Minding The Campus

Editor’s Note: The following is a work of fiction.

The Chronicle of Higher Education reports the presumably happy news under the headline “In First Year of ‘Demographic Cliff.’

“Hell is hot, don’t be a thot.”

Peter Wood has led the National Association of Scholars (NAS) for nearly two decades.

This is the week when pumpkins are carved, costumes are prepared, and millions of kids go from house to house to ask for candy and trick-or-treat.

Higher education seems to be biding its time, but what for, and until when, remains unclear.

In 1683, English settlers in Rye, New York, paid “a valuable sum of money” to the Weckquaeskeck people for about 4,400 acres of land 25 miles north of Manhattan.

The American Academy of Sciences and Letters (AASL) is to be congratulated on its deep historical dive into doctoral dissertations spanning the years 1960–2025.

In an upcoming episode of Brains & Bots, I am joined by Paul Vane, Jersey’s Information Commissioner, whose office oversees data protection and freedom of information on the island.

My colleague Jared Gould is skeptical of my idea that philanthropy will be the salvation of the lumbering, politicized dinosaur that is the modern university.

Many arguments about artificial intelligence (AI) in education never get resolved because people use the same words to answer different questions.

“Never forget” is a familiar instruction on historical anniversaries.

There is a reason that books in my field—the field of consulting to very wealthy families about the preservation of their families and their money—often put pictures of trees on their covers.

Debate is a hallmark of the Western civic tradition.

In the latest episode of Café Berlin, Ian Oxnevad and I are joined by Elias Coop, a member of the West Virginia House of Delegates, to discuss what education owes students beyond a diploma.

Are colleges and universities reviving admissions tests?

In the news lately has been the donation of $1 billion by Phil and Penny Knight, of Nike fame, to establish a top-ranked engineering school at the University of Oregon (UO).

Professors and students at one of the world’s most prestigious universities have warned that their institution must recommit to quality teaching in response to artificial intelligence (AI) if higher education is to survive as a gateway to opportunity and…

There is a massive tsunami of student loan defaults on the horizon.

Dear Higher Ed...

I come to praise courses with boring titles: Introduction to Medieval European Literature, Introduction to American Literature to 1900, Introduction to American History to 1877, Introduction to Medieval and Early Modern Philosophy, Introduction to Classic…

There are major legitimate questions that can be raised about whether America’s colleges and universities should operate what are essentially large revenue-raising athletic teams whose student-athlete participants are increasingly divorced from the academ…

In December 2023, Liz Magill told Congress that whether calling for the genocide of Jews violated the University of Pennsylvania’s conduct code was “a context dependent decision.”

On October 13, 1776, the three-day battle at Valcour Island came to an end when Benedict Arnold ordered his remaining ships run aground and set them on fire to keep them from falling into British hands.

Editor’s note: This is the second of three essays in a joint series by Minding the Campus and the James G.

Much could be said this week about the Cornell 7 or those so-called student protests in France.

America and the West are moving away from climate alarmism and toward energy policies that prioritize affordability, reliability, and economic growth.

Senator Ted Cruz’s Going Further: The Incomparable Clarence Thomas arrives at a moment when Clarence Thomas stands both as the intellectual anchor of the Supreme Court’s conservative bloc and as one of the most polarizing figures in American public life.

Gallup has released new data showing a dramatic decline in public support of American higher education.

On September 25, the Harvard Salient ran the headline “Mansfield Calls for ‘A Certain Coercion’ to Bring Conservatives to Harvard.”

Is artificial intelligence (AI) going to kill humanity or not?

Editor’s note: This essay is part of a joint series by Minding the Campus and the James G.

It’s a great time to teach at a community college.

After decades of feasting on a reliable supply of high school graduates, higher education is entering a period of relative famine, which will likely get much worse before it gets better.

Usually, when a donor gives a university money for a specific program or project, the intent behind the gift makes sense for at least a generation.

When a college goes belly-up—happening now at a rate of about one a week—students and faculty might pull up stakes and go elsewhere, but the bricks and mortar remain, often perched on prime real estate.

Does restorative justice work?

The walls are closing in on the scam that is modern higher education.

Many small colleges have closed for good.

Teaching on both sides of the high school-to-college boundary has shown me a peculiar form of academic success: a student can finish an assignment without being able to explain what was learned.

The issue of college and university endowments has moved in and out of the headlines since Donald Trump returned to office in January 2025.

In the latest episode of Café Berlin, Ian Oxnevad and I are joined by Daniel Di Martino, founder of the Dissident Project.

The advent of generative artificial intelligence (AI) has elicited waves of frustration and worry across academia for all the reasons one might expect: Early studies are showing that AI tools can dilute critical thinking and undermine problem-solving skil…

Michigan State University students helped underwrite a “feminist rage room,” according to public records obtained exclusively by the College Fix.

Few things are as aggravating as paying for something against your will.