Stream of Reading (Prepare to be Forwarded) – An Archive of What I'm Reading
Elite higher education in America has long been a Veblen good—a commodity that obeys few, if any, conventional laws of economic activity. In some cases (chiefly among the children of the serene professional elders perusing the Sunday New York Times), the higher the sticker price of a particular college or university, the more attractive it…
In this 2012 file photo, students walk through the University of Texas at Austin campus near the school’s iconic tower. The University of Texas was among 27 top universities to participate in a joint study of sexual assault on the nation’s campuses. (AP Photo/Eric Gay, File) The Association of American Universities on Monday released the…
As so often happens, a government attempt to quash the use of technology it doesn’t like has made that tech more popular than ever. A week after the Department of Homeland Security intimidated a New Hampshire public library into shutting down its Tor relay, about a dozen other libraries nationwide have shown interest in running…
For a school that teaches the art of good management, Stanford’s elite business school is having a rough time at the top. Yesterday, the school announced that its dean, Garth Saloner, would step down at the end of this academic year in the face of a lawsuit from a former faculty member. The lawsuit, filed…
Photo Credit Kyle Platts “WERE you in the Army or something?” a tall kid in khakis and a polo shirt asked as I refilled my Solo cup for the fifth time that night. “You look old for an undergrad.” It was day two of rush week, and this was my 10th party. So far I’d…
You may love your job. You may love your boss. But if your boss has a problem with you getting the money you deserve, then the friendly boss is not your friend. At the University of Washington, a group of professors is seeking to unionize the faculty. Their aim, the Seattle Times reports, is not…
More than half of students at 347 colleges and vocational schools defaulted on their loans or failed to pay down even a single dollar of their debt after seven years, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of federal data released Saturday. Despite the low repayment rates, students at these predominantly for-profit schools received $2.2…
Colleges give prospective students very little information about how much money they can expect to earn in the job market. In part that’s because colleges may not want people to know, and in part it’s because such information is difficult and expensive to gather. Colleges are good at tracking down rich alumni to hit up…
San Diego police believe DNA evidence has finally enabled them to solve the case of a 14-year-old girl who was gruesomely murdered in 1984. But what if the evidence is wrong? The rapping of knuckles on wood brought Kevin Brown to his front door on the morning of January 9, 2014. The uniformed detectives standing…
New York University’s commencement ceremony in 2012. (Melanie Stetson Freeman/The Christian Science Monitor via Getty) New York University is among the country’s wealthiest schools. Backed by its $3.5 billion endowment, the school has built campuses in Abu Dhabi and Shanghai, invested billions in SoHo real estate, and given its star faculty loans to buy…