|
« AAUP Homepage
|
Trends
By Hans Johnson
State Support for Higher Education
A study of state appropriations for higher education revealed a significant surge in university funding and student aid. The report from the Center for the Study of Education Policy at Illinois State University found that overall funding for fiscal 2000 rose 7 percent from 1999 levels. The more generous investments in educational institutions yielded particular boosts to the budgets of community colleges, but no region or sector lagged in the largess, according to the report. Oregon led the way with an overall increase of 17 percent, but Mississippi, not a traditional list-topper in education funding, also raised funding by a hefty 16 percent.
Binge Drinking on Campus
As high-level concern escalates over the problems of campus binge drinking, several organizations are attempting to counteract the trend. One approach--espoused by the Education Development Center (EDC), based in Newton, Massachusetts, and recently endorsed by the Department of Education with a five-year, $4 million grant--seeks to educate students about how much alcohol peers are actually imbibing at parties. By flagging the consumption levels that can result in drunkenness, which are lower than many students expect, the EDC program dovetails with the Just the Facts campaign sponsored by the Atlanta-based Golden Key National Honor Society, which has successfully reduced high-risk drinking on some campuses. For more information about the EDC program, contact Laura Gomberg at 617-618-2289 or lgomberg@edc.
Online Admissions
College admissions officers are scrambling to adapt procedures to the Web as more and more prospective students take advantage of the medium to apply, according to a report by TMP Worldwide, a company specializing in online recruitment. The report indicates that 98 percent of colleges and universities now offer some form of online application. In 1999 institutions received an average of 4 percent of their applications by way of the Internet, compared with 2 percent the previous year.
But while the Web serves to channel hundreds of admissions-related inquiries to most institutions, these constitute just a trickle-or about 4 percent of all queries-in the growing torrent of requests for admissions information. For details, call (212) 940-7956.
|