Opinion

Balancing responsibilities is the most difficult part of an academic career, writes Nate Kreuter. And that's true even in summer, when some duties may not be present (and you may not be getting paid).

By Nate Kreuter

Mitt Romney’s plans for higher education thus far are silly, but not catastrophic. Already that puts him ahead of much of his party.

By Dean Dad

I'm not too proud to beg Facebook to consider including educators at the table during the design of the Facebook phone.

By Joshua Kim

Indonesia was one of the first to give significant autonomy to a select group of its universities. In the first years of post-1998 democracy, which included significant moves to decentralise education, Indonesia introduced a significant scheme to reform its higher education system. Of more than 3,000 higher education institutions across the archipelago, four were selected for a pilot programme that gave greater academic freedom and financial autonomy. So why has the MoEC now proposed to withdraw the autonomy granted to chosen universities little more than a decade ago, with the view that, if the pilot programme was successful, it might then be extended to more and more institutions?

By Anthony Welch and Aminudin Aziz

What happens if (when?) the public money vanishes from “public” higher education?

By Kenneth C. Green

My kids are counting down to the last day of school. This morning I heard the daily update: 9 days left. They’ve had it. They are both exhausted and tired of the grinding routine: wake up early, long day at school, homework, dinner, daily afterschool programs, choir, piano lessons and practice, etc, etc. Swim practices have stopped, as the season is over, but the (considerable) time this frees up quickly dissipates into special end of year performances, practices, field trips, ceremonies, and although a little different, these weigh on my kids too. Summer vacation is looking good in their eyes. I blogged before about how our family is relocating across the country this summer. This will certainly shake things up this summer – a cure to the blahs of long-term, rigorous school routine.

By Dana Campbell

I am working on a presentation today, a riff on a theme I have often mentioned in these blogs under the title: The Internet transfigures humanity. In the course of reviewing the history of U.S. higher education in the twentieth-century, I reread President Eisenhower's farewell speech. In search of understanding the context around which he coined the famous "military-industrial complex" phrase, I discovered that higher education has a walk on role in the drama. Here is what President Eisenhower had to say:

By Tracy Mitrano