Universities are undergoing historic change, from the sharp downward shift in government funding to widespread demands to document performance. At the University of California Berkeley, this led to an operational change effort unlike any the university had ever attempted, dubbed Operational Excellence. The authors describe their experiences…

This article summarizes a study of the viewpoints of Bible lecturers in the Kindergarten Education Department while teaching content related to the biblical "other." The study, by two researchers themselves part of the study population, was conducted according to the qualitative approach and included interviews with participants from a…

With the ever-increasing availability of online education opportunities, understanding the factors that influence online student satisfaction and success is vital to enable administrators to engage and retain this important stakeholder group. The purpose of this ex-post-facto, nonexperimental quantitative study was to investigate the impact of…

The demand for online courses and programs continues to rise as more learners are looking for flexible learning options to meet their needs. Despite declining levels seen in overall enrollment, distance education enrollments are steadily growing (Seaman, Allen, & Seaman, 2018). Along with this demand and increase, however, comes a concern of…

A new and rigorous examination of cost structures on the academic side of colleges and universities is needed in order to continue increasing access and serve the historic role of educating future citizens and functioning as an economic driver of society. Only rethinking the development and delivery of the curriculum will address today's issue of…

The author argues that while outcomes assessment may be an imperfect process, if completed in a systematic and deliberative manner, it can help determine the overall direction, culture, and success of an academic department. Most important, assessment can spark meaningful pedagogical and curricular discussions that can lead to substantive academic…

As remedial mathematics education has become an increasingly important topic of conversation in higher education. Mathematics departments have been put under increased pressure to change their programs to increase the student success rate. A number of models have been introduced over the last decade that represent a wide range of new ideas and…

In this study the core job characteristics that contribute to the internal motivational factors and job satisfaction of information technology faculty members working at a community or state college in Florida were investigated. Fifty-four information technology faculty members working at a community or state college in Florida completed the Job…

Analysis of tuition and fees at public colleges and universities in Virginia must include a discussion of the funding received from the General Assembly. The period covered by this report represents a particularly complicated scenario that impacted not just higher education but all entities that receive general fund tax dollars in Virginia. The…

Since the onset of the COVID-19 crisis, public colleges and universities have prioritized the health and safety of students, faculty, staff and visitors while continuing to offer an exceptional, affordable learning environment. Public higher education has been agile and responsive. In March 2020, the state system institutions transitioned more…

In Texas, educators working to coordinate the efforts of fifty community colleges, thirty-eight universities, and six university systems are bringing the resources of the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) Liberal Education and America's Promise (LEAP) initiative to bear in order to ensure that the state's nearly 1.5…

One key objective of California's Prevention and Early Intervention (PEI) Student Mental Health (SMH) initiative funded under Proposition 63 is to establish a formal process for ongoing collaboration between higher education systems and county mental health, as well as to increase collaboration among higher education campuses to improve student…

Thomas Edison State College (TESC) and Colorado State University (CSU) offer significant contrasts in institutional culture, student demographics, faculty and institutional priorities and approaches to distance education course development and delivery. This article offers case studies showing that widely disparate program design and delivery…

The price of college is rising, making college feel out of reach for a rising share of Americans. Families can borrow to be sure, but with total student loan debt now above $1 trillion nationally, the situation seems unsustainable. It is no surprise then that in the campaign for U.S. President in the 2016 election, nearly all candidates of both…

Excessive course attrition is costly to both the student and the institution. While most institutions have systems to quantify and report the numbers, far less attention is typically paid to each student's reason(s) for withdrawal. In this case study, text analytics was used to analyze a large set of open-ended written comments in which students…