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Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons™

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

2012

Higher Education

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Articles 1 - 10 of 10

Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

Reaching For The Brass Ring: The U.S. News & World Report Rankings And Competition, Ronald Ehrenberg Nov 2012

Reaching For The Brass Ring: The U.S. News & World Report Rankings And Competition, Ronald Ehrenberg

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] The behavior of academic institutions, including the extent to which they collaborate on academic and nonacademic matters, is shaped by many factors. This paper focuses on one of these factors, the U.S. News & World Report (USNWR) annual ranking of the nation’s colleges and universities as undergraduate institutions, exploring how this ranking exacerbates the competitiveness among American higher education institutions. After presenting some evidence on the importance of the USNWR rankings to both public and private institutions at all levels along the selectivity spectrum, I describe how the rankings actually are calculated, then discuss how academic institutions alter their …

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The 1995 Nrc Ratings Of Doctoral Programs: A Hedonic Model, Ronald Ehrenberg, Peter Hurst Nov 2012

The 1995 Nrc Ratings Of Doctoral Programs: A Hedonic Model, Ronald Ehrenberg, Peter Hurst

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

We describe how one can use multivariate regression models and data collected by the National Research Council as part of its recent ranking of doctoral programs (Research-Doctorate Programs in the United States: Continuity and Change) to analyze how measures of program size, faculty seniority, faculty research productivity, and faculty productivity in producing doctoral degrees influence subjective ratings of doctoral programs in 35 academic fields. Using data for one of the fields, economics, we illustrate how university administrators can use the models to compute the impact of changing the number of faculty positions they allocate to the field on …

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Generation X: Redefining The Norms Of The Academy, Ronald Ehrenberg Oct 2012

Generation X: Redefining The Norms Of The Academy, Ronald Ehrenberg

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] The members of Generation X are the young faculty members of today and the immediate future. The panelists at this session of the conference were asked to discuss the effects of this generation on academic norms and institutional governance and the types of new models that may be emerging for academia as a result of them. More specifically, they were asked if the attitudes and loyalties of these young faculty members really do differ from that of the Baby Boom Generation, how their attitudes and behavior affect graduate programs, what academic institutions will need to do to attract the …

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Unequal Progress: The Annual Report On The Economic Status Of The Profession 2002-03, Ronald Ehrenberg Sep 2012

Unequal Progress: The Annual Report On The Economic Status Of The Profession 2002-03, Ronald Ehrenberg

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] Most colleges and universities adopted budgets for the 2002-03 academic year in the spring and early summer of 2002. At that time, a pessimist might have cited several factors – negative rates of return from institutional endowments, a rising unemployment rate, an economic recession, and large increases in college and university enrollments, for example - to predict that faculty members would not see their earnings increase substantially in real terms in the coming year. The good news is that, overall and on average, the pessimists' worst fears proved incorrect. The bad news is that the overall aver-ages don't tell …

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The Changing Distributions Of New Ph.D. Economists And Their Employment: Implications For The Future, Ronald Ehrenberg Aug 2012

The Changing Distributions Of New Ph.D. Economists And Their Employment: Implications For The Future, Ronald Ehrenberg

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] Academic careers are no longer the be-all and end-all for economics Ph.D. students, and the findings and background provided by Siegfried and Stock help to explain why this is so. The median age at which individuals receive economics Ph.D.'s in the Siegfried and Stock sample is 32. While they are somewhat surprised at this finding, it parallels the experiences of many other fields. Increasingly, students are working before proceeding to doctoral studies. Often Ph.D. students in economics enter their programs after having spent several years working for government agencies or research consulting companies—work that has whetted their appetites for …

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Do Economics Departments With Lower Tenure Probabilities Pay Higher Faculty Salaries?, Ronald Ehrenberg, Paul Pieper, Rachel Willis Aug 2012

Do Economics Departments With Lower Tenure Probabilities Pay Higher Faculty Salaries?, Ronald Ehrenberg, Paul Pieper, Rachel Willis

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

The simplest competitive labor market model asserts that if tenure is a desirable job characteristic for professors, they should be willing to pay for it by accepting lower salaries. Conversely, if an institution unilaterally reduces the probability that its assistant professors receive tenure, it will have to pay higher salaries to attract new faculty. Our paper tests this theory using data on salary offers accepted by new assistant professors at economics departments in the United States during the 1974-75 to 1980-81 period, along with data on the proportion of new Ph.D.s hired by each department between 1970 and 1980 that …

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How Would Universities Respond To Increased Federal Support For Graduate Students?, Ronald Ehrenberg, Daniel Rees, Dominic Brewer Aug 2012

How Would Universities Respond To Increased Federal Support For Graduate Students?, Ronald Ehrenberg, Daniel Rees, Dominic Brewer

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

[Excerpt] This paper has demonstrated that doctorate-producing universities respond to changes in the number of FTSEG students supported on external funds by altering the number of FTSEG students that they support on institutional funds. While institutional adjustment to changes in external support levels appears to be quite rapid, in the aggregate the magnitude of these responses is quite small. A increase of 100 in the number of FTSEG students supported by external funds is estimated to reduce the number supported on institutional funds by 22 to 23. Since some of the institutional funds that are "saved" may be redirected to …

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Institutional Responses To Increased External Support For Graduate Students, Ronald Ehrenberg, Daniel Rees, Dominic Brewer Aug 2012

Institutional Responses To Increased External Support For Graduate Students, Ronald Ehrenberg, Daniel Rees, Dominic Brewer

Ronald G. Ehrenberg

This paper uses institutionally based data to estimate how universities would respond to increased federal support for graduate students. It demonstrates that doctorate-producing universities do respond to changes in the number of full-time science and engineering students supported on external funds by altering the number of students that they support on institutional funds. Institutional adjustment to changes in external support levels appears to be quite rapid. However, in the aggregate, the magnitude of these responses is quite small.

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Industry, Employment, And Population Profile: Supporting Analysis: Gippsland Tertiary Education Plan, Daniel Edwards, Paul Weldon, Tim Friedman Jul 2012

Industry, Employment, And Population Profile: Supporting Analysis: Gippsland Tertiary Education Plan, Daniel Edwards, Paul Weldon, Tim Friedman

Dr Tim Friedman

There is considerable interest in the provision and access to tertiary education within the Victoria by the State Government. In 2010, a Tertiary Education Plan was released by the Government, detailing various targets and policy objectives in this sector. Despite a change of Government, the broad objectives in the plan continue to be pursued. As such, a number of more specific plans, based on geographic locations within Victoria are being constructed. One such plan is being constructed for Gippsland. An Expert Panel has been formed to create the plan for Gippsland, chaired by Professor Kwong Lee Dow. This document provides …

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Latino Students In Lawrence: An Educational Profile, Lorna Rivera Mar 2012

Latino Students In Lawrence: An Educational Profile, Lorna Rivera

Lorna Rivera

With financial support from the National Council of La Raza, the Gastón Institute is developing "Educational Profiles" for the sixteen Massachusetts public school districts with the highest Latino student enrollments: Boston, Springfield, Lawrence, Worcester, Holyoke, Lowell, Lynn, Chelsea, New Bedford, Brockton, Fitchburg, Salem, Chicopee, Framingham, Haverhill, and Somerville. The profiles present basic data provided by the Massachusetts Department of Education including information on student enrollment, MCAS results, dropout rates, and student aspirations. We hope this information will be used by Latino students, parents, educators, and policy-makers to make informed decisions and improve public education for Latino students in Massachusetts.

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