for each evaluation method/tool, as appropriate


Assignment:
Map their SLOs to their programs and activities
Self critique 5 current student learning outcomes and their mapping
Peer evaluate at least two other sets of learning outcomes and their mapping
Self-critique evaluation methods and criteria
Peer evaluate at least two other sets of evaluation methods and accompanying criteria
Determine how decisions can be made with this type of data


SESSION 3:

Q and A and Closing the Loop (1 hour)
Participants will:
Determine how decisions can be made with this type of data
Identify some documentation solutions that will aid decision-making
Questions and Answer


This webinar will benefit student affairs professionals who are doing any level of assessment, from assessment of a single workshop to assessment of the entire program. Those responsible for assessment of their division will also benefit.



Marilee J. Bresciani, Ph.D. is Professor of Postsecondary Education Leadership at San Diego State University, where she coordinates the masters in Student Affairs/Services in community colleges and higher education, the certificate in institutional research, planning, and assessment, and the masters and doctorate in community college leadership. The curriculum at San Diego State University emphasizes student learning centeredness, integration of the curricular and co-curricular learning paradigms, and analysis, planning, and responsible practice of leaders in a socially just and global environment.



Dr. Bresciani’s research focuses on the evaluation of student learning and development. She uses grounded theory to explore how systems and processes contribute to student learning centeredness, which includes the study of leaders’ roles in these systems and processes.


Dr. Bresciani has held faculty and higher education administration positions for over 21 years. In those positions, she has conducted enrollment management research, quantitative and qualitative institutional research, course-embedded assessment, and academic and administrative program assessment. Previously as Assistant Vice President for Institutional Assessment at Texas A&M University and as Director of Assessment at North Carolina State University, Dr. Bresciani led university-wide initiatives to embed faculty-driven outcomes-based assessment in the curriculum. She has led reforms in outcomes-based assessment program review, assessment of general education, quality enhancement, and assessment of the co-curricular.


Dr. Bresciani has been invited to present and publish her findings on assessment and is a leading author of five books on assessing student learning and outcomes-based assessment program review. Dr. Bresciani has developed and delivered several courses on assessment of student learning and is reviewer for the Australian Quality Assurance Agency and is also a managing partner in an international assessment and enrollment management consulting firm.


Dr. Bresciani holds a Ph.D. in Administration, Curriculum, and Instruction from the University of Nebraska and a Masters of Arts in Teaching from Hastings College.

Innovative Educators Webinar 3-Part Workshop: Outcomes-Based Assessment for Student Affairs

ACRLMetrics

http://www.acrlmetrics.com/

ACRLMetrics is a new on-line service providing access to ACRL and NCES academic library statistics (2000 to present).



ACRLMetrics includes powerful "click-only" reporting functionality that:
•supports strategic planning and advocacy efforts
•complements budget presentations and grant applications
•enables peer benchmarking
•delivers multi-year trend analysis


ACRLMetrics is a web-based on-line subscription service providing:
•on-demand, 24x7 secure browser access
•comprehensive customized report outputs
•easy re-purposing, sharing and publishing of report outputs.

ACRLMetrics

LSU Health Sciences Center Recruitment and Information Session November 4 2010

http://www.slideshare.net/ccharles/lsu-health-sciences-center-recruitment-and-information-session-november-4-2010

The LSUHSC Office of the Associate Vice Chancellor for Academic & Multicultural Affairs Invites


Dillard University Students (faculty, staff, & alums are also welcome) to a Recruitment and Information Session

Thursday, November 4, 2010 at 5:00pm
Professional Schools & Sciences Building Room 136


Come learn about research opportunities, graduate school, medical school and a host of our health science programs:
• School of Allied Health
• School of Dentistry
• School of Graduate Studies
• School of Medicine
• School of Nursing
• School of Public Health


Refreshments will be served!

Great door prizes will be distributed!

It’s not too late to apply for Fall 2011 Semester

LSU Health Sciences Center Recruitment and Information Session November 4 2010

RACE - 2010 New Orleans Film Festival

http://www.slideshare.net/ccharles/race-2010-new-orleans-film-festival

RACE - 2010 New Orleans Film Festival

The 1020 Louisiana Congressional 2nd District Election Assouncement

Dillard University Department of Political Science

Office of Undergraduate Research

Project Pericles

http://www.slideshare.net/ccharles/the-1020-louisiana-congressional-2nd-district-election-assouncement

The 1020 Louisiana Congressional 2nd District Election Assouncement

Faculty Focus: Intellectual Property, Copyright, and Harassment: Navigating the Murky Legal Waters of Online Teaching

October 18, 2010

http://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/online-education/intellectual-property-copyright-and-harassment-navigating-the-murky-legal-waters-of-online-teaching/?c=FF&t=F101018a

 

Faculty Focus: Intellectual Property, Copyright, and Harassment: Navigating the Murky Legal Waters of Online Teaching

Faculty Development on TWITTER

http://www.google.com/search?q=faculty+development+groups+on+FACEBOOK&rls=com.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=ie7&rlz=1I7GGLL_en#sclient=psy&hl=en&rls=com.microsoft:en-us%3AIE-SearchBox&rlz=1I7GGLL_en&source=hp&q=faculty+development+on+TWITTER&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=faculty+development+on+TWITTER&gs_rfai=&pbx=1&fp=98ec2ad8abf723f3

Faculty Development on TWITTER

Faculty Development Groups on FACEBOOK

http://www.google.com/search?q=faculty+development+groups+on+FACEBOOK&rls=com.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=ie7&rlz=1I7GGLL_en

Faculty Development Groups on FACEBOOK

Faculty Development Videos on YouTube

Faculty Development Videos on YouTube

Faculty Development Videos on YouTube

Blogs about Faculty Development

http://en.wordpress.com/tag/faculty-development/

Blogs about Faculty Development

Special Report_Supporting Teachers in Identifying Students’ Learning Styles in Learning

http://www.ifets.info/journals/12_4/2.pdf

Special Report_Supporting Teachers in Identifying Students’ Learning Styles in Learning

Special Report_New Directions in Advanced Learning Technologies

http://www.ifets.info/journals/12_4/1.pdf

Special Report_New Directions in Advanced Learning Technologies

The Educator's Reference Desk Website

http://www.eduref.org/cgi-bin/res.cgi/Educational_Technology

The Educator's Reference Desk Website

Educational Technology: The Magazine for Managers of Change in Education

http://asianvu.com/bookstoread/etp/Educational_Technology_March-April_2009.pdf

EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY MAGAZINE: The magazine for managers of change in education.


Educational Technology Magazine is the world's leading periodical publication covering the entire field of educational technology, an area pioneered by the magazine's editors in the early 1960s. Read by leaders in more than one hundred countries, the magazine has been at the forefront of every important new trend in the development of the field throughout the past five decades. Its list of published authors is a virtual "who's who" of the leading personalities and authorities from all over the world active in educational technology research, development, and application. Its stimulating, provocative, challenging articles are eagerly awaited by its loyal readership. It has also published more scores of special issues that have defined the field and created whole new areas for research. There is no other periodical that approaches its high level of prestige within the field of educational technology. The senior editor is Lawrence Lipsitz, who has personally known every leading authority in educational technology since the 1960s, and who today continues to be in direct daily contact with all of those doing the finest, most up-to-date thinking in this field. The magazine's book division, also headed by Lawrence Lipsitz, has published more than three hundred books since the 1960s, many of which are classics in the literature and a staple of advanced courses in departments of educational technology and instructional systems design. Published six times annually by Educational Technology Publications.

Educational Technology: The Magazine for Managers of Change in Education

Inside Higher ED: Documenting Adjunct Work

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/09/27/adjuncts

September 27, 2010

The Coalition on the Academic Workforce -- a group of disciplinary and professional associations and faculty unions -- is undertaking a major effort to document the working conditions and needs of adjuncts.


The goal of the strategy is to advance efforts to improve adjunct pay and working conditions by showing the extent of the challenges faced by those off the tenure track. Many adjuncts and their tenure-track supporters have complained about being rebuffed by administrators who cite examples (which may well be real for individuals, but not reflective of the group at large) of adjuncts who love being adjuncts, or who aren't worried about health insurance or retirement benefits because they have other, full-time jobs.


In addition, many of the national databases on academic working conditions -- such as the American Association of University Professors' much-cited annual survey of faculty salaries -- focus on full-time, generally tenure-track professors and so do not yield much information about a group that is already the majority at many institutions.



A statement from Robert Townsend, assistant director of research and publications for the American Historical Association, one of the coalition members, explained the survey this way: "Although the majority of U.S. faculty are now off the tenure track, information about their working conditions is sorely lacking. Most of the limited data that exist on the working conditions of the contingent academic workforce are too generic to be of much use in really understanding how these professionals are being compensated and treated."


The survey, which will be open on the coalition's website from today until November 30, features questions on how much work adjuncts are doing, their career goals, and their compensation. The survey reflects the way many adjuncts work at multiple institutions with differing pay and benefits.


Some of the questions appear designed to quantify the proportion of adjuncts who do and don't rely on their college employers to put food on the table and to provide life essentials such as health insurance. Questions cover such topics as whether higher education is the "primary employment" for these individuals, and whether they are seeking or would accept tenure-track positions. Benefits questions cover health insurance, retirement benefits and any other benefits. Adjuncts are also asked about limits on the number of courses they may teach, and about whether they are members of unions. Questions about courses include the number of students per section and such factors as whether the course is in person, online or hybrid.


The new survey will be open to all who are teaching off the tenure track -- full-time, part-time and graduate students. A survey released in March by the American Federation of Teachers included only part-time adjuncts. That survey found that part-time faculty members are generally satisfied with their jobs, but that many have concerns about the lack of health insurance, the lack of job security and other issues.
— Scott Jaschik

Inside Higher ED: Documenting Adjunct Work

Inside Higher ED: Around Washington: College Prices, Student Data

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/09/28/washington

September 28, 2010

WASHINGTON -- In a conversation with student journalists aimed at trumpeting his administration's higher education accomplishments and persuading young people (roughly a month ahead of midterm elections) that he's fighting for their interests, President Obama also signaled to college leaders that he is closely watching their soaring prices.


The president spent most of his time on the conference call with editors at college student newspapers discussing financial aid increases and health care changes designed to help young Americans maneuver through increasingly difficult financial times, so that they don't become a "lost generation," as Colin Daileda, a Radford University senior, put it. "Do you think it will take a longer time than usual for our generation to get on our feet?"

Obama sought to be reassuring, saying: "First of all, I think your generation is going to be just fine. I mean, we’ve gone through the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, and so things are real tough for young people right now. But having said that, if you are getting a college degree, if you’ve got skills in math and science or good, sound communication skills, there are still jobs out there even in a tough environment. And 9 out of 10 people who are looking for work can still find work."



As he mixed political chatter (bashing Republicans for favoring tax cuts for the rich and implying that they would roll back increases in student aid) with sports small talk (discussing the results of Saturday's football games with several callers), the president was asked by Daniel Schonhaut of the University of California at Los Angeles to "address this concern that public higher education is becoming more of a strain on families?"


The president's answer managed, in about a minute, both to cogently summarize the factors that many experts credit (or blame) for rapidly increasing college tuitions and to make clear that continued escalation is unacceptable.


"If I keep on increasing Pell Grants and increasing student loan programs and making it more affordable, but ... higher education inflation keeps on going up at the pace that it’s going up right now, then we’re going to be right back where we started, putting more money in, but it’s all being absorbed by these higher costs," Obama said.


It aggravated college leaders no end that officials in the Bush administration often played down the extent to which state budget cuts contributed to rising college prices, and Obama has avoided that trap. "[S]tate budgets are being so hard pressed that they’re having to make severe cutbacks in the support they provide to public education," the president said Monday. "So one of the things that I can do to help is to make sure that the economy is growing, states then are taking in more tax revenue, and if states are taking in more tax revenue, then they don't have to try to pass on increased costs to students because they can maintain levels of support to institutions of higher learning."


But college and state leaders need to do their parts, too, Obama said, to "figure out what is driving all this huge inflation in the cost of higher education, because this is actually the only place where inflation is higher than health care inflation." While health insurance and other employee-related costs are "out of the control of the administrators at universities," the president said, "there are other aspects of this where, frankly, I think students as consumers, parents as consumers, and state legislators and governors are going to need to put more pressure on universities."


Sounding a bit like the grandfather who tells the teenagers that he used to walk a mile to school in the snow without boots, Obama said he has been struck on campus visits by "the athletic facilities that exist these days, or the food courts or the other things that have to do with the quality of life at universities. ...


"[I]t’s sure a lot nicer than it was when I was going to college. ... And part of what I think we’ve got to examine is are we designing our universities in a way that focuses on the primary thing, which is education. You’re not going to a university to join a spa; you’re going there to learn so that you can have a fulfilling career. And if all the amenities of a public university start jacking up the cost of tuition significantly, that’s a problem."


Obama touched (in a slightly self-contradictory way) on the tension over faculty workloads, "so that we’re making sure that the teaching loads at universities continue to emphasize research and continue to give professors the opportunity to engage in work outside the classroom that advances knowledge, but at the same time reminding faculties that their primary job is to teach, and so you’ve got to structure how universities operate to give students the best deal that they can -- that’s important, too."


The president said the administration will be "working with university presidents and college presidents to figure out how can we get control of costs generally and refocus our priorities and our attention on what the primary function of a university is, and that is to give students the knowledge and skills that they need to have a fulfilling career after they get out -- not to provide the best situation for the four years that they’re there."


Terry W. Hartle, senior vice president for government and public affairs at the American Council on Education, said the higher education presidents' group would be "happy at any time" to work with the president on such a review. He called the president's analysis "incredibly detailed and amazingly insightful," especially for "somebody who is extraordinarily busy with matters of state."


GAO on State Student Records Systems
In the push to measure outcomes, states are moving to maintain longitudinal data systems linking educational and employment information for individual students, but concerns about maintaining student privacy and judging institutions fairly worry some state and institutional officials, reported the Government Accountability Office in a study released Monday.


Based on surveys conducted by the Lumina Foundation for Education and the State Higher Education Executive Officers, GAO counted 26 states that maintain longitudinal data systems that track employment and other outcomes of the graduates of postsecondary institutions, while 45 have at least one postsecondary data system.


GAO found that the U.S. Department of Education needs to offer more guidance on how state agencies can ensure compliance with the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act while still effectively keeping tabs on students. Several federal initiatives, including the department’s Grant Program for Statewide Longitudinal Data Systems, aim to encourage states to link education and workforce data, and could potentially violate FERPA.


In some states, GAO said, agencies use workforce data to promote economic development, offer feedback to institutions on where and how students were employed after earning certain degrees, and inform prospective students of their potential outcomes. GAO also suggested expanding direct state-to-state data sharing to better understand work force movement across state lines.


The report was authorized by the Higher Education Opportunity Act of 2008 and conducted between July 2009 and this month, and does in a sense weigh in on the current tug-of-war over the Education Department’s proposed regulations on “gainful employment," which would use average salaries calculated by the Social Security Administration as one part of a formula to measure student outcomes.


Some stakeholders interviewed, including officials from colleges, GAO said, “raised concerns that employment outcomes that are beyond a school’s control should not be used as a basis for assessing the quality of the education provided by the school or adequacy of preparing students for employment.”
— Doug Lederman and Jennifer Epstein

Inside Higher ED: Around Washington: College Prices, Student Data

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation: The Official Blog of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation



http://www.gatesfoundation.org/foundationnotes/Pages/default.aspx

Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation: The Official Blog of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

Inside Higher ED: Libraries Make it Personal

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/09/28/librarians

September 28, 2010

At a time when technology is said to be creating a gulf between librarians and students, a handful of libraries are trying to make their relationships with undergraduates a bit more personal.


Drexel University made headlines earlier this month with its new “personal librarian” program, which assigns each incoming undergraduate a specific member of the library staff to serve as a first point of contact.


Wesleyan University also started assigning students “personal librarians” this fall. Both institutions drew on the example of Yale University, which in 2008 began reaching out to undeclared undergraduates after providing the service to medical and law students for years. Libraries at University of Richmond and the University of Chicago started similar programs for undergrads about a decade ago.

There are small differences, but these programs share a basic template. The library contacts incoming students, usually a few weeks before orientation, with a personalized letter, along with a business card, from a specific librarian introducing them to the library. The librarians might e-mail their assigned students periodically, reminding them of what services the library offers.



The obligations are not nearly the same as those between academic advisers and advisees; in fact, students are not required to meet with their personal librarian, or even acknowledge them. The important thing for the library is that students know the library has not just books but also familiar-looking people who know their names and want to help them. The idea is that getting that name might make students more likely to schedule a sit-down meeting to learn how to use the library's various interfaces, collections, and specialists. Sit-downs, or even e-mail correspondence, are much more effective than group orientations, says Patricia Tully, the university librarian at Wesleyan.


If personal librarian programs are a trend, the trend is a recent one. Barbara Rockenbach, director of undergraduate and library research at Yale, frames the movement toward “personalization” as a foil to technological forces that have made the library seem more impersonal. With many libraries canceling subscriptions to printed journals, shuttling underused books off to remote storage, and making more of their resources available on the Web, students might increasingly view the library as a database they can use from a solitary dorm room rather than an actual place populated by helpful humans.


“We weren’t seeing students at the reference desk anymore,” Rockenbach says. “…It feels for us that technology is the driver.”


It was not, however, the driver at the University of Richmond, which was the first institution to assign personal librarians to undergraduates — at least as far as any of the recent practitioners can remember. According to Lucretia McCulley, director of outreach services at Richmond’s Boatwright Memorial Library, the motivation was simpler and had less to do with cultural tectonics.


“The bank I had at the time had personal banking,” McCulley says. “I had always really liked my personal banker, so I thought, ‘Why can't we do this for students?’ ”


The library building at Richmond still sees plenty of traffic, McCulley says. The personal librarian program was just another outreach effort. Same with Drexel and Wesleyan, officials there say. “We want to reach out to students who might feel a little intimidated — particularly students from small schools, or international students,” says Tully, of Wesleyan. Sending personalized letters with business cards to incoming students does not require a huge investment, notes Danuta Nitecki, dean of libraries at Drexel. It was not so much a question of “Why” as “Why not?”


At Chicago, where undergraduates share the library with the university’s considerable graduate population, putting a face to the building serves as a hedge against alienating the younger students, says Rebecca Starkey, a reference librarian there. Personal relationships with library staff generally are more common among graduate students, whose library use is frequent and well-defined, and undergraduate juniors and seniors, whose research interests have begun to narrow along the lines of a declared major, she says. First-year students are less likely to develop personal relationships with librarians.


“We’re a large research library — our undergraduates don’t always know who they need to talk to for the right things,” says Starkey. “This allows us to sort of cut through that.”


Still, the “personal librarian” service is curious in that it only works if it is low-impact. Depending on the university, librarians might be assigned 50 or 500 students to serve personally. In most cases, if all or even half of those students availed themselves of the service, the librarians would be swamped. Yale says only 10 percent of students actually contact their personal librarian; a higher yield, and the program would not work.


Meanwhile, the extent to which the program is actually bringing new students into the library is hard to pinpoint, since the students who take care to avail themselves of a personal librarian might have sought out the help of the library staff anyway, adoptive librarian or no.


But the general view among the librarians who have adopted the practice is that another step toward demystifying the library is a good thing, even if the effect of the personal librarian program turns out to be marginal. “There’s a lot of adjustment happening in that freshman year for students,” says Jim Rettig, the university librarian at Richmond. “And if we can make it a little easier for them, that [means] a better experience.”
— Steve Kolowich

Inside Higher ED: Libraries Make it Personal

Inside Higher Ed: Online Colleges as a Policy Bloc?

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/10/13/forum

October 13, 2010

WASHINGTON -- For-profit colleges in one camp and everyone else in another may be the prevailing theme of higher education policy this fall, but online institutions, regardless of their tax status, were all in one camp Tuesday at a discussion of the challenges they face in proving quality and value while offering a kind of learning that's very different from the hidebound practices of traditional colleges and universities.


The dominant concern coming from the leaders of online programs at the seventh meeting of the Presidents’ Forum -- a group of institutions that serve adult students primarily online -- was proving they offer quality and value as the U.S. Department of Education and Congress begin roundabout efforts to measure those things.

“We need to again use better data to make our case … to tell our story in credible ways,” said Margaret Spellings, who served as secretary of education during George W. Bush’s second term. She is now senior adviser to the president and CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and consults for Education Management Corporation. “We’re seen as wild-eyed, often profit-making, the wild west of higher education, and often don’t get credit for what we do.”



The challenge of finding the right data to collect to get a better sense of what works and what doesn’t resurfaced throughout the daylong meeting, but there was little talk of exactly what those data should be. Gordon Freedman, vice president of global education strategy at Blackboard, suggested that analytic data from students’ interactions with his company’s products and other learning management systems could be a good place to start. Mark David Milliron, deputy director for postsecondary improvement at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, also pointed to better use of the data gleaned by online learning as a means for identifying struggling students and measuring outcomes.


At the core of the push for more data are the bigger goals that foundations, the Obama administration and business leaders have set out for higher education, said John F. Ebersole, president of Excelsior College, a private nonprofit New York institution that specializes in serving adult learners online. The forum and its members, he said, hope to take a leadership role to “try and address this issue of degree completion, as we try and address the issues of access, quality and accountability.”


During a panel on state regulation, some consensus emerged that states ought to do a better job collaborating and developing reciprocity agreements, both with one another and with accreditors. Some states, like Wisconsin, consider online institutions based in other states but serving their residents to fall under their regulatory purview, while others, like New York, require state oversight only of institutions with a physical presence there.


Regulators and online programs could make progress, said Byron Connell, associate in higher education at the New York State Education Department, by “trying to identify core information” that institutions need to gain state approval. “Each of us has our own set of information requirements, most of which are similar, and it ought to be possible to develop a multi-state common set of information requirements, so that if an institution needs to apply to a state individually it doesn’t have to fill out a unique set of forms.”


At another panel, Charles S. Lenth, vice president for policy analysis and academic affairs for the State Higher Education Executive Officers, said the challenge states face is even more basic than attempting to cooperate on program approval. “We can take some important steps just to set up mechanisms that provide, if not a welcome mat, at least a place to go for information about who at the state level does what and why,” he said. “And you might think that’s an unnecessary step. I happen to believe that it would be a first step toward resolving these issues.”


Simplifying the puzzle of 50 states with distinct sets of data requirements and regulatory frameworks has been one of the Presidents’ Forum’s key objectives since its founding. While still a priority -- more than a dozen states are working together with the help of a Lumina Foundation grant -- sorting out state regulation has taken a backseat to the federal government’s new efforts toward oversight of higher education.


“The feds, I think quite frankly, have lost faith in the triad” -- the regulatory triangle involving the federal government, the states, and accrediting agencies -- said David A. Longanecker, president of the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education, who spent six years as the Clinton administration’s assistant secretary for postsecondary education. “While it still exists, they’re relying much less heavily on the states for consumer protection, the accreditors for quality assurance.”


The result, he said, is heightened scrutiny from Washington. “It’s not because they’ve gone nutso on regulation. I think they’ve just lost faith in their partners…. And it’s legitimate because we don’t have a reasonable standards-based system today.”


Not everyone was quite as enthusiastic about the push for greater oversight coming from the Obama administration and Congress. The Education Department’s proposed regulations on “gainful employment” -- due to be published in two parts, one by Nov. 1 and the other probably early next year, following meetings and hearings with stakeholders – came up several times throughout the day’s conversation.


The rules and the department’s general direction, said Spellings, are “really interesting and … the subject of some great cocktail party conversation in Washington these days.”


She added: “It does seem like it came from a place different from where every secretary of education, Republican and Democrat alike, had been with respect to that quasi-arcane part of the law,” referring to the “gainful employment” language in the Higher Education Act. “In my mind, this is a skirmish in the overall war. There will be other issues…. It’s the wrong issue at the wrong time, in my view.”


Instead, she and several others said, Washington’s focus ought to be on better facilitating access and completion.


“Gainful employment has gotten as far as it has because it is focused on the for-profit sector,” said Holly Kuzmich, vice president of Margaret Spellings and Company, who filled several roles in Spellings’ Education Department.


Jennifer Blum, a partner at the Washington law firm Drinker Biddle & Reath, said that with issues like the Education Department’s forthcoming regulations on credit hours, an institution’s tax status isn’t relevant. But Russell S. Kitchner, associate vice president for regulatory and governmental relations at the American Public University System, said her view was relevant only if politicians were excluded from the equation. “If a politician wants to make it relevant, it is. And there are very strong political movements in Congress to make irrelevant points relevant and I think we have to recognize that.”


And Ebersole, of Excelsior, expressed concern that online programs would be lumped in with the egregious examples highlighted by the Senate’s Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.


“We all, I think, have to agree there is some bias against for-profits,” he said. “I think that our coming together, talking together, working together -- profit, not-for-profit -- is one of the ways that perhaps we can soften [the conflict] because those of us who work alongside our for-profit brothers know that in fact there is much good work being done.”


He added: “We worry that [when] someone catch[es] a cold, we get the flu. So we care about how online learning is being perceived in the marketplace, regardless of the corporate structure of the institution providing it.”
— Jennifer Epstein

Inside Higher Ed: Online Colleges as a Policy Bloc?

The Chronicle of Higher Education: Delivering an Influx of Federal Dollars, Obama Administration Wants Results

October 13, 2010

http://chronicle.com/article/In-Return-for-Federal-Dollars/124861/ 

President Obama campaigned on a promise to provide billions more dollars to students and colleges, and he has delivered.


Since he took office, almost two years ago, spending on student aid has grown by nearly 50 percent, to $145-billion, while aid to colleges has exploded. Much of the new money has come with no strings attached, including $36-billion for Pell Grants in a student-loan bill he signed in March.


But the president has also sought to use federal funds as leverage, offering carrots to colleges and states that embrace his goals, and sticks to those that hinder them. More than any of his predecessors, he has demanded results in exchange for federal dollars, requiring grant applicants to set benchmarks for improvement and threatening to withhold aid from programs that fail to prepare students for jobs.


That approach has rankled some higher-education leaders, who accuse the administration of meddling in academic affairs, but it has won praise from advocates of greater accountability and assessment for colleges.


Secretary of Education Arne Duncan says the administration sees itself as a "partner" in a nationwide effort to improve schools and colleges. In a speech he gave a year ago, Mr. Duncan sought to reassure state education leaders that he was not seeking to seize control of the education agenda.


"Education reform starts locally, ... and my job is to help you succeed," he said. "I want to be a partner in your success, not the boss of it."


Still, he continued, "I'm not willing to be a silent partner who puts a stamp of approval on the status quo."


"I plan to be an active partner."


It's too soon to say whether the president's accountability agenda will succeed. Though Congress has embraced his ideas, his proposals have run into budget constraints. So far lawmakers have provided only a fraction of the money the president has sought for new incentive grants to states and community colleges.


He has also faced significant pushback on his plan to tie federal aid to graduates' debt levels and employment. While the administration is unlikely to abandon the proposal, it is under intense pressure from for-profit colleges to soften the so-called gainful-employment rule, and it recently postponed putting out the regulation until after the midterm elections.


An Ambitious Agenda
The president set ambitious goals for the nation's colleges early in his presidency, calling for the United States to lead the world in college-completion rates by 2020 and asking every American to obtain a "year or more" of higher education.


To make college more affordable for the millions of Americans without degrees, he proposed ending subsidies to student lenders and using the savings to significantly expand federal support to students, states, and colleges.


The president put community colleges at the center of his plan, asking Congress to give the institutions $12-billion over 10 years to educate five million more students. Much of the money would have come with conditions: To qualify for federal support, community colleges would have had to set goals tied to program completion, work-force preparation, and job placement. Grantees would have chosen their own benchmarks, but those would have had to be approved by the U.S. education secretary.


The proposal represented a significant shift in the way federal aid has been awarded to community colleges, requiring them to negotiate individual goals for the first time. It also broke from the tradition of distributing aid based on enrollments, instead tying awards to students' graduation.


The administration also sought to enlist governors in its goals, proposing a $2.5-billion College Access and Completion Fund to support states' efforts to improve college attendance and completion rates. The money, which was to be competitively awarded, would have rewarded states that embraced the administration's vision of reform, much like the new Race to the Top grants for elementary and secondary schools.


Both the community-college and state-grant proposals sought to change the incentive structure for higher education, encouraging colleges to focus on graduating students, not just enrolling them. As Mr. Arne Duncan explained to reporters in a 2009 briefing on the president's budget, "there have been very few incentives on the graduation side."


"There's been a lot of push to get students in the door, but not to graduate," he said. "We really have to change the status quo."


An 'Activist' President
Not surprisingly, the plans met with skepticism from colleges. Some community-college leaders worried that benchmarking could shift the balance of power from state and local governing boards to Washington, setting the stage for federal meddling in curricula. Private colleges, meanwhile, objected to the plan to funnel the Access and Completion grants through the states, arguing that it would be inefficient and could compromise their cherished independence. While public colleges must answer to state higher-education offices, private colleges are independently governed.


"We couldn't have states setting benchmarks for private colleges," said Sarah A. Flanagan, vice president for government relations and policy at the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities.


Colleges were also ambivalent about the president's plan to expand the Perkins Loan program and award a portion of the new aid to colleges that held down their tuition and did a good job graduating Pell Grant recipients. While college officials welcomed the money, they warned that the plan would penalize public colleges in states whose legislatures set tuition, often raising it to offset budget cuts.


Terry W. Hartle, senior vice president for government and public affairs at the American Council on Education, said Mr. Obama has taken a more "activist" and "expansive" approach to higher education than his predecessors, "both in terms of investing in education and moving the industry in ways it wants it to go."


"The good news is that they think higher education is important," Mr. Hartle said. "The bad news is that they would like more say over it than any other administration has had."


So far, though, Mr. Obama has had limited success in advancing his accountability agenda. Though Democrats included the president's proposals in legislation that ended the bank-based student-loan system, they were forced to scale back many of the programs when the bill yielded less savings than expected.


In the end, the measure provided only $750-million of the $2.5-billion Mr. Obama had sought for grants to states that advance his agenda on college completion. It included just $2-billion of the $12-billion the president was seeking for community colleges, and nothing for the program that would have required recipients to set benchmarks for improvement.


A 'Free Pass' for Colleges?
The president got another opportunity to shape education policy with the passage of the economic-stimulus bill, a multibillion-dollar bailout for cash-strapped states. The bill, which doubled the size of the Department of Education's budget, gave Mr. Duncan more money than any previous education secretary and the power to distribute it as he saw fit.


Though much of the bill's education aid, some $48.6-billion, was distributed by formula, governors had to provide four "assurances" to receive awards, including having "national college and career-ready standards" and tracking students from pre-kindergarten through college and careers.


The goal, said MaryEllen McGuire, who served until recently as Mr. Obama's senior adviser for education, was to leverage federal dollars for reform and build state capacity in the process.


"We weren't just giving money away," she said. "We had assurances in place."


But it was the bill's Race to the Top fund that gave the administration the most influence over education policy. Though only $4.35-billion in size, the fund has driven significant change at the state level, prompting governors and state legislatures to adopt common standards in elementary and secondary education, lift caps on charter schools, and begin to evaluate teachers based on their students' performance. Secretary Duncan recently credited the program with driving a "quiet revolution" of education reform.


Critics of the Race to the Top program see it as an example of federal micromanagement of education.


"This is the federal government telling states that if you want this money, you have to make your priorities Washington's priorities," said Neal McCluskey, associate director of the Center for Educational Freedom, at the Cato Institute.


But supporters of the program say it's a model that should be extended to higher education. Kevin Carey, policy director of Education Sector, and a frequent contributor to The Chronicle, says colleges got a "free pass" in the stimulus bill, receiving millions of dollars with virtually no strings attached.


He argues that colleges would be better off if they accepted more federal oversight in exchange for more federal aid.


"There should be a Race to the Top for colleges," Mr. Carey said. He suggests, among other things, that the money go only to states that are open about their colleges' graduation rates, provide evidence of student learning, and publicly report their job-placement rates.


Regulatory Changes
Meanwhile, the president has pursued an aggressive regulatory agenda, proposing a slew of rules aimed at safeguarding the federal student-aid program from fraud and abuse. The most controversial of these is the "gainful-employment rule," which would cut off federal student aid to programs whose graduates have high debt-to-income ratios and low loan-repayment rates.


While the rule is aimed at for-profit colleges, some nonprofit colleges fear it could set a precedent for evaluating all colleges based on their graduates' earnings. That could hurt programs in regions with high unemployment and discourage colleges from offering degrees in low-paying fields, lobbyists say. "They're fairly well crossing the Rubicon," said David S. Baime, senior vice president for government relations at the American Association of Community Colleges. "You're not that many steps away from forgetting about debt and just looking at earnings."


Other rules the Obama administration has proposed would apply to all institutions, including a plan to establish a federal definition of credit-hour and expand state-authorization requirements for colleges. Colleges say the proposals invite federal intrusion into academic and state affairs and would limit innovation in higher education.


With the first round of rules due out at the start of November, the Education Department is under intense pressure from colleges to soften its proposals.


But it's clear that President Obama hasn't given up on using federal dollars to push for change in higher education. In his budget for the 2010 fiscal year, the president proposed putting schools of education in direct competition with alternative-certification programs like Teach for America when seeking federal grants. And he's also expected to use $2-billion in grants to community colleges to reward programs that emphasize reform and innovation.


Mr. Carey, of Education Sector, sees signs that the days of free money to colleges are over.


"In the future, if colleges expect to get additional investments, they're going to have to make the case for what that money will buy," he said.

The Chronicle of Higher Education: Delivering an Influx of Federal Dollars, Obama Administration Wants Results