I write a lot but I do not often post my core academic work on my blog. I especially do not often do it when the work is still very much in the formative stages. However, my recent unpacking of prestige and for-profit colleges needed some crowdsourcing. So, after a marathon writing session of aRead More “The Power of Thinking in Public”
Blanket “Don’t Go To Graduate School!” Advice Ignores Race and Reality?
When I decided to return to graduate school I was about as devoid of prestige as one can be. I was old, from a no-name undergraduate university (worse, maybe, an HBCU!), I lacked social capital, my undergraduate performance was fine but not stellar, and I did not know the difference between sociology and anthropology. Fortunately,Read More “Blanket “Don’t Go To Graduate School!” Advice Ignores Race and Reality?”
How I Ended Up Constructing An Elite For-Profit College
It is a thought exercise. It is one I have resisted but that my advisers have pushed me to tangle with. I brought it up to Kevin Kinser recently on Twitter and he said he would read ramblings on trying to reconcile quality and profit. It has also be presented to me as a moneyRead More “How I Ended Up Constructing An Elite For-Profit College”
Lean In Litmus Test: Is This For Women Who Can Cry At Work?
I have reasons for not leaning in with Sheryl Sandberg. Kate Losse writes a great, insightful piece that situates Sandburg’s book in the neo-liberal corporate ethos that dominates some feminist traditions. That is one reason I am not so interested in the book. The less erudite reason I am not interested is that it failsRead More “Lean In Litmus Test: Is This For Women Who Can Cry At Work?”
The “Ikea” Degree? A Value Proposition
I have five minutes before I wax poetic on qualitative interviewing in class. This is a serious drive-by post. Matt Yglesias over at Slate has an interesting blurb today about higher education, cheap-ocity and quality. (Thanks to Sherman Dorn for the signal). Ikea, for example, has not risen to power by manufacturing better furniture thanRead More “The “Ikea” Degree? A Value Proposition”
How For-Profit Colleges Are Rebuilding The Middle Class?
That’s the title of this infographic using statistics from the professional organization that represents most of the country’s for-profit colleges and institutes: It is truly hard for me to know where to begin. So, let me begin at the beginning. Beginnings are funny things, empirically and theoretically. Where you choose to begin your analysis, temporallyRead More “How For-Profit Colleges Are Rebuilding The Middle Class?”
HigherEd Prestige Cartels: My Latest on MOOCs, 4profits in Inside Higher Ed
Last week when I asked a classroom full of Georgia State University students why they didn’t apply to Everest College, I got a range of giggles and choruses of “I don’t need to get off my couch!” That’s standard. So, too, was the inevitable response from the young woman in the back: “Because they’re, like…they’reRead More “HigherEd Prestige Cartels: My Latest on MOOCs, 4profits in Inside Higher Ed”
When You Are The Demographic You Study: Interrogation of Self versus Going Native
One of my least favorite academic concepts is the anthropological “going native“. This idea that one can become so immersed in the culture or phenomena one is studying that they lose objectivity is rife with cultural, imperialist, racist ideas of knowledge, understanding, and science. But, I have to give anthropology credit for at least articulatingRead More “When You Are The Demographic You Study: Interrogation of Self versus Going Native”
How “Admissions” Works Differently At For-Profit Colleges: Sorting and Signaling
In the dominant discourse you hear two lines about for-profit colleges. They are either the solution to expansion and access problems in the traditional college sector, which has ignored non-traditional students, or they are draining the federal coffers dry by accelerating the privitization of public education. Despite what some argue, I actually come down aRead More “How “Admissions” Works Differently At For-Profit Colleges: Sorting and Signaling”
On White Women’s Anger
I once wrote an article calling Barack Obama a fraud for his treatment of Shirley Sherrod. I may or may not have cussed him out, actually. That post got fewer angry emails, comments, tweets, and general responses than has my analysis of the white feminist response to The Onion’s attack on Quvenzhané Willis. Seriously. Certainly,Read More “On White Women’s Anger”