Quick Takes

President Obama will soon announce a plan for a major increase in support for community colleges, with the goal of promoting job training programs, the Chicago Tribune reported. The newspaper quoted Rahm Emanuel, the White House chief of staff, as telling the Democratic Leadership Council on Wednesday that "in the next couple of weeks, you will see a major announcement by the president on community colleges and job training and the rewriting of all the legislation related to job training and community ed. in the country -- but, most importantly, in the area of community colleges." Emanuel said that the goal of the proposal will be to enable community colleges to help five million more workers than they would be able to otherwise.

What do Harvard, Yale and Princeton Universities have in common with the University of Florida? They are all worth the same ranking, according to Bernie Machen, president of the University of Florida -- or at least that's what he told U.S. News & World Report. One of the most controversial parts of the magazine's rankings is the reputation survey, in which presidents are asked to rank their peers. Inside Higher Ed reported this month on how Clemson University's president ranked his institution above every other in the country on his report to U.S. News. The Gainesville Sun obtained the rankings of Machen (using a public records request to the university -- the magazine keeps these forms confidential) and discovered that he gives his institution the highest possible ranking. Generally, he was tough on other Florida universities, and his reviews reinforced to some why the reputation survey is problematic. Donald Eastman, president of Eckerd College, who is among a group of presidents who have vowed not to fill out the surveys, told the Sun: "To say that Florida is better than Harvard or Columbia or such places is an exercise in hubris."

Faculty and staff at the University of California could face a salary cut of 8 percent, 21 days of unpaid furloughs, or a combination of pay cuts and furloughs in 2010, under a proposal made by the president of the university system Wednesday. In a letter and memorandum sent to all employees of the 10-campus system and obtained by Inside Higher Ed, President Mark G. Yudof said that the "unprecedented challenges" facing the university -- a deficit of nearly $800 million in the current and next fiscal years -- would require $195 million in pay reductions, on top of $211 million generated through tuition increases and about $400 million that would fall to individual campuses to save through program and other reductions. The systemwide cut would be accomplished, Yudof wrote, either through an 8 percent salary decrease from August 2009 through July 2010 (4 percent for those earning under $46,000), 21 days of unpaid holidays and scheduled furloughs (slightly fewer for those who work only during the academic year and for those earning under $46,000), or 12 unpaid days and a 3.4 percent salary decrease. Yudof said university leaders would decide on one option to present to UC's Board of Regents in July.

Congress could formally begin its work on President Obama's proposal to restructure the student loan programs to free up money for Pell Grants and other financial aid as soon as next week, with the House of Representatives scheduled to mark up legislation that (by most accounts) would end all loan originations out of the lender-based Family Federal Education Loan Program but would not call for providing a consistent, permanent source of funding for Pell Grants. With that major development looming, the U.S. Education Department made an announcement Wednesday that could help lay the groundwork for the larger changes. The administration said that four lenders had emerged from a months-long competition to see who would "service" the existing portfolio of federal student loans, but the competition was also seen as a step toward testing the department's plan (as part of its larger loan proposal) to have lenders compete for "performance-based contracts" to service all federal loans when the FFEL Program vanishes. The four lenders that won the department's competition were AES/PHEAA, Great Lakes Education Loan Services, Inc., Nelnet, Inc., and Sallie Mae Corporation. The competition was controversial in part because the department limited it to lenders of a certain size, freezing out smaller nonprofit and other lenders.

In a sign of the increased interest by colleges in taking steps to attract more applicants, the Common Application announced that a record 49 new institutions are joining the program, in which applicants can designate multiple colleges to receive their materials. The brings total membership to 392, including a record-breaking 35 public institutions. The numbers are also up for the Universal College Application, a rival to the Common Application that started two years ago with 13 institutions, and now is in the 80s. Some colleges are involved with both applications.

The U.S. military academies reported a surge in applications this year, The New York Times reported. Many colleges that are relatively inexpensive or that offer generous financial aid reported application increases this year, and the military academies are free. But they also have military service requirements after graduation that represent a more lasting and serious commitment than most students must make when selecting a college. Still, the Naval Academy reported an application increase of 40 percent, while applications were up just under 10 percent at the Military Academy and the Air Force Academy.

The University of California at Davis has agreed to add a women's varsity field hockey team and also to add more money to develop club sports, under a settlement of a lawsuit filed by female athletes charging violations of Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, The Sacramento Bee reported. University officials said that they didn't think the suit was needed, but that they were happy to reach an agreement to resolve it.

Illinois College is the latest institution to announce that it will no longer require ACT or SAT scores of all applicants. The requirement will remain in place for home-schooled or international students.