Columbia students stuff Nutella in their pants to the tune of $1,000s a week. (SLNYT)
Last month one of Columbia’s undergraduate dining halls began serving Nutella every day, not just in crepes on weekends. The problem was that the Columbia students went through jars and jars of Nutella — at least 100 pounds a day. Apparently they were not just eating it in the dining hall. They were spiriting it away in soup containers and other receptacles, to be eaten later.
posted by grobstein
on Mar 7, 2013 -
100 comments
In several computer science courses at Johns Hopkins University, the grading curve was set by giving the highest score on the final an A, and then adjusting all lower scores accordingly. The students determined that if they collectively boycotted, then the highest score would be a zero, and so
everyone would get an A.
posted by Foci for Analysis
on Feb 18, 2013 -
162 comments
In 2003, only two colleges charged more than $40,000 a year for tuition, fees, room, and board. Six years later more than two hundred colleges charged that amount. What happened between 2003 and 2009 was the start of the recession. By driving down endowments and giving tax-starved states a reason to cut back their support for higher education, the recession put new pressure on colleges and universities to raise their price.
When our current period of slow economic growth will end is anybody’s guess, but even when it does end, colleges and universities will certainly not be rolling back their prices. These days, it is not just the economic climate in which our colleges and universities find themselves that determines what they charge and how they operate; it is their increasing corporatization.
If corporatization meant only that colleges and universities were finding ways to be less wasteful, it would be a welcome turn of events. But an altogether different process is going on
[more inside]
posted by the man of twists and turns
on Nov 14, 2012 -
69 comments
T. Boone Pickens and other wealthy, elderly Oklahoma State alums decided to participate in a scheme named "Call of a Lifetime", where they would allow the university to take out $10 million life insurance policies on them.
What could go wrong?
posted by reenum
on Oct 7, 2012 -
66 comments
"
I, Polina Marinova, have resigned as the editor-in-chief from The Red & Black, the student newspaper covering the University of Georgia. The Red & Black’s top editors, design staff, photo staff and reporters walked out of the newspaper building this afternoon."
The mass departure follows a
memo of staff expectations issued by the board of directors of the newspaper, which is independent of the university. Among the "expectations" issued by the board to which Marinova objected was that the newspaper's coverage find a balance of "GOOD" (human interest pieces directly relating to the UGA student audience) and "BAD" (explained in the board's memo as "Content that catches people or organizations doing bad things. I guess this is 'journalism'."). This was followed by a final note to "[i]f in question, have more GOOD than BAD." Marinova also alleged that students no longer have final approval in the content of the newspaper, writing that
"[r]ecently, editors have felt pressure to assign stories they didn't agree with, take 'grip and grin' photos and compromise the design of the paper." [more inside]
posted by ctab
on Aug 15, 2012 -
84 comments
A recent article in the Chronicle of Higher Education tells the story of
The Education of Dasmine Cathey, a 23-year-old football player for the University of Memphis. Writer Brad Wolverton met Cathey, who taught himself to read his second year of college, while doing research on student-athletes with severe reading, writing, and learning problems.
posted by naturalog
on Jun 4, 2012 -
43 comments
"Don't ever forget that you're a citizen of this world, and there are things you can do to lift the human spirit, things that are easy, things that are free, things that you can do every day. Civility, respect, kindness, character. You're too good for schadenfreude, you're too good for gossip and snark, you're too good for intolerance—and since you're walking into the middle of a presidential election, it's worth mentioning that you're too good to think people who disagree with you are your enemy.... Don't ever forget that a small group of thoughtful people can change the world. It's the only thing that ever has."
On May 13th, Aaron Sorkin
gave the commencement address to the graduating class at Syracuse University, a speech that
has been mildly criticized for recycling some lines from his shows
West Wing and
Sports Night.
Video. (
Via.)
posted by zarq
on May 19, 2012 -
50 comments
The Higher Education (Debt) Bubble - "[H]igh and increasing college costs mean students need to take out more loans, more loans mean more securities lenders can package and sell, more selling means lenders can offer more loans with the capital they raise, which means colleges can continue to raise costs. The result is over $800 billion in outstanding student debt, over 30 percent of it securitized, and the federal government directly or indirectly on the hook for almost all of it. If this sounds familiar, it probably should...
[more inside]
posted by kliuless
on May 17, 2011 -
185 comments
The Texas House Homeland Security and Public Safety Committee voted 5-3 Wednesday night to advance legislation to allow concealed handguns on college campuses. Over half of the Texas House has
signed on as co-authors of the bill. University of Texas System Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa
disagrees.
Utah beat them to it.
posted by the Real Dan
on Mar 18, 2011 -
106 comments
PhDChallenge.org proposed a
challenge: To have the phrase "I smoke crack rocks" included in a peer reviewed academic paper. The winner is Gabriel Parent from Carnegie Mellon, who included it in his
paper [PDF].
posted by reenum
on Dec 16, 2010 -
54 comments
