Prof. Robert L. Harris, Jr. resigned his post as director of the Africana Research and Studies Center in protest of the University’s announcement Wednesday that the Africana Center — currently a unit under the supervision of Provost Kent Fuchs and separate from any of Cornell’s seven undergraduate colleges — will be merged into the College of Arts and...Read More >>

Wayne State University is ending the Helen Thomas Spirit of Diversity in Media award, citing what officials described as anti-Semitic remarks made by the award's namesake at a conference in Dearborn this week. Thomas, 90, said Thursday she stands by controversial comments about Israel that led to her resignation as a White House correspondent in June, but then she...Read More >>

Calvin College leaders, anticipating declining enrollment and rising expenses, say they will eliminate the equivalent of 20 full-time jobs by the middle of next year. President Gaylen Byker recently sent an e-mail to employees discussing the reductions, saying the college could not get by if it just continued to freeze salaries and cut nonpersonnel areas. Next...Read More >>

Millions of dollars in revenue and nearly 200 jobs in the first seven years are expected to come along with the return of football and a new women's lacrosse team at Stetson University, according to a city study. A draft of an economic impact analysis prepared for Stetson's Athletic Department found local sales would pour an extra $5 million into Volusia County in...Read More >>

University of Massachusetts officials unveiled an new Frameworks for Excellence plan to the Faculty Senate on Thursday, proposing to add more faculty, bring in more students and increase the number of doctorate degrees awarded by 2020. The university hopes to be invited to join the Association of American Universities and the goals are in keeping with what member...Read More >>

For the first time in 17 years, the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School, one of the world's premier MBA programs, has announced a significant overhaul of its curriculum, shifting everything from the structure of required classes to how executive education is delivered. The curriculum change, which will be partially rolled out in the fall of 2011 and fully...Read More >>

A School of Medicine faculty member has been accused of signing her name to a ghostwritten study, a practice that many believe amounts to plagiarism and undermines scientific integrity. The nonprofit watchdog Project on Government Oversight (POGO) claims that School of Medicine associate professor Kimberly Yonkers signed her name to work that was not her own in...Read More >>

City Councilor Ayanna Pressley is calling for a city agency to investigate a complaint of racial bias at a new downtown Boston nightclub after a group of African-American students and alumni from Harvard and Yale said they were denied entry or ejected from a private function last weekend because security staff members felt they would attract criminals. Although...Read More >>

Newly empowered Republican lawmakers in Iowa want to cancel paid research leaves for university professors in a budget-cutting move, even as the Board of Regents considers approving them for dozens of employees for next year. Incoming House Speaker Kraig Paulsen said taxpayers cannot afford faculty sabbaticals, a sentiment backed by the president of Iowa's largest...Read More >>

Ohio State University President E. Gordon Gee immediately handed back a nearly $300,000 bonus that he was awarded yesterday, saying the money should go to a scholarship fund for students and some other university programs that he thinks are important. After Gee's annual performance evaluation, trustees voted unanimously to give him a $16,042 pay hike and the...Read More >>

Faculty members and open-records advocates are criticizing a Texas A&M University System policy that bars professors from directing students to submit public information requests to A&M campuses and agencies. Journalism teachers sometimes instruct students to file such requests under the Texas Public Information Act to gain experience using an important tool for...Read More >>

Direct contract talks between the University of New Hampshire and its professors have broken down amid disputes about salary and benefits, both sides announced Monday. The two sides said they had reached an impasse and would meet with a mediator today to begin the next phase of negotiations toward a new, three-year contract. The current one-year contract was...Read More >>

Idaho State University’s Faculty Senate decided Monday to cancel its previous decision to hold a vote of confidence/no confidence in ISU President Art Vailas on Dec. 6. During its regular meeting at ISU’s Rendezvous Center, the senate voted 13-8, with one abstention, to not hold the confidence vote, which was approved during a Nov. 8 meeting. Monday’s...Read More >>

Apollo Group Inc., the country's largest for-profit school company, said Monday that it has laid off 700 full-time employees, mostly in student admissions, as enrollment drops off sharply. In October, Apollo said it expected new students enrolling at University of Phoenix campuses to drop 40 percent in the quarter ending in November and withdrew its profit outlook...Read More >>

A 48-year-old Bronx man has been arrested and charged with grand larceny for allegedly stealing nearly $4.5 million from Columbia University over the course of two months, authorities said Monday. George Castro is accused of adding a TD Bank account belonging to him as a payee in the Columbia University Medical Center's accounts payable system, netting payments of...Read More >>

Southern University Chancellor Kofi Lomotey opted to resign rather than face a possible ouster on the eve of today’s Bayou Classic football game. The Southern Board of Supervisors, meeting here Friday, approved Lomotey’s resignation, effective June 30, the end of the fiscal year. Lomotey declined comment Friday. Southern University System President...Read More >>

Glades Day School sits on the edge of swampland in Belle Glade, Fla., and its headmaster, Dr. Robert Egley, often drives past alligators lazing in canals on his way to work. When the school was founded in 1965, its location made the Gator an ideal mascot, and its logo, aside from being green and gold, was nearly identical to the University of Florida’s. Egley,...Read More >>

Officials say a former University of Connecticut administrator is paying $4,000 to settle allegations that he charged 23 unauthorized hotel stays to the school. Jeffrey Reynolds of Wallingford denies the allegations, but said in a consent order released Monday that he agreed to settle the matter with the civil penalty to the Office of State Ethics.Read More >>

With NYU poised to switch its e-mail service to Google Apps for Education, faculty have brought into focus a series of questions surrounding Internet security and privacy. Steinhardt associate professor of media, culture and communication Alexander Galloway said one of the main concerns that students, faculty and staff have is that Google's servers have access to...Read More >>

Since the spring semester of her freshman year, Heather Slifko has held a work-study job at Elizabethtown College. The junior from Hamilton, N.J., is an AmeriCorps scholar in the school's Office of Civic Engagement. Slifko said she spends her time "organizing a lot of projects" on and off campus. The Federal Work-Study Program covers up to 10 hours each week,...Read More >>

When Grinnell College's new president, Raynard Kington, bikes over to the Danish Maid Bakery a few blocks off campus, he doesn't play the VIP card. He doesn't mention the medical degree he earned at 21 or his centuries-old vacation home in Crete. He doesn't point out his directorship at the National Institutes of Health, where he had to figure out how to spend $10...Read More >>

Gov.-elect Nikki Haley plans to meet with S.C. public college and university presidents to get their ideas about how to change the way that the state helps pay for higher education, tying that money to the performance of schools. “Let’s work with them,” Haley said of college and university officials in an interview with The State. “Let’s see what the...Read More >>

A former Naropa University employee has been indicted on 18 counts of theft and forgery. Prosecutors accuse Ronda Devers of stealing $590,871 over a two-year period from the Buddhist-inspired school. Devers, an accounts payable clerk in the university's finance department, was responsible for issuing refund checks to students and paying vendors, according to a...Read More >>

Chris Cordner moved from California to Maine and gave up a scholarship to another school because the University of Maine at Farmington has a long-established Chinese exchange program with the Beijing University of Technology. This year, Cordner, an international studies major at UMF, is racing to learn Chinese in classes taught by a visiting professor from...Read More >>

Since Mary Ruth Patranella began working at Texas A&M University in 1939, she's seen 15 presidents lead, watched as the first women and black students were admitted, and has witnessed enrollment grow from just a few thousand to nearly 50,000. This week, Patranella, 90, who is assistant to the dean of agriculture, celebrated her retirement from the College of...Read More >>

When his professors drone, Dan Kautz whips out his phone. Kautz, a senior at Wilkes University, might send a text message to someone across the room — "I can't wait to get out of here" — or make plans with his roommates. He's become so adept at texting during class that he can tap out a message without even looking at the screen, making it appear as if he's...Read More >>

A much-criticized campaign to crack down on rowdy tailgating before University of Iowa football games reduced excessive drinking, school officials said Monday. Police officers made fewer public intoxication arrests and transported a smaller number of fans to the Johnson County jail this season compared to last, according to statistics released after Iowa's final...Read More >>

When UCLA neuroscientist J. David Jentsch was a grad student, he never expected his life as an academic would require around-the-clock armed guards, or a closed-circuit TV inside his bedroom so he could keep constant watch over his home. But the high-powered security proved necessary again this month when the researcher, who experiments on monkeys, opened a letter...Read More >>

Western Kentucky University faculty raises of more than $5,000 must be justified in writing to the school's Board of Regents to ensure salary amounts are known to all under a new plan enacted this year. Faculty members at the Bowling Green school began receiving word this week that the plan was going into effect, more than a year after a dispute arose over a...Read More >>

Former University of Colorado professor Ward Churchill won't be returning to the classroom anytime soon after losing his appeal Wednesday to get his job back. The Colorado Court of Appeals upheld a lower-court decision holding that the CU Board of Regents was entitled to "quasi-judicial immunity" when it voted to fire Mr. Churchill in 2007 on grounds of academic...Read More >>

SUNY New Paltz teachers' union officials say college administrators are sitting on as much as $4 million in as many as 400 college accounts - money that they argue could be used to save jobs and offset the college's looming $3.2 million budget shortfall. Last week, interim college President Donald Christian said the college could not legally or in principle use...Read More >>

A report from an influential Washington think tank Tuesday likens for-profit colleges to subprime lenders for their meteoric growth and for their propensity to drive customers into debt. The report says that 22 percent of students in four-year programs at for-profit colleges earn degrees within six years, compared with 55 percent graduation rates at public...Read More >>

Austin Peay State University Police Chief Lantz Biles was placed on leave without pay for a month because he sexually harassed female employees, according to the university. Biles' personnel records, obtained by a Leaf-Chronicle public records request, include a letter from university President Tim Hall dated Nov. 1 that spelled out the circumstances of Biles'...Read More >>

Three female Seton Hall professors can pursue a lawsuit alleging the university paid younger instructors and male professors better salaries, the state Supreme Court ruled today. In a 5-1 decision, the court said some paychecks the women received count as separate alleged acts of discrimination. "We hold that the payment of wages on a discriminatory basis...Read More >>

A faculty group at Northeastern Illinois University delivered a vote of “no confidence” in the leadership of Sharon Hahs, president, and Lawrence Frank, provost and vice president for academic affairs. Among faculty complaints were that their participation in governance is not considered and that the administration retaliates whenever faculty members challenge...Read More >>

Faculty leaders at the University of Colorado unanimously passed a measure advising that the school hire a football coach who supports academic performance and citizenship. The resolution has been forwarded to Chancellor Phil DiStefano and Athletic Director Mike Bohn as a search for CU's next head coach continues. The measure states that CU's football program...Read More >>

Central Michigan University officials have asked faculty and staff of “all six colleges including the College of Medicine” to justify the importance of their programs in order to better allocate limited resources. Monday, an open forum took place at Park Library auditorium, and an online webcast of a presentation and discussion opportunity was offered on the...Read More >>

A federal lawsuit contends that University of Miami credit history checks of job candidates discriminate unfairly against minorities. The potential class-action lawsuit filed Monday claims that use of credit histories in hiring decisions violates the Civil Rights Act. The suit argues there is no link between credit histories and job performance or trustworthiness....Read More >>

Michael Rao was welcomed to Virginia Commonwealth University last year as a young president -- not much older than the school he would lead -- who was just hitting his stride. With his warm smile and knack for remembering names after even brief encounters, Rao was seen as a president who would herald a happier era for a campus recently roiled by scandal. Now,...Read More >>

Two leaders of the University of Massachusetts board of trustees plan to meet with Governor Deval Patrick today to try to assure him of the fairness of the selection process for a new university president, amid concerns from the governor that a former member of Congress has an inside track to get the job. Former US representative Martin T. Meehan, now chancellor...Read More >>

Medill faculty members voted earlier this month in favor of changing the name of the Medill School of Journalism to "The Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing," professors confirmed last week. The change, approved by a 38-5 vote, will now be sent to the Board of Trustees for approval this spring. Conversations about changing Medill's name...Read More >>

With suicide the second-highest cause of death for college students, area campuses are working to screen for depression and educate students to recognize the warning signs. North Dakota State University is the only university in the upper Midwest with an interactive screening program that identifies students at risk for suicide. It allows students to take an...Read More >>

It is the class that wasn’t supposed to happen. In the basement of Jubilee Hall at Seton Hall University, 24 undergraduates meet twice a week for a course known as "Special Topics in Political Theory: Gay Marriage." Most of the tension that surrounded the first few weeks of class has disappeared. The security guard who stood outside the door the first week is...Read More >>

Dr. Anil Potti stepped down from his positions at Duke’s Institute for Genome Sciences and Policy and the School of Medicine Friday and took sole responsibility for the problems in his research, IGSP Director Huntington Willard said. Potti had been on paid administrative leave since this summer. “This is obviously a very regrettable series of events at all...Read More >>

New York University abandoned plans to build the tallest tower in Greenwich Village on Thursday after the influential architect I. M. Pei made his opposition known, and is now proposing to build a shorter but bulkier building on a different site. N.Y.U. had sought approval from the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission to add a 38-story tower to the...Read More >>

Monty Cook, hired this summer by the UNC-Chapel Hill School of Journalism and Mass Communications to lead an innovative online news operation, resigned Tuesday amid allegations that he has sent sexually explicit messages to a female student. Cook, a UNC alumnus, left The Baltimore Sun as senior vice president and editor earlier this year to take a post as...Read More >>

Students long have complained about teachers with eyes on the backs of their heads. A New York University photography professor is going one further by implanting a camera in the back of his head. The project is being commissioned by a new museum in Qatar. But the work, which would broadcast a live stream of images from the camera to museum visitors, is...Read More >>

From Boston to China and across the Internet, University of California campuses this year are taking unprecedented and potentially controversial steps to recruit out-of-state and international students for the extra revenue and geographic diversity they bring to the cash-strapped system. Most of the nine UC campuses that enroll undergraduates report sending...Read More >>

The University at Albany faculty senate voted on three resolutions that condemned the school's decision to phase out five majors. The senate vote does not have any binding authority, but it will be considered by UAlbany President George Philip before the final decision to suspend admissions to the French, Russian, Italian, classics and theater departments,...Read More >>

UNC shared Monday its plans to develop an online MBA program, the first to be offered by a top-ranked business school and a major move by the University into the business of online higher education. The program, MBA@UNC, is a joint one between the Kenan-Flagler Business School and 2tor, a New York-based startup focusing on online education. MBA@UNC Executive...Read More >>