'U.S. News & World Report' rankings? Some say, 'forget it'
The "Forget U.S. News Coalition," founded by a group of Stanford University students, has been joined by student governments at several institutions of higher learning. According to the Nov. 15 issue of The Chronicle of Higher Education, various groups have joined in urging administrators to withhold the data that U.S. News & World Report uses in their annual college and university rankings report. The magazine has been publishing rankings for 10 years and James Fallows, new editor of the magazine, said that he would be meeting with college presidents and members of the student coalition regarding criticism that the rankings unfairly compare institutions with a false sense of precision.
Information highway to be cleared for academic travel
Representatives of 34 research universities have joined forces to develop a new "Internet II" that will free academic functions from the congestion and other problems that now plague the existing Internet. The new network is intended to meet the research needs of faculty, to exploit the capacity of broadband networks, to support special functions to advance distance education and other research and educational activities. The project is expected to take three to five years to complete and will eventually involve 50 to 100 universities.
State appropriations for higher education reach new high
Related Link: State Appropriations infoTotal state appropriations for higher education, including student aid, have risen to a new high of $46.5 billion in the current fiscal year, according to a study performed by Illinois State University's Center for Higher Education. It is the fourth year in a row that state appropriations for higher education have increased, following major declines in the early 1990s. The data do not reflect enrollment growth.
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