Insightful Piece by George Will in the Washington Post.

Here is a link to it. Opinion | Campus pro-Palestinian protests sap universities’ prestige. Good. – The Washington Post Here is what I posted. This nation’s most admired observer of higher education (and a revered sociologist) saw what was happening as early as 1980. the “wants” of students to which competing institutions, departments, and individual […]

Mystery? What Mystery?

Opinion | The Mystery of White Rural Rage – The New York Times (nytimes.com) In this piece Prof. Krugman admits that he is confused. He says he just doesn’t get it. I doubt if he will ever read my comment, but here is what I posted. Prof. Krugman doesn’t get it because it is beyond […]

Higher Ed Dumbs Down Much of Society – Really. Here’s How

As a professor I have seen how the corrupted values in higher education have sent destructive waves throughout all of American education; and thus against the bulwark of our economy, our politics, and our society. Here is the process in a nutshell. ● It starts with poor undergraduate education for all but a very small […]

James Madison on Education and Democracy

Sadly, in today’s world of higher education, the institutions that Madison trusted to “diffuse knowledge” have used that trust to take knowledge, money and fame for themselves. Of course, when I say institutions, I don’t mean every institution, or every member of any particular institution. But everyone does bear some responsibility for stopping this. It […]

“…if the teacher doesn’t know enough mathematics, she will answer the simple question and shut down the other, more difficult one…”

Source: The Math Revolution The quote I posted here is the most important one from the article above.  That is because, it is not hard to teach teachers; it’s hard to stop scoundrels.  Anyway, here is my comment. I’m a retired math professor. Here is the problem with most math in America and it should […]

Tenured Professor Confused By Negative Cube Roots?

I received this comment on a previous post.  I thought it important enough to make it a post. “I routinely deal with college-level mathematics faculty that often have serious trouble with simple high-school mathematics. For example. I once had to explain that the domain of a cube root function is all reals and the faculty […]

Nationwide Test Shows Dip in Students’ Math Abilities (NY Times)  I Say,  It’s Not Going to Stop Until It’s Stopped

Education officials said the decline in scores was unexpected, but could be related to changes ushered in by the Common Core standards. Source: Nationwide Test Shows Dip in Students’ Math Abilities – The New York Times I commented as follows. The major reason for poor math performance is clear to me. It’s due to unscrupulous […]

More on Vanderbilt’s “Red Tape”. This Time a Senator Uses it to Go to Town

Here is what the Chair of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tenn., wrote in and op-ed piece. “…Clear out the federal red tape that soaks up state dollars that could otherwise go to help reduce tuition. The Boston Consulting Group found that in one year Vanderbilt University […]

My Grades for Vanderbilt’s Highly Cited Report on “Red Tape”

Earlier I posted on the “…Senate-sponsored task force…calling for Congress and the U.S. Department of Education to simplify and scale back federal regulation…” At that time I thought it was going to be a sham. It turns out it was another demonstration of how immune to getting caught universities know they are – at least getting […]