Academics

Future leaders in business, government, and civil society need more than just job skills. The following articles defend the value of liberal education, with a focus on academic quality and rigor, fundamental knowledge, and the ideas that have shaped Western Civilization. They also scrutinize academic programs that have departed from these ideals in the name of progressive ideology.

Senate introduces flurry of higher education bills

Mar 21, 2007 ·

RALEIGH – Bills that would provide full funding for all University of North Carolina budget requests, create a ROPE Scholars program, and alter tax deductions for contributions to 529 plans were among the bills introduced in the State Senate Wednesday.

The introductions came during a busy day in the General Assembly that marked the deadline for bills in the State Senate to be filed with the Senate Principal Clerk’s office. The House has a similar deadline of April 18 for public bills and May 9 for appropriation bills.

300,000 UNC students in ten years?

Mar 16, 2007 ·

GREENVILLE � Enrollment across the University of North Carolina could reach 300,000 by 2017, according to projections presented during a Thursday policy meeting.

The projections also point to a growing number of Hispanic students from North Carolina who will seek higher education. UNC leaders say if that occurs, a number of campuses will not have a majority of one race or ethnic group.

Duke Praised for Educational Innovations

Mar 15, 2007 ·

Duke University’s undergraduate curriculum — like many others – went through a period of erosion beginning in the late 1960s. For many schools, that decline has continued, but not at Duke, according to a new paper just released by the Pope Center. “The Decline and Revival of Liberal Learning at Duke: The Focus and Gerst Programs,” written by Russell K. Nieli, examines how Duke stopped the decline and suggests ways in which other schools can help their students find more meaning in their education.

Nieli, who graduated from Duke in 1970 and now teaches at Princeton, observes that the administration at Duke – as at many other prominent universities – succumbed to two Siren songs during this period. One was to relax the constraints of the old idea of a core curriculum in order to give students more control over their college education. The result was a “distribution requirements” system that allowed students to pick most of their courses from a smorgasbord of offerings.

That change destroyed the educational commonality that had once tied Duke students together. “Gone were the days when almost all Duke students would have read the Canterbury Tales, Paradise Lost, and King Lear; when you could strike up a conversation with even a Duke chemistry or biology major on the differences between St. John’s Gospel and the Synoptics; when students eagerly debated in their dorm lounges whether Yeats, Eliot, and Pound were fascists or high-minded traditionalists; and when Southern students and faculty took special pride in the outstanding literary achievements of the great Southern writers,” Nieli says.

Duke Brings Coherence to Curriculum, Says Policy Report from Pope Center

Mar 12, 2007 ·

Two academic programs at Duke University are helping
undergraduates experience a well-rounded education and could be copied by other universities.

This is the message of a new report from the Pope Center for Higher Education Policy, “The Decline and Revival of Liberal Learning at Duke: The Focus and Gerst Programs,” by Russell K. Nieli.

Duke is responding to a problem that afflicts many universities: There is no longer a “core curriculum. “
Students round out their education by selecting courses that meet loose “distribution requirements,”
but the resulting education can be fragmented, limited, and incoherent.

Executive Summary: The Decline and Revival of Liberal Learning at Duke: The Focus and Gerst Programs

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Duke University grew from a small liberal arts college founded before the Civil War into a major national university by the 1960s. Throughout those years, the school (named Trinity College until 1924) was known for its solid, traditional curriculum and its opposition to the racism that was prevalent across most of the South. Unfortunately, Duke was badly affected by the student upheavals of the 1960s and 70s. Catering to students’ demands for greater control over their education, the university abandoned its old core curriculum in favor of a loose “distribution requirements” system, thereby discarding the idea that certain subjects are vital to a well-rounded education.

Higher education leaders plea case to legislators

Mar 7, 2007 ·

RALEIGH – The heads of the University of North Carolina, the North Carolina Community Colleges, and the organization of independent colleges all appealed for money at a legislative committee hearing Tuesday.

Hope Williams, president of the North Carolina Independent Colleges and Universities, asked that the governor’s new EARN scholarship program apply to students in private schools as well as public. She made the request during a joint meeting of the House and Senate Appropriations Subcommittees on Education. UNC President Erskine Bowles and Community College System President Martin Lancaster also discussed the budget recommendations made by Gov. Mike Easley last month.

Easley’s budget request makes rounds at General Assembly

Mar 1, 2007 ·

RALEIGH – A week after Gov. Mike Easley released his record-setting $20 billion budget, legislators were at work dissecting the proposal.

Members of Easley’s budget team were in the General Assembly Tuesday and Wednesday providing legislators details of the proposals included in the budget for the 2007-09 biennium. With Easley’s budget being released last Thursday, it was difficult for appropriations meeting to start until now, because members typically leave Raleigh following Thursday’s sessions.

Easley’s budget, as has been the case throughout his administration, calls for increases in the spending on education, which comprises 58 percent of the governor’s budget. The University of North Carolina would receive an appropriation of $2.7 billion, an 11.3 percent increase from the 2006-07 appropriations. The percent increase far outpaces those of other branches of governments.

Let the Sunshine In

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Last November, voters in Michigan overwhelmingly mandated an end to the use of racial and ethnic preferences in, among other things, public university admissions there. In a Democratic year in a blue state–and over the opposition of the educational establishment, most leaders in both political parties, the media, big business and labor unions, and even prominent clergy–58 percent of the people rejected this kind of discrimination.

One would think and hope that the citizens of North Carolina would feel the same way. Most Americans agree that, as Martin Luther King, Jr. said, people should be judged not on the color of their skin, but the content of their character. When it comes to higher education, that means treating all applicants under the same standards, not having different criteria depending on a student’s race.

Pope Conference Scheduled

Feb 23, 2007 ·

The Pope Center will hold its annual conference on higher education, “Building Excellence into American Higher Education, on Saturday, October 27, 2007, at the Hilton Raleigh-Durham Airport at Research Triangle Park.

The keynote speaker will be Harry Lewis, former dean of Harvard College and author of “Excellence Without a Soul: How a Great University Forgot Education.”

Gov. Easley releases budget recommendations

Feb 22, 2007 ·

RALEIGH – Gov. Mike Easley on Thursday released his $20 billion budget recommendation to the General Assembly, which calls for a new $150 million scholarship grant as well as a special bond election for university projects.

The budget also increases spending on on-line education programs offered through the University of North Carolina and the North Carolina Community College System.

Easley presented his budget at a press conference in Raleigh. Officials from his administration will meet with legislators Tuesday morning to discuss further details of his budget proposal.