Charles Darwin’s Theory of Evolution, first published in 1859, offered a bold new explanation for how animals and plants diversified and still serves as the foundation underpinning all medical and biological research today. But the theory remains under attack by creationists in various parts of the world, particularly the US, Turkey, Indonesia and the Middle […] … learn more→

The University where I currently work has recognised an age imbalance in its workforce, which is skewed towards those over 55. It is now taking active steps to rebalance – including encouraging retirement of aging academics at one end and entry of fresh new talent at the other. Some may scream about ageism – but […] … learn more→

In a month when news from academia includes the story of an Idaho State professor literally shooting himself in the foot with a concealed handgun, it takes a lot to win the prize for dumbest move. But, to give credit where credit is due, Goucher College managed to pull it off. One of the unwritten […] … learn more→

I’ve certainly written many times how community colleges seem designed simply to rip off people, and I’ve provided much eyewitness testimony in that regard, and shown what’s going on in their publicly available course offerings. I admit, I’m just some guy with a blog, I don’t expect I can change things no matter how many […] … learn more→

Remember feeling nervous before starting your first day on the job? You may have experienced butterflies in your stomach, had questions about expectations, or concerns about learning the rules and finding information. Students feel the same way with a new professor, regardless if the class is face-to-face or online. With technology, you can reduce new-class […] … learn more→

In my classroom, we talk in an unstructured way about big themes—love, justice, beauty, the meaning of life—mostly without citing any evidence in support of our claims (certainly not scientific evidence), and almost always without coming to any conclusions. We usually do have a text in front of us, but I am hoping that it […] … learn more→

In a fascinating op ed in the Boston Globe recently, Andrew W. Lo, a professor at MIT’s Sloan School of Management and Tom Rutledge, chief investment strategist at Alpha Simplex Group, looked at how the area’s colleges and universities might support Boston’s bid to host the 2024 Olympics. The reaction across Boston to the City’s […] … learn more→

As the immense corruption of higher education grows, it gets ever more crass, to the point that the rulers of higher education no longer make any pretense of their corruption (say, does that remind you of any current government?). Anyway, the title of a recent article demonstrates just how little effort is put into maintaining […] … learn more→

Is gender theory relevant to undergraduate students? Skeptics have long dismissed theory’s intellectual import largely on the basis of style. In the 90s, Gayatri Spivak, Judith Butler, and Homi Bhabha were scrutinized for their “pretentiously opaque” prose, “bad writing,” and “indecipherable jargon” respectively. Of course not all scholars are equally subject to these sorts of […] … learn more→

The liberal arts environment demands that faculty show students connections between disciplines. As a political scientist, I often link course topics with economics, history, and sociology, but last summer I realized that I could make linkages with visual art. Because I was soon traveling to Washington, D.C. and New York City, I could take pictures […] … learn more→