Note from the editor: Much of the news this past week covered the repercussions from the April 17th House Education and Workforce Committee hearings in which Columbia University’s president and other officials faced an intense grilling from Republican committee members. (You can read the statements from Columbia’s officials here.) As protests and pro-Palestinian encampments have spread to dozens of campuses across the country, the number of students arrested by local police forces climbed into the hundreds, beginning with the arrest of Columbia students by the NYPD. The protests are likely the most wide-spread on-campus protests since 1968, which also began at Columbia, and raise the question of whether campus administrators have learned anything in the last half-century.
[Image: University of Michigan Museum of Art, Ann Arbor]
Teaching and Learning
Effects of Drawing on Memory (Carolina Kuepper-Tetzel, Learning Scientists, April 26, 2024): Researchers wanted to test whether drawing increases memory performance more than writing or mental imagery. In three experiments they pitched different conditions against each other to explore this topic.
Faculty’s Role in Student Success (Bonni Stachowiak, Teaching in Higher Ed, April 25, 2024): Jody Greene discusses the faculty’s role in promoting student success in this 40-minute podcast.
Zoom, The Live Sessions and Engaging Pedagogies (Andrew Pegoda, Inside Higher Ed, April 25, 2024): The author describes the advantages of bringing together students and the authors they are reading for class and other experts.
Is the Sandwich Method Getting Stale? Fresh Approaches to Providing Effective Student Feedback (Melinda McGuire, Faculty Focus, April 24, 2024): Layers of praise, followed by critique, followed by praise: is it the best way to structure your feedback?
Communication on Growth Mindset Can Benefit Student Achievement (Ashley Mowreader, Inside Higher Ed, April 23, 2024): New research from Washington State University finds first-generation students perform better after receiving encouraging messages from their instructor on strategies for improvement.
Postliberal Education (Steven Mintz, Inside Higher Ed, April 23, 2024): Ensuring well-roundedness in the emerging postliberal higher ed landscape.
7 Ideas to Perk Up Your Last Day of Class (Kristi Rudenga, Chronicle of Higher Education, April 22, 2024): How to end the semester with a flourish instead of a fizzle.
The Continuous Quest: Integrating Reflective Practices into Teaching (Dana Grossman Leeman, Faculty Focus, April 22, 2024): Reflection – the intentional “mulling over” of experiences in ways that impel us to ask questions of ourselves and others, develop new thoughts or ways of knowing, impact future action, and catalyze shifting perspectives and behaviors – can alter our beliefs about ourselves, others, or the world we hold to be true.
All Things AI
Responsible AI and the ‘Future of Skills’ (Sara Weissman, Inside Higher Ed, April 26, 2024): A gathering hosted by ETS delved into hos AI could change how students are tested and how employers assess skills.
How Has ChatGPT Affected Your Teaching This Semester? (Beth McMurtrie, Chronicle of Higher Education, April 25, 2024): A summary of findings from various faculty members.
Free Speech and Academic Freedom: The Aftermath of the April 17 House Committee Hearings
News of the ongoing student protests:
Pro-Palestinian Encampments Spread, Leading to Hundreds of Arrests (Anna Betts, New York Times, April 24, 2024): Protests and encampments in support of Palestinians in Gaza have sprung up at colleges and universities across the country, and the police have intervened on several campuses.
Police Ratchet Up Use of Force on Campus Protesters (Jessica Blake and Katherine Knott, Inside Higher Ed, April 26, 2024): As colleges turn to police to suppress pro-Palestinian demonstrators, some are calling for the National Guard. Experts say history should be a warning.
As Some Universities Negotiate with Pro-Palestinian Protesters, Others Quickly Call the Police (Steve Leblanc and Nick Perry, AP, April 26, 2024): Reports from campuses around the country.
Campus Protests Over Gaza Intensify Amid Pushback by Universities and Police (J. David Goodman, David Montgomery, Jonathan Wolfe, and Jenna Russell, New York Times, April 25, 2024): There were more than 120 new arrests as universities moved to prevent pro-Palestinian encampments from taking hold as they have at Columbia University.
‘This Is Incredibly Scary’: Students Arrested at UT-Austin Protests (Scott Carlson, Chronicle of Higher Education, April 24, 2024): A planned teach-in ends with police in riot gear.
Protests Roil Columbia, Spread to Other Campuses (Jessica Blake, Inside Higher Ed, April 23, 2024): Columbia cancels in-person classes as pro-Palestinian protests continue on and off campus. Reverberations affect Yale, NYU and Harvard.
Dozens of Students Arrested at Yale as Administrators Clear Encampment (Forest Hunt, Chronicle of Higher Education, April 22, 2024)
Columbia Faculty Members Walk Out After Pro-Palestinian Protesters Arrested (Gloria Oladipo and Erum Salam, Guardian, April 22, 2024): Hundreds of members of teaching staff demonstrate in solidarity with arrested students as protest tents put back up on campus.
Another Wave of Unrest Grips Campuses (Susan H. Greenberg, Inside Higher Ed, April 22, 2024): Protesters regroup at Columbia, garnering support from students at other colleges. Penn blocks a pro-Palestinian group; USC cancels more graduation speakers.
‘I Have Never Seen Campus Like This’ (Kate Hidalgo Bellows, Chronicle of Higher Education, April 21, 2024): On Saturday, protesters on either side of the entrance presented different forms of activism.
Some Jewish Students Are Targeted as Protests Continue at Columbia (Luis Ferré-Sadurní, Colbi Edmonds and Liset Cruz, New York Times, April 21, 2024): After reports of harassment by demonstrators, some Jewish students said they felt unsafe. Others said they felt safe, while condemning antisemitism.
Republicans Want Columbia’s Federal Funding Stopped. There Are at Least 3 Big Problems (Bianca Quilantan and Michael Stratford, Politico, April 25, 2024): Sure, yanking taxpayer money from any college looks clear and decisive on paper, but it’s a move so rife with potential unintended consequences and legal hurdles.
Here’s What Student ‘Boycott, Divest, and Sanction’ Activists Are Demanding (Maggie Hicks, Chronicle of Higher Education, April 25, 2024): Financially and academically untangling colleges from Israel is not as easy as it looks. Protesters vow they won’t let up.
How Columbia Was Torn Apart Over Gaza (Andrew Marantz, The New Yorker, April 25, 2024): The university asked the NYPD to arrest pro-Palestine student protesters. Was it a necessary step to protect Jewish students, or a dangerous encroachment on academic freedom?
The Palestine Exception to Academic Freedom Must Go (Mohammad Fadel, Chronicle of Higher Education, April 24, 2024): Examples of institutional discrimination against Palestine advocacy abound.
Why Students Must Shout to Be Heard (Gabriel Winant, Chronicle of Higher Education, April 24, 2024): The new wave of protests isn’t just about Gaza. It’s a response to the undemocratic university.
Columbia Has Resorted to Pedagogy Theater (Ian Bogost, The Atlantic, April 24, 2024): Holding classes over Zoom just pretends to solve a problem.
Protest and Civil Disobedience Are Two Different Things (Keith E. Whittington, Chronicle of Higher Education, April 23, 2024): Students and administrators need clear sets of principles about campus activism.
A Passover Reminder (Rachel Fish, Inside Higher Ed, April 22, 2024): The Seder liturgy reminds us that too many colleges are creating students who don’t know how to ask a question.
Elise Stefanik, Dean of Faculty (David A. Bell, Chronicle of Higher Education, April 22, 2024): The zealous Trump booster wields dangerous influence over higher education.
Columbia, Free Speech and the Coddling of the American Right (Lydia Polgreen, New York Times, April 19, 2024): Many of the voices who for years ridiculed the safety concerns of Black, brown, Indigenous and queer students are notably silent as an iron-fisted university leader sends in cops in riot gear to arrest college students for passionately engaging with political life and taking a stand on an important moral issue.
When a Pro-Free-Speech Dean Shuts Down a Student Protest (Jay Caspian Kang, The New Yorker, April 19, 2024): An online argument erupted after a video of a law professor grabbing a microphone from a student went viral. But the debate has obscured some fairly basic truths.
A MAGA Assault (William M. LeoGrande and Scott A. Bass, Inside Higher Ed, April 25, 2024): Higher ed’s leaders need to push back on attacks form MAGA Republicans, not try to placate them.
DEI Issues
DEI Statements Are Not About Ideology. They’re About Accountability (Stacy Hawkins, Chronicle of Higher Education, April 19, 2024): If critics have a problem with the goal of diversity, they should say so. [You might want to read alongside of Kansas Lawmakers Dangle $36 Million for Public Universities to Secure anti-DEI Commitments (Tim Carpenter, Kansas Reflector, April 18, 2024): Legislation seeks pledge to abandon diversity, equity and inclusion programs.]
Standardized Admissions Testing
Redefining Who Gets a Seat at the Table (Edward Wingenbach, CommonWealth Beacon, April 20, 2024): The president of Hampshire College asks why does every viable measure of student performance always favor the rich?
Future Imperfect
Kyle Rittenhouse, Deadly Shooter, College Speaker? A Campus Gun-Rights Tour Sparks Outrage (Cybele Mayes-Osterman, USA Today, April 24, 2024): The man known only for having killed two others at a Black Lives Matter rally is now on a college speaking tour sponsored by Turning Point USA.
Hawley, Cotton Call on Biden to Deploy National Guard over Gaza Protests at Colleges (Alexander Bolton, April 22, 2024): “Eisenhower sent the 101st to Little Rock. It’s time for Biden to call out the National Guard at our universities to protect Jewish Americans,” Senator Hawley posted. [See, as well, The Republicans Who Want American Carnage (Adam Serwer, The Atlantic, April 24, 2024): Calls for the National Guard to stop campus protests are not about safety.]
Banned in the USA: Narrating the Crisis (Kasey Meehan, Sabrina Baeta, Madison Markham, and Tasslyn Magnusson, PEN America, April 16, 2024): There were over 4,000 instances of book bans in the first half of this school year – more than all of last school year as a whole.
Extra Credit Reading
Universities Should Be for Students (John Warner, Inside Higher Ed, April 26, 2024): Does it need saying that calling in the riot police to disperse and arrest students engaged in the exercise of their First Amendment rights—as has now happened at multiple institutions, including public ones—is not consistent with the reality that students are and must be the center of the university?
“How Can Values Be Taught,” Gaza Edition (Maureen E. Ruprecht Fadem, Inside Higher Ed, April 26, 2024): The author asks what values universities are teaching through their silence on Gaza.
10 Campus Museums Shine a Spotlight on Democracy (Alina Tugend, New York Times, April 25, 2024): A coalition of universities is tying exhibitions into the 2024 elections and the broader issue of extreme political polarization in the United States.
The Campus-Left Occupation That Broke Higher Education (George Packer, The Atlantic, April 24, 2024): Elite colleges are now reaping the consequences of promoting a pedagogy that trashed the postwar ideal of the liberal university.
Harvard Youth Poll – 47th Edition (Harvard Kennedy School Institute of Politics, Spring 2024): A national poll among 18-29-year-olds reveals, among other things, that one-third of college students are uncomfortable sharing their political views on campus, with young Democrats more comfortable and more likely to be politically engaged.
The Ghostwriter in the Machine (Matthew Kirschenbaum, Chronicle of Higher Education, April 23, 2024): A review of Dennis Yi Tenen, Literary Theory for Robots: How Computers Learned to Write (Norton).
The Wrong Remedy (Tony Banout, Inside Higher Ed, April 24, 2024): Will aggressive state and federal intervention destroy higher ed even as it presumes to save it?
Happy Birthday, Kant! (Michael S. Roth, Chronicle of Higher Education, April 22, 2024): The great philosopher was also a great theorist of education.
Sending College Students into Classrooms to Help Our Struggling Students Could Be a Winning Post-Pandemic Solution (Liz Cohen, Hechinger Report, April 22, 2024): If we remove obstacles, the federal work-study program could bring thousands of tutors into the nation’s schools.
Philosophy Is An Art (Peter West, Aeon, April 15, 2024): For Margaret Macdonald, philosophical theories are akin to stories, meant to enlarge certain aspects of human life.
Webinars
AI and Personalized Learning: May 8, 2024, 2:00 PM Eastern. AI can foster learning by helping students move at their own pace and in their own way. Join us to discuss how to support faculty experiments that avoid AI pitfalls. Register here.
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Steven Volk (steven.volk@oberlin.edu), Editor
GLCA/GLAA Consortium for Teaching and Learning
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Colleen Monahan Smith (smith@glca.org