Category: Education (higher ed)
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Cultural Death Wish
by James A. Bacon In my previous post I gave a just-the-facts-ma’am account of the controversy over the appearance of gay- and fat-rights performance artist Kimberly Dark at the Virginia Military Institute. In this column, I’ll give my personal reaction. There are three elements to the controversy (1) the incident is solid evidence that VMI…
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Does VMI Oppress Fat People?
by James A. Bacon Last night the Virginia Military Institute hosted Kimberly Dark, a gay- and fat-rights activist, at its Gender Inclusion Dinner. The VMI website has published no information about the event. But in her website, Dark said she intended to address “the ways in which women and LGBTQ+ cadets, along with those who…
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Data of the Day: 5-Year Enrollment Trends
A week ago I published data showing the winners and losers among public Virginia four-year colleges and universities in the enrollment sweepstakes for the 2022-23 academic year. Larry Houseworth, a Virginia Military Institute alumnus, has shared the table above showing the five-year record. For most institutions, declining/increasing enrollment this year represents a continuation of trends…
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The Widely Varying and Inflated Costs of State Colleges and Universities in Virginia
by James C. Sherlock A College Board report, “Trends in College Pricing and Student Aid” estimated the total costs of attending college in 2021. The figures above represent total annual budget costs. This is a drill that many parents have been through. But I offer for the broader audience the differences in costs for one…
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Enrollment Winners and Losers
by James A. Bacon The fall 2022-23 enrollment numbers are in for Virginia’s institutions of higher education. Collectively, the state’s public colleges and universities held their own in a year in which enrollment continued to decline nationally. The community colleges staunched their bleeding after a couple of years of severe losses, keeping numbers stable, while…
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The Shockley-Goldsby Debate: The Rest of the Story
by James A. Bacon In August The Cavalier Daily ignited a furor over Bert Ellis, a conservative businessman whom Governor Glenn Youngkin appointed to the University of Virginia Board of Visitors. In a lengthy article, the student newspaper detailed Ellis’ role, as a tri-committee chairman of the University Union, in bringing Nobel Prize winner William…
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GMU Rebates Tuition Increase Students
by James A. Bacon George Mason University, the last holdout among Virginia’s public universities in freezing tuition for in-state undergraduate students this year, has announced that it will rebate this year’s 3% tuition increase. Now all 15 public colleges in Virginia have acceded to a request by Governor Glenn Youngkin to forebear on raising tuition…
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UVa Rules Out a “Pattern” of Hate Crimes
by James A. Bacon University of Virginia executive leadership has issued a remarkable statement that lends insight into the fraught state of race relations at Virginia’s flagship university. Three recent incidents have taken place on the Grounds since the new academic year began that have “caused some to speculate that they are linked or part…
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FIRE to VMI: Hands Off the Independent Student Newspaper
by James A. Bacon The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) has asked the Virginia Military Institute to refrain from pressuring an independent student newspaper, The Cadet, to change its editorial stances. “Cadet staff have faced interference from VMI leadership, including pressure to make the paper’s content more flattering to the Institute, suppression of…
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UVa Updates: Jefferson Legacy, Honor System, Tuition Credit
The University of Virginia Board of Visitors met Thursday and Friday last week and discuss several matters of interest to the broader community. Here are some headlines: Clement Defends Jefferson’s Legacy; Ryan Stays Mum Jefferson Council blog Whitt Clement, rector of the University of Virginia, gave a brief defense of Thomas Jefferson and his legacy…
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College “Equity” and the Student Pipeline Problem
by James A. Bacon It’s sad to see that my friends at the Partners for College Affordability & Public Trust (once a sponsor of Bacon’s Rebellion) have embraced the “social justice” paradigm for higher education. I whole-heartedly endorsed their mission when it focused on containing the rising cost of college attendance generally and advocated increased…
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VCU Police Department Signals Its Wokeness
by James A. Bacon A new “resource” will be available to the LGBTQIA+ community in Richmond. Virginia Commonwealth University — yes, the same institution that recently lost $470,000 in a cyber scam — has assigned two campus patrol officers as “campus LGBTQIA+ liaisons.” A recent university announcement noted that VCU Police Chief John Venuti has…
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Presumed Racist Until Proven Innocent
by James A. Bacon Around 11:15 p.m. last Wednesday, a White male dressed in dark clothing climbed the statue of the blind poet Homer on the grounds of the University of Virginia and hung a noose around its neck. The next day University President Jim Ryan declared the incident to be a “hate crime” and…
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The Trouble with Guaranteed Student Loans
by Dr. A Schuhart I benefitted directly from the guaranteed student loan program. Unlike most of my colleagues, I was a first-generation college student, and I took out loans for both BA and MA degrees. I would not have attended college were it not for this program, so I have always been grateful for it.…
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Va. Colleges Fare Pretty Well in Free-Speech Rankings
by James A. Bacon Three Virginia universities scored in the top 25 institutions in the 2022-23 College Free Speech Rankings published this week by the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE). The College of William and Mary scored 12th among the 203 institutions ranked in the national survey of 44,900 undergraduate students. George Mason…