Category Archives: Economics

Globe and Mail: Academics tout wisdom of spending on decaying campus infrastructure

Patching roofs and fixing windows on Canadian campuses is an efficient way to pump money into all regions of the country and better prepare the next generation of workers, postsecondary leaders are telling politicians looking for quick fixes for the sagging economy.

Follow

AlterNet: The Best and the Brightest Have Led America Off a Cliff

By Chris Hedges, Truthdig. Posted December 9, 2008.

Don’t expect the so-called experts to fix it either. They can’t. They are loyal to the decaying political and financial systems that empowered them.

The multiple failures that beset the country, from our mismanaged economy to our shredded constitutional rights to our lack of universal health care to our imperial debacles in the Middle East, can be laid at the feet of our elite universities. Harvard, Yale, Princeton and Stanford, along with most other elite schools, do a poor job educating students to think. They focus instead, through the filter of standardized tests, enrichment activities, advanced-placement classes, high-priced tutors, swanky private schools and blind deference to all authority, on creating hordes of competent systems managers. The collapse of the country runs in a direct line from the manicured quadrangles and halls in places like Cambridge, Mass., Princeton, N.J., and New Haven, Conn., to the financial and political centers of power.

Follow

Japan Times: Komazawa U. racks up ¥15.5 billion in derivatives losses

Komazawa University, a major private university, has incurred losses of roughly ¥15.5 billion in the trading of financial derivative products, impacted by the global financial crisis, officials at the university said Wednesday.

Follow

The Chronicle News Blog: Californians Cite Costs and Budget Cuts as Biggest Problems in Higher Ed

Berkeley, Calif. — Californians believe affordability and a lack of government support are the top issues facing colleges and universities in the state, but a majority are unwilling to pay more taxes or tuition to support higher education, according to a statewide survey conducted by the Public Policy Institute of California and released late Wednesday.

Follow

The Globe and Mail: Universities eye ‘painful’ cuts in wake of crisis

STOCK-MARKET MELTDOWN: HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF DOLLARS VANISH FROM POSTSECONDARY COFFERS

With endowment funds taking a beating, student aid, scholarships, hiring and academic programs could all be on the chopping block

Canadian universities could be forced to cut student aid, scholarships and funding for various programs as early as next spring because of multimillion-dollar losses in their investment holdings.

The recent freefall of financial markets, coupled with a wait-and-see attitude of donors, has campus leaders across the country preparing for the worst and hoping for

a quick recovery.

Follow

Inside Higher Ed: Will Professors Delay Retirements?

At TIAA-CREF this week, the volume of calls from clients is up 30 percent from the same point a year ago.

Given the dramatic drops on Wall Street, it’s not surprising that many in academe are wondering about the status of their retirement funds. But a big question for academe may be whether those funds are shrinking substantially enough to prompt professors to delay retirement. Many think that the drops this week — coming in a year in which funds were already going down — may in fact be that significant.

Follow

The New York Times: High Cost of Driving Ignites Online Classes Boom

NEWTOWN, Pa. — First, Ryan Gibbons bought a Hyundai so he would not have to drive his gas-guzzling Chevy Blazer to college classes here. When fuel prices kept rising, he cut expenses again, eliminating two campus visits a week by enrolling in an online version of one of his courses.

Follow

The Chronicle News Blog: Financial Crisis Forces Illinois Seminary to Make Radical Cuts

An Episcopalian seminary outside Chicago has stopped accepting new students and has told its professors that their appointments will be terminated next year, according to the Episcopal News Service.

Follow

Axe Falls at Malaspina University College

NANAIMO, BC, April 18 /CNW/ – Malaspina expects to offer significantly
fewer courses this fall. The Malaspina Faculty Association has learned that
layoff notices will be going out on Monday morning to 15 employees at
Malaspina. While the Faculty Association is working with management at
Malaspina University-College and is hopeful that layoffs can be rescinded, if
these cuts are not reversed, they will likely result in the end of degree
programs in Computer Science and Earth Sciences.

Follow

Opinion250.com: CNC Faculty Speaks Up

Later this morning, the President of the College of New Caledonia will hold a media conference to talk about the budget crisis and lay off notices that have been issued to those employed at CNC.

What is not so well known, is that the President of the Faculty Association of the College of New Caledonia George Davison has submitted comments to the College Board. A copy of the entire presentation is attached to this story.

In those comments, Davison says staff were not involved in any meaningful way in the budget preparations, the lay offs will affect 22-24 insructors, the administration has grown from 1 person earning over $100,000 a year in 1991 to 3 people earning more than $100,000 easch two years ago, and to 10 this year earning more than $100,000 each . Davison says the administration is top heavy.

He also speaks about the Marketing and Recruitment budget , saying it has ballooned from $133,553 in 2004-05 to a budgeted figure of $668,876 this year. That department, he says, has grown from one to 10 people over that period.

Follow

Inside Higher Ed: Who Gets How Much Money and Where It Goes

Sure, public universities generally make their annual budgets available. But how much did the chemistry department spend on copying at Kinko’s – yesterday?

At Oregon State University, that kind of detailed information on financial transactions is accessible online, albeit only to those connected to computers on the campus. “It’s pretty basic, but it is very transparent. Everybody in the institution can see everything that goes on everywhere,” says Mark McCambridge, vice president for finance and administration at Oregon State.

“There’s always this mystery — ‘The vice president is holding back money,’ or ‘This person got more money than I did’.… There’s always that mystery that surrounds the budget, and in our case it isn’t there.”

On Oregon State’s budget reporting Web site, users can track expenditures, transaction by transaction, by clicking through the various budget lines in an academic department or administrative office, from the president’s on down. As shown in a demonstration of the system, accessible here, users dissecting the biology department’s budget can check out expenditures under “lab supplies” and see, for instance, $49.15 spent at WARD’S Natural Science one day, and $115.47 spent at PETCO three days earlier.

Follow

Inside Higher Ed: Prisons vs. Colleges

For years now, educators have been warning that U.S. society might soon be spending more on prisons than colleges. In five states, that moment has arrived, according to a report released Thursday by the Pew Charitable Trusts.

Those states are (in order of spending the most proportionally on prisons in 2007): Vermont, Michigan, Oregon, Connecticut and Delaware. The state spending the least on prisons relative to higher education was Minnesota, where for every dollar spent on higher education only 17 cents was spent on corrections. The average for all states was 60 cents, nearly double the 32 cents spent 20 years earlier. Only three states saw gains in spending on higher education, relative to corrections: Alabama, Nevada and Virginia

Follow

The Chronicle: Canada’s Budget Includes Need-Based Grants, but No Increase for Student Aid

Canadian students, at long last, will get a federal need-based grant program next year. A new $350-million program, announced on Tuesday in the Conservative minority government’s latest budget, will replace Canada’s Millennium Scholarships program, which ends in 2009.

On the whole, however, the budget left higher-education officials with mixed feelings. While it includes money for some new programs, existing problems — such as more core funds for universities and colleges — were ignored.

Although there had been speculation in recent weeks that the opposition would reject the budget and thus trigger a spring election, that’s not going to happen. The opposition leader Stéphane Dion, although critical of the document, said his party would not vote against it.

Follow

The National Post: Abolish tuition fees, Liberal Senator says

OTTAWA – Canada should abolish tuition fees for all post-secondary students because everyone needs a college or university education these days to compete in the global economy, says Senator Elizabeth Hubley.

The Liberal Senator from Prince Edward Island is hoping to jump-start a debate that has played out internationally but has been muted in Canada, about whether an economy with a shortage of skilled workers can benefit from offering up free education for all.

Follow

The New York Sun: CUNY Mulls Restructuring Nearly $1 BIllion in Debt

The City University of New York, after its weekly interest rate payments almost doubled to nearly $1.1 million, is considering plans this week to refinance a large chunk of nearly $1 billion of its debt.

Follow

The Chronicle News Blog: Antioch College to Close for 2008-9 as Negotiations Fail to Save It

Antioch University’s Board of Trustees announced today that Antioch College would be closed, as originally planned, for the 2008-9 academic year.

Follow

The New York Times: Wealth Gap Growing Bigger Among American Colleges

Stanford University had an exceptional year for fund-raising in 2007, collecting $832 million in private donations. Harvard, too, reaped a bounty, with $614 million in gifts.

Follow