From The Chronicle, what accounts for the remarkable stability of university rankings? John Quiggin on rank delusions. Beyond college rankings: Jonathan Rothwell and Siddharth Kulkarni on a value-added approach to assessing two- and four-year schools. Rebecca Mead on how Cooper Union’s ideal of free education seems to be foundering amid the financial pressures and preoccupations of Manhattan today. For-profit Corinthian Colleges shuts down dozens of campuses, leaving thousands of students without a school. Jonathan Chait on how Republicans learned to love colleges. Daniel Little on self-selection and “liberal” professions. Law schools are in a death spiral — maybe now they’ll finally change. Burdened with debt, law school graduates struggle in job market. Someone calculated how many adjunct professors are on public assistance, and the number is startling. Tenured professor Susan Boynton on why hiring adjuncts is wrong. Evan Kindley reviews Versions of Academic Freedom: From Professionalism to Revolution by Stanley Fish. Prof, no one is reading you: An average academic journal article is read in its entirety by about 10 people — to shape policy, professors should start penning commentaries in popular media. Chris Rasmussen reviews The End of College: Creating the Future of Learning and the University of Everywhere by Kevin Carey. Thorstein Veblen’s The Higher Learning in America is back in a new edition; Scott McLemee revisits a scathing classic.
