Pew Research has some interesting findings that make intuitive sense. While a majority of the public (55%) continues to say that colleges and universities have a positive effect on the way things are going in the country these days, Republicans…
Category: Education
How Trumpism is Faring in My Precinct
Tuesday was Election Day in Pennsylvania, but there wasn’t a whole lot to get excited about on the ballot out here in the Philly burbs. The main thing getting decided was who the candidates would be for school board elections…
Historians Aren’t To Blame for Donald Trump
I think we can debate whether historians, much like climate scientists, have an inherently liberal bias or it’s more accurate to say that they’re being pushed in that direction by the increasing rejection by conservatives of the values and standards…
Invested in the Ignorance of the People
Well-educated people are such a pain in the ass: If Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) has his way, the Badger State will become the first to stop requiring students in public schools to spend a minimum number of hours in class.…
Trump Will (Mostly) Pay Back Students He Ripped Off
This is your occasional reminder that the president of the United States is a fraudster: A federal judge has approved a $25 million settlement President Donald Trump agreed to late last year in a bid to head off a civil…
DeVos Tries to Enlist HBCUs in Her Ideological War
Ben Mathis-Lilley of Slate had an appropriate response to the statement the Trump administration released from Education Secretary of Betsy DeVos after their meeting with leaders of Historically Black Colleges and Universities yesterday. But, first, let’s look at the press release: So,…
The GOP Just Corbetted Themselves
As a Pennsylvania resident, I was perplexed by Gov. Tom Corbett’s persistent unpopularity which led ultimately to his political defeat when he sought reelection. To be more specific, I saw many reasons for the citizens of the Commonwealth to oppose…
Cal-Berkeley and the Frayed Free Speech Movement
Mario Savio once said: “There’s a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can’t take part! You can’t even passively take part! And you’ve got to put your bodies…
Betsy DeVos Confirmation is No Longer Assured
I attended public schools. My son attends a public school. I think public schools are important. For these reasons, I’d oppose making Betsy DeVos the Secretary of Education for purely policy reasons. But she’s witless and incompetent, and that’s presumably…
Don’t Tell Me How Stupid People Are
I hate polls that demonstrate that some astronomical number of people are foolish. For example, there’s a a new poll from The Economist/YouGov that says: Forty-nine percent of Republicans believe it is definitely or probably true that “leaked email from some of Hillary…