Education Commons^™

Rankings Can Be Bad For Colleges’ Health, Aldemaro Romero Jr.

Publications and Research

In previous columns I have reported how a number of external factors, such as funding, demographics, politics and the like have been hurting higher education. In many other cases – overblown athletic programs, misguided marketing, and plain bad leadership – the injuries have been self-inflicted. To these cases we can now add the race for the rankings.

I have argued in this column in the past that rankings like the ones by U.S. News & World Reportand its copycats make little sense. To begin with, many of the things they claim to measure, such as athletics, facilities, and “reputation,” …

Hyper-Selectivity, Racial Mobility, And The Remaking Of Race, Van C. Tran, Jennifer Lee, Oshin Khachikian, Jess Lee

Publications and Research

Recent immigrants to the United States are diverse with regard to selectivity. Hyper-selectivity refers to a dual positive selectivity in which immigrants are more likely to have graduated from college than nonmigrants in sending countries and the host population in the United States. This article addresses two questions. First, how does hyper-selectivity affect second-generation educational outcomes? Second, how does second-generation mobility change the cognitive construction of racial categories? It shows how hyper-selectivity among Chinese immigrants results in positive second-generation educational outcomes and racial mobility for Asian Americans. It also raises the question of whether hyper-selectivity operates similarly for non-Asian groups. …

The Black Legend Of Higher Education, Aldemaro Romero Jr.

Publications and Research

The concept of “fake news” is not new by any stretch of the imagination. Over centuries people have invented stories of all types and dimensions. From dragons to the “fake” moon landing, from the Masons behind every political conspiracy to the Jews trying to control the world, there have been complex stories that try to indict entire peoples or nations with all kinds of atrocities. One of the most famous is the “black legend” (or leyenda negra), according to which Spain has been the culprit for everything bad that happened in the western hemisphere for centuries.

As Alfredo Alvar …

Uncertain Futures For Private Colleges, Aldemaro Romero Jr.

Publications and Research

Although we hear a lot about problems at public colleges and universities – budget cuts, enrollment issues, political interference – private colleges also have their share of concerns.

Of the more than 4,600 institutions of higher education in this country, a little more than 3,000 (almost two-thirds of the total) are private. Although there are a few exceptions, they tend to be small, at around 2,000 students or fewer.Yet they represent a significant number of the overall number colleges and universities. Obviously not all are created equal. Some of them have large endowments and can a word to be very …

Trade Wars Are Bad For Higher Ed, Aldemaro Romero Jr.

Publications and Research

In the last few weeks we have heard a lot about trade wars (taking place or looming) between the U.S. and virtually every economically important nation in the world. This is surprising in today’s world where the tendency has been over the past few decades to eliminate trade barriers.

Mainstream economists have pointed out for years the benefits of free trade: international economic growth, improved financial performance of investments, lowered business risks, more competition that lowers prices while increasing choices for the consumers, and diversification of revenues. Although there are some risks associated with free trade, such as the environmental …

Melbourne’S Chinatown: Continuous Chinese Enclave For 168 Years In Australia, Wendy W. Tan

Publications and Research

Melbourne’s Chinatown is the longest continuous Chinatown in the western world. Besides the long history, it is also known for having many alleys; hosting largest dragon exhibits; and showing strong characteristics of cultural diversity. The author made a journey there to witness the beauty of being a well-preserved community.

Big Questions Surrounding Gender Equity In Academia And The Field Of Public Administration, Maria J. D'Agostino, Nicole Elias

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Justice Kennedy’S Exit And Higher Ed, Aldemaro Romero Jr.

Publications and Research

The recent announcement of the July 1 retirement of Associate Justice to the U.S. Supreme Court Anthony M. Kennedy has already created a political storm about many issues ranging from reproductive rights to LGBTQ issues. What effects can we expect on higher education from his departure and the potential appointment of a new justice by President Trump? Plenty. Let’s begin by examining those decisions in which Kennedy participated that directly affected colleges and universities.

Translanguaging And Responsive Assessment Adaptations: Emergent Bilingual Readers Through The Lens Of Possibility, Laura Ascenzi-Moreno

Publications and Research

Through a case study, this article features how three teachers working with emergent bilingual students adapted formative reading assessments by creating a space for translanguaging within these assessments. The findings demonstrate that through these shifts, called responsive adaptations, teachers were able to construct an accurate portrait of these students’ reading development. In addition, when students’ translanguaging was welcomed into the reading assessment process, it became apparent that their bilingual abilities were essential to their development as readers. This article aims to inspire and aid teachers in identifying the language resources students bring to classrooms, integrating responsive adaptations into their reading …

Higher Education And Immigration, Aldemaro Romero Jr.

Publications and Research

In the latest scandal-du-jour of the Trump administration, the policy of separating children from their parents at the border with Mexico has brought widespread condemnation not only across the political spectrum but also across society. Religious, business, and civic leaders have also raised their voices and the Trump Administration backed down from this policy, although it is not clear what it is going to happen to the children who have already been separated from their families and dispersed across the country. But how has higher education responded to this crisis? In many interesting ways.

In unusual responses, leaders of both …

Product Development Process And Student Learning In An Engineering Technology Capstone Project: Electrical Go-Kart, Angran Xiao, Andy S. Zhang, Joyce Tam

Publications and Research

Project based learning (PBL) is a dynamic classroom approach in which students actively explore, solve real world problems and gain knowledge through developing real products. In our Engineering Technology program, a project based capstone design class is offered that provides graduating seniors a hands-on opportunity to experience team-based design under conditions that closely resemble current industry practice. In this paper, we introduce a capstone project, an electrical go-kart. A group of 20 students spent 15 weeks and around $600 designing and building a working electrical go-kart. This multidisciplinary project allows students to integrate knowledge from across the core curricula, and …

Chinese Garden Of Friendship And Sydney’S Chinatown : Friendship And Something Beyond At Darling Harbor, Wendy W. Tan

Publications and Research

Chinese Garden of Friendship was a gift from China; Sydney’ Chinatown is a Chinese Australian community, and they are adjacent to each other at Darling Harbor of Sydney, Australia. The author made visits there to witness their beauties. Besides, she also explored other connections—friendship; Feng Shui; and cultural diversity within these two famous tour sites.

The Problem Of Sexual Harassment, Aldemaro Romero Jr.

Publications and Research

In the last few months, the media have been inundated with news about sexual harassment of women. The cases with the most notoriety have been those of celebrities or associated with the entertaining industry, but they have not been the only ones. This attention to the issue has generated what is called the “Me Too Movement” (or “MeToo”). With sexual harassment and assault occurring in every segment of society, it is important to ask how this issue is seen on college campuses, which have been accused of too much “political correctness” in the past.

A new study published last week …

Not All College Faculty Are Equal, Aldemaro Romero Jr.

Publications and Research

Despite the fact that college faculty seem to lead very public lives because they show up in front of audiences on a regular basis, the fact of the matter is that most people – even faculty themselves –don’t know how much time they spend doing the different aspects of their jobs. A new study helps us better understand faculty by grouping them according to the way they spend their time.

A team of researchers from the Center for Postsecondary Research at Indiana University at Bloomington just published a report based on the analyses of responses to the center’s survey of …

Stranger-Making As Difference: Childhood Memories Of Belonging And Exclusion By Undergraduates Of Color, Debbie Sonu, Marissa Bellino

Publications and Research

In this article, we draw from the notion of stranger-making to focus on how undergraduates of color at one large university in New York City recount their subjective experiences with inclusion and exclusion at the borderlands of educational spaces. We use narratives to evoke the unfolding of life events and to destabilize categories of difference that are all too often based on a politics of perception rather than an ethical gesture to know. This paper presents four selected vignettes that demonstrate the instability of being a racialized human and draws attention to how belong- ing, or socially felt memberships, is …

The Hidden Curriculum In Financial Literacy: Economics, Standards, And The Teaching Of Young Children, Debbie Sonu, Anand R. Marri

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

No Time For College? An Investigation Of Time Poverty And Parenthood, Claire Wladis, Alyse C. Hachey, Katherine Conway

Publications and Research

Postsecondary outcomes are significantly worse for student parents even though they earn higher G.P.A.'s on average. This study used institutional records and survey data from a large urban U.S. university to explore whether time poverty explains this trend. The results of regression and KHB decomposition analysis reveal that students with preschool-aged children have a significantly lower quantity and quality of time for college than comparable peers with older or no children, and that time spent on childcare is the primary reason for this difference. Both quantity and quality of time for education had a significant direct effect on college persistence …

Authoritarians Don’T Like Higher Ed, Aldemaro Romero Jr.

Publications and Research

History is always a good source to help us understand today’s problems and tomorrow’s challenges. In the last few years we have been witnessing mounting attacks on higher education. Detractors contest its value, accuse it of brainwashing people, and call it a waste of taxpayers’ money. And all this is taking place in an environment in which facts are distorted, people seem less educated about reality, and ideological leanings are more important than critical thinking. In other words, a world that seems to be moving more and more towards mediocrity and authoritarian-ism. Are there historical precedents to what we are …

Dialogicity In Written Specialised Genres, Editado Por Luz Gil-Salom Y Carmen Soler-Monreal (2014)., David Sánchez-Jiménez

Publications and Research

Review of Dialogicity in Written Specialised Genres, edited by Luz Gil-Salom and Carmen Soler-Monreal.

For-Profit Colleges Impact Democracy, Aldemaro Romero Jr.

Publications and Research

The for-profit sector of higher education in this country has accumulated a long list of denunciations in its relatively short history. Those admonitions range from low quality education, much higher cost (including when com- pared with private, non-profit schools), generating a long-time debt burden for their users, deceptive advertising, and stigma when trying to get a job while saying that you graduated from one of those schools.

In their defense, these institutions say that they provide opportunities for people who do not havethe minimum qualifications to enter most public institutions or because of their work schedule they can only go …

Iran Deal Will Impact Higher Ed, Aldemaro Romero Jr.

Publications and Research

On May 8, President Donald Trump announced that the United States was pulling out of the 2015 deal with Iran and other countries to limit the Iranian nuclear program. This deal was designed to slow anddelay Iran’s efforts to build anuclear weapon by lifting economic sanctions on that country in exchange for a number of actions aimed at shutting downits uranium enrichment e ortsand related programs.

The decision by the Trump Administration seems to have been prompted more by demagoguery and hatred towards anything President Barack Obama did, than by reason. In fact, America’s European allies tried everything in their …

A Catch-22 For Illinois Higher Ed, Aldemaro Romero Jr.

Publications and Research

The 1951 novel “Catch-22” byJoseph Heller describes its own title as a situation from which you cannot escape because of contradictory rules, such as “How am I supposed to gain experience to get a job if I’m constantly turned down for not having any experience?” The troubles for public higher edu- cation in Illinois, which have attracted much national atten- tion, seem to be a clear example of a Catch-22 situation. And it seems that the last few weeks have been nothing but full of bad news for Illinois higher ed.

First, we have the case report- ed by “The …

Online Learning With In-Person Technology: Student & Faculty Experiences In Hybrid/Online Courses At Cuny, Maura A. Smale, Mariana Regalado, Jean Amaral

Publications and Research

Online learning continues to grow throughout higher education, including expansion at urban commuter institutions like the City University of New York (CUNY) that have traditionally focused primarily on in-person courses. Building on research into the scholarly habits of CUNY students, we undertook a qualitative study to explore the lived experiences of CUNY students and faculty using technology in online and hybrid courses. Our research revealed how students and faculty use online tools in support of learning and illuminated a range of experiences determined by differing access to and skills with technology, the usability of required technology platforms, availability of support, …

Cultural Competence Amongst Undergraduate Healthcare Students (Spring 2018), Mary Lee, Paulina Szymanska, Vivian Liang, Tiffany Yip, Zoya Vinokur

Publications and Research

In response to the growing issue of health care disparities amongst the diverse populations in the United States, more medical programs are including cultural competency education as part of their undergraduate curriculum. As students in the healthcare field, we want to be able to understand and provide care that best serves the needs of a culturally diverse patient body. This study aims to look at whether healthcare and non-healthcare students at City Tech are able to clearly define and understand the concepts of cultural competence and implicit bias in their healthcare encounters.

Sports Scandals Cost Higher Education Ed Big, Aldemaro Romero Jr.

Publications and Research

Last week in this column I summarized some studies showing that most athletic programs at colleges and universities are run at a financial loss. I also addressed how other aspects of some athletic programs have become liabilities in other ways, including the seemingly never-ending scandals that take place around those programs. But do scandals result only in a bad image for the institutions, or are there also financial consequences to them?

In a study just published titled, “Universities Behaving Badly: The Impact of Athletic Malfeasance on Student Applications and Enrollment,” several researchers from Appalachian State University and Seton Hall University …

The Cost Of Athletics In Higher Ed, Aldemaro Romero Jr.

Publications and Research

Among the greatest concerns regarding higher education are their budgets. With diminishing appropriations from state governments for public institutions, and decreasing enrollments affecting not only state but also private institutions, we see policies of slash and burn. Entire academic programs have been eliminated, which has oftentimes led to a loss of jobs. Yet a number of other programs that have nothing to do with the main mission of colleges and universities – education – seem to be untouchable. The most prominent example is athletics. It is interesting that big sports programs are a feature unique to the American higher education …

2001 And Future Of Higher Education, Aldemaro Romero Jr.

Publications and Research

1968 was one of the most convulsive years in recent world history. Fifty years later it is worthwhile to remember many of the things that happened back then. That was the year of the Tet Offensive that radically changed American public opinion about the Vietnam War. That was also the year of the Paris revolts in May that transformed a lot of popular culture, of the Mexico City Olympic games where two African-American athletes publicly protested against racial discrimination by raising their black-gloved fists and wearing black socks in lieu of shoes at the podium. It was also the year …

College Students Not Intolerant Of Ideas, Aldemaro Romero Jr.

Publications and Research

One of the current urban legends circulating about is that college students are intolerant to a diversity of views and have a selective attitude towards free speech. Epitomized by a few highly publicized cases highlighted in the media, especially conservative ones, the idea of intolerance as a feature at colleges and universities has now become part of the conventional wisdom. But, is it true?

As usually happens with legends, impressions may be just a reflection of a distorted reality.

According to a study carried out last year but published a few weeks ago by Gallup and the Knight Foundation, stu- …

Peer-Led Team Learning Bridges The Learning Gap In A First-Year Engineering Technology Course, Chen Xu, Ohbong Kwon, Juanita C. But, Benito Mendoza, Janet Liou-Mark, Robert Ostrom

Publications and Research

Electrical Circuits (EMT 1150) is a first-year engineering gateway course for Electromechanical Engineering Technology (EMT) associate degree students. It is a five-credit course with a combined lecture and laboratory components. Topics in the lecture portion introduces the physical basis and mathematical models of electrical components and circuits. The laboratory sessions of the course are performed on a breadboard using the digital multi-meter, oscilloscope, and function generator. In the past ten consecutive semesters, the average enrollment for EMT1150 was approximately 144 students per semester with an average of 73% passing with a D or better and 64% passing with a C …

The Effects Of Peer-Led Workshops In A Statics Course, Melanie L. Villatoro, Karla Karolin Peña, Janet Liou-Mark

Publications and Research

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, an 8% increase in employment for civil engineers is expected in the next decade.1 To assist in attracting more undergraduates to pursue a degree in Civil Engineering Technology, New York City College of Technology has implemented an instructional strategy in one of the main gatekeeper courses. Statics has been identified as a course where undergraduates either decide to retain in their Civil Engineering Technology major or transfer out to another one. To provide more support for undergraduates taking this course, the Peer-Led Team Learning (PLTL) strategy was adopted. This study compared the final …