Miami Herald: More college students using food stamps
In a down economy, some Florida college students have found a new form of financial aid: food stamps.
The number of Sunshine State students receiving stamps was up 44 percent in July compared to the same time in 2007.
That’s about twice the rate of increase for food-stamp recipients in the population as a whole.
Currently, hundreds of Palestinian students are trapped in the Gaza Strip – unable to reach the universities around the world to which they have been accepted. Since June of 2007, Israel has imposed a closure on the Strip, violating the right to freedom of movement and other rights for which freedom of movement is a pre-condition, such as the right to access education.
Faced with pressure from world leaders outraged over the ban, Israeli officials declared recently that they would allow exit for just a few dozen students in Gaza holding “recognized scholarships” as a gesture to “friendly countries” but will continue to prevent hundreds of other students from reaching their studies. With each passing day, Gaza’s most talented young people risk losing their places in universities abroad – and losing their chance to pursue their dreams of building a better future in the region.
Further information on this issue is available in Gisha’s report issued in June 2008 and in Gisha’s July 2008 Power Point Presentation.
With the new academic year fast approaching, Gisha – Legal Center for Freedom of Movement is working to persuade Israeli authorities to cancel the ban on students leaving the Gaza Strip and to allow Gaza’s students to reach their studies abroad. One of the ways we are doing so is via a new internet campaign, in which banners featuring the students (see an example of one which I’ve attached below) are passed along through mailing lists and posted on blogs. Clicking on the banner then leads to the campaign’s minisite: www.trappedingaza.org, where visitors can send a message to Israeli leaders in support of the right of Palestinian students in Gaza to reach their studies.
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Posted in International, Students
Guardian: Radical Islam gains ground in campuses
Poll attacked over claim that a third of Muslim students think killing in the name of religion is justified and 40 per cent support sharia law in the UK
Almost third of Muslim students on Britain’s campuses believe killing in the name of religion can be justified, according to a controversial survey described as the most comprehensive of its kind.
The poll, conducted for Islam on Campus, a new report from the Centre for Social Cohesion think-tank, also found that 40 per cent of those interviewed supported the introduction of sharia law for British Muslims.
But the findings have been fiercely attacked by student groups which described the poll’s methodology as ‘deeply flawed’ and accused the report’s authors of isolating Muslims.
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Posted in Students
Inside Higher Ed: Access Denied
In a discrimination case that is still crawling through the Louisiana court system after seven years, McNeese State University’s president has asserted that it is not a “high priority” for disabled students to access the university’s student union.
The case, which stems from a 2001 accident, was brought by a student who — while in a wheelchair — was injured trying to pry open a bathroom door in the union. The door was not made accessible for disabled people, according to the suit.
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Posted in Administration, Legal issues, Students
Ynetnews.com: University heads: IDF interfering in enrollment process
In letter to Barak, Council of University Presidents say Israeli institutions ‘open to all those who meet academic demands, irrespective of race, sex, religion or nationality’; professors join petition against restrictions imposed on Palestinian students
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Posted in International, Students
The Canberra Times: Welcome to nation of university ghettos
A WIDENING gulf between local and foreign university students is creating segregated classes, cultural cliques and religious ghettos, raising fears of a backlash on campuses.
International education is a $12.5 billion industry, and foreign students’ fees account for an average 15 per cent of universities’ overall funding, but a higher education experts warns of “informal but real segregation”.
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Posted in International, Students
The Chronicle: Using New Policy, Students Complain About Classroom Bias on 2 Pa. Campuses
Two undergraduates on Pennsylvania State University’s main campus have filed four complaints against instructors under new procedures designed to help students who believe that their professors have presented biased lessons in the classroom. Two more complaints have been filed at Temple University.
Penn State and Temple put their student-complaint procedures in place in 2006, after Pennsylvania’s legislature held much-publicized hearings to investigate allegations that professors had indoctrinated students in left-wing ideology and discriminated against conservatives.
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Posted in Academic freedom, Students
AFP: Students protest sexual harassment in Iran university
17 hours ago
TEHRAN (AFP) — Thousands of university students in an Iranian city have held a protest against the attempted sexual harassment of a female colleague by a top university official, the press reported on Monday.
The Guardian: ‘Infantilised’ students unable to cope with life, book claims
Can students cope? Have your say on the Education blog
“Therapy culture” has invaded schools and universities creating a generation of “infantilised” students and lecturers unable to cope with rigorous academic life, authors of a new book claim.
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Posted in Students
The New York Times: Report Takes Aim at ‘Model Minority’ Stereotype of Asian-American Students
The image of Asian-Americans as a homogeneous group of high achievers taking over the campuses of the nation’s most selective colleges came under assault in a report issued Monday.
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Posted in Students
The Chronicle Review: Extreme Work-Study 1
By Marc Bousquet
cross-posted from howtheuniversityworks.com
Not that most of you will care very much, but one of the best contenders for the thoroughbred Triple Crown will race this Saturday. The horse’s moniker, “Big Brown,” expresses the owner’s gratitude to shipping giant UPS for renewing a contract with his trucking company. For folks like him, for full-time Teamster drivers, and for the customers who want their online-ordered crap at their doors tomorrow, UPS represents a good deal. The company’s also received plenty of good ink for its “Earn and Learn” financial-aid packages for part-time student employees.
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Posted in Contingent labor, Corporate University, Students
Inside Higher Ed: A new letter from human rights and academic groups is calling for the U.S. government to take stronger steps to assure that students in Gaza are permitted by Israel to leave for education elsewhere. The letter was sent to Condoleezza Rice, the secretary of state, by Human Rights Watch, the Committee on Academic Freedom of the Middle East Studies Association, and the Committee for Human Rights of the American Anthropological Association. “Gaza’s students need to have access to higher education abroad,” the letter says. “Opportunities in the Gaza Strip are currently quite limited. Many degrees are not at all available in the four universities there. For instance, there are no undergraduate degrees in languages other than Arabic, English, and French, and no master’s degrees in law, journalism, and information technology. Doctoral degrees are not offered at all. Israel rarely permits professors and lecturers from outside Gaza to enter to teach there.”
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Posted in Students
The New York Times: U.S. Withdraws Fulbright Grants to Gaza
GAZA — The American State Department has withdrawn all Fulbright grants to Palestinian students in Gaza hoping to pursue advanced degrees at American institutions this fall because Israel has not granted them permission to leave.
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Posted in Government, International, Students
The Chronicle News Blog: Judge Refuses to Force U. of Texas to Reconsider 2 Rejected White Applicants
A federal judge has refused to order the University of Texas at Austin to re-evaluate, without any consideration of race or ethnicity, the applications of two white students who have sued the institution, challenging its admissions policies as discriminatory. The lawsuit is continuing.
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Posted in Students
The State: N.C. pushes ban on illegal immigrant students
While other states struggle with the issue, North Carolina alone is moving ahead with an interpretation of a federal law that the state says bars illegal immigrants from attending community colleges, even if the students pay more than the cost of their education.
IN-STATE TUITION
Ten states offer in-state tuition for illegal immigrants, according to the American Association of State Colleges and Universities:
* California
* Illinois
* Kansas
* Nebraska
* New Mexico
* New York
* Oklahoma
* Texas
* Utah
* Washington
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Posted in Students
News & Observer: Colleges to bar illegal immigrants
RALEIGH – The community college system will no longer admit illegal immigrants to degree programs based on an advisory letter from the Office of the Attorney General, the system announced today.
Community college officials made the decision based on a May 6 letter from the Attorney General Roy Cooper’s office and a subsequent meeting with officials in the office.
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Posted in Students
News & Observer: Colleges may admit illegals
Federal officials say N.C. schools aren’t required to consider students’ status
North Carolina is free to admit illegal immigrants to public colleges and universities, federal officials said Friday.
“It is left for the school to decide whether or not to enroll” illegal immigrants, said a statement released by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. “The Department of Homeland Security does not require any school to determine a student’s status.”
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Posted in Students
Inside Higher Ed: New Salvo in Fight on Immigrants
Many states have debated the legality of extending in-state tuition rates to students living in the United States illegally.
In North Carolina, the debate over the legality of a more fundamental matter — admitting undocumented students at all — has only just begun.
The North Carolina Community College System set off a firestorm in November when it issued a directive indicating that all 58 colleges must begin admitting undocumented students under the open admissions policy. But the state attorney general’s office has now called for reversing course. The office sent out an advisory letter Tuesday suggesting a return to an earlier system policy, propagated in 2001, which limited enrollment of illegal immigrants on the basis that federal law restricts their eligibility for most state and local public benefits. “Postsecondary education is one of those benefits that undocumented or illegal aliens are not eligible to receive,” the 2001 policy reads.
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Posted in Students
CBS5.com: CSU Students Urge Gov To Reconsider Education Cuts
(BCN) Students and faculty at three California State University campuses were to call and fax Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s office Thursday to urge him to reconsider an expected budget cut to the university system.
Banks of phones and fax machines are set up today at CSU Monterey Bay, Sacramento State, and Cal State Los Angeles so that students and faculty can call and deliver a common message: “The California State University is part of the solution to an economic downturn; don’t cut it!” according to a statement released by the California Faculty Association.
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Posted in Budgets & Funding, Protests, Students
The Gazette: TA strike leaves trail of bad blood at McGill
Where’s the logic? McGill University takes pride in its reputation as one of the premier schools in North America, maybe the world – an image built on academic standards and professors with alphabet soup after their names.
McGill finds itself embroiled in a labour dispute with teaching assistants. It fires strikers from their other jobs on campus, citing a strict interpretation of the Quebec Labour Code.
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Posted in Contingent labor, Strikes & Labor Disputes, Students
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