National Association of Scholars, a non-profit organization of higher education faculty, administrators, and graduate students

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Most recent posting below. See other articles in the column to the right.

Chocolate Rage
November 26, 2008 By Ashley Thorne
New anger in America sets cultural trends, writes NAS Executive Director Peter Wood.

NAS Renews Its Call to Make Accreditation Contingent on Fair Hiring
November 26, 2008
Today NAS urged ACCJC once again to take action to ensure that Santa Rosa Junior College is not violating Proposition 209.
3 comments - Last on 12/01/2008

Recommendations for NASW
November 25, 2008
A letter to the key social work organization calls upon its new president to make changes to protect students.
3 comments - Last on 12/08/2008

The College Backgrounds of America’s Leading Newspaper Opinion Columnists
November 21, 2008 By Tom Wood
A look at how higher education has influenced the analysts and inscribers of American public opinion.

Beehive Whacking
November 20, 2008 By Peter Wood and Ashley Thorne
A professor who publicized names of plagiarizing students in his course was fired from Texas A&M International University. Many see the incident as a discouragement to faculty to report academic dishonesty.
4 comments - Last on 11/26/2008

Good Sports
November 19, 2008 By Peter Wood
How the college sports industry undermines higher education

Highlights from our Fall Semester
November 19, 2008 By Ashley Thorne
Wondering what NAS has been up to recently? Click here for a one-stop index of some of our favorite articles this fall.

What Ails College Teaching?
November 18, 2008 By Peter Wood
Is it the division of labor between tenured scholars and "teaching specialists"?
1 comment - Last on 11/19/2008

You Too Can Write Like Toni Morrison!
November 17, 2008 By Peter Wood
It's not for nothing that Toni Morrison is the most assigned author in college today. Her revamping of written English gives a new model for fiction. As a service, NAS's executive director has distilled certain rules that we might adopt to emulate Ms. Morrison's colorful style.
2 comments - Last on 11/24/2008

Feminizing Science: The Alchemy of Title IX
November 17, 2008 By Patricia Hausman
Will gender balancing come to dominate science? The following article was published in Academic Questions (volume 21, number 4).
4 comments - Last on 11/21/2008

Bruce Cole: A Tribute
November 14, 2008 By Steve Balch
Chairman Cole will depart the National Endowment for the Humanities with a record of striking sucess in rekindling the appreciation for this country's founding and heritage.

Political Correctness Run Amuck
November 14, 2008
Candace de Russy tells the story of a professor fired for voicing political views outside the classroom.

Ask a Scholar: Seatbelts on School Buses
November 13, 2008
Have you ever wondered whether science fiction is literature? Or whether Russia is part of 'the West'? Now is your chance to ask a scholar! Today, a rather unpretentious inquiry important to parents: Why don't school buses have seatbelts?
1 comment - Last on 11/18/2008

Educating the Rich and Powerful: The College Backgrounds of America's Richest and Its Top CEOs
November 12, 2008 By Tom Wood
How higher education has influenced the business world Open DOC file ( 88.58KB) . . .

Stop the Hate and Celebrate: The University of Arizona Purges
November 11, 2008 By Peter Wood and Ashley Thorne
After a controversial comic was published in the student newspaper, the campus will "regroup."
2 comments - Last on 11/12/2008

Undowments: Higher Education Goes for Broke
November 10, 2008 By Peter Wood
Is college really an "investment"?

My Degree in Diversity
November 06, 2008 By Ashley Thorne
I just completed an online course on how to lead diversity education workshops. Guess what I learned?
3 comments - Last on 11/07/2008

Election 2008: The University’s Long Shadow
November 05, 2008 By Peter Wood
The polity and academy are joined at the hip.
1 comment - Last on 11/11/2008

Closed Minds
November 05, 2008 By Glenn Ricketts
A recently published book seeks to debunk the belief that professors politically indoctrinate their students.
1 comment - Last on 11/14/2008

Congratulations President-Elect Obama
November 05, 2008 By Steve Balch
We wish our nation's next leader every success in the service of America.
2 comments - Last on 11/05/2008

Evolving
November 04, 2008 By Peter Wood
The endless injunction in schools and colleges to “celebrate diversity” is a call to ignore our profound commonality in favor of superficial difference.

Election Eve
November 03, 2008 By Peter Wood
When tempted to fret over the election, read world history...
2 comments - Last on 11/04/2008

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Take Back the Classroom from PowerPoint
September 02, 2010 By Jason Fertig
Restrict PowerPoint use in teaching to pictures and videos, writes Jason Fertig. Too much PowerPoint usurps professors' authority and accustoms students to lazy thinking.

Collegiate Press Roundup 9-2-10
September 02, 2010 By Glenn Ricketts
Student journalists examine topics from presidential speeches to campus smoking bans.

Will You Promote Diversity? Virginia Tech Tests Faculty Candidates’ Commitment
September 01, 2010 By Peter Wood and Ashley Thorne
A major public university has fashioned a “diversity” litmus test for faculty hiring

FIRE Educates for Free Speech on Campus
August 31, 2010 By Glenn Ricketts
FIRE will offer a Free Speech Seminar in NYC on September 14.

University Speaker Series: Arab Feminism, Black Feminism, and "A Southern Queer Love Story"...No Comment
August 30, 2010 By Ashley Thorne
A program on gender and diversity at the University of Richmond will explore "emancipatory ideas of social justice" this fall.

How Scholarships Morphed into Financial Aid
August 30, 2010 By Jackson Toby
This excerpt from Jackson Toby's latest book, The Lowering of Higher Education in America: Why Financial Aid Should Be Based on Student Performance, will appear in the forthcoming fall issue of Academic Questions (vol. 23, no. 3).

Common Reading Controversy at Brooklyn College
August 27, 2010 By Ashley Thorne
Is Brooklyn College using freshman reading for ideological goals?

Question of the Week: How Many Colleges Should You Apply To?
August 27, 2010 By Ashley Thorne
To answer, leave a comment on this article, email us, or respond via Facebook or Twitter (no more than 140 characters).

Atlas Black Shrugs
August 26, 2010 By Jason Fertig
The first comic book textbook combines management jargon and theories and packages them into a story about a slacker student's attempt to become an entrepreneur.
1 comment - Last on 08/27/2010

Collegiate Press Roundup 8-26-10
August 26, 2010 By Glenn Ricketts
Student journalists have a look at the Ground Zero mosque controversy, reducing your carbon footprint and the pitfalls of "sexting."

A Regulatory Assault on For-Profit Higher Education
August 25, 2010 By Richard J. Bishirjian
How the attacks on for-profit higher ed are squashing needed competition.

New Excellent Programs: Tocqueville Program and Center for Statesmanship
August 24, 2010 By Ashley Thorne
Check out our list of excellent programs as we add new ones at Indiana and Richmond.

The Glut of Academic Publishing: A Call for a New Culture
August 23, 2010 By Stanley W. Trimble, Wayne W. Grody, Bill McKelvey, and Mohamed Gad-el-Hak
This article will appear in the forthcoming fall issue of Academic Questions (vol. 23, no. 3). A short version of this paper appeared under the title “We Must Stop the Avalanche of Low-Quality Research” in the June 13, 2010 Chronicle of Higher Education.
1 comment - Last on 08/25/2010

Building a 21st Century Syllabus
August 20, 2010 By David Clemens
Professors these days have to cover their backs when writing syllabi, writes David Clemens.
2 comments - Last on 08/20/2010

Question of the Week: Why Did You Choose Your College?
August 20, 2010 By Ashley Thorne
We're starting a new "Question of the Week" series. We'll have a new higher-education-related question every week. To answer, leave a comment on this article, email us, or respond via Facebook or Twitter (no more than 140 characters).
2 comments - Last on 08/20/2010

Dictatorships and Double Standards, Part II
August 19, 2010 By Robert L. Paquette
Professor Paquette responds to the controversy generated this summer after Hamilton College sought to censor his NAS article.

Real Ethics Education
August 19, 2010 By Jason Fertig
Ethics courses should make moral decisions personal, argues Jason Fertig.

Collegiate Press Roundup 8-18-10
August 18, 2010 By Glenn Ricketts
Student journalists tackle gay marriage, weird psycholgy studies and state liquor regulations.

5 Consequences of Administrative Bloat
August 18, 2010 By Ashley Thorne
What happens to higher education when universities are dominated by administrators?

Ravitch Repentant
August 17, 2010 By Peter Cohee
Peter Cohee reviews Diane Ravitch's book, a partial volte-face, The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education.