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• October 1, 2013 5:21 PM

  How Apprenticeships Work in Switzerland

  Some conservative critics argue that the problem with American higher education is that too many high school students are going to college. College is something where they may not be prepared to succeed and the education will end up costing...

  By Daniel Luzer

• July 11, 2013 3:01 PM

  Career Services Can't Perform Magic

  American colleges are apparently now working to focus more on career preparation because they want to help their graduates be better prepared to get jobs. Good luck with that, career services; you can’t get blood from a stone. According...

  By Daniel Luzer

• June 19, 2013 11:34 AM

  Unpaid Internships Don’t Help People Get Jobs

  Internships are the new entry-level jobs. In this economy, critics often argue, the unpaid internship is a good way into a company. It helps give one demonstrate experience demanded for real jobs, and it provides a great opportunity to display...

  By Daniel Luzer

• May 20, 2013 2:25 PM

  Fashion College, for Fun and Profit (and Just for Fun and Profit)

  Among the more controversial aspects of young adult training, two things stick out as particularly offensive, and perhaps mutually reinforcing: overpriced schools and the scarcity of good jobs. And now, at long last, we’ve got an institution of higher...

  By Daniel Luzer

• May 14, 2013 2:05 PM

  Community Colleges Focus on Jobs

  Back in 2010, Jamie Merisotis and Stan Jones wrote for this publication about the potential benefits of using community colleges, and federal money, to help get the unemployed back to work. The administration appeared to have listened and the next...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 31, 2012 4:23 PM

  Ohio’s Jobs Idea

  One common complaint about American universities is that they are simply failing to train students for available jobs. This is why graduates are unemployed; they don’t know how to do what businesses really need. Critics suggest that it might be...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 14, 2012 11:00 AM

  Today in Fad Majors

  In another strange college-to-career development, it turns out students at one college will soon be able to major in… social media. According to a piece at Gizmodo, Newberry College in Newberry, South Carolina has made an entire undergraduate major...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 10, 2012 11:21 AM

  The Supply and Demand for Dental Hygienists

  American employers are more and more seeking to hire employees with bachelor’s degrees. This is true even for jobs where, strictly speaking, those degrees aren’t necessary to do the job properly. According to a piece by Shereen Marisol Meraji at...

  By Daniel Luzer

• August 1, 2012 5:25 PM

  Where Is the Skills Gap?

  We often hear chatter about the “structural issues” that ail our economy, such as a supposed skills mismatch that is restraining hiring. Take, for example, The New York Times’ Thomas Friedman in a column this May: “The Labor Department reported...

  By Minjae Park

• July 10, 2012 11:00 AM

  Even the Science PhDs Are in Trouble

  Despite frequent assertions from politicians and pundits that the United States desperately needs more students studying science and math, the Washington Post reports that Americans with science degrees aren’t finding jobs. According to an article by Brian Vastag: Although jobs...

  By Daniel Luzer

• June 14, 2012 3:26 PM

  Holding Colleges Accountable

  More and more, parents and students have been weighing the costs and benefits of college and deciding whether it is worth the price. For most, the value of college does not come from the four years that the students spend...

  By Danny Vinik

• April 11, 2012 6:39 PM

  Why Are There So Many College Majors?

  According to a recent blog post by Jeff Selingo of the Chronicle of Higher Education, there are a lot more college majors than there used to be. There, is, however, no indication that students are any better educated or prepared...

  By Daniel Luzer

• March 2, 2012 2:52 PM

  The Elusive Qualified Employee

  Just because there are jobs available doesn’t mean the unemployed can get those jobs. This is because the United States, it appears, simply isn’t funding training programs in the way it needs to ensure that there are enough people trained...

  By Daniel Luzer

• February 16, 2012 10:00 AM

  The Real Adjunct Faculty

  Yesterday, when discussing a piece about the presence of adjunct professors in higher education, I characterized the problem as essentially one of oversupply. I wrote that “institutions abuse adjunct faculty [because] there are still people willing and eager to take...

  By Daniel Luzer

• February 15, 2012 10:00 AM

  The Servants of Academia

  America’s adjunct faculty “lacks a professional identity and a sense of self-worth, according to a study published in the American Behavioral Scientist. Yes, they did a study to determine this. It’s perhaps more important to note that they also often...

  By Daniel Luzer

• February 14, 2012 6:15 PM

  Do We Really Have a Scientist Shortage?

  It’s a fundamental starting point for much of education reform. This country’s schools are bad, and education is in trouble, it part because they're not producing enough students prepared for careers in sciences, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). But...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 30, 2012 10:00 AM

  What Businesses Want

  Business leaders are “underwhelmed” by recent college graduates looking for jobs. According to a piece at the Chronicle of Higher Education: Many university graduates don’t measure up to the expectations of business leaders who hire them…. The online survey asked...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 23, 2012 10:00 AM

  A Test to Meausure Job Skills

  Straighter Line, a company that first generated interest for its potential to reduce the cost and inconvenience of college by offering online college courses cheaply, may move in a new direction: offering courses to prove job skills. According a piece...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 4, 2012 11:00 AM

  Rick Perry’s Reform

  College Guide earlier covered some of Texas Governor Rick Perry’s education reform efforts. He’s particularly into accountability, specifically making colleges reveal information about professors to the public. One of Perry’s earlier projects, however, was an effort to specifically connect education...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 4, 2012 10:00 AM

  Sure Beats Remedial Math

  Part of what community colleges do, especially in times of high unemployment, is to train people to succeed in local companies. These schools provide training for the jobs of the future. That doesn’t always mean jobs in high-tech manufacturing, allied...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 22, 2011 11:00 AM

  The Jobs Training Problem in Community Colleges

  Despite the fact that community colleges exist at least in part to train people for jobs, many such institutions are apparently now having trouble keeping up with demand, and have had to cut back on jobs training programs. High unemployment...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 17, 2011 12:00 PM

  Humanities Majors Will Be Fine

  One of the constant refrains of college critics has to do with those students majoring in the humanities. “We don’t need a lot more anthropologists in the state,” said Florida governor Rick Scott recently. “It’s a great degree if people...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 8, 2011 10:00 AM

  China's Gainful Employment

  Apparently China has instituted its own gainful employment rule. According to a report by Xinhua News, the press agency of the People's Republic of China: A recent decision by China's education administration to phase out college majors with a bleak...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 6, 2011 11:00 AM

  Artificial Intelligence, A Real Job

  For all of those who complain about those humanities programs weighing down our public universities and not preparing graduates for jobs, I give you this job posting, from the American Philosophical Association's Jobs for Philosophers: CYCORP, AUSTIN, TX. Cycorp has...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 6, 2011 10:00 AM

  Anti-Recession Training

  As long as we provide unemployment insurance to people when they don’t have jobs, reasons The Atlantic’s Derek Thompson, why not also provide them with some money for retraining? Maybe then they can make more money once they eventually get...

  By Daniel Luzer

• November 22, 2011 2:45 PM

  Trying to Do More With Less

  “Americans Need More Work and Less College” screams a headline at Forbes. Too many high school students are going to college, complains Jay Schalin of the John William Pope Center for Higher Education Policy. This is preventing them from working...

  By Daniel Luzer

• November 15, 2011 6:29 PM

  Laid Off and Back to School

  Laid-off workers in Kansas City are using their free time to return to school in an effort to gain skills to try and improve their employment prospects. All of this education should, in theory, improve employment prospects. But what happens...

  By Daniel Luzer

• November 10, 2011 10:00 AM

  Real Skills, Unreal Expectations

  Our workers just don’t have the skills they need to succeed in today’s economy, say America’s business leaders. Back to school with you! Well, maybe. According to a recent report by the AAR (Allen Aircraft Radio) Corporation: At a time...

  By Daniel Luzer

• October 29, 2011 12:00 PM

  College for Firefighters

  More education, so the thinking goes, will improve economic productively by increasing the quality of work Americans are capable of doing. Along with this, however, comes something interesting: it becomes more difficult to get many jobs without going to college,...

  By Daniel Luzer

• August 1, 2011 10:00 AM

  Engineering Wins

  Just in case you were wondering, it turns out that while in many cases one’s undergraduate major doesn’t really matter so much, a few majors pay a lot better than others. According to an article by Lynn O'Shaughnessy at CBS...

  By Daniel Luzer

• July 7, 2011 1:45 PM

  Career Fair Hiring Again?

  Apparently companies are going to college career fairs again, and hiring. Well, maybe. According to an article by Josh Dawsey at Fortune: After a two-year hiatus, major corporations are starting to hit college career-fair tables once again. Bank of America...

  By Daniel Luzer

• July 5, 2011 3:06 PM

  The Income Payout Question

  Are fancy colleges worth it? Stacy Dale and Alan Krueger recently estimated “the monetary return to attending a highly selective college.” So what’s the payoff? Well, nothing much, at least as far as money is concerned. According to Dale...

  By Daniel Luzer

• July 5, 2011 10:00 AM

  The College-Educated Telemarketer

  Pretty much everyone now knows that college graduates earn more than people who have only attainted a high school degree. But perhaps this was limited to college graduates in professional jobs, many worried. There are, after all, a lot of...

  By Daniel Luzer

• June 10, 2011 1:54 PM

  University of Phoenix Graduates Earn More

  According to the good folks over at the Center for College Affordability and Productivity, those who attend the for-profit University of Phoenix earn more than those who attend traditional, selective colleges. Well, sort of. This is potentially very important information....

  By Daniel Luzer

• June 8, 2011 5:59 PM

  Connecting Community College Students to Real Jobs

  President Obama today announced a new program to help connect community college students to jobs. According to an article by Rebecca Kaplan in the National Journal: Seeking to offset weak job growth last month, President Obama announced plans today to...

  By Daniel Luzer

• June 7, 2011 4:49 PM

  Getting Workplace Skills, in Community College

  According to a recent Wall Street Journal piece, American companies are now putting more pressure on vocational colleges to produce graduates with the skills they want. As James Hagerty explains: Much of the emphasis is on community colleges and vocational...

  By Daniel Luzer

• June 6, 2011 10:00 AM

  The Real For-Profit Question

  A recent piece at CBS News, tied no doubt to the Education Department’s recent release of new rules about debt levels at for-profit schools, looks at something really interesting: actual professional success. According to Armen Keteyian: A CBS News investigation...

  By Daniel Luzer

• May 27, 2011 3:19 PM

  Jobs for Graduates?

  This might be a little optimistic, but maybe recent college graduates will have a slightly easier time finding jobs than their counterparts last year. Despite extensive gloom and doom coverage of unemployment in recent months, companies may start hiring again....

  By Daniel Luzer

• May 24, 2011 2:37 PM

  Worth It

  Apparently what people study in college matters for their future earnings. According to an article by Peter Whoriskey in the Washington Post: Over a lifetime, the earnings of workers who have majored in engineering, computer science or business are as...

  By Daniel Luzer

• May 20, 2011 3:48 PM

  The “Careers” of College Graduates

  In an update, of sorts, to the recent post about the influence of the Recession on current college graduates, Ezra Klein over at the Washington Post is letting us know that it’s actually even worse. Two charts explain it: Leaving...

  By Daniel Luzer

• May 19, 2011 11:00 AM

  Recession Continues for New Graduates

  Guess what? The economy is still crappy. Despite widespread attention to perceived upturns in the U.S. economy, recent college Graduates are still going to be hit hard by The Great Recession, according to a piece by Geoff Mulvihill at the...

  By Daniel Luzer

• May 3, 2011 4:03 PM

  The Arts Majors Are Fine

  Stop worrying about students getting unusable arts bachelor’s degrees. It turns out that getting a degree in the arts is plenty practical. According to an article by Dan Berrett in USA Today: Conventional wisdom has long held that pursuing a...

  By Daniel Luzer

• April 6, 2011 10:00 AM

  Giving Up on Academia: the Public Fellows

  It’s really hard to get a tenure-track job. Part of this has to do with the economy, but it also stems from an odd overabundance of PhDs in the job market. Well just give up on an academic job, seems...

  By Daniel Luzer

• April 4, 2011 10:00 AM

  Colleges, and Their Interns

  Many recognize that the internships that many businesses offer to college students are rather unfortunate. Often the experience interns have is important but the whole structure of the thing is troublesome. Internships do not provide those participating with health care...

  By Daniel Luzer

• March 25, 2011 11:30 AM

  The Danger of Vocational Universities

  In terms of college goals, American policymakers must focus not just on educating people, but on educating people for specific jobs of the future, says the National Governors Association. Wow, that’s shortsighted. According to an article by Catherine Gewertz in...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 12, 2011 4:58 PM

  Not Good Enough

  Thought going to college would be a sensible way to get a good job? Well it looks like for the most sought-after positions in the country, only a few schools—five of the more than 4,000 colleges and universities in the...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 12, 2011 10:00 AM

  Welfare and Work Training

  The significant changes to American welfare policy enacted by the Clinton administration’s Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, which limited the amount of time someone could receive government assistance and also encouraged recipients to find jobs, may...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 11, 2011 12:46 PM

  Certifying What?

  This may be merely a symptom of the current recession or a long-term trend in higher education, but the country is increasingly focused on vocational education. The specialized certificates that people can earn in relatively short periods of time guarantee...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 30, 2010 4:02 PM

  Diminished Expectations: Lessons from 2010

  It turns out this may have been the year in which Americans figured out that college isn’t exactly the golden ticker we once thought it was. According to an article by Victoria Reitano at the Huffington Post: With the current...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 9, 2010 4:15 PM

  Job Certificates Actually Work

  Earning a vocational certificate is the only reliable way to get unprepared, reasonably low-achieving students on the path to a steady job and a good salary. According to a piece in The Hechinger Report’s Community College Spotlight: “Some college” doesn’t...

  By Daniel Luzer

• November 8, 2010 3:40 PM

  Retrained for What?

  No matter what training someone has, sometimes the jobs still just aren’t there. While going back to school seems like a good way to help improve job prospects, further training doesn’t guarantee real employment. According to an article by Frank...

  By Daniel Luzer

• November 4, 2010 3:11 PM

  Indiana’s Speedy Degree

  Community colleges in Indiana are now starting to offer an associate degree really, really fast. While such programs usually take two academic years, or 18 months, Ivy Tech Community College is now working on offering them in a mere 12...

  By Daniel Luzer

• October 26, 2010 2:07 PM

  I Want to Get a PhD in the Humanities

  No, kid. No you don’t:...

  By Daniel Luzer

• October 23, 2010 12:00 PM

  Your Waiter's Bachelor's Degree

  Richard Vedder, an economist at Ohio University who’s very, very interested in proving that college is overrated, has an fascinating new piece in the Chronicle of Higher Education. He’s created a fun new chart that seems to prove that,...

  By Daniel Luzer

• October 16, 2010 12:00 PM

  Public Colleges Pay Off

  American public colleges generate a higher return on investment. According to a piece in The American, a publication of the American Enterprise Institute, by Andrew Kelly: In a new, thought-provoking analysis of previously unreleased data, my colleague Mark Schneider calculates...

  By Daniel Luzer

• October 5, 2010 10:00 AM

  Community Colleges and the Training Part of Education

  The goals for higher education and the goals for workforce training—while theoretically complementary (“more college-educated workers will improve the economy")—are often troublesome on the ground. Last week, for instance, a publication of the American Federation of Teachers complained that the...

  By Daniel Luzer

• September 29, 2010 2:49 PM

  Measuring What Colleges Do

  Richard Vedder over at the Center for College Affordability and Productivity has an interesting piece today about trying to find a “bottom line” for college quality. What do colleges actually produce ? As Vedder explains: I have a modest proposal...

  By Daniel Luzer

• September 28, 2010 1:02 PM

  Real Information About Jobs

  The one thing so many people want to know about college graduates is what their job prospects really look like. This is true whether graduates went to the oft-maligned for-profit schools or regular colleges. According to a new report by...

  By Daniel Luzer

• September 21, 2010 10:00 AM

  College: At Least it Helps You Keep That Crappy Job

  Surprise, the Wall Street Journal says, it turns out college graduates, even with all that debt, still make more money than anyone else. Perhaps more importantly in this economy, people with college degrees are more likely to keep their jobs....

  By Daniel Luzer

• September 17, 2010 3:57 PM

  “Practical” College Education

  With the economy in freefall, many are worried about the employment prospects of college graduates. Related to this, some Americans wonder if students are actually learning the skills they need in college to even get jobs. Marybeth Gasman writes in...

  By Daniel Luzer

• September 13, 2010 4:30 PM

  Recruiters Prefer State Schools, Really?

  That out-of-state education may not be worth it. It turns out state school graduates do pretty well in the job market. According to an article by Jennifer Merritt: U.S. companies largely favor graduates of big state universities over Ivy...

  By Daniel Luzer

• September 2, 2010 4:19 PM

  The Job Guarantee

  A small college in Michigan has taken the remarkable step of guaranteeing that its students will get jobs if they finish school. And not just any jobs, good jobs. According to a piece by Daniel de Vise at the...

  By Daniel Luzer

• September 2, 2010 2:01 PM

  When Cops Go to College

  In a very loose sense, American jobs are now divided into two types, those that require a college degree and those that don’t. Some people, after all, simply don’t need to go to college to do their jobs effectively....

  By Daniel Luzer

• September 1, 2010 4:47 PM

  Praise for Trades

  Joining the chorus of people who wonder if we focus on college too much is social critic Camille Paglia, who thinks Americans have got college all wrong. Writing in the Chronicle Review, Paglia says: The pressuring of middle-class young...

  By Daniel Luzer

• August 31, 2010 10:00 AM

  The Worst Internships

  Regrettable as it may be, both college students and businesses basically understand the internship to be an essential part of today’s career path. People now have to take internships because they’re a way to enter into a particular industry...

  By Daniel Luzer

• July 29, 2010 3:59 PM

  Prison College

  Prisoners are anxious to get college degrees, too. From Oklahoma comes news of a surprisingly interest in higher education. According to an article by Sara Plummer in Tulsa World: About 40 offenders are enrolled in college courses this summer in...

  By Daniel Luzer

• July 23, 2010 3:55 PM

  New Rules on For-Profits

  The U.S. Department of Education has finally released its much-anticipiated gainful employment rule, the device that allows for-profit colleges to remain eligible for federal financial aid. According to an article by Jennifer Epstein in Inside Higher Ed: Striking a middle...

  By Daniel Luzer

• July 13, 2010 1:35 PM

  Getting a Job

  The United States does not send enough of its young people to college. The apparent truth of this statement is what fuels both President Obama’s American Graduation Initiative and much of the rhetoric behind any proposed increased in government...

  By Daniel Luzer

• July 8, 2010 2:48 PM

  Real Career College

  There was a time, back in those glory days of strong unions and guaranteed pensions, in which people commonly held jobs in which their employers would pay for them to go back to school to attain the college degrees...

  By Daniel Luzer

• July 3, 2010 12:00 PM

  Community Colleges and Jobs

  Community colleges have apparently not been helped dramatically by money for job retraining. According to an article by Marisa Schultz in the Detroit News: When Gov. Jennifer Granholm launched the No Worker Left Behind program in August 2007, she stood...

  By Daniel Luzer

• June 29, 2010 12:57 PM

  The Other Non-Traditional Student

  Apparently even if one has a bachelor’s degree, vocational programs sometimes look attractive. According to a piece by Karen Birchard in the Chronicle of Higher Education: [Abdullah Muhaseen] enrolled in a public college to become a paramedic. The University...

  By Daniel Luzer

• June 24, 2010 4:26 PM

  College Alternatives

  Something about America’s vocational programs doesn’t really work too well. Jamie Merisotis and Stan Jones argued just that in the May/June issue of the Monthly. Well they’re not the only ones. According to an article in The Economist, the United...

  By Daniel Luzer

• June 22, 2010 2:55 PM

  Say No to the Bachelor's Degree

  In several states, legislatures are attempting to deal with the increased demand for college, not to mention the demand for education for many jobs, by converting community colleges into four-year schools. Later this month Michigan will vote on legislation to...

  By Daniel Luzer

• June 21, 2010 1:34 PM

  After Graduation

  As pretty much everyone knows by now, it’s hard for college graduates to get job offers in today’s economy. This means, according to an article by Jenna Johnson in the Washington Post, that they’ll pretty much do anything: Instead...

  By Daniel Luzer

• June 16, 2010 11:00 AM

  Lead What?

  In an effort to help students help secure jobs upon graduation, the University of Iowa recently created an undergraduate Certificate in Leadership Studies program. The program begins in the fall. According to an article in the Chicago Tribune: Kelley...

  By Daniel Luzer

• June 16, 2010 10:00 AM

  Second Chances

  Apparently the continuing recession is causing some college graduates to flock to jobs as skilled laborers. According to an article by Carol Morello in the Washington Post: In a region in which 47 percent of Washington area residents have...

  By Daniel Luzer

• June 15, 2010 12:22 PM

  Supply and Demand

  Despite continuing unemployment, the United States is actually not producing enough people with the certificates and training needed for growing jobs. According to an article by Jacques Steinberg in the New York Times: The number of jobs requiring at least...

  By Daniel Luzer

• June 15, 2010 12:01 PM

  Fed Chairman on Community Colleges

  Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke apparently thinks that community colleges are very important. They might even fix the economy. According to an article in Community College Times: Innovative workforce development programs at community colleges can play an important role...

  By Daniel Luzer

• June 3, 2010 4:47 PM

  The Uses of Education

  So now college graduates have begun the arduous, perhaps futile, effort to find entry-level professional positions across America. But without jobs they’ve got a lot of time on their hands. Why not consider what they should have majored in...

  By Daniel Luzer

• June 3, 2010 3:25 PM

  School, and Work

  With the economy seemingly in long-lasting freefall, and college graduates scrambling for employment, any employment, some American colleges are now looking to make their degrees align closer to actual work. According to an article by Lee Lawrence in the Christian...

  By Daniel Luzer

• May 17, 2010 1:00 PM

  No Jobs

  Now is the season of the college graduations. All across the country, 22-year-olds and their parents will listen to local politicians say things like, "The world you are entering is a world ready for you, the world you are...

  By Daniel Luzer

• May 17, 2010 10:00 AM

  Just Say No (to College)

  College may be a little over-hyped, according to many detractors. But what should people do instead? According to an article by Jacques Steinberg in the New York Times: A small but influential group of economists and educators is pushing another...

  By Daniel Luzer

• May 14, 2010 1:54 PM

  College for Some or Some College for All?

  College isn’t worth it. Joining the chorus of the college detractors, the Associated Press wonders if too many Americans are going to college, or something. According to the article: Growing numbers of experts are challenging the assumption that a...

  By Daniel Luzer

• May 10, 2010 10:00 AM

  Lucrative Majors

  How much does that degree pay, anyway? While it’s still unclear how much one’s undergraduate major really matters in the long run—is it the college or the course of study that matters most in terms of pay?—each year, PayScale, a...

  By Daniel Luzer

• May 7, 2010 1:00 PM

  College and Career Readiness: Another Commission

  The Obama administration announced months ago that it planned to change federal education policy such that public schools were measured such that students graduated from high school “college and career ready.” While no one seems to know quite what...

  By Daniel Luzer

• May 3, 2010 1:14 PM

  The Pink Floyd Internship

  What people do once they finish college is always a big question as graduation rolls around, particularly during a recession, when no one seems to have jobs. Maybe this worry is misplaced, writes University of Virginia English Professor Mark...

  By Daniel Luzer

• April 30, 2010 3:01 PM

  Who’s in Charge?

  College administrators apparently don’t want the Department of Labor regulating internships. They want to do it themselves. According to an article by Sara Lipka in the Chronicle of Higher Education: Thirteen college presidents urged the federal government this week not...

  By Daniel Luzer

• April 29, 2010 4:06 PM

  College Enrollment Increases

  Contrary to the recession discouraging families from sending their children to college, as some suggested, actually more students are coming to college than ever before. Sara Murray writes in the Wall Street Journal that: The share of new high-school graduates...

  By Daniel Luzer

• April 22, 2010 12:52 PM

  New Rules About Unpaid Interns

  The federal government has new rules about unpaid internships. According to an article by Sara Lipka in the Chronicle of Higher Education: For interns to work for private companies without compensation, the Labor Department says, their positions must meet...

  By Daniel Luzer

• April 16, 2010 12:40 PM

  Define Career Ready

  Ah, career readiness. Ever since President Obama announced in March that he aimed to change federal education law so that high schools prepared their students for "college and career readiness" people wondered how to make this happen. The trouble is...

  By Daniel Luzer

• April 15, 2010 12:07 PM

  It Does Matter

  It’s now April, the time of year when many high school seniors are getting acceptance and rejection letters to college. Adele Scheele says not to worry about it, writing in the Huffington Post that where one goes to college...

  By Daniel Luzer

• April 14, 2010 10:00 AM

  Rhode Island Community College Sees Record Enrollment

  More evidence that the recession is leading students to community colleges. An article in the Boston Globe reports that more students than ever are enrolled in the Community College of Rhode Island: College officials say this spring's enrollment is the...

  By Daniel Luzer

• April 2, 2010 10:00 AM

  PhD Dropouts

  While policymakers might be forgiven for failing to address this issue, apparently dropouts aren’t just a problem for high schools and colleges. By some accounts, in fact, 30 percent of people who start PhD programs never finish. Some academics apparently...

  By Daniel Luzer

• March 29, 2010 12:31 PM

  Is Jobs Retraining Worth It?

  According to an article by Matthew Miller in the Lansing State Journal, despite a lot of money available for unemployed workers to gain new skills, most of them aren’t able to attend school to do so. Laid off workers...

  By Daniel Luzer

• March 23, 2010 1:39 PM

  Or Your Money Back

  Lansing Community College has a new program guaranteeing that graduates will get a job. Beginning in May Lansing students studying for careers as pharmacy technician associates, customer service specialists, or industrial quality inspectors. The program is called "Get a Skill,...

  By Daniel Luzer

• March 22, 2010 12:01 PM

  Limited Options for High School Graduates

  “Everyone doesn’t need to go to college” has long been the cry of conservatives who decry the rising cost of colleges and financial aid. Why don’t they just get jobs? Surely we can't afford all of these liberal arts majors...

  By Daniel Luzer

• March 19, 2010 1:25 PM

  Get Ready

  No Child Left Behind is a complicated law and the Obama administraton’s plan to reorganize it will have many many components. One proposed change has to do with college, sort of. Currently public schools must make “adequate yearly progress” in...

  By Daniel Luzer

• March 18, 2010 1:45 PM

  Bad News for Career Services

  College graduates are going to have a hard time finding jobs this spring. In an article for Diverse Issues in Higher Education, Reginald Stuart reports that: Gone are the days when even the best candidates at the best schools can...

  By Daniel Luzer

• March 17, 2010 1:43 PM

  Rewards for Professors

  One Michigan professor is very, very mad about the way universities reward academics. Another eccentric egghead? Well maybe. But this time, some people are paying attention. According to an article by David Glenn in the Chronicle of Higher Education: Last...

  By Daniel Luzer

• March 17, 2010 12:03 PM

  Community Colleges Want More Information

  All U.S. states and the federal government information about the economy and the job market, but neither is apparently very good about sharing this information with community colleges, the group of institutions that might most benefit from this information. According...

  By Daniel Luzer

• March 12, 2010 2:25 PM

  The Career College Solution

  Under his American Graduation Initiative President Obama’s goal is to produce some 63 million additional graduates by 2020. That’s a huge goal; one America simply won’t meet without making dramatic changes. Career College Association CEO Harris Miller argues in...

  By Daniel Luzer

• March 12, 2010 1:46 PM

  Why Not Go There?

  Leaders of America’s teachers colleges are working on a new campaign to highlight and improve teacher training. American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education held an event at the National Press Club yesterday to discuss the organization’s ideas. According to...

  By Daniel Luzer

• March 2, 2010 10:30 AM

  Pay to Work?

  To save money many city newspapers are now setting up programs so that journalism school students cover local affairs. Students at City University of New York, Indiana University, the College of Saint Rose, St. Cloud State University, Cal Berkeley,...

  By Daniel Luzer

• February 24, 2010 4:14 PM

  College Alternatives

  An article by Ramesh Ponnuru in Time makes the case that too many people are going to college. Joining the ranks of other college limiters Ponnuru explains that just because college graduates earn, on average, more than those who don’t...

  By Daniel Luzer

• February 22, 2010 5:31 PM

  The Pedagogy Con

  President Obama hired Arnie Duncan to be education secretary in part because Duncan would support dramatic changes in American education. Unlike someone like, say, Stanford School of Education’s incremental reformer Linda Darling-Hammond, Duncan was supposed to make people uncomfortable....

  By Daniel Luzer

• February 11, 2010 2:07 PM

  An Associate’s Degree Salary

  Higher education advocates often see community colleges as introducing students to college cheaply. Students can attend these colleges cheaply and then use their education to transfer to traditional colleges. But according to an article in Community College Times, in some...

  By Daniel Luzer

• February 8, 2010 2:27 PM

  But What Did Students Learn?

  Auburn University reports that it’s one of the first American colleges to participate in the Collegiate Learning Assessment, or CLA. According to the Auburn press release: Recent results from a pioneering study involving more than two dozen colleges and universities...

  By Daniel Luzer

• February 3, 2010 4:05 PM

  What College Really Pays

  For years, despite the rising cost of college, the increasing burden of undergraduate debt, and the difficulty college graduates have finding professional jobs, there’s been one number that explains why college is worth it: $800,000. That’s the difference between the...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 29, 2010 2:31 PM

  Ideas for Community College Improvement

  At least in part because of Obama’s American Graduation Initiative, the higher education community now understands that community colleges are important. It’s a little unclear what community colleges should actually do to be a force for good in the economy...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 28, 2010 5:43 PM

  Good News About For-Profit Schools

  From the Chronicle of Higher Education comes news that students who attend for-profit schools are doing okay: Students who attend for-profit colleges have comparable and often higher retention and graduation rates than those at other institutions, according to the findings...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 22, 2010 3:43 PM

  The Applied Workforce Degree

  From an article in Community College Times comes an article indicating that it’s now increasingly common for community colleges to offer bachelor’s degrees: [The] embrace of four-year degrees represents a larger national trend that is seeing community colleges across the...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 21, 2010 8:57 PM

  A Placement Office for Unemployed PhDs

  As the United States has known for years, American universities produce too many over-credentialed people in the liberal arts and the social sciences. And now they don’t have jobs. Stephen Joel Trachtenberg, president emeritus of George Washington University, has an...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 21, 2010 3:45 PM

  What Freshmen Think

  College freshmen are very, very worried. According to an article in the New York Times The recession hit this year’s college freshmen hard, affecting how they chose a school as well as their ability to pay for it, according...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 20, 2010 3:32 PM

  The True Cost of College

  Sometimes college doesn’t pay. At least it doesn’t pay very well. While the Community College Times glowingly reported yesterday that “completing an associate’s degree was worth $41,962 more than the cost of tuition, fees and forgone wages while in college,”...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 17, 2010 11:13 PM

  PhD Salaries Still Sinking

  Never mind getting a tenure-track job in academia. While a PhD-holder finding a good job is rare enough, it turns out that the salary prospects for academics is declining too. From the Boston Globe comes news that: Perhaps people should...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 14, 2010 2:49 PM

  New York Times Company College

  According to an article in Inside Higher Ed, the New York Times will now be teaching college: Two years ago, with revenue from its celebrated print product in a nosedive, the New York Times Company starting poking its nose...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 13, 2010 6:57 PM

  What College Means

  Mike Rustigan writes in the Los Angeles Times that it’s time to reconsider vocational training: According to a growing number of demographers and labor experts, the U.S. soon will be experiencing a severe shortage of skilled workers. Blue-collar baby...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 12, 2010 3:27 PM

  New (Depressing) Career Advice for Law Students

  From the Chronicle of Higher Education comes news that many are urging law schools to work on helping law students “cope” with not getting a job: Law schools have a responsibility to teach students how to be emotionally resilient...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 10, 2010 2:09 PM

  Economic Meltdown Causes Surge in Grad School Applications

  With the recession more people than ever are looking to return to school. According to an article in the New York Times: The number of people taking the Law School Admissions Test, for example, rose 20 percent in October, compared...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 8, 2010 7:05 PM

  Oakland College Succeeds, Despite Economy

  In other weird news from California, yesterday saw the grand opening of the new space housing Oaksterdam University, “America's first cannabis college, founded… to provide students with the highest quality training for the cannabis industry.” According to an article...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 8, 2010 2:07 PM

  Too Many Law Schools?

  Mark Greenbaum writes in the Los Angeles Times that there are too many law schools in America. According to the article: The problem can be traced to the American Bar Assn., which continues to allow unneeded new schools to...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 7, 2010 2:07 PM

  More Math and Science Teachers

  From the Chronicle of Higher Education comes news that the Obama administration is looking to augment the number of science and math teachers in American elementary and secondary schools through college partnerships: Leaders of 121 public universities have pledged...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 7, 2010 1:42 PM

  Measure It

  In a follow-up to the piece Kevin Carey wrote for Democracy last year, Time has an interview with Carey to take another look at some of the issues he raised about American colleges and their transparency. According to the article...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 6, 2010 1:16 PM

  Jobless Overwhelm Community Colleges

  An article in U.S. News and World Report indicates that the unemployed are straining community colleges across the country. While many educators tout continuing education as the solution for unemployment, the article indicates that many schools may simply not...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 5, 2010 1:50 PM

  American Colleges Not Responsive to Labor Needs

  In other news from the annual meeting of the American Economic Association, apparently, despite extensive rhetoric about education and the workforce, American colleges don’t do a terribly good job preparing students for employment. According to an article in the Chronicle...

  By Daniel Luzer

• January 4, 2010 1:35 PM

  The Guaranteed Job

  With the economy in freefall the connection between a college degree and a job is looking a little less clear. So now some colleges are looking to make their schools more “relevant.” Welcome to Thomas College, “Home of the Guaranteed...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 30, 2009 8:03 PM

  HED Seaks HED

  Does the bad economy actually help humanities professors get laid? One normally wouldn’t think so (or think the question worth asking) but apparently some members of the Modern Language Association (MLA) are trying to figure out if it does....

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 21, 2009 2:47 PM

  Another Online School

  While there may be some, perhaps misguided, enthusiasm for the three-year bachelors degree, it looks like the popularity of the accelerated BA is increasing. The University of Texas system announced yesterday that it was offering what it called “Fast-Track Bachelor’s...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 18, 2009 7:31 PM

  What Does a Pell Grant Buy?

  There’s an interesting piece in the latest issue of Democracy about Pell Grants and the state of higher education. Pell Grants, awards for higher education sponsored by the Department of Education, give money (actual money, not loans) to allow...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 18, 2009 2:43 PM

  The Workforce and Its Needs

  In preparation for next year's renewal of the Workforce Investment Act, the federal job training law, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Vocational and Adult Education is soliciting comments from citizens. Yesterday about 50 people came to Washington, most...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 17, 2009 5:42 PM

  The Trouble with That PhD...

  One longstanding discussion in higher education has to do with the risk inherent in obtaining a humanities PhD. Unlike the situation in more, well, practical disciplines (engineering, math, the hard sciences) the jobs for people with academic degrees in the...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 17, 2009 1:55 PM

  Taking the Gamble Out of Student Loans

  The “value” of a college diploma has always been a little vague, at least in part because the investment and the potential return on investment are so far removed. But, from the Wall Street Journal comes news that with the...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 13, 2009 9:18 PM

  Tech School

  Barbara Barreda writes in Education Week that it may be time to change how schools use technology. Historically, universities and (to a lesser extent) public schools were the institutions that brought new equipment and training to students. Students alone...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 7, 2009 5:26 PM

  Florida Students as Journalists

  Recently the College Guide ran a piece on the potential for journalism and higher education to work together. Apparently it is happening already. According to an article in the Miami Herald students at the University of Florida are now launching...

  By Daniel Luzer

• December 2, 2009 8:24 PM

  Covering Education

  A report issued today by the Brookings Institution, Invisible: 1.4 Percent Coverage for Education is Not Enough (pdf) indicated that the press insufficiently covers education issues. Apparently in 2009 less than two percent of national news focused on education issues....

  By Daniel Luzer

• November 23, 2009 2:24 PM

  It's About the Jobs

  It is a discussion that rears its head every time the country has economic problems: just what good is college, anyway? A recent research study published by CQ Researcher titled “Is a 4-year degree the only path to a secure...

  By Daniel Luzer

• November 11, 2009 3:28 PM

  Strong Words on the Usefulness of Four-Year Programs

  From the Community College Times: Jane Oates, assistant secretary for employment and training at the U.S. Department of Labor, challenged four-year universities at an economic symposium at Harper College (Illinois) to look at how their students fare job-wise after they...

  By Jesse Singal

• September 11, 2009 2:06 PM

  Do Green Jobs Initiatives Overlook the Real Issue?

  Ross Hancock, spokesman for the American Welding Society, as quoted in Inside Higher Ed: The American Welding Society gets concerned when we see Congress act, as it did this year, to discontinue funding for proven programs like the National Science...

  By Jesse Singal