Differential Knowledge

Watch Stephen Colbert discuss "College Credit" on tonight's Word.

Rising Tuition is a Myth?

It was quite the relief to see yesterday that "the real cost of university is falling". Here I thought that university prices were going up, and that accessibility was an ongoing issue -- if not an increasing one. But apparently "one province is even paying its students" when tax rebates are considered, according to an EPI study. So where did I go wrong?

Was it the increasing housing costs? Maybe textbook prices? How about childcare? Wait, have I touched on tax rebates before? Let's see:

"A report released yesterday by the Canada Millennium Scholarships Foundation asserted that student aid may not be going to those who need it most. The report indicates a fundamental shift from needs-based grants to tax credits and rebates, a move that tends to favour the more affluent and leave the truly needy further behind."

And on that note, the EPI study reports that Alberta relies more heavily on tax credits than any other province.

The Cost of Income

University rankings continue to spread, both in publication and methodology. The latest has me thinking back to Boeing's entry into the business, where it used output-based criteria to evaluate the institutions. The aerospace giant proposed using internal data to match employee evaluations with information about the institution their pilots and engineers attended.

And rankings that measure job performance are not too far off from rankings that measure salary. This new approach took the average of graduates' salaries to evaluate institutions -- but added a twist. SmartMoney compared these salaries to the cost of attending the university, and using the ratio to determine "salary payback".

SmartMoney found the results -- which indicated a greater value in community colleges -- "pretty jarring". Why this is so surprising to them, I'm not sure, especially given the general agreement surrounding a recent report by NASULGC, which explored the education-as-an-investment argument:

"No university can legitimately claim that their students learn more than do students graduating from competing universities."

Indeed, such claims not only mislead students, the report continues, but can be detrimental to society. Why? Because studies and rankings such as those above take focus away from the social good of an institution, opting instead to pitch universities and colleges as simply a means to a higher income.

To the Fall Term's Nominees: Congratulations!

The selection committee for the Teaching Matters! Awards will be meeting in just a week's time to choose this term's best instructors from the list below. Congratulations to all involved, and thank you for all your hard work!

For Innovation With Academic Materials
John Bowman, Math and Statistical Sciences
Gerald Cliff, Math and Statistical Sciences
Adam Morton, Philosophy
Heather Proctor, Biological Sciences

For Engagement With Students
Darryl Adamko, Pediatric Respiratory Medicine
Bob Beck, Computing Science
John Bowman, Math and Statistical Sciences
Paul Cartledge, Math and Statistical Sciences
Ewa Dabrowska-Miciula, Earth & Atmospheric Sciences
Judy Gnarpe, Medical Microbiology and Immunology
Roxanne Harde, Augustana
Denis Lamoureux, St. Joseph's College
Robert MacDonald, Physics
Richard Moses, Biological Sciences
Heather Proctor, Biological Sciences
Allan Rowe, History and Classics
John Simpson, Philosophy
Susan Smith, History and Classics
Vera Vrencic, Economics
Sai Yiu, Chemistry
Heather Zwicker, English and Film Studies

For Quality as a Contract Staff Member
Bob Beck, Computing Science
Ewa Dabrowska-Miciula, Earth & Atmospheric Sciences
Richard Moses, Biological Sciences
Allan Rowe, History and Classics

Study(ing) Aid

With the economic downturn, many university leaders have begun questioning stewardship priorities, often with a resulting shift to student aid. Take Bobbi Mark, vice president for institutional advancement at Barnard College, who recently empathized,

"We can delay in building that new building, but we can't say to the entire sophomore class: Why don't you take a year off?"

That year off may be forced on more students than higher education officials expected, according to a number of recent studies.

From the annual conference of the Association for the Study of Higher Education came three reports which examined the effect of two major need-based scholarships. These reports concluded that generous grants not only increase access, but also increase retention, especially among low-income recipients.

Unfortunately, that level of aid is all too often absent, a study by the National Association for College Admission Counseling determines. This report details that although many institutions claim to be need-blind, their aid only covers a small portion of costs -- resulting in a "gapping" effect that can leave many students behind. One of the reasons: colleges and universities are spending less on need-based aid than in the past.

Which brings us to a recent study from the Institute for Higher Education Policy. This study finds that the increasing costs of university and the dwindling availability of aid are preventing access to qualified students. More than 80 percent of non-college goers -- who had earned at least a 2.5 high school GPA, taken a college-preparatory curriculum, and taken some levels of advanced mathematics -- reported that the availability of financial aid was either “extremely” or “very” important in their decision not to enroll.

And some institutions are responding. Not only is Barnard College going to "delay building that new building", but they are also going to concentrate their efforts on increasing aid. This initiative of shifting donor contributions to student aid has been adopted by numerous universities, with some community colleges even waiving tuition for their local unemployed.

Let's hope it's enough to prevent students from taking the year off -- if they can afford it in the first place.

The Giving of Gadgets

Earlier this week, Ohio State announced their plan to make "it easier for medical students at OSU to navigate classroom lectures and clinical duties with patients." How? The iPod Touch. The popular device can be used to view high quality images from different angles, to access videos of medical treatments, and to request review quizzes.

Some other med schools in the U.S. have also tried incorporating popular media players into their programs, but Ohio's plan has one key difference: they're giving their students the device for free. Not that this is likely to be a growing trend. After all, history tells us that gimmicky give-aways, from laptops to iPods, rarely catch on.

What we can see in these attempts are three movements in higher education: first, the intense competitiveness in attracting students; second, the increasing pervasiveness of technology (often in the form of gimmicks); and third, the desire to incorporate these changes with the consequent shifts in the learning environment.

For years, it was the competitiveness driving post-secondary institutions, but thanks to technological advances, many universities are beginning to remember their mandates: the public good. One example is MIT, where technology not only refocused their learning environment but increased access as well. Today, the institute is renowned for their open courseware.

And most recently, MIT has created a version of their website for smartphones, taking advantage of the latest in gadgets. But instead of capitalizing on this idea, they are sharing the code with all institutions who may want it, making everyone's life a little easier.