A baccalaureate degree is essential to success in the contemporary United States. The degree offers improved economic security and the development of capabilities such as critical thinking, effective communication, quantitative reasoning, creativity, problem solving, personal and social responsibility, and social and cultural capital. Failure to…

For the past five years, the Brandeis Science Posse program has recruited and retained students from underrepresented groups in STEM disciplines. In collaboration with the Posse Foundation, we have facilitated the formation of a close-knit, mutually supportive learning community, or a "science posse" for sixty students from New York City…

Because of their commitment to the voluntary measurement and improvement of student learning outcomes, colleges and universities that are members of the Council of Independent Colleges (CIC) have been at the forefront of the national shift from teacher-centered to student-centered learning. The institutions participating in the CIC Degree…

On January 26, 2009, the Brandeis University Board of Trustees voted unanimously to close the Rose Art Museum (Waltham, Massachusetts). The proceeds from the subsequent auction were to be reinvested in the university to ensure its long-term financial health. The reaction to the decision by campus constituencies provides a case study to show the…

As places to engage with changing and complex ideas, institutions of higher education offer a logical site for bringing Indigenous ways of knowing together with environmental studies and science. However, profound differences between Indigenous and Western knowledges, as well as ongoing colonialism, cultural biases of science, and the nature of…

The NEAIR 2013 Conference Proceedings is a compilation of papers presented at the Newport, Rhode Island, conference. Papers in this document include: (1) Aspiring to the Role of "Data Badass:" Some Thoughts on the Political Context of IR (Mark Freeman); (2) Data-Driven Internal Benchmarks and Successful Learning Outcomes (Mamta Saxena…

This State Profile from the Delta Cost Project presents data on key Delta metrics for public research, master's, bachelor's, and community college sectors in the state of Massachusetts. The data are limited to a five-year period, showing data for the most recent year, and the five-year change.

Colleges and universities in the United States are currently in the midst of a debate on how to integrate students' academic and social lives in a manner similar to the centuries old model of Oxford and Cambridge. One of the major initiatives by colleges and universities is the re-establishment of residentially-based learning communities whose use…

The college choice process can be reduced to three questions: (1) Where does a student apply?; (2) Which schools accept the students?; and (3) Which offer of admission does the student accept? This paper addresses question three. Specifically, we offer an econometric analysis of the matriculation decisions made by students accepted to Williams…

This article presents the "U.S. News" ranking profiles of four colleges, namely: (1) Smith College; (2) Washington University in St. Louis; (3) Colorado State University at Fort Collins; and (4) Whitman College. Smith College was in the top 10 of the nation's liberal-arts colleges, or just outside it, almost since the "U.S.…

Annually, ACT provides each state with "The Condition of College & Career Readiness," a report that details the college readiness of students who took the ACT[R] test. This report is a companion to "The Condition of College & Career Readiness." This paper traces the college enrollment, retention, re-enrollment, and…

The Boston metropolitan area is recognized by many for its concentration of prestigious private colleges and universities. The metropolitan area is home to over 80 private colleges and universities employing 68,600 people and attracting over 360,000 students from all over the world. This report uses employment and wage data from the Bureau of…

Like many elite colleges and universities, Amherst College is going to great lengths and expense to identify and attract to its campus talented students who are not affluent and white. Its efforts are directed at offering opportunities for social and economic mobility to those students, at providing some measure of social equity. Bringing a…

The counterintuitive approach of the world's greatest value investor, Warren Buffett, may be the best hope for colleges and universities during this recession. Buffett's time-tested philosophy of seeking value and investing for the long term remains a sound approach, even if his short-term returns have declined along with those of the rest of the…

Many undergraduate liberal arts institutions offer computer science majors. This article illustrates how quality computer science programs can be realized in a wide variety of liberal arts settings by describing and contrasting the actual programs at five liberal arts colleges: Williams College, Kalamazoo College, the State University of New York…