NoemiStanton

"College sports is a multi-billion-dollar business. Do its workers deserve to be paid? 

It's a simple question taking a convoluted journey through our legal system. But student-athletes are closer to getting their day in court, since a judge ruled yesterday that NCAA athletes can legally pursue a cut of the billions of dollars flowing to college sports through TV deals."

Currie is CIO at Princeton University.

Here's a sample of one of the many observations and thoughts available now to the public from Volume 8, by Phllis T.H. Grummon, SCUP's director of education and planning.

Observation

The cost of delivering higher education in the US rose at the smallest rate in the history of the higher education Price index (hePi), less than one percent. the drop was due almost exclusively to a drop in the cost of utilities.

More.

Things are getting tough in the small liberl arts colleges marketplace.

About the authors:

Michael Hites is senior associate vice president for administrative information technology services and CIO at the University of Illinois. He advances collaborative vision, strategy, management, and accountability for enterprise-wide information technology services within the University of Illinois’ multicampus environment. He has also led institutional research, library services, and distance education services. He has developed leadership program curricula and led strategic planning and IT planning for several universities. He is a former member of the SCUP Board of Directors and one of Computerworld’s Premier100 IT Leaders.

Kelly J. Block is assistant vice president for portfolio and planning management and leads the Portfolio and Process Management Office (PPMO) for the Office of the CIO at the University of Illinois. The PPMO focuses on providing services, tools, and standards for project and portfolio management, IT governance, and business process improvement.

A deep look at possibilities for new models for higher education as a business. In one section, titled "Know Thyself," the author says "Before taking action, universities and colleges need to take stock in their own positioning: 'Know yourself,' as Sun Tzu advised. Using the language of business strategy, institutions must understand their “value propositions” from a set of four distinct benefits." 

Those four distinct benefits are labeled Selection, Knowledge, Certification,  and Immersion. Definitely worth a read for perspective and ideas.

These two articles are available for one week only in SCUP's Planning for Higher Ed Mojo.

Some suggestions for steps to take to achieve a more meaningful faculty representation on committees. Interesting in light of the video interview for this Friday's Planning article in SCUP's Mojo.

To all the administrators and retention peeps to whom I predicted this 10 years ago...I hate to say, "I told ya so," but...

Critical to HE, MOOCs, on-line learning  Ackn.SCUP -  Society for College and University Planning (SCUP)'s insight:  Must-read:   "As we look to the future of higher education, said the M.I.T. president, L. Rafael Reif, something that we now call a 'degree' will be a concept 'connected with bricks and mortar' — and traditional on-campus experiences that will increasingly leverage technology and the Internet to enhance classroom and laboratory work."

How the education scenario is changing to a new landscape.

Pedro Barbosa | www.pbarbvosa.com | www.harvardtrends.com

Town and gown battles going back 658 years.

"[S]tudents nowadays are much gentler than those of yesteryears. A look back at history will reveal the extent of the open hostility between town and gown. This Sunday marks 658th anniversary of the riots of St. Scholastica’s Day, where many students and locals died. The trigger of the riots was a dispute between two students and a taverner on 10th February, 1355. The two students, named Walter Spryngeheuse and Roger de Chestefield, were having a drink at Swyndolnestok Tavern, near the corner of St.Aldate’s and Queen Street. The quality of the wine was not up to their standards, and when the students decided that verbal insults were not enough, they literally poured their dissatisfaction onto the taverner John Croidon by throwing the liquid in his face. The conflict escalated when Croidon got assualted by the students."

We all knew this was coming.

In our Planning interview with the authors of "Agency and Influence: The Organizational Impact of a New School of Education Building," which will be released tomorrow, two faculty-related questions were raised that I thought worthy of further discussion.

You can watch that interview, listen to or download that interview (MP3), or read that interview. These questions are independent of the article's content.

Question 1: Space Change Organizational Trauma

Do planners typically alert the occupants, such as faculty, who are planning new space, or moving into new space, that the move itself can be organizationally traumatic?

Question 2: How Do Faculty Use Space?

In the case of a building like the education building that is the topic of this interview, do planners study—pre- and post-move—how the faculty use spaces? If so, are the compilations or resources that share the process or results of such studies available?

Different "performance standards" for colleges?

The policy brief delves into four major areas of future study, including:  

1. The Value of Institutional and Student “Skin in the Game” 
2. Student Loan Reform
3. Streamlining and Improving Consumer Information 
4. Rethinking Entitlement and Professional Judgment

Number four, of four, pertains:

4. Low-cost, online, competency-based learning universities. Innosight Institute Education Executive Director and Disrupting Class co-author Michael Horn noted this one. He said, "We'll see UniversityNow and others rise up and get more attention as their ultra-affordable degrees (no government dollars or loans needed) that are aligned to real work-force needs gain increasing traction in today's market. Some will take the best from MOOCs and mash them up with teachers, tutors, coaches and more to give students a complete learning experience." Horn also suggested that companies like Code Academy and DevBootcamp will increasingly provide face-to-face mechanisms that complement MOOCs. ... 

It is still early enough in the development of any of these areas that market leaders in respective sectors have sufficient time to formulate response strategies. They should be doing much more than watching and analyzing however — they should be actively experimenting in the disruptive space, either through organic efforts or through investments and partnerships.

Market leaders also should ensure that they monitor a set of metrics that help them identify the acceleration or deceleration of a particular trend, because response windows can close quickly.  

"MOOCs are still the wild west of higher education, and there is no “one size fits all” approach to building one."

Yes, they are, including ours.

The policy brief delves into four major areas of future study, including:  

1. The Value of Institutional and Student “Skin in the Game” 
2. Student Loan Reform
3. Streamlining and Improving Consumer Information 
4. Rethinking Entitlement and Professional Judgment

Things are getting tough in the small liberl arts colleges marketplace.