From the issue dated March 12, 2004
THE FACULTY
SCHOLARLY SNOWBIRDS
Older professors in cold-weather regions of the United States find that spending half of the year teaching in the Sun Belt is a fine way to ease into retirement.
THE BUTTERFLY EFFECT
Can the small events that transpire over the course of a 60-minute class change someone for a lifetime?
COMPLAIN, COMPLAIN
A widely published scholar wonders why academics gripe so much about how hard they work.
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- LABOR WATCH: In a campaign against the University of Pennsylvania's unwillingness to recognize a graduate-student union, hundreds of teaching assistants walked off their jobs for two days. ... An organizing committee for part-time professors at George Washington University switched its affiliation from the United Automobile Workers to the Service Employees International Union.
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- PEER REVIEW: The controversial president of Harford Community College, in Maryland, steps down. ... The dean of New School University's drama school retires. ... Kenneth W. Starr is back on the short list for dean of Pepperdine University's law school.
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- UNCOVERED IN CLASS: Responding to a professor's pedagogical dare, a student at Mars Hill College disrobed in class for the promise of an A.
RESEARCH & PUBLISHING
BACK TO THE BIG BANG
Physicists at the Brookhaven National Laboratory try to re-create conditions of the very, very early universe to reach a more intimate understanding of matter.
MANY VOICES
The most notable collection of writing at Minneapolis Community and Technical College is photocopied and stapled together.
SEE NO EVIL
Why have social scientists turned a blind eye to Islamic anti-Semitism? asks Neil J. Kressel, who directs the honors program in social sciences at William Paterson University of New Jersey.
THE FAB FOUR
Americans' attention to the seasons has gone through its own changes, writes Michael Kammen, a professor of American history and culture at Cornell University.
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- VERBATIM: Ervand Abrahamian, a professor of history at Baruch College, talks about the significance of Iran's recent elections.
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- WET, ONCE: One of the Mars rovers finds signs that a region of the planet was once soaked with water and could have supported life.
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- NOTA BENE: In their third book on opera, a literary theorist and a physician explore the musical drama as a contemplation of death, allowing rehearsals of mortality in ways that give life meaning.
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- HOT TYPE: The money-losing University of Idaho Press will be put out of business by its university on July 1, while on the same date, state support for the University of Georgia Press will reportedly be cut in half.
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- FROM 78 TO 23: Fewer colonies of human embryonic stem cells will be available to scientific researchers than President Bush estimated in 2001, according to a report from the National Institutes of Health.
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- THANK YOU AND GOODBYE: President Bush removed two dissenting members of his bioethics advisory council, renewing criticism that he is playing politics with scientific policy.
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- NEW SCHOLARLY BOOKS
GOVERNMENT & POLITICS
MCKEON'S RETREAT
To the relief of higher-education leaders, a proposal before Congress that would have punished colleges for big increases in their tuition has been dropped by its Republican sponsor.
FEWER FOREIGN STUDENTS
The number of applications from abroad is down, particularly at graduate schools, which critics say is a result of stricter national-security measures.
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- TESTY TESTIMONY: In a Senate committee hearing, a representative of a group of college trustees and alumni accuses accreditors of "a record of persistent failure."
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- NARROW MARGIN: California voters approved a bond measure that will give the state's public colleges and universities $2.3-billion for construction projects through 2006.
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- FROM 78 TO 23: Fewer colonies of human embryonic stem cells will be available to scientific researchers than President Bush estimated in 2001, according to a report from the National Institutes of Health.
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- $2.6-MILLION PAID: The Johns Hopkins University settled a lawsuit that claimed that its scientists had overstated the time they were spending on federally financed research projects.
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- THANK YOU AND GOODBYE: President Bush removed two dissenting members of his bioethics advisory council, renewing criticism that he is playing politics with scientific policy.
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- OVERWHELMING SUPPORT: The Utah legislature passed a bill to remove the University of Utah's ban on firearms.
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- 'ATTAINABLE FOR ALL': An alliance of 34 national groups that work to improve college access and success for underserved populations issued a report containing almost 100 recommendations to reach those goals.
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- 'DISINCENTIVE FOR ORACLE': The Justice Department filed a lawsuit to block Oracle Corporation's bid to take over PeopleSoft, arguing that the merger would result in higher costs for colleges and other users of the companies' software.
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- SCANDALIZED: A Congressional panel will investigate recruiting practices in college sports, spurred by allegations that the University of Colorado at Boulder used sex and alcohol to attract football players.
MONEY & MANAGEMENT
THE CONTRARIAN
A technology-transfer expert says universities should use inventions to build relationships with companies rather than to maximize profits.
MCKEON'S RETREAT
To the relief of higher-education leaders, a proposal before Congress that would have punished colleges for big increases in their tuition has been dropped by its Republican sponsor.
A FIFTH BIG BOWL
Leaders of the six most powerful college-football conferences agreed with representatives of other leagues to open the postseason to more teams by adding a game to the championship series.
FOUL TERRITORY
If baseball teams were managed like public universities, the dysfunction would be in a league of its own, writes Mark Yudof, chancellor of the University of Texas System.
AN UNHAPPY INTERIM
Temporary appointees may claim that they don't want the permanent post, but what if they secretly do?
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- PLATINUM PARACHUTE: The president of Auburn University, who resigned in January, will receive his pay through June 2005.
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- BIG GIFT: A telecommunications pioneer gave $52-million to the University of Southern California's School of Engineering.
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- FOLLOW THE MONEY: Students from five universities started a campaign to demand that a hedge fund that manages money for their institutions disclose information about its investments.
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- FLATTENED RAISES: The rate of growth in college administrators' median salaries has continued to decline, an annual survey found.
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- LEGAL FIRE: A class-action lawsuit accused ITT Educational Services of defrauding investors by falsifying enrollment and other records.
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- IT'S (NOT) A GAS: In addition to textbooks and collegiate apparel, the bookstore at Connecticut College sells push lawnmowers.
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- PEER REVIEW: The controversial president of Harford Community College, in Maryland, steps down. ... The dean of New School University's drama school retires. ... Kenneth W. Starr is back on the short list for dean of Pepperdine University's law school.
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- TESTY TESTIMONY: In a Senate committee hearing, a representative of a group of college trustees and alumni accuses accreditors of "a record of persistent failure."
INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
THE SNITCH'S SONG
Whether or not a student at the University of Maryland at College Park really reported a campus file-sharing hub to authorities, the ensuing unpleasantness shows that colleges must still contend with students' illegally trading music online.
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- 'FLASHMOB I': Computer owners have been invited to take their machines to the University of San Francisco next month to combine them into a supercomputer that organizers hope will be, for a few hours, one of the most powerful in the world.
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- NO STRATEGIC PLANS: Most institutions that serve mainly minority students provide adequate technology but may fall behind for a lack of reliable revenue, a report said.
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- COLLEGE-COMPUTING CONGLOMERATE: SunGard Data Systems is acquiring Collegis, its second purchase of a company involved in higher-education software.
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- 'DISINCENTIVE FOR ORACLE': The Justice Department filed a lawsuit to block Oracle Corporation's bid to take over PeopleSoft, arguing that the merger would result in higher costs for colleges and other users of the companies' software.
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- E-TAMPERING PUNISHED: An Indiana University student was put on disciplinary probation for posting an unauthorized alert on the Bloomington campus's emergency site.
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- UNWANTED E-MAIL: Computer-security officials at the University of Wisconsin at Madison traced a mass mailing that appeared to originate on the campus to a company in Pennsylvania that runs chat rooms.
STUDENTS
THE SNITCH'S SONG
Whether or not a student at the University of Maryland at College Park really reported a campus file-sharing hub to authorities, the ensuing unpleasantness shows that colleges must still contend with students' illegally trading music online.
CHANGING GRADERS
The College Board said Pearson NCS will grade the new essay portion of the SAT, the first time in over 50 years that an entity other than the Educational Testing Service will grade any part of the test.
CLASS DISMISSED
At Metropolitan College of New York's seminars on urban issues, the student is a subject, source, and scholar, writes Hakim Hasan, director of the college's Metropolitan Institute.
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- LEVELING THE FIELD: Harvard will stop asking parents who earn less than $40,000 a year to pay anything toward their children's education.
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- SHE WANTS MAIL: A Williams College senior peppered Williamstown, Mass., with self-addressed postcards on which she asked locals to write their memories of the town.
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- IN OTHER NEWS: A man wearing a Richard Nixon mask flashed students at Iowa State University. ... A Chinese professor remembers the Titanic with a swim. ... Surfers from the University of California at Santa Cruz had to be rescued. ... A lesbian at a British university sold her virginity to pay her tuition.
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- FOLLOW THE MONEY: Students from five universities started a campaign to demand that a hedge fund that manages money for their institutions disclose information about its investments.
ATHLETICS
A FIFTH BIG BOWL
Leaders of the six most powerful college-football conferences agreed with representatives of other leagues to open the postseason to more teams by adding a game to the championship series.
WHEN WORLDS COLLIDE
Mix undergraduate sex and drinking, big-time college sports recruiting, and politically correct administrators, and you've got an explosive combination, writes Murray Sperber, a professor of English and American studies at Indiana University at Bloomington.
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- 'CAUTIONARY LESSON': The National Collegiate Athletic Association punished Gardner-Webb University for violating a number of rules.
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- SCANDALIZED: A Congressional panel will investigate recruiting practices in college sports, spurred by allegations that the University of Colorado at Boulder used sex and alcohol to attract football players.
INTERNATIONAL
ON THEIR OWN
In what the Japanese government calls the biggest reform in higher education in more than a century, the 87 national universities will set their own directions starting in April.
FEWER FOREIGN STUDENTS
The number of applications from abroad is down, particularly at graduate schools, which critics say is a result of stricter national-security measures.
TRUTH OR CONSEQUENCES
In the Russian race between revanchism and reform, an honest assessment of history could provide the winning edge, writes Jonathan Brent, associate director and editorial director of Yale University Press.
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- WEST POINT EAST: The U.S. Military Academy is working with the government of Afghanistan to establish a four-year national military academy there, based on the elite American model.
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- GULF-BOUND: Carnegie Mellon University will be the latest American institution to establish a degree program in Qatar.
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- ON STRIKE: British professors at some universities are refusing to teach until they get a pay raise.
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- JOINING FORCES: Israel and Jordan will create a center for scientific research on the life sciences.
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- CLASSES CANCELED: Acadia University, one of Canada's leading institutions, was shut down last week when faculty members went on strike.
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- PROTEST IN FRANCE: French scientists plan to boycott their administrative duties to protest the government's attitude toward public research institutes.
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- CALL FOR HELP: Foreign students in Russia demand protection from racist attacks on university campuses.
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- BLUE OVER TUITION: A group of student filmmakers at the University of Leipzig made a soft-porn movie to protest a plan to charge tuition in Germany.
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- A WHIFF OF ROMANCE: Faced with a falling birthrate, Singapore asked some chemistry students to create a perfume that inspires love.
NOTES FROM ACADEME
MANY VOICES
The most notable collection of writing at Minneapolis Community and Technical College is photocopied and stapled together.
THE CHRONICLE REVIEW
CLASS DISMISSED
At Metropolitan College of New York's seminars on urban issues, the student is a subject, source, and scholar, writes Hakim Hasan, director of the college's Metropolitan Institute.
FOUL TERRITORY
If baseball teams were managed like public universities, the dysfunction would be in a league of its own, writes Mark Yudof, chancellor of the University of Texas System.
TRUTH OR CONSEQUENCES
In the Russian race between revanchism and reform, an honest assessment of history could provide the winning edge, writes Jonathan Brent, associate director and editorial director of Yale University Press.
SEE NO EVIL
Why have social scientists turned a blind eye to Islamic anti-Semitism? asks Neil J. Kressel, who directs the honors program in social sciences at William Paterson University of New Jersey.
THE FAB FOUR
Americans' attention to the seasons has gone through its own changes, writes Michael Kammen, a professor of American history and culture at Cornell University.
POLAR EXPLORER
In a retrospective, Lee Bontecou's opposites attract.
WHEN WORLDS COLLIDE
Mix undergraduate sex and drinking, big-time college sports recruiting, and politically correct administrators, and you've got an explosive combination, writes Murray Sperber, a professor of English and American studies at Indiana University at Bloomington.
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- MELANGE: Selections from recent books of interest to academe.
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
CHRONICLE CAREERS
AN UNHAPPY INTERIM
Temporary appointees may claim that they don't want the permanent post, but what if they secretly do?
THE BUTTERFLY EFFECT
Can the small events that transpire over the course of a 60-minute class change someone for a lifetime?
COMPLAIN, COMPLAIN
A widely published scholar wonders why academics gripe so much about how hard they work.
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- ACADEMIC JOB FORUM: A discussion forum on the job search in higher education.
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- DETAILS OF AVAILABLE POSTS, including teaching and research positions in higher education, administrative and executive jobs, and openings outside academe
GAZETTE
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