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?”
Tag Archives: #LowerEd
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”
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”
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”
Higher Education Ideology Wars: Who Is The “Slave”?
When Emory University president, James Wagner, made a plea for restraint in contentious debates about the future of higher education he appealed to history. The history he chose to appeal to is shocking. Building on the U.S.’s “three-fifths” compromise, which famously enshrined blacks as 3/5 of a person into the legal and cultural coda ofRead More “Higher Education Ideology Wars: Who Is The “Slave”?”
Rationalization of Higher Education: We’re All Bureaucrats Now
I have been working on a project with a good friend and mentor about the rationalization of higher education. It has been a joy. I am less happy with the survey I did as part of the preparation for this project. I had read most of this literature over the past few years. This wasRead More “Rationalization of Higher Education: We’re All Bureaucrats Now”
Race, Bureaucracy, Data, and MOOCs
Two things made this drive-by post happen. First, Eric Cantor is continuing a long tradition among many in the conservative Republican party by calling for the end of federal investment in social science research. Second, a tweep asked me: Both got me thinking about how important data has been to black social movements. It mayRead More “Race, Bureaucracy, Data, and MOOCs”
Degrees of Gender
I’ve had a project on gender and for-profits for a few months now. This paper is currently under review in a later format. I will also be presenting some of the ideas set forth in this paper at SSS this year with preliminary data from my research with for-profit students. A few images: The IntroRead More “Degrees of Gender”