With goals as lofty and abstract as providing “an occasion for key stakeholders to make a new commitment to the development of higher education and agree on action-oriented recommendations which will enable higher education and research to better respond to changing labour market needs and to the growing and multiple demands of society”, the 2009 World Conference on Higher Education in Paris this month promises to be as ambitious as it is nebulously directed. (more…)

Quite possibly the biggest nod that online education has ever gotten, a new study from the U.S. Department of Education has found that good teaching is enhanced by new technologies. The study found all sorts of great things about online education as opposed to face-to-face instruction. I, for one, am excited to hear this great news. (more…)

On June 24th, Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced that FAFSA (the free application for student aid) is about to get a whole lot easier. Right now, the application is monstrous, daunting, and the last thing I wanted to have to fill out when I was about to graduate from high school–seriously, I would’ve rather had more homework to do. (more…)

Jack Welch, former General Electric Co. Chief Executive, has put his stamp of approval on the MBA program at Chancellor University. Of course, Chancellor University has only recently donned this name. Myers University, the formerly bankrupt, is now Chancellor University System LLC, and Jack Welch owns 12 percent of it. (more…)

It’s no secret that I’m a big fan of college funds. I’ve mentioned more then once that I had a college fund before I was born, thanks to my wonderful parents. I can’t imagine how different and debt-ridden my life would be without it. That’s why I was very excited to read today that 52 percent of parents are still–in spite of the economy–saving the same amount or more for their children’s future. (more…)

The online education news world is hopping this week. With a cyber charter school in Pennsylvania unionizing (the first of its kind to do so), Herzing University voted ‘Best School for Online Education‘ in Wisconsin, and young tennis players being given access to two top-notch online schools–newsworthy events are cropping up right and left. (more…)

Times are strange. Don’t take my word for it, though. Let’s have a little education news rundown.

First, the good news: Arne Duncan, who is the Secretary of Education, has just announced an $18.5 million dollar plan to “enhance libraries in 57 low-income school districts across the United States” (from the press release). (more…)

Times are tough for everyone lately. Education, recently one of the only two growing industries–it has since lost this title, leaving health care lonely at the top–is being hit hard by budget cuts, deficits, and general re-allocation of funds. Is this a trickle-down effect, or are there more sinister forces at work here? By sinister forces, I mean, of course, the slow-brewed, new American anti-intellectualism over the last decade. (more…)

Americans are spending less and saving more this year. The savings rate got up to a 14-year high of 5.7 percent of our disposable income in April or this year. This is the sharpest increase in saving since the numbers started being tracked in the early 1950s. It’s also the first year since WWII that Americans spent less than they did the year before. One big expense that’s getting dropped? Dream schools. (more…)

On April 7th, 2009, the journalism school at the University of Missouri made a bold move: they sent out an email to all incoming freshman telling them that, in addition to their other school supplies, they’ll be required to have an iPhone or iPod Touch. The requirement has since been changed to include other Internet-ready, portable gadgets–quashing brand-specific criticisms–but the debate rages on. (more…)