Mark Thoma noticed something interesting about the Fed's statement in raising the Fed funds target to 4.5% today.

Finally, and worthy of attention, Minneapolis did not request an increase in the discount rate potentially signaling the Minneapolis Fed was not in favor of further rate increases. We won't know for sure until the minutes are released.

For the non-economist readers: typically when the Fed funds rate is raised, the Federal Reserve banks will request an increase in the discount rate they charge banks for loans. The president of the Minneapolis Fed, Gary Stern, rotated off the FOMC this meeting so he did not vote on the increase in the Fed funds rate. We saw a broader amount of this behavior in the September meeting, as David Altig noted then.

... this information needs to be interpreted cautiously. All we know for sure is that these Banks did not submit a request for a 25 basis point increase in the discount rate (the rate the Fed charges banks for direct loans). We do not know if the Banks not included in this list wanted less or more. You are, of course, free to draw your own conclusions.

I seem to recall that Stern has, in the past, felt that robust economic growth was a reason to take rates up faster. I see nothing in the Beige Book report from Minneapolis that would indicate that we were somehow outside the experience of the rest of the country. Our own survey up here in St. Cloud would agree with that assessment. On the other hand, it could be concerns over increasing prices, in which case perhaps Stern wants to go faster on increasing interest rates. That would be, by the way, the doomsday scenario for the Bush administration and Republican leadership, since any speedup in the rate of discount rate increases would presage a recession in late 2006 and early 2007 ... just like Bush 41 had.

Lucky for them, though, this seems very unlikely. Given that the Fed's statement removed the famous "measured pace" language, new Chairman Ben Bernanke (swearing him in tomorrow -- the big guy was a little busy today) might have room to go a little slower -- rather than overshoot -- with increasing interest rates. Markets currently bet against going faster. (Go here and here for more statement parsing.)

Categories: economics

Reader jw sends me a comment on Katherine Kersten's column on addressing the gender gap in education. He notes this paragraph:

Edina High School's all-boys reading club, Guys Quarterly, is another experiment. "Reading is seen as a feminized thing," says teacher Tim Klobuchar, who helped start the club. "Talking about literature sounds suspiciously like talking about feelings." The book club, he says, shows a guy that books are something he can share with his buddies.

Klobuchar acknowledges that reducing the gender gap will take time. For now, though, he's glad to see boys piling into his room to discuss spy novels and the best-selling "Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything."

Freakonomics??? When I was a junior high student I was already into war books, particularly Civil War and WW2. My uncle worked at a news and magazine distributor in Dover, NH and gave me copies of any of the Ballantine Illustrated history he could find, and I read these almost as fast. Ball Four was out by the time I reached 8th grade and, along with the Godfather (which I snuck off my parents' bookcase and read in three days), that's how my reading began to expand. My reading was not feminized.

I sincerely doubt I would have been attracted to Freakonomics, and I admit surprise that Kersten reports these boys are.

Categories: education; economics

Once again, DePaul University is in some hot water for silencing student speech on its campus.

DePaul’s latest foray into censorship began on January 17, when the DePaul Conservative Alliance (DCA) held an “affirmative action bake sale” at a table in the student center. Affirmative action bake sales are a widely used form of satirical protest against affirmative action. Organizers display a menu on which black and Hispanic students are charged lower prices than Asian and white students for the same items. The bake sales are intended to spark debate about affirmative action policies, not to raise revenue. At DePaul, the protest did just that, drawing a crowd of people who argued about the issue vehemently but peacefully.

Less than an hour into the sale, DePaul’s dean of students ordered the DCA to shut down the protest. University spokeswoman Denise Mattson told the student newspaper that the location of the protest was inappropriate, even though the university allowed a PETA table protesting the use of fur to be set up in exactly the same place a week later. On January 20, undergraduate Michael O’Shea, who led the protest, was informed that he was under “investigation” for violating DePaul’s “discriminatory harassment” policy. O’Shea met with administrative investigator Cynthia Summers on January 24. In a chilling e-mail exchange, Summers answered O’Shea’s question of exactly why the bake sale was being investigated by saying, “[t]here is no ‘because’ for the investigation that is pre-determined.”

I went to read the article written about this in the DePaul campus newspaper, and I find that one class is using this as a teaching moment:

Megan Wiskiewicz, a junior history student, is currently working on an e-mail along with other members in her class, Women’s and Gender’s Studies 200: Women in Transitional Context, that will call for a few changes within the DCA organization. “We are expressing concern and seriously requesting that the organization put out a public written apology, be placed on probation and agree to take part in a forum on affirmative action,” said Wiskiewicz. The e-mail compiled by her class will be sent to Jim Doyle in Student Affairs, among other faculty members.

I do not know if this is considered part of their coursework, but organizing it within a classroom seems wrong.

Categories: higher_ed

It would be very difficult to list all the encomiums offered for Alan Greenspan as he leaves the Federal Reserve after today's FOMC meeting (the results of which we'll sift through later). Milton Friedman himself pays homage in today's WSJ, crediting Greenspan with low inflation and low inflation uncertainty, the latter of which may be even more important.

Greater price stability had far-reaching effects. By greatly reducing the uncertainties, enterprises could use their resources more efficiently and steadily. Price stability fostered innovation and supported a high level of productivity. ... Of the 379 months from January 1948 to Volker's accession, 17.4% are months of recession; of the 220 months of Greenspan's tenure, only 7.3% are.

It has long been an open question whether central banks have the technical ability to maintain stable prices. Their repeated failures to do so suggested that they did not -- whence, in part, my preference for rigid rules. Alan Greenspan's great achievement is to have demonstrated that it is possible to maintain stable prices.

A quick look at the reference cycle from NBER, though, would seem to show that expansions were getting longer and contractions shorter even before Greenspan's arrival. One of my credos for macroeconomic crystal ballgazing is "supply shocks suck." There have been two supply shocks during the Greenspan era -- Gulf War I and 9/11 -- and we had recession for both. Mild? Yes, but so too were the shocks relative to those of the 1970s (crop failure, two oil price shocks.)

Barry Ritholz says Greenspan was more lucky than right -- and there's a case to be made for that. But it takes good sense to not screw up a good thing. And in other ways, Greenspan has done some rather amazing things with the Fed. Take, for example, Greg Ip's column from yesterday's WSJ on the increased use of communications from the Fed to financial markets:

As recently as 15 years ago, the Fed said almost nothing about its actions. Beginning in February 1994, the Fed issued a statement when it changed interest rates. It was an ad hoc action to ensure markets didn't misinterpret the move. The first statement was attributed to Mr. Greenspan, not the FOMC.

Over the years, the process became more formal. Before meetings, Mr. Greenspan drafted the statement with a handful of advisers, primarily Donald Kohn, who was the head of the division of monetary affairs and FOMC secretary until becoming a Fed governor in 2002. Governors sometimes discussed the draft the Monday before an FOMC meeting.

...Other FOMC officials were initially unperturbed by their lack of input but that changed as the statement's importance grew. In mid-1999, the Fed began to issue a written statement after every meeting, including the policy "tilt" -- the likely direction of the next interest rate change. In August 2003, it went further and said that its interest-rate target, then 1%, would stay low for a "considerable period." From May 2004 until last November, it said rates would rise at a "measured" pace.

Think of how much more open the process is now. Fedwatching now can be backed by so much more than reporting on gossip you obtained by talking to a primary dealer desk somewhere. We can sift through FOMC statements now and determine what happens to interest rates within hours of a meeting. It used to be several weeks before the minutes of a meeting revealed anything to Fedwatchers.

Economics professors teaching macro are accustomed to saying it's only unexpected changes in the money supply that have real effects on the economy. That was at one time an argument for central bank secrecy (see for example this JEC report, which was an early influence on me to look at the issue; see also this book by my friend Pierre Siklos.) Those arguments have given way to a Fed that uses its reputation to make market signals that are treated as credible.

UPDATE: I should note that I am not saying Greenspan wasn't ambiguous. This is still the man who once said about his Congressional testimony "If you understood me, then I wasn't clear enough."

Categories: economics

Funny and slightly uncomfortable moment this AM: Coming back from a meeting in the student union, I pass by someone familiar-looking in the hallway of my own office and classroom building. She turns and addresses me by name, and sure enough if it isn't Senator Tarryl Clark. We chatted for five or more minutes in the hallway, and she says to me that she reads the blog and that her office intends to send me a pail for the next election. Touche, madam!

I did put to her the question a couple of people asked me -- what is her feeling about the stadium issues? It turns out she and I agree that local voters should have a chance to decide if they want to pay for a stadium in their jurisdiction. I don't think that's a hard position to take, but someone might want to get that message to our governor and the logrolling speaker of the house. I didn't ask her about this morning's Times editorial on eminent domain reform, but I wouldn't be surprised to learn she agrees with it. Overall the conversation was quite agreeable; she has all the people skills others had told me she had.

This woman is everywhere and working groups around town, and is informed about issues. And to prove the point, within an hour I saw her again talking to leaders of a local business group at a coffee shop as I ducked in for one last cup after picking up my car from the garage. Note to Republican leaders: If you want this seat back, you better get serious, soon.

Categories: Minnesota, St._Cloud, politics, sports

Joanne Jacobs notes the effects of a California rule that students cannot complete high school without passing algebra. Three-quarters of students who fail the course once also fail a repeat attempt. 61% of first-time students took D's or F's in the course. And as a results, students are leaving:

"It triggers dropouts more than any single subject," said Los Angeles schools Supt. Roy Romer. "I think it is a cumulative failure of our ability to teach math adequately in the public school system."

Now one problem seems quite clear to me: Just having students retake the course isn't going to help. If you are serious about math education as giving graduates "a better education and groom more graduates for college and high-level jobs," you need to address the lack of preparation in the first eight grades. That involves both a review of what is being taught in K-8 and something to remediate the students already in the system. Creating a pre-algebra course for students who fail freshman algebra should be a no-brainer ... assuming it is funded. Jacobs:

At Downtown College Prep, the San Jose charter school that's the subject of my book, ninth graders who are more than two years behind in math skills take a "numeracy" course to brush up on the basics while also taking algebra. Most flunk algebra the first time they take it but pass in summer school or 10th grade. ... For LA high schools to keep students in algebra year after year without teaching basic math skills is ludicrous.

Yes. But it seems to me as well that the data on algebra skills and college success (or career success) suffers as well from the old chestnut that "correlation does not mean causation". The lack of algebra skills among these students is not random; failing algebra can be a marker for a whole set of other issues that may make college or career success less likely. While there are plenty of studies that indicate that a students with a rigorous high school curriculum do better in college, that does not mean that it's causative. We know that kids that can hit a 90-mph fastball in high school are more likely to become major league players, but that doesn't mean you make any kid a player by putting him in a batting cage with the machine turned up to 90. It's this failure to distinguish between necessary and sufficient conditions that make for bad policy decisions.

Categories: education

I appear in a Mark Yost story (WSJ subscribers) on the business of the Super Bowl along with people who know a lot more. Thanks to Chad and Phil for noticing. I happen to think, along with Craig Depken, that Detroit is the BEST place for hosting a Super Bowl if what you are after is local economic impact. Still, the NFL oversells the impact -- we're only dickering whethter they are overstating by 300% or 500%.

Also highly recommended is Brad Humphreys' post on Super Bowl ticket prices.

Categories: economics, sports

Flash noted late Friday that Patty Wetterling has blown off Mike Hatch's overtures to be his running mate, and that she will run in the Sixth District Congressional race. This means she will break her promise to Ev Tinklenberg that she would not enter that race. I asked some DFL party people about this over the weekend and they confirmed it. They are using a "draft Patty" campaign including a rally here in St. Cloud yesterday afternoon. Theory goes: If she breaks the promise she will receive negative press, but it would fade rather quickly and not be a problem for her by the time the district convention arrives. Makes sense to me.

Same people confirm to me that Ciresi is in.

You know, you never see that on notices for campus events. But invite a conservative, and you get a tag.

Student groups are bringing conservative author Dinesh D'Souza to St. John's University.

D'Souza will speak and sign copies of his best seller "What's So Great About America" in an event sponsored by Students Fostering Conservative Thought, the College Republicans and the local chapter of Young America's Foundation.

D'Souza is scheduled to speak at 7 p.m. Tuesday in the Pellegrene Auditorium at St. John's.

D'Souza has been shouted down and out of Columbia University in the past. I will be at the Medved event instead with most of NARN, but I hope some readers will visit D'Souza and report back on his talk. Here's his latest book.

so Greg Lukianoff, interim president of FIRE, will be helping them find it.

Lukianoff’s speech, entitled “Liberty in Danger: The All-Too-Frequent Quashing of Student Rights at UWEC and Nationwide,” will take place at 8 p.m. in UWEC’s Schofield Auditorium. In the speech, Lukianoff will discuss UWEC’s nationally notorious RA “Bible study ban,” which FIRE originally brought to light late last year, as well as several other abuses at UWEC and on other campuses.

We've had a speech here by former FIRE president Alan Charles Kors, and if Lukianoff is as good, UWEC is in for a treat ... and some heat.

There are times on campus where I think I'm used as the conservative token. "Oh, King's on that committee, so we've had a diversity of thought on this issue." My eyes roll heavenward. It makes no more sense to me to put a conservative on a committee, say, that hears a discussion of academic freedom than it does to be sure there's a faculty member of color on every search committee.

Another professor here at SCSU, Phyllis VanBuren, has written an editorial on SCSU's debate of academic freedom. After about six months of discussion, we got the faculty senate to agree to the 1940 AAUP "Statement on Academic Freedom and Tenure." That's a good thing, and though there's still much to debate over how we will make the university adhere to the statement, that's a debate worth having. Prof. VanBuren recounts many of the things that this blog has devoted itself to over the last three and a half years. It's a nice piece, well worth the read, and I'm happy to include Prof. VanBuren among my colleagues who want there to be greater intellectual diversity on campuses.

I'm more amused, however, by the SCTimes chatters, one of whom refers to this blog as "enough bias on either "side" to balance out."

My point with the SCSU Scholars site was because most people I talk to assume that college bias is liberal.

I am thinking in business classes, the default is going to be slightly Republican, and in the social services field, it is going to be Democrat, because of people who are attracted to those sorts of fields in the first place. That's just one example.

To Laura of Saint Cloud I say, first, that we're not in the college of business but in the college of social sciences. You're right that social services tend to be Democrat, but so too are economists, unless you want to take refuge in the knowledge that the ratio of Republicans to Democrats is "only" 1 to 3. Of course, maybe it's selection bias -- but that says very little for me!

Prof. VanBuren asks at the end of her article, "Who wrote that sunshine is the best disinfectant?" Long-time readers of the Scholars will know that it used to be in our banner, and that the quote comes from Justice Brandeis. But I am just a flashlight, not the sun.

Categories: higher_ed, Minnesota, newspapers

Fourth quarter GDP growth fell to 1.1% in the fourth quarter from 4.1% in the third. GDP from an expenditures approach consists of four items: consumption; investment; government expenditures; and net exports. Taking each one in turn with two numbers -- the contribution to growth in the fourth quarter, and in parentheses the third quarter contribution.

• consumption = 0.79% (2.85%) -- certainly automobiles took a tumble, knocking 2.06% off of growth versus a 0.45% contribution in the third quarter. There isn't much else there to mention, actually, but the news isn't very good elsewhere either. Real final sales -- which is a very broad measure of purchases by all sectors of the economy, not just households -- fell 0.3%. That means inventories are up, which may lead to softening of production and employment coming up. As James Hamilton says, this is just where you don't want to see problems.
• investment = 1.95% (0.87%) ... but again most of that is inventories. Nonresidential fixed investment only rose 0.3%, and this could be the effects of the hurricanes all folded into one quarter. Yes, maybe. If I'm the Republican leadership preparing for off-year elections, I sure as hell hope so. Hamilton says the increase in probability of recession right now is just slightly higher than it was a month ago, so hope is reasonable. So too is increased uncertainty.
• net exports = -1.18% (-0.12%), almost all of which is an increase in imports. I don't need to belabor this point further, but it's just hard to see that number improving too much going forward.
• government expenditures = -0.45% (0.54%). Most of this is a slowdown in defense spending on consumption goods, which knocked two-thirds of a point off GDP growth. That seems likely to stabilize, at least.

Folks will tell you that you shouldn't worry over a single data point, and some even want to average the previous two. But there's no way you can paint this as good news.

Categories: economics

I am known to my friends as one of those "early adopters" of technology who has to have the latest, greatest toys. I have one of my breakfast friends who does the same thing, and his PDA with Bluetooth and a wireless connection typically beats my Treo for finding the name of the new woman on "24". (This one.) But mine grabs my office email and his can't, so there! I had to have the cool looking Vaio Z1 when they first came out, the first Touareg, the first house with wireless, etc. I know it's expensive. Why do I do that?

The answer comes, of all places, from Adam Smith, as Grant McCracken points out. He quotes from the Theory of Moral Sentiments.

A watch, in the same manner, that falls behind above two minutes in a day, is despised by one curious in watches. He sells it perhaps for a couple of guineas, and purchases another at fifty, which will not lose above a minute in a fortnight. The sole use of watches however, is to tell us what o'clock it is, and to hinder us from breaking any engagement, or suffering any other inconveniency by our ignorance in that particular point. But the person so nice with regard to this machine, will not always be found either more scrupulously punctual than other men, or more anxiously concerned upon any other account, to know precisely what time of day it is. What interests him is not so much the attainment of this piece of knowledge, as the perfection of the machine which serves to attain it.

How many people ruin themselves by laying out money on trinkets of frivolous utility? What pleases these lovers of toys is not so much the utility, as the aptness of the machines which are fitted to promote it. All their pockets are stuffed with little conveniencies. They contrive new pockets, unknown in the clothes of other people, in order to carry a greater number.

I'm busted! I have contemplated carpenter pants at work for just this reason (cooler, more metrosexual heads have prevailed) and so instead it seems sometimes my pants are about to fall off because there's four pounds of electronic crap in my pocket. But, McCracken explains, it's not even our fascination with "the perfection of the machine" that causes us to risk a wardrobe malfunction:

It is as if Smith is saying that there is something about the object that serves as an expression of its use, that it works, when we look upon it, as an anticipation of itself, as a kind of prediction of its efficacy. It's as if Smith is saying that we treasure the object, that we take pleasure in the sight of the object, because it is a time machine showing us what it can do.

The view of the object (watch or PDA) treats it as a statement of the owner's enablement or potentiality. And clearly the other Scottish philosopher was on to something. Objects add enablement to the owner. Without apology or hesitation, we claim this enablement as our own. Nice work, Mr. Smith. The utility is not (only) the function. The utility is not (only) the enablement. The utility is (also) that new confidence that in a world of astonishing complexity and dynamism, we are enabled.

Am I a gadget geek out of fear that I need more and more things to prevent the world from going too fast for me? I have a desktop at home and at my office that is cluttered (to be polite), and people often remind me of the phrase "a clean desk is the first sign of a terrified mind." I am never stressed about the desk because I manage paper flow rather well. I seldom miss appointments either. But from where comes the utility, the satisfaction, that we get from things that organize our work? I pay for the service that allows my phone to get my work email, and I do so out of my pocket. Am I just showing off? Or is it because I'm deathly afraid I'll miss that one email that will offer to change my life, but the offer good only for a moment? Or, is it to say to others (or myself?) that I can still master a complex world?

For those microeconomists who draw up utility functions and indifference curves, I wonder, how do you deal with such disparate sources of satisfaction? Your "feh"s invited to comments...

Categories: economics

I sent a couple of comments this morning to Craig Westover on a piece in the morning paper he had read, and El Capitan Palito de pescado has used it to work over Laura Billings. It concerns her use of a study I find pretty crappy to make a case for single-payer health insurance. You can go read what I said, but first read what Craig said:

Medical bankruptcies hardly justify the call for Universal Health Care. Some quick calculations indicate that the total cost of the bankruptcy problem for individuals ($13,460 average outlay in medical bankruptcy filings times approximately 750,000 medical bankruptcies) means we're looking at about a $10 mbillion bankruptcy problem. That’s a far cry from the billions of dollars that Universal Health Care would cost, not to mention the inflationary effect on medical costs of “free” service.

As a country, we’d be better off cutting checks to seven-tenths of one percent of the population that are (a big leap here for the sake or argument) victims of market failure than we would be to turn everyone’s health care over to the same government implementing a square-wheel rollout of the prescription drug program.

And as I should have noted to Craig before, to get 750,000 bankruptcies requires extrapolating from a non-representative sample. It could be and probably is much less than a $10 mbillion problem. In no small part, it's because those who probably are most harmed by the lack of health insurance options never file bankruptcy anyway, because they have nothing to protect. It's a silly way to make the case for single-payer; a bankrupt idea.

Robert Samuelson hits the nail on the head: For most people, the system really isn't broke.

The reason is that most Americans don't want to fix the system in that sense. Most are satisfied with their care. Most don't see (or directly pay) the vast majority of their costs. Because politicians -- of both parties -- reflect public opinion, they won't do more than tinker.

Unfortunately Samuelson goes down the road of saying "experts know it really is, and our indifference is dangerous." Why? Because he says we want incompatible things: "(1) provide needed care to all people, regardless of income; (2) maintain our freedom to pick doctors and their freedom to recommend the best care for us; and (3) control costs." That idea, too, is bankrupt. I do not really want to provide you with needed care regardess of income, because to do so means I obligate others to take care of you. I don't have that right. I only want it because I don't bear the costs myself. Samuelson is correct in saying that "We need to reconnect people with the public consequences of their private acts." That's exactly right. Himmelstein's idea goes in the opposite, wrong direction.

CORRECTION: Doug S. points out that it should be billion, not million. I didn't review Craig's calculation but just copied it over. My bad, but it doesn't change how I think of this issue at all.

Categories: economics, Minnesota, MOB

Comes from Dave Barry:

The ancient Chinese tried to solve the problem [of what could be used as money--kb] by using seashells as money. The advantage of this system was that seashells were small, durable, clean, and easy to carry. The drawback was that they were, in a word, seashells. This meant that anybody with access to the sea could get them. By the time the ancient Chinese had figured this out, much of their country was the legal property of gulls.

And so the quest continued for a better form of money. Various cultures experimented with a number of commodities, including tea, grains, leather, tobacco, and Pokémon cards. Then, finally, humanity hit upon a medium of exchange that had no disadvantages–a medium that was durable, portable, beautiful, and universally recognized to have lasting value. That medium, of course, was beer.

I guess that's another book I have to buy. Of course, some places cigarettes were money, and a chess set I still play with today I bought in Romania in 1974 for a carton of Parliaments. (Those were a favorite brand in eastern Europe back then.)

Categories: economics

Now that we're aware of the situation with gas in Ukraine and the South Caucasus, we might be able to better address the question I raised last Saturday with Captain Ed over whether it's China or Russia that is going to matter more in the West's dispute with Iran over nuclear development.

Russia is being seen as a go-between for Iran through its help developing Iran's nuclear power facilities at Bushehr. This now has expanded to Russia creating a joint enrichment program on Iranian soil, with the apparent blessings of Europe. For their part, the U.S. State Dept. has said that having the Russians involved in affairs is providing some reassurances:

...the history of those discussions is one of frustration on the part of the Russians. They have put forward a proposal that, as I described before, would address Iran's stated desire to have peaceful nuclear energy. And we would question why the need for peaceful nuclear energy, given the fact that Iran is sitting on top of some of the world's largest hydrocarbon reserves, but put that aside, and that would give objective guarantees that would provide the international community some comfort that Iran couldn't use that mechanism to try to obtain a nuclear weapon.

Of course, the Iranians say, if you refer us to the Security Council all this nice cooperation is off. Who would be harmed most by this, and who would intercede in the Council to prevent sanctions? Ed argued for China, but I argue for Russia. The pipelines give us part of the story.

When the pipeline fires left Georgia and Armenia without gas in a very cold winter, the Iranians offered up gas to cover the shortfall until the pipeline could be repaired. The Iranians would love to drive a wedge between Georgia and the west, which has viewed the Rose Revolution as a crowning achievement of Bush's desire to spread democracy. Armenia, not nearly as big on the West's radar, has already been striking deals for Iranian gas. Armenia pays for the gas by bartering its excess nuclear electricity capacity. This of course harms the ability of Gazprom to maintain its power in the region. Why do that, if not because Russia and Iran are cooperating beyond Bushehr?

Russia's Caucasian flank has always been difficult for it to defend, and of course the north Caucasus contains Chechnya, Ossetia and other areas of unrest, much of it connected with Islamic terror. It is in Russia's interest to keep Iran placated to prevent an upsurge of terrorist activities in its 'near abroad'. It therefore has a real interest in Iran's plans for nuclear development, whatever they are, not being seen as dashed by Moscow.

So the question between Ed and me comes to this: Which is the greater motivation to protect Iran? China's never-ending thirst for energy? Or Russia's desires both to protect its soft underbelly and to gain more access to warm-water ports? (Remember, they're not on all that solid a footing in Crimea any more.)

The Christian Science Monitor reports that a new fad in education funding is dedicating a certain share of state spending on education to classroom instruction. They call it the "65-percent solution". Here in Minnesota, Governor Pawlenty has upped the ante to 70%. I had wondered how tightly he was going to define "classroom instruction"; now we know.

Under the proposal, classroom expenditures would include classroom teachers and personnel (salary and benefits), special education, vocational education, classroom instructional supplies, instructional aides and activities. Non-classroom expenditures would include district and school administration and support services, operations and maintenance, staff development, pupil and instructional support services, athletics and co-curricular activities.

Pawlenty's press release says under those definitions, on average Minnesota school districts spend 69.2% on classroom instruction. Here's a spreadsheet showing the calculations for each district. I ask, what's magic about 65% or 70%? Larger districts have scale economies and scale diseconomies. We know that cities tend to have higher per-pupil spending, and since they likely have more special ed students, their share of spending in instruction is likely larger. Sure enough, Minneapolis and St. Paul are comfortably above this line. Duluth and Rochester are a little below; Roseville is the largest metro-area district that is well below.

It seems like a one-size-fits-all solution; as the CSM article points out as well, while we know there's a correlation between state spending shares on classroom instruction and performance, we don't know if that correlation holds up at the local level.

Categories: education, economics

It seems like the Russia-Ukraine-Europe gas crunch will not go away. On the back of a cold snap in eastern Europe that is causing a great deal of anguish in Ukraine, the Russians and Ukrainians cannot sign their agreement on Russian shipment of gas to Ukraine. Heat is in such short supply that the Ukrainian prime minister has suggested he may ask industries to halt production to divert gas to residential use; the Russians are accusing Ukraine of siphoning gas again, which the Ukrainians deny. LEvko reports that the Russians are asking the Europeans to help pressure Ukraine to not siphon.

The problem is made worse by explosions on the gas pipelines between Russia and the south Caucasus. It may be Chechen sabotage. Russia may therefore be diverting gas it would have sent through to Europe to the Caucasus instead, greatly complicating matters. I don't have any definitive view of what's happening yet, but I think LEvko makes an interesting case:

In an address to Ukrainians yesterday Yuschenko unequivocally said: "Ukraine is receiving Europe's cheapest fuel, while its gas transportation system remains in state ownership. There can be no discussion of its transfer to some other country or group of countries." PM Yekhanurov, said much the same, more wittily, in a recent TV interview: "He who gives up his gas transport system will have to dance to music played to him on a balalaika". He did however encourage and invite foreign partners to co-operate in developing any new pipelines through Ukraine.

In March 2004 President Yushchenko proposed the creation of an international consortium to build, own, and operate a new large-capacity gas pipeline from Turkmenistan via Kazakhstan and Russia to Ukraine and on to Western Europe, but it came to nothing because, as I wrote in an earlier posting: "this would have challenged Putin's plan of a Eurasian producers' cartel which would enable Russia to monopolize supply and dictate the price of gas delivered to European customers." Any possible foreign co-owners of Russian gas transportation systems would surely insist that Russian domestic consumers also contribute a fair price to system costs too.

So perhaps for Europeans it will be difficult to gain any control of existing pipelines, but for future pipeline projects between Russian gas fields and European markets, [which certainly will be required] they should collectively demand some input and control. A good place to start would be to ask Germany to have a rethink and cancel its planned expensive underwater Baltic pipeline, which bypasses Poland and the Baltic countries. For the same money a shiny new overland pipeline could be constructed direct from the gas fields to end users. Sadly I don't think it will happen, not while every player is just thinking of their own self-interest.

UPDATE: Now this is interesting: Abdymok reports that the "technical reasons" for the delay in signing the gas agreement is that the Ukrainians are balking at buying shares in RosUkrEnergo, the new joint venture to deliver Russian and Central Asian gas to Ukraine, is that the Ukrainians claim not to have the money.

Categories: economics

I was just reading the transcript of the radio interview of Theo Epstein and Larry Lucchino, who have resolved their differences and brought Epstein back as general manager of the Red Sox. This comes after an 85-day trial separation, when Epstein quit what he called his dream job as Boston GM over differences with Lucchino. When I was in Boston three weeks ago Epstein was already being interviewed in the papers, and you could see hints that he would have some role with the Sox. I won't go into my feelings about this as a Red Sox fan, because if you're not one you most likely don't care. But this answer to the first question really grabbed me.

What it was about was we had a fairly fundamental disconnect about things that are very important in an organization, if you’re going to stay for three years as a GM and be responsible not only for the product on the field but be accountable to your colleagues and the fans as well and where that disconnect was fairly wide ranging. ...

I’m taking a chance by coming back. Larry’s taking a chance by having me back. John [Henry] and Tom [Werner, the owners] are taking a chance by getting involved to help broker this whole thing.

So the disconnect is related to everything from baseball philosophy, simple issues that come up all the time but are very important. How much do you value the long term vs. the short term? What’s your philosophy? How far will you go to retain veteran players? How much do you want to rely on young players?

Everything from baseball philosophy to simple communication issues … How do we communicate internally? What’s our philosophy to communicate with the press? How much must we trust each other to communicate the right way with respect to the media? It was all these issues that may not seem that important on the outside looking in but I can tell you and Larry can tell you, that when you’re in a leadership position with a sports franchise, especially one like the Red Sox, those things are fundamentally important.

That applies to much, much more than a sports franchise. Sometimes, you need to make a clean break to get others in the organization to see wherein lies the breakdown in communication, where the loss of vision is. Particularly if trust is lost. I'm heartened by the story that trust appears to have been restored in my favorite baseball team, but even more heartened that trust can be restored by people passionately discussing their principles and having the courage to stand by them.

The alumnus of UCLA who we reported last week paying $100 for information on his alma mater's biased professors has withdrawn his offer. The Los Angeles Times reports that several members of his advisory board have resigned since the press coverage of the bounty hunting had begun. The Times' article seems to take great lengths in attacking Andrew Jones (some of it ad hominem), who was successful in raising $24,000 for the project. It was a bad idea, but I doubt even Mr. Jones was prepared for the poopstorm he's experienced this last week.

UPDATE: I hadn't seen Mitch's post when I wrote the paragraph above.

Now, I could hardly care less about the goings-on on the nation's campuses, personally, although since my children are approaching college age, I'm certainly paying attention. Personally, I took a look at the graduate-school paper chase when I was still in college, laughed, and scratched it off my to-do list; I figured life would be more productive running on a Habitrail wheel. Other conservatives see it differently, no doubt.

But I don't see life from the academic's perspective. So someone tell me - why is it a problem to academics if a private group reviews professors' political biases for non-commercial, copyright-law-compliant, critical use?

I commented to Mitch that what UCLAProfs does not appear to be a "non-commercial, copyright-law-compliant, critical use." My lectures are a creative act, paid for by the university. The university may claim rights to that act, or may let me retain rights. The battle over intellectual property on campuses -- particularly for research funded by outside grants -- is replete with stories like this. First, Jones raised money in return for "getting the goods," making the enterprise a form of commerce. Second, he was careful to tell students that they needed to ask permission of the faculty, but it may be that UCLA doesn't give faculty transferable rights. I may be able to give my (paying) student permission to view or even record my lecture for her individual use, but the university may not give me the right to tape it myself and sell it off-campus, and it may not allow students to do likewise. See Steve Bainbridge FMI, because he's a law professor and I'm just an economist. As to other views Mitch would like to see, Bainbridge surveys the Sunday LATimes, which gave a defense of the academy worse than what BAA is doing.

Categories: higher_ed

From this morning's New York Times:

While the Big Three are visibly shrinking, their combined moves do not spell the end of automotive manufacturing in the United States. But the geographic footprint has largely shifted south, where a new auto industry is flourishing.

Japanese, German and South Korean companies now employ 60,000 people, or about the same number by which Ford and G.M. have said they will shrink. But foreign makers are creating a younger, cheaper work force, sidestepping Detroit's unemployed and the higher pay and benefits packages that Detroit workers were getting.

As you can see from the accompanying graph (source), that isn't exactly true. Most of the automotive industry expanded to reach foreign markets and capture new SUV buyers among boomers in the mid-1990s, a model that worked only for awhile. But it is worthwhile to see that what we've done is just return to the level of employment that existed in 1990. The cuts announced would reduce another 7% of the workforce, assuming none of the automotive companies outside the Big Three expand production.

Categories: economics

Using a publication that was created by the anti-Semitism settlement of three years ago, the administration has decided to continue its war on the University of North Dakota logo. It includes a peroration by our President Roy Saigo, who has made the logo his cause celebre, and devotes 10 of its twelve pages to the issue. The slogan of the publication is "Encouraging new ways to think how we view each other." I see only claims of victimization, and that ain't new.

Is it any coincidence that this comes after the student newspaper, which had already voted to not use the UND athletic name in its stories, received continuous heat for a picture of a hockey game between the two schools in which a UND player jersey was visible? The Chronicle finds itself having to defend an action shot of a sporting event.

This publication has produced some of the best collegiate photography in the state of Minnesota. It is also our policy to print the best available photographs our talented staff submits. The editorial board decided to continue this tradition of excellent visual arts and will not discard a photograph of the UND logo if it is the best graphic we have available.

...Newspapers are valuable to society because they objectively report the facts, and this staff is not in the habit of placing disclaimers on facts. The fact is the University of North Dakota's athletic team name is Fighting Sioux. The fact is they have a logo with a drawing of a Native American. Until those facts change, we reserve the right to print the news without a sugar coating.

Two points: First, it strikes me as quaint that the newspaper still sees its function as "obhectively reporting the facts, and this staff is not in the habit of placing disclaimers on facts." As "Mayor of the MOB" Doug Williams links today, the teaching of journalism and the work of reporters differs greatly. The newspaper seems to have eschewed the "comfort the afflicted and afflict the comforted" mindset of modern journalism. Photoshopping out the UND logo in the campus newspaper also blurs the distinction between reality and the cosmic world we wish we had. Bully for them for not seeing comforting the afflicted as part of their job.

So why does the campus and its leadership continue to think they should? Part of it ties, in my view, to Shelby Steele's excellent diagnosis of Hillary Clinton's MLK day speech to a largely black audience.

When political pandering goes awry, it calls you a name. On an emotional level, many blacks will hear Hillary's remark as follows: "I say Republicans run the House like a plantation because I am speaking to Negroes--the wretched of the earth, a slave people--who will surely know all about plantations." Is this a tin ear or a Freudian slip, blacks will wonder? Does she really see us as she projects us--as a people so backward that our support can be won with a simple plantation reference, and the implication that Republicans are racist? Quite possibly so, since no apology has been forthcoming.

Think the analogy inapt, when you hear this in our campus diversity publication from the head of the American Indian Center?

Along with other societal abuses and stereotypes, Indian mascots and logos separate, marginalize, confuse, intimidate and harm American Indian children, thereby creating a barrier to learning and making the school an inhospitable place. Schools must be places where children and students are allowed equal opportunity to participate in learning. The use of Indian logo caricatures denies full and welcome participation to American Indian children, while at the same time, teaching all school children to tolerate discrimination against Indian people, their heritage and their cultures.

All this from a picture on a hockey sweater? That's some sweater. Or this, from a Native American student,

When asked to write about my opinions of the mascots, logos and stereotypes presented at a collegiate level, I was very excited. I began preparing by sitting on my floor in my office, engulfed with hundreds of articles and files that I have collected regarding this issue. I started highlighting everything I wanted to represent. I was ready to command an audience and I was ready to show the world the ill effects mascots and logos had on Native Americans and our society. I came to the conclusion, as wonderful as this presentation could have been, to write not from an academic perspective, but from the my perspective as a Native American woman, a college student who is offended, hurt and humiliated by the misuse of Native American mascots and logos.

In other words, at an academic institution, where preparing an academic argument, she chose to become a symbol, to be used by the institution as a means of assuaging its own perceived guilt. Does the institution see Native Americans as injured people too unable to lift themselves up beyond the ill-informed use of one its symbols for an athletic team?

It would seem to me you'd be tired of this by now. It would seem to me that some of our campus leaders run articles and glossy magazines to harvest cheap support from groups that they view as victims, and that their support is only desirable as long as they are victims. They do not attack Native American mascots to give Native Americans power, but to give it to themselves.

UPDATE (6/12/06): Thanks for Hugh Hewitt readers stopping by. Please see this updated post.

Categories: higher_ed

In a rather fawning frontpage article this week in the campus newspaper regarding the election of Tarryl Clark to the state senate, we learn that she has some pull as a former DFL state associate chair.

Clark will be on two Senate committees that will have a direct impact on schools in Minnesota: the K-12 Education Policy Division and the Higher Education Policy Division. She will also be on the Jobs, Housing and Community Development Committee.

"It's rather rare for freshman legislators to be granted assignment to finance committees," said State Senate Majority Leader Dean Johnson. "But Tarryl made a strong case that the St. Cloud area, with both a state university and a technical college, needed a voice in the state's higher education budget decisions."Along with education, Clark's agenda will likely fill up with a slew of other perennial issues, such as the building of a new stadium, a balanced budget and economic growth.

Why do you think it is rare? It's because these are committees from which Sen. Clark will be able to dole out pork to her constituencies (which of course includes my employer). It is no accident that the very day her committee assignments were announced, she was seen having lunch with the president and the legislative liaison of SCSU (to which I say, good for you President Saigo!) The return to pork

I would like to know why the stadium issue is in that list, though.

Categories: politics, Minnesota, higher_ed

Professor Steve Frank, a co-director of the SCSU Survey, sends me a link to a special report by Gallup that shows a shift in party identification towards Democrats nationwide, and towards the DFL in Minnesota. The moving of party ID, Gallup points out, coincides with the decline in Bush's approval rating (the nationwide Democratic advantage in the first quarter, when Bush's approval rating averaged 51.3%, was 0.2%, but in the fourth quarter Bush's approval fell to 40.6% and party ID shows a 6.5% advantage for Democrats.)

Likewise in Minnesota, the state showed itself to be competitive -- leaning less than 5% in the DFL direction -- in 2002 and 2003, but becoming more DFL in 2004 and 2005. Prof. Frank points out to me that the Survey polls in 2002 and 2003 likewise showed party ID at 38D/34R, as opposed to the latest poll at 45D/33R. That is, as Bush and Pawlenty both have declined in the last 12 months, those who had responded independent, apolitical, or don't know, have moved their affiliation to the DFL column. Party ID isn't a fixed point, as Steve pointed out in a comment last month.

My friend Gary Miller and others at KvM have slagged the Survey for suspect polling by oversampling Democrats. I think they need to reconsider.

Categories: politics, Minnesota

This one has been even more goofy than the usual. So busy that I have trouble getting posts up here. If I may have your patience one more day while I get my last night class launched tonight, I'll be better tomorrow.

So busy that I won't be able to make the Center for the American Experiment's evening with Peter Schweizer. If you heard him on NARN on Saturday, you know this will be fun. Corey Miltimore, a media specialist at the Center, has a new blog and reviews the book as well.

What will I be doing instead? Running a basketball court with Littlest Scholar, except I'll be wearing stripes. For some reason the whole story spilled out of my mouth during the show Saturday, one of my crappier moments of radio. Just a couple of moments of brain freeze from what was otherwise a fun show. Captain Ed and I had a debate about whether China or Russia has Iran's back over the nuclear thing. Unsurprisingly, I'm the Russia guy. We'll lay off that for a day, let Ed soak up the Steelers win, but I'd like to get to a discussion of the Great Game politics between Russia, Iran, and the south Caucasus.

If there's another post today, I'm not as busy as I thought I'd be.

My mechanic got rich yesterday when Mrs. S's car came back with a repair bill over $1300. Some of it is because the car is as old as Littlest Scholar, and some is because Mrs. S isn't all that interested in assuring her car's maintenance. I have no useful skills in the manual arts; I believe in specialization and exchange, which means I get to teach an extra course or pick up a consulting contract, and with that money pay my mechanic to specialize in his comparative advantage. But, my mechanic says, how can someone as educated as Mrs. S not pay attention to an oil light or a maintenance schedule?

I say education has little to do with it. And reading this article that college seniors lack literacy skills, I wonder what people think a college degree actually creates.

More than 50 percent of students at four-year schools and more than 75 percent at two-year colleges lacked the skills to perform complex literacy tasks.

That means they could not interpret a table about exercise and blood pressure, understand the arguments of newspaper editorials, compare credit card offers with different interest rates and annual fees or summarize results of a survey about parental involvement in school.

The results cut across three types of literacy: analyzing news stories and other prose, understanding documents and having math skills needed for checkbooks or restaurant tips.

Three of the four tasks on that list are quantitative; it doesn't surprise me much at all in a world where math is de-emphasized in universities' general education program. (I must be geting crotchety in my old age to think students in college should all take college algebra.) The study makes clear that no more than 30% have even basic quantitative literacy, like being able to look at a menu and figure out the cost of a sandwich and a salad sold separately. An older NAS study shows that only 10% of schools surveyed had a math or quantitative general education requirement that had no exemptions by 1993 -- over half had none whatsoever. And the courses taken now as the math requirements are set even below finite math (a precursor to college algebra that was in my high school in the 1970s the course the freshmen got). The same is true with the natural sciences. Most problematic is that students who are not in the sciences or in business often are given options for math-lite.

Note to parents: If you want your children to be in the share of students who are quantitatively literate, send them to schools with rigorous general education requirements in math and natural sciences, particularly if your children intend to major in education or the arts or social sciences. They won't get it otherwise.

Categories: higher_ed

Ever-reliable Jim Paine continues to cover the proceedings of the Ward Churchill Investigating Committee. The committee contains faculty with the same ideological biases that Churchill has, Jim says. He may want to notice how a committee that conducts impartial investigations can work. At the University of North Dakota, a music professor and choral director who claimed the university wanted to fire him because he is gay tendered his resignation yesterday after a faculty committee investigating university charges recommended his termination. The Chronicle of Higher Education (subscriber link) provides some pertinent details:

A report the panel issued this month said Mr. Reeves [the faculty member investigated --kb] had focused his recruiting for the music program on top choral students and, in the process, had alienated other students who were not as talented. The report said he had also improperly charged personal purchases on a university credit card, although it noted that he had reimbursed the institution.

Finally, the report said that on a trip to Europe with choral students last summer, Mr. Reeves failed to adequately help a student who had lost her passport or to prepare choral students to sing a cappella.

The report did not mention an earlier allegation that Mr. Reeves had gotten drunk during that trip but said that "all too often," he came "perilously close" to engaging in conduct that impaired the fulfillment of his responsibilities. The panel cited Mr. Reeves's "inability to recognize what is considered acceptable and unacceptable personal behavior for a faculty member of the UND community."

In his resignation letter, Mr. Reeves said that "although I continue to enjoy great support from the majority of my colleagues, from many people in the community, and from an overwhelming majority of my students, the conclusions of my colleagues ... have led me to believe that it would be institutionally divisive ... to attempt to continue at UND."

That's how you do it, people. A professional hearing of his peers (though the CHE article has statements from Reeves' lawyer claiming the hearings were sloppy and did not provide due process, which is for a court to decide) led to a conclusion that had integrity in the eyes of the faculty member accused, and that faculty member did the honorable thing as a result.

Categories: higher_ed

A website of conservative UCLA alumni has been created to expose radical professors at UCLA. And it's decided to offer cash to students who help get the goods on liberal faculty. This organization is the brainchild of Andrew Jones, a UCLA graduate who wrote about his own experience with a UCLA professor who was, in another student's words, most close-minded professor I know, which affects the grading a lot!"

We have means already for students to discuss issues of bias, and to have someone independently evaluate the claims. Noindoctrination.org is one such place (and has five entries for UCLA). I certainly support paying someone for providing something of value, but alas the payment in this case will be seen by those who oppose any openness of classrooms to be a bribe to engage in a witchhunt, no matter how many disclaimers this alumni group offers. A Chronicle of Higher Education article (subscriber link) shows the line of attack taken:

The association has already drawn criticism from some UCLA faculty members, including Peter McLaren, a professor of education who ranked No. 1 on the group's "Dirty Thirty: Ranking the Worst of the Worst" list.

"This Web site offers nothing but name-calling," said Mr. McLaren, who insisted that he is tolerant in the classroom. The Web site says that he "teaches the next generation of teachers and professors how to properly indoctrinate students."

"This is a McCarthy-like kind of smear," said the professor. Asking students to "serve as spies," he said, is not only antagonistic and pernicious, it's also "un-American."

Lawrence Lokman, a UCLA spokesman, said the university supported Mr. Jones's right to free expression. However, the university plans to contact Mr. Jones to let him know that students who sell course materials without the consent of both the professor and the campus's chancellor are breaking university policy. UCLA plans to communicate that policy to students as well.

UPDATE: I mostly agree with Kieran Healy and Eugene Volokh. Bainbridge agrees that the payments are unpleasant and unproductive.

Categories: higher_ed

I recall reading papers about how having "white" names was supposed to help the earning power of people of color. But "acting white" in school -- in terms of being in honors or AP classes, speaking proper English or dressing the wrong way -- can cost a high school kid friends.

The resulting popularity indexes demonstrate that "the relationship between social status and achievement is categorically different between racial groups, a difference that is robust to changes in specifications, data sub-samples, and definitions of social status or achievement." At a GPA of roughly 2.5, racial differences begin to emerge, and Hispanic students lose popularity rapidly.
Popularity peaks at a GPA of about 3.5 for black students. Whites continue to gain popularity as their grades increase. The social cost of "acting white" is more severe for black males than for black females. It is larger for blacks in public schools, but nonexistent for blacks in private schools, "a finding that may partially explain why black kids in private schools do especially well." Finally, the burden imposed for "acting white" is greater for students with more interracial contact. Blacks in more segregated schools "incur less of a tradeoff between popularity and achievement." The toll for "acting white" is "particularly salient among high achievers and those in schools with more interracial contact."

Here's the paper if you're interested.

Categories: education

According a new report, there is no correlation between the amount of money spent on public higher education by states and those universities' academic performance.

Discussions about funding in most states usually leave evidence about the overall adequacy of public-institution funding off the table. As a result, in times of decreasing state appropriations, institutions often attempt to offset revenue shortfalls by simply raising tuition and fees. In response to the question of 'how much funding is needed?' the typical answer of 'more' or 'as much as our peers' leaves out all consideration of performance and affordability to students.

There is also no evidence of correlation between spending on higher education and economic growth. Philip Trostel argues that there's a Say's Law of college graduates -- an increase in the number of college degree-holders in the workforce creates demand for more high-skilled workers -- but even then, a 10% increase in state spending on higher education may lead to only a 1% increase in college graduates, because the money isn't targeted to just marginal students (meaning here students who otherwise would not attend and graduate). What this new report adds is that there are systems spending public education dollars inefficiently. Alas, the report declines to identify which states.

(Source: Chronicle of Higher Ed, subscriber link.)

Categories: higher_ed, economics

Within the last twenty four hours we find the intrepid department chair having to (1) sit in two search committee meetings, (2) a dean's advisory council meeting (better known as "dean and dummies"), (3) sign up two majors, (4) cancel a class which was full but has nobody to teach it (expect calls for my head around 9:40am tomorrow) and (5) find out Mrs. S's car needs $1200 worth of repairs. She has my car right now; I'm stuck here unable to get a beer to drown my sorrows.

This guy had a worse day, but he had beer. (Boxers?)

Hugh, I need a favor. The next time you interview Governor Bill Owens, please read back to him his state of the state speech:

We also need to make sure that we have outstanding faculty at our taxpayer-funded institutions of higher education. There are currently no statewide standards for the college tenure process-not even recognized minimum standards.

Let's see to it that tenure is given only to those truly qualified professors who deserve such recognition. I plan to work with the Commission on Higher Education to establish a basic threshold for tenure common to all state schools.

Dumb, dumb, dumb. The state has no ability to determine who should get tenure in one department or another. What makes tenure for an economics prof differs from that for a music prof, which differs from that for a historian, which differs... well, you get my point. Governor Owens looks like he's grandstanding on the Ward Churchill controversy. What he needs to do is put the University of Colorado's feet to the fire and have real professionals determine if Churchill committed academic fraud. Have it done with integrity, and let professionals deal with their own profession with the same integrity. Would you be so kind as to question him on this piece? I'll tape it and respond when I get it. Maybe I'll even save Duane's fingers.

Thanks, Hugh. I knew you'd see it my way.

Best,
King

Categories: higher_ed

The University of Wisconsin seems intent on picking a fight.

The University of Wisconsin committee charged with making recommendations for a final, system-wide policy on whether RAs should be allowed to lead Bible studies in their dorms put out its Resident Assistant Working Group Final Report late last week. The committee’s recommendation: each school in the UW System should make the decision for itself.

This arises from the UWEC ban on RAs leading Bible studies in their dorm rooms, and while it seems to be a rather evenhanded claim, FIRE says the UW system is acting foolishly:

The Report suggests that UW–Eau Claire and UW-Madison, both of which currently
prohibit RAs from leading Bible studies in their dorms, be able to maintain their unconstitutional, repressive, and highly unpopular practices of intruding upon the personal lives and private domains of religious RAs.

I.e., they punted. If the president of the system thought he was going to get to hide behind a committee, he thought wrong.

MOBster Gary Gross has additional commentary.

Categories: higher_ed

Matt Abe and I were in a discussion about this with Flash and one other blogger whose name I will forget and feel bad for ... until now. Matt reminds me of this again with his post on the Stossel special on education.

It's well worth noting that Minnesota is a national leader in school choice, with charter schools (they were invented here), open enrollment (students are free to enroll outside their district; 30,000 Minnesota students did so in 2004-05), online learning, homeschools, post-secondary enrollment options (PSEO), and more. Stossel should visit Minnesota for a follow-up ...

Matt thanks Craig Westover, who also posts about these issues and distinguishes between varying delivery of public-provided education and public-financed, privately-provided education. Both Craig and Matt oppose No Child Left Behind, but Craig's concern is that it's harming higher achievers:

A voucher system targeting low-income families, allowing them to escape schools not meeting their children’s needs by attending private schools -- secular or religious -- is not an impediment to high achievers. It simply provides choice options to low-income families approximating those of the modestly well-to-do. Closing the achievement gap is important, but it needs to be done by skewing the bell curve to the right, narrowing the deviation about the center of the curve and pushing the “average” student towards the high achievement tail of the curve.

I would be happy to start a voucher program by focusing on low-income families; indeed, that has been the means to successful starts in Milwaukee and Cleveland, but what happens is that it stops there. The poor even fight to keep well-off families from gaining the same rights. The rich, Craig may argue, have always had choice; yes, I reply, but saying that means that school taxes are simply redistribution. I think you want to avoid that suggestion.

But in the list Matt offers we have public school choice -- i.e., pick which flavor of monopoly provision you want -- charter schools, which is a private school only in the sense of having a residual claimant on revenues but is compelled to take any student at a fixed price, mixed with online courses and homeschools. I would dare say that is not enough choice, as it does not provide sufficiently for private provision of publicly funded education.

Categories: education, Minnesota

A colleague sends around the university by email today a notice sent at the Univ. of Minnesota that students are being invited to visit Pick-A-Prof to determine who to take for their classes.

Pick-A-Prof has posted the number of A-F's given by professors at University of Minnesota, Twin Cities and lets you compare the grade histories in the courses you are about to register for. That means before you register you can look up the courses you are thinking about taking and see the number of A-F's professors historically give as well as their DROP RATE - straight from the official University of Minnesota, Twin Cities records.

For example, if you are interested in taking a Math course, Pick-A-Prof will tell you who is teaching it next semester at University of Minnesota, Twin Cities and what they historically give in that course.

Pick-A-Prof has tons of reviews from University of Minnesota, Twin Cities students. That means you can learn WHAT IT TAKES to make the grade you want using other student's reviews with information including:

• Exam Type
• Homework Load
• Lecture Style
• Attendance Policy & More

NEW! - Discussion Boards Pick-A-Prof Discussion Boards are a place online for students to search for an answer, post questions, or answer other student's questions. They are a student-to-student support forum that enables anyone who uses Pick-A-Prof to discuss various class topics, ask questions about homework or projects, and get tips and advice about the courses you are taking. You'll find a wealth of information about courses that will help you get the most out of your classes and help you get the grades you want.

Shopping for professors has been around forever, of course -- in dorms, fraternities and sororities, at nearby coffee shops, etc., there has always been a desire to find out the "gut course" and the "easy A". The thing the internet is supposed to do best is to disseminate information, so it makes sense to me that Pick-A-Prof exists. And I'm not bothered either by someone creating a website, driving eyes to it and selling ads on it, particularly when I do it here myself. And I'm not sure other faculty would be bothered by this search for an easy grade either. (My colleague who sent it to the campus had as his subject line simply "Sigh".) It's discouraging, but it's hardly a surprise.

So why does this bother faculty so much? I suspect the biggest issue faculty have with it, as well as with online professor ratings/evaluations, is the same "gatekeeper" issue that others (such as Saint Paul or the folks at Oh That Liberal Media) are discussing about blogs versus MSM. Does the market for information work well enough in these discussion areas that the one student who had a computer failure cause her to miss a homework assignment, and who blames it all on Prof. X, cannot pillory Prof. X over and over in the discussion area and create the impression that Prof. X is a bad prof?

Categories: higher_ed

I question whether students prefer online classes. I just finished using Aplia with a principles of macroeconomics course and student reaction was about 50-50. Aplia is class management software with two great features to me: First, it provides some cool real-time experimentation. Students loved that. But it also provides a rather substantial set of homework assignments for students to do. Now my students keep complaining that they "want more homework", which my colleagues and I agree is code for "we want some easy points." Not an opportunity for points, just something that says "click here and here and watch your grade go up!" Nationally-normed homework assignments are likely to not do that for students at places like St. Cloud State. The questions are not easy. So while I like it, the students don't.

But the article is correct that online classes and traditional classes with a lecture component are not all that different, which creates a problem for universities:

They are reluctant to fill slots intended for distance students with on-campus ones who are just too lazy to get up for class. On the other hand, if they insist the online courses are just as good, it's hard to tell students they can't take them. And with the student population rising and pressing many colleges for space, they may have little choice.

So universities are trying to manage the flow of students into online classes. In the department's distance offerings we have a GPA minimum that we do not use for the traditional sections, because we find students aren't as motivated naturally by online sections.

Two-thirds of schools responding to a recent survey by The Sloan Consortium agreed that it takes more discipline for students to succeed in an online course than in a face-to-face one.

"It's a little harder to get motivated," said Washington State senior Joel Gragg, who took two classes online last year (including "the psychology of motivation"). But, he said, lectures can be overrated -- he was still able to meet with the professor in person when he had questions -- and class discussions are actually better online than in a college classroom, with a diverse group exchanging thoughtful postings.

"There's young people, there's old people, there's moms, professional people," he said. "You really learn a lot more."

And that's my one suggestion for these courses for next time: If you can give them a chat area or some place to interact with the instructor and each other (I think it should be something other than email), this is a big help. That's been the suggestion I've made to Aplia, which has no chat or bulletin board area.

(h/t: reader jw)

Categories: higher_ed

Crossposted at The Sports Economist:

Was it an accident that Jackie Robinson was picked by the Dodgers to break the color barrier in professional baseball? Reflecting on the new movie Glory Road, about the integration of the basketball team at Texas Western by Don Haskins who won a championship and broke the color line in collegiate basketball in the South, HedgeFundGuy makes a point that discrimination creates an opportunity for those who will not:

...when discrimination is at work, there's an opportunity. If the truth diverges from conventional wisdom, it's better to take advantage than lament. The West likes a winner more than anything else. As unfair as life is, it is still ultimately meritocratic more than ever before, and much more than many believe.

Texas Western at the time Haskins took over was not a collegiate power, and not even a very good team. It was his first job after three good high school programs, and as he says in this interview in November he was just trying to win the game, not to break down barriers. The responses to these three questions are fascinating:

We all look now and see how important that game was. Did you realize it at the time?
We hadn't played in the Deep South, that much ... well, none. We had played teams in the Midwest and in the Southwest that had a black player or two, although not all five. It wasn't that big a deal. Of course, I'm looking at Duke and Kentucky with Moe Iba, my assistant, getting ready to scout the game [at the Final Four]. I had Moe, who was a lot better scout than me, take Kentucky, and I took Duke. We both made comments about it looked kind of funny seeing two teams that were totally white.
Did you have any second thoughts about starting five black players for the title game?
Not really. No. I was trying to win.
Did you get any reaction after the title game?
That's when I first realized that this wasn't just a game. I was young, and I wasn't thinking. The hate mail started coming in by the baskets. One person wasn't enough to open them. Finally, I got really, really frustrated. I doubt that there's anybody that has ever won a national championship was more down than I was two weeks after it was over. ... A lady in our office said we must have gotten 40,000 letters. Of course, they were all from the South. Normally, crudely written [and] all starting with "N-lover." The ones that bothered me the most were from several black leaders that w