Nathan Heller\’s terrific New Yorker article Laptop U has been making the rounds in our professional networks. By Tweet and e-mail, photocopy and blog post, many of us are spending some quality time with some of the good folks responsible for bringing higher education to scale. Like most of the colleagues I have spoken to […] … learn more→

The following annotated bibliography on machine scoring and evaluation of essay-length writing is based on the 2012 published bibliography in the Journal of Writing Assessment 5 (compiled by Richard Haswell, Whitney Donnelly, Vicki Hester, Peggy O’Neill, and Ellen Schendel). The bibliography was compiled by reviewing recent scholarship on machine scoring of essays, also referred to […] … learn more→

Yet another clinical study has confirmed the growing body of evidence linking inadequate sleep to obesity. One of the more surprising factors linked to weight gain is lack of sleep. More and more research studies are finding that poor sleep patterns and insufficient sleep are closely linked to weight gain and obesity. The mechanism linking […] … learn more→

A ground-breaking report examining the experiences of nearly 50 British women of all ages, ethnicities, backgrounds and faiths (or no faith) – who have all converted to Islam – was launched in London yesterday by the University of Cambridge. The report (http://bit.ly/12tv0YM), produced by the University’s Centre of Islamic Studies (CIS), in association with the […] … learn more→

This being spring conference season, I’ve attended a number of higher education events in recent weeks, as well as a number of smaller gatherings where higher education leaders have congregated to reflect on the present moment and what it might mean for the future of our colleges and universities. Needless to say, many of the […] … learn more→

My friend “Jana” sent her most promising manuscript to a journal that we’ll call The Ivy League Business Review. She received immediate confirmation that it was received, although the e-mail did not indicate whether or when it would be sent out for peer review. So she waited. And waited some more. After six months of […] … learn more→

“Planning without action is futile, action without planning is fatal” – Unknown We receive many positive comments regarding our GradHacker posts, but we also receive advice that warns us (and our readers) that some of our tips will provide people with procrastination mechanisms rather than ways to move their work forward. Think of how many […] … learn more→

In this corner: MOOC enthusiasts, envisioning how these large, online courses will increase access to higher education, reduce costs, and reinvigorate teaching and learning. In the other corner: MOOC critics, anticipating how MOOCs will eliminate meaningful interaction between faculty and students, reduce the quality of learning, and decimate the professorship. You’ve probably heard by now […] … learn more→

We’ve come a long way, as a species. And we’re better at many things than we ever were before – not just slightly better, but unimaginably, ridiculously better. We’re better at transporting people and objects, we’re better a killing, we’re better at preventing infectious diseases, we’re better at industrial production, agricultural and economic output, we’re […] … learn more→

Jeffrey Beall is a metadata librarian at the University of Colorado at Denver, but he\’s known online for his popular blog Scholarly Open Access, where he maintains a running list of open-access journals and publishers he deems questionable or predatory. Now, one of those publishers intends to sue Mr. Beall, and says it is seeking […] … learn more→