From the issue dated March 14, 2003
THE FACULTY
ON STRIKE, AGAIN
For 35 years, labor relations at Yale have been terrible, and last week 4,000 workers walked off the job. What's going wrong?
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- BITTER EXCHANGE: A Seton Hall University instructor, saying she was hurt by students' criticisms on a Web site, offers her own vitriolic volley.
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- AN EARLY CASUALTY: The climate for intellectual debate has chilled as war with Iraq looms larger, says the American Studies Association.
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- NO DAY AT THE BEACH: Professors and administrators describe their spring breaks past and present.
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- CULTURE WATCH: A philosophy professor evaluates the believability of the new film The Life of David Gale.
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- PEER REVIEW: A prominent professor of art at the University of Nevada at Las Vegas threatens to leave because his wife got a bad midtenure evaluation. ... An expert on entrepreneurship will leave the University of Virginia's business school for the University of Auckland. ... A noted economist has chosen to stay put at Harvard University rather than move to New York University's business school.
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- SYLLABUS: At Rhodes College, physics majors and art majors pair off to create robots, and to learn about each other's world in the process.
RESEARCH & PUBLISHING
IN CASE OF PANIC
Is the government taking intelligent steps to prepare for a bioterror emergency? Social scientists debate the benefits of quarantine and the prospects of mass hysteria.
- WHO LIVES? Bioethicists weigh the allocation of health-care resources in a severe bioterror event.
CONSTRUCTIVE DIFFERENCES
America's ambivalent relationship with Islam is as old as America. That history can offer perspective, and perhaps even ideals, writes Anouar Majid, chairman of the English department at the University of New England.
VERSES VERSUS ...
Poets, like all citizens of conscience, have the right and even the duty to speak up in times of crisis, writes Jay Parini, a poet, novelist, and professor of English at Middlebury College.
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- WAR OF WORDS: The director of the Illinois-based Center for Book Culture believes that arts foundations short-change literature -- and he's taken out his frustration with a sarcastic full-page ad denouncing the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.
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- VERBATIM: Reflections on the death of a renowned French chef and France's education of the palate.
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- WHO KNEW? On the basis of computerized speech analysis, researchers conclude that mothers are better than fathers at baby talk. ... Agricultural economists report that Americans buy more beer but less liquor when times are tough. ... Biologists investigating the hiccup say it originated as a helpful device when our evolutionary ancestors used gills to breathe. ... A European experiment showed that hand-washing dishes can use as much as 10 times the water and twice the energy of a dishwasher.
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- NOTA BENE: Music's role in war is explored in Proof Through the Night: Music and the Great War, a combined book and CD.
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- HOT TYPE: A scholar revisits the archetypal story of Stagolee. ... The writings of a folk-music archivist will be published in April.
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- NEW SCHOLARLY BOOKS
GOVERNMENT & POLITICS
BAD BLOOD
Supporters of TRIO and Gear Up, the two main federal programs that encourage low-income students to prepare for college, gird for a battle over a proposed merger.
BUMPY ROAD TO REFORM
Budget deficits and changes in leadership imperil Kentucky's pioneering effort to improve its public colleges.
IN CASE OF PANIC
Is the government taking intelligent steps to prepare for a bioterror emergency? Social scientists debate the benefits of quarantine and the prospects of mass hysteria.
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- TAKING SIDES: Partisan politics played a key role in determining whether states, and some public colleges, weighed in on the two college affirmative-action cases pending before the U.S. Supreme Court.
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- KUDOS TO CAL STATE: The California State University System scored a coup by hiring the well-connected former Congressional aide George H. Conant, a Republican, as its top Washington lobbyist.
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- PRICE PENALTY: A forthcoming bill in the U.S. House of Representatives would penalize colleges that raise tuition by twice the rate of inflation.
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- RILED OVER RESEARCH: The U.S. House of Representatives voted again to criminalize the creation of cloned human cells for any purpose.
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- PROTECTING COPYRIGHTS: Members of Congress told colleges to get tougher with students who illegally swap music and video material online.
MONEY & MANAGEMENT
FOR-PROFIT GOLD RUSH
Private-equity funds are pouring millions of dollars into higher-education companies, and college endowments are among the investors.
FAIR? IMPOSSIBLE. RATIONAL? YES.
Giving preference to legacy applicants is defensible, and it is a trivial issue compared with pressing educational needs, write Debra Thomas and Terry Shepard, both of Rice University.
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- NAME BRAND: Indiana University's Board of Trustees granted its former president a six-year leave so he could receive deferred compensation.
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- ON-TARGET SCHOLARSHIP: The National Rifle Association has endowed a chair at the George Mason University Law School.
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- 'NEXT STAGE OF MY LIFE': Nannerl O. Keohane said she would step down as president of Duke University after 11 years in office.
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- $2.85-BILLION: The University of Southern California, in a nine-year effort, set a record for college fund-raising campaigns.
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- BOND-RATING UPDATE
INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
BULKING UP ON FIBER
Colleges are taking advantage of bargains on fiber-optic lines to build regional computer networks; some envision a national network for academe.
THE PLUGGED-IN FACULTY
Community colleges need to integrate technology into teaching -- not only to better serve students, but to outdistance distance-learning competitors, writes Ned J. Sifferlen, president of Sinclair Community College in Dayton, Ohio.
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- ARISTOTLE UNBOUND: A professor aims to cite online a century's worth of research on the philosopher.
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- 'CIVILITY' VS. 'PRIOR RESTRAINT': Faculty members at California Polytechnic State University at San Luis Obispo take sides over a professor's proposed ban on the viewing of pornography on campus computers.
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- STAMP OF APPROVAL: Western Governors University, a virtual institution, was granted regional accreditation by a group of four agencies.
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- PROTECTING COPYRIGHTS: Members of Congress told colleges to get tougher with students who illegally swap music and video material online.
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- WEB NOIR: A site developed by a professor and students at Mount Saint Mary's College, in Los Angeles, explores the city's rich literary tradition.
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- BITTER EXCHANGE: A Seton Hall University instructor, saying she was hurt by students' criticisms on a Web site, offers her own vitriolic volley.
STUDENTS
COLLEGE MUST WAIT
Students are among the reservists whose lives have been put on hold by military activation.
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- FORUM ON DIVERSITY: Connecticut College canceled all classes for one afternoon to hold a forum on diversity.
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- MAJORITY RULES: A Texas Tech University senior, complaining that the United Negro College Fund is discriminatory, set up a scholarship to benefit white students.
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- 'BOOKS NOT BOMBS': Thousands of students at more than 350 colleges and high schools walked out of classes and held antiwar rallies.
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- NEVER MIND: Cornell mistakenly sent congratulatory e-mail messages to hundreds of unsuccessful early-decision applicants.
ATHLETICS
LOOKING FOR THE MAGIC BULLET
Despite potential health risks -- and occasional deaths -- performance-enhancing drugs are seen by college athletes as a boost to the top of their game.
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- IF IT AIN'T BROKE ...: Myles Brand, president of the National Collegiate Athletic Association, called on the U.S. secretary of education to preserve and strengthen the rules banning sex discrimination at institutions receiving federal funds.
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- DASHED HOOPS: California State University at Fresno and St. Bonaventure University pulled their teams out of postseason men's basketball tournaments amid questions about players' academic records.
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- CRIMSON CRUSHER: A Harvard graduate attracts fans to World Wrestling Entertainment.
INTERNATIONAL
REPLAYING THE GREAT GAME
Through several colleges in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, three powers -- the United States, Turkey, and Russia -- seek to influence the course of Central Asia.
WAVE OF SUCCESS
A Swiss university helped propel Team Alinghi to victory in this year's America's Cup yacht race.
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- WORLD BEAT: The number of students in higher education in Europe has doubled in the past 25 years. ... A leading private university in Japan plans to open a college largely for foreign students.
THE CHRONICLE REVIEW
TASTE TEST
Matisse or Picasso -- who's better? What a vulgar question, and what an important one, writes Laurie Fendrich, a professor of fine arts at Hofstra University.
US, WEEKLY
Celebrity-watching isn't an escape from the problems of daily life. It amplifies and refines those problems in an exciting narrative context, writes Neal Gabler, a cultural historian.
CONSTRUCTIVE DIFFERENCES
America's ambivalent relationship with Islam is as old as America. That history can offer perspective, and perhaps even ideals, writes Anouar Majid, chairman of the English department at the University of New England.
THE PLUGGED-IN FACULTY
Community colleges need to integrate technology into teaching -- not only to better serve students, but to outdistance distance-learning competitors, writes Ned J. Sifferlen, president of Sinclair Community College in Dayton, Ohio.
FAIR? IMPOSSIBLE. RATIONAL? YES.
Giving preference to legacy applicants is defensible, and it is a trivial issue compared with pressing educational needs, write Debra Thomas and Terry Shepard, both of Rice University.
PRANKSTA RAP
Ali G is keepin' it fake. And when it comes to hip-hop, that's the way Americans like it, writes Kevin J.H. Dettmar, a professor of English and cultural studies at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale.
THE ART OF WAR
Photographs are not the only documentation of modern battles. Sketch pads and paints have also done combat duty.
VERSES VERSUS ...
Poets, like all citizens of conscience, have the right and even the duty to speak up in times of crisis, writes Jay Parini, a poet, novelist, and professor of English at Middlebury College.
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- MELANGE: Selections from recent books of interest to academe.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
GAZETTE
CAREER NETWORK JOB NOTICES
DETAILS OF AVAILABLE POSTS,
including teaching and research positions in higher education, administrative and executive jobs, and openings outside academe
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