July 20, 2006

Quick Takes: ETS Wants More Testing, Bush Vetoes Stem Cell Bill, New Mexico Highlands President Out, California Review on Race and Admissions, Saint Louis U. President Out of Lebanon, Genetics Prof Guilty of Molestation, Clark College President Fired

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• The Educational Testing Service today is releasing a report calling for more assessment of what students learn in college. The call comes amid growing interest by a federal panel in using various tests for such assessment. Much of that interest is focused on the Collegiate Learning Assessment, which is managed by the Council for Aid to Education, not ETS.
• A day after the Senate passed the Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act by a 63-37 margin, President Bush vetoed the legislation, which would have allowed federal funds to be used for human embryonic stem cell research. The veto was the first of Bush’s presidency, and stem cell research advocates say that it is unlikely either the House or Senate can muster the two-thirds majority needed to override a veto. In an announcement Wednesday, Bush said that the policy he instituted in 2001 — allowing taxpayer money to be used for research on only a small number of existing stem cell lines — struck a good balance between research needs and “a moral boundary that our decent society needs to respect.” Researchers have said that the president has overstated the availability of such lines and ignored evidence that a broader research agenda could lead to important advances in science.
• The controversial president of New Mexico Highlands University — embroiled in controversy over his hiring choices and relations with professors — will leave his job. A joint statement from the president, Manny Aragon, and the Board of Regents, said that Aragon had done nothing wrong, but that it was in the “best interests” of the university that he leave.
• The University of California Board of Regents will conduct a review of the impact of operating for 10 years without affirmative action in admissions, the Los Angeles Times reported. The study follows significant drops in black enrollment at the University of California at Los Angeles.
• As evacuations continue of American students and professors who were in Lebanon this summer, one of those now out is the president of Saint Louis University. The Rev. Lawrence Biondi was in the country to give a commencement speech at Notre Dame University, outside of Beirut. The commencement was postponed because of the violence, and Father Biondi was stuck in Lebanon when the airport in Beirut was closed. The university reported that he had evacuated by ship to Cyprus.
• A leading figure in genetics, William French Anderson of the University of Southern California, was convicted Wednesday of molesting a colleauge’s daughter between 1997 and 2001, the Associated Press reported. Anderson’s lawyers vowed to appeal.
• The president of Clark College, a two-year institution in Washington State, was fired Wednesday, The Oregonian reported. R. Wayne Branch had clashed with faculty members, who said he did not respect the ideals of shared governance.

— Scott Jaschik and David Epstein

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