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Full-Text Articles in Education
Higher Education And Income Distribution In A Less Developed Country, Gary S. Fields
Higher Education And Income Distribution In A Less Developed Country, Gary S. Fields
Gary S Fields
[Excerpt] The primary purpose of this paper is to empirically test among both the intra- and the inter-generational version of these three hypotheses for higher (i.e. post-secondary) levels of education for one less developed country, Kenya. A secondary purpose is to investigate other economic aspects of spending on higher education, most notably the question of horizontal equity in school finance. Before proceeding, a methodological point is in order. There is no consensus in the public economics literature on what is a suitable criterion for assessing the equitability of a fiscal programme. At least three criteria may be distinguished (the terminology …
Private Returns And Social Equity In The Financing Of Higher Education, Gary S. Fields
Private Returns And Social Equity In The Financing Of Higher Education, Gary S. Fields
Gary S Fields
[Excerpt] A widespread phenomenon in developing countries has been the rapid growth of schools and institutions of higher learning resulting in a so-called ‘education explosion’. One possible explanation for the education explosion is that education is a profitable personal investment, as evidenced by high private rates of return. The high private returns are translated into demands on politicians for additional schooling spaces. To gain or maintain public favour, each politician uses his influence to try to increase the number of schools in his constituency. By this chain of events, growth of educational systems might be anticipated as long as private …
Conclusion: Looking To The Future, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Conclusion: Looking To The Future, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
[Excerpt] A number of important themes emerge from the chapters in Governing Academia. First, decentralization gives individual units—be they university campuses within a state system, colleges within a university, or departments within a college—an incentive to act in their own best interests, but less of an incentive to work toward the common good. As Heller points out, at the level of a state system, decentralization of control may lead to wasteful overlap between campuses. As Wilson shows, decentralized budgeting in the form of responsibility center management models may cause units not to maximize the quality of the education they are …
Introduction To The Book Governing Academia, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Introduction To The Book Governing Academia, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
[Excerpt] During recent decades tuition for undergraduate students has risen at rates substantially higher than the rate of inflation at both public and private colleges and universities in the United States. These high rates of tuition increases led Congress to establish the National Commission on the Costs of Higher Education in 1997 to conduct a comprehensive review of college costs and prices and to make recommendations on how to hold tuition increases down. Parents of college students, taxpayers, and government officials all wanted to know why academic institutions can't behave more like businesses—cut their costs, increase their efficiency, and thus …
Collective Bargaining In American Higher Education, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Daniel B. Klaff, Adam T. Kezbom, Matthew P. Nagowski
Collective Bargaining In American Higher Education, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Daniel B. Klaff, Adam T. Kezbom, Matthew P. Nagowski
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
[Excerpt] No discussion of governance in higher education would be complete without a consideration of the role of collective bargaining. Historically, most researchers interested in the subject have directed their attention to the unionization of faculty members. Given several recent decisions by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) that leave open the possibility that unionization of faculty in private colleges and universities may increase in the future, we discuss collective bargaining for faculty in the first section (Leatherman 2000, A16). Recently, however, attention has been also directed at the unionization of two other groups in the higher education workforce. Activists …
Do Indirect Cost Rates Matter?, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Jaroslava K. Mykula
Do Indirect Cost Rates Matter?, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Jaroslava K. Mykula
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
This study addresses the relationship between a university's indirect cost rate and its level of federal research funding. Both direct and indirect cost funding are examined. The data used in the analyses include unpublished institutional level data for all doctoral and research universities on funding and indirect cost rates obtained from the National Science Foundation for the fiscal years 1988 to 1997 period. Our major finding is that higher indirect cost rates are associated with higher levels of direct and indirect cost funding for institutions that initially are among the largest recipients of federal funding. In contrast, for universities initially …
Enhancing The Attractiveness Of Research To Female Faculty, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Enhancing The Attractiveness Of Research To Female Faculty, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
[Excerpt] CSWEP has long been concerned about the underrepresentation of women in faculty positions at major research universities. I have been charged by the committee with enumerating a set of policies that might enhance the attractiveness of research universities to female faculty. After presenting some data that suggest the magnitude of the underrepresentation problem, I do so below. In each case, I sketch the pros and cons of the policy. Although the focus is on increasing the attractiveness of research universities to female faculty, many of the policies would increase the attractiveness of academic careers per se to new female …
Review Of The Book In Pursuit Of The Ph.D., Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Review Of The Book In Pursuit Of The Ph.D., Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
[Excerpt] When William Bowen, the President of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation (formerly the President of Princeton University), and Neil Rudenstine, the President of Harvard University (formerly Executive Vice President of Mellon), combine to write a book on doctoral study in the arts and sciences, the academic profession must take notice. And well it should. Building on Bowen and Julie Ann Sosa's (1989) predictions of forthcoming shortages of Ph.D.'s in the arts and sciences, In Pursuit of the Ph.D. provides a detailed analysis of the propensity of American college graduates to enter doctoral programs in the arts and sciences and …
Review Of The Book The Cost Of Talent: How Executives And Professionals Are Paid And How It Affects America, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Review Of The Book The Cost Of Talent: How Executives And Professionals Are Paid And How It Affects America, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
[Excerpt] Why should the former President of Harvard University be concerned that during the 1970s and 1980s the earnings of doctors, lawyers in private practice, and top corporate executives grew substantially relative to the earnings of professors, teachers, and high level federal civil servants? Why should he care that physicians with specialized hospital-based practices, such as neurosurgeons, have seen their earnings rise substantially relative to physicians practicing family medicine during the same period? In each case, the answer is that Bok believes that occupational choices are determined, at least at the margin, by the pecuniary and nonpecuniary benefits that the …
Review Of The Book Prospects For Faculty In The Arts And Sciences, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Review Of The Book Prospects For Faculty In The Arts And Sciences, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
[Excerpt] Very few books by economists are announced to the world in a front page story in the New York Times. However, Prospects for Faculty in the Arts and Sciences by William G. Bowen and Julie Ann Sosa was (see Fiske) and this honor is well deserved. Prospects may well be the most important analysis of the academic labor market to appear since Alan Cartter's pioneering work in the mid-1970s.
Reaching For The Brass Ring: The U.S. News & World Report Rankings And Competition, Ronald Ehrenberg
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 …
Crafting A Class: The Trade-Off Between Merit Scholarships And Enrolling Lower-Income Students, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Liang Zhang, Jared M. Levin
Crafting A Class: The Trade-Off Between Merit Scholarships And Enrolling Lower-Income Students, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Liang Zhang, Jared M. Levin
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
[Excerpt] It is well known that test scores are correlated with students’ socio-economic backgrounds. Hence, to the extent that colleges are successful in “buying” higher test-score students, one should expect that their enrollment of students from families in the lower tails of the family income distribution should decline. However, somewhat surprisingly, there have been no efforts to test if this is occurring. Our paper presents such a test. While institutional-level data on the dollar amounts of merit scholarships offered by colleges and universities are not available, data are available on the number of National Merit Scholarship (NMS) winners attending an …
The Impact Of U.S. News & World Report College Rankings On Admissions Outcomes And Pricing Policies At Selective Private Institutions, James Monks, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
The Impact Of U.S. News & World Report College Rankings On Admissions Outcomes And Pricing Policies At Selective Private Institutions, James Monks, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Despite the widespread popularity of the U.S. News & World Report College rankings there has been no empirical analysis of the impact of these rankings on applications, admissions, and enrollment decisions, as well as on institutions' pricing policies. Our analyses indicate that a less favorable rank leads an institution to accept a greater percentage of its applicants, a smaller percentage of its admitted applicants matriculate, and the resulting entering class is of lower quality, as measured by its average SAT scores. While tuition levels are not responsive to less favorable rankings, institutions offer less visible price discounts in the form …
Faculty Turnover At American Colleges And Universities: Analyses Of Aaup Data, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Hirschel Kasper, Daniel Rees
Faculty Turnover At American Colleges And Universities: Analyses Of Aaup Data, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Hirschel Kasper, Daniel Rees
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
This paper uses institutional level data collected by the American Association of University Professors as part of their annual survey of faculty members' compensation to analyze faculty turnover. Analyses of aggregate data over almost a twenty-year period highlight how remarkably stable faculty retention rates have been nationwide and how little they vary across broad categories of institutions. Analyses of variations in faculty retention rates across individual institutions stress the role that faculty compensation levels play. Higher levels of compensation appear to increase retention rates for assistant and associate professors (but not for full professors) and the magnitude of this effect …
Paying Our Presidents: What Do Trustees Value?, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, John J. Cheslock, Julia Epifantseva
Paying Our Presidents: What Do Trustees Value?, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, John J. Cheslock, Julia Epifantseva
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Our study makes use of data from a panel of over 400 private colleges and universities on their presidents’ salaries and benefits. These data, reported annually to the Internal Revenue Service on Form 990, have been collected by and reported in the Chronicle of Higher Education for academic years 1992–1993 through 1997–1998. We merge these data with those from other sources including the American Association of University Professors, the American Council on Education, Who’s Who in America, the National Association of College and University Business Officers, the Council on Aid to Education, and the National Science Foundation’s CASPAR system. This …
Do Historically Black Colleges And Universities Enhance The College Attendance Of African American Youths?, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Donna S. Rothstein, Robert B. Olsen
Do Historically Black Colleges And Universities Enhance The College Attendance Of African American Youths?, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Donna S. Rothstein, Robert B. Olsen
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Recently, Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) have become the center of intense policy debates. Do HBCUs enhance the college attendance of African American youths? Previous research has been inconclusive. Among other improvements, our study adjusts for the relative availability of HBCU enrollment opportunities in each state. We find that African Americans are more likely to choose HBCUs over other colleges if more HBCU openings are available. However, more HBCU openings don't increase overall African American enrollment. As we have shown elsewhere, attendance at an HBCU does enhance African American students' college graduation rates.
Generation X: Redefining The Norms Of The Academy, Ronald Ehrenberg
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 …
A Brief Guide To The Aaup Salary Data, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
A Brief Guide To The Aaup Salary Data, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
[Excerpt] The AAUP data not only document faculty salary levels, but may also play a role in determining future levels. They represent average data for all full-time faculty members at the university, excluding faculty in medical colleges and health sciences. Thus, they can not be used to compare salaries within a discipline across institutions. They have long been used, however, by faculty on budget or finance committees to inform discussions with central administrators regarding the parameters of the next year’s budget (e.g. tuition increases, faculty salary increases, and endowment payout rates). Often, the faculty and administration will agree on a …
Faculty Retirement Policies After The End Of Mandatory Retirement, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Michael J. Rizzo
Faculty Retirement Policies After The End Of Mandatory Retirement, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Michael J. Rizzo
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
[Excerpt] The findings we report above have implications for both institutions and their faculty members. In some states, rapidly growing college age cohorts will require academic institutions to hire large numbers of new faculty in the years ahead to fill positions created to meet the expanding demand for enrollments. Nationally, institutions will have to replace a large number of retiring faculty members in the years ahead. This suggests that most institutions’ concern in upcoming years will not be how to encourage their faculty members to retire. Rather, their concern will be how to continue to draw on the skills of …
Introduction: Choices In Education, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Introduction: Choices In Education, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
[Excerpt] Society has high expectations for our educational system, and social science research should contribute to helping meet these expectations. Research on the choices that participants in the system make, and on the consequences of these choices, is particularly useful and often provides information that is directly relevant to the policy debate. Thus the four chapters in this volume all address the choices, and the consequences of choices, made by students, teachers, and school administrators. They are grouped together in this book in the belief that providing them this way will increase their influence on public policy.
No Longer Forced Out: How One Institution Is Dealing With The End Of Mandatory Retirement, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
No Longer Forced Out: How One Institution Is Dealing With The End Of Mandatory Retirement, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
: [Excerpt] Why should academic institutions or their faculty care about the end of mandatory retirement for tenured faculty, which became effective in January 1994? From the perspective of an individual tenured faculty member who wants to continue her career beyond age seventy, the elimination is a welcome event. In the past, faculty members who wanted to remain active after reaching seventy had to negotiate their status with institutions that were under no legal obligation to allow them to continue. Now, however, tenured faculty members have the legal right to continue indefinitely in their tenured appointments. From the point of …
American Higher Education In Transition, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
American Higher Education In Transition, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
[Excerpt] In public higher education, tuition increases in recent decades have barely offset a long-run decline in state appropriations per full-time equivalent student. State appropriations per full-time equivalent student at public higher educational institutions averaged $6,454 in fiscal year 2010; at its peak in fiscal year 1987, the comparable number (in constant dollars) was $7,993 (State Higher Education Executive Officers 2011, figure 3), translating into a decline of 19 percent over the period. Even if one leaves out the "Great Recession," real state appropriations per full-time equivalent student were still lower in fiscal year 2008 than they were 20 years …
Do Historically Black Institutions Of Higher Education Confer Unique Advantages On Black Students? An Initial Analysis, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Donna S. Rothstein
Do Historically Black Institutions Of Higher Education Confer Unique Advantages On Black Students? An Initial Analysis, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Donna S. Rothstein
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
[Excerpt] Despite the declining relative importance of HBIs in the production of black bachelor's degrees, in recent years they have become the subject of intense public policy debate for two reasons. First, court cases have been filed in a number of southern states that assert that black students continue to be underrepresented at traditionally white public institutions, that discriminatory admissions criteria are used by these institutions to exclude black students (e.g., basing admissions only on test scores and not also on grades), and that per student funding levels, program availability, and library facilities are substantially poorer at public HBIs than …
Financial Forces And The Future Of American Higher Education, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Michael J. Rizzo
Financial Forces And The Future Of American Higher Education, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Michael J. Rizzo
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Recent shifts in state funding are altering the most basic realities of American higher education, from student access to faculty research.
Career's End: A Survey Of Faculty Retirement Policies, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Career's End: A Survey Of Faculty Retirement Policies, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
There are almost as many ways to retire from the academy as there are types of schools. But, as a recent study shows, institutional planning can prevent unpleasant surprises.
Are Black Colleges Producing Today's African-American Lawyers?, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Are Black Colleges Producing Today's African-American Lawyers?, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
In past years, almost all of America's black lawyers came from historically black colleges and universities because these schools were the only ones that would admit black students. Today, it appears that black colleges are producing increasingly fewer of the nation's black lawyers.
Academic Labor Supply, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Academic Labor Supply, Ronald G. Ehrenberg
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
[Excerpt] The plan of this study is as follows. In the remainder of this chapter, some background data are presented on the academic labor market and new Ph.D. production in the United States. Chapter 7 describes a schematic model of academic labor supply and indicates the underlying trends since 1970 in a number of variables that contribute to projections of shortages of faculty. In Chapter 8, a general model of occupational choice and the decision to undertake and complete graduate study is sketched. This framework, available data, and the prior academic literature are then used to address students' choice of …
The Underrepresentation Of Minority Faculty In Higher Education: Panel Discussion, John Brooks Slaughter, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Eric Hanushek
The Underrepresentation Of Minority Faculty In Higher Education: Panel Discussion, John Brooks Slaughter, Ronald G. Ehrenberg, Eric Hanushek
Ronald G. Ehrenberg
[Excerpt] The 3 July 2002 issue of the Chronicle of Higher Education described the matter we are discussing today in these words: "Taken together. African-Americans and persons of Hispanic origin represent only 8 percent of full-time faculty nation-wide, and while 5 percent are African-American, half of them work at historically black institutions. The proportion of black faculty members at white institutions is 2.3 percent, virtually the same as it was 20 years ago." We are privileged to have the opportunity to explore this issue from two different perspectives. The first contends that unless major changes occur, the number of minority …
Institutional Environments And Resource Dependence: Sources Of Administrative Structure In Institutions Of Higher Education, Pamela S. Tolbert
Institutional Environments And Resource Dependence: Sources Of Administrative Structure In Institutions Of Higher Education, Pamela S. Tolbert
Pamela S Tolbert
Two theoretical perspectives are combined to explain the pattern of administrative offices in public and private institutions of higher education. The first perspective, resource dependence, is used to show that the need to ensure a stable flow of resources from external sources of support partially determines administrative differentiation. The second perspective, institutionalization, emphasizes the common understandings and social definitions of organizational behavior and structure considered appropriate and nonproblematic and suggests conditions under which dependency will and will not predict the number of administrative offices that manage funding relations. The results of the analyses indicate that dependence on nontraditional sources of …
Unionization Among College Faculty - 1996, Richard W. Hurd, Amy Foerster
Unionization Among College Faculty - 1996, Richard W. Hurd, Amy Foerster
Richard W Hurd
[Excerpt] Unionization among college and university faculty continued its slow but steady increase in 1995. Academic unions now represent 246,207 professors, a growth of 3,986 (1.65 percent) from that reported in last year’s NCSCBHEP's Directory of Faculty Contracts and Bargaining Agents in Institutions of Higher Education. We can now report 504 bargaining agents on 1,115 campuses throughout the United States. These increases can be attributed to three sources. First, unions won 4 out of 4 collective bargaining elections during 1995 to determine new bargaining agents. Second, some existing bargaining units grew in size as institutions hired additional faculty. Third, the …