by Dr. Watson Scott Swail, President & Senior Research Scientist They watched. They listened. They acted. And once they understood the depths of the pandemic from the experts, college presidents at some of our finest institutions decided it was okay to open up their campuses to students. Brown University was the figurehead for opening up, stating in an open letter that they would open carefully … Continue reading The Utter Ignorance of Higher Education
By Dr. Watson Scott Swail, President & Senior Research Scientist, Educational Policy Institute On Friday, President Trump signed an executive order that would allow the federal government to hire by merit rather than by degree. “Degree-based hiring is especially likely to exclude qualified candidates for jobs related to emerging technologies and those with weak connections between educational attainment and the skills or competencies required to perform them. … Continue reading Skills Versus Degrees: The Administration Got This One Right
Today, June 5, the United States reached the 110,000 COVID-19-related death mark. As a policy analyst and researcher, I follow the data very closely. In fact, I am in Day 80 of tracking new daily cases, new daily deaths, and total deaths for the virus, which I then repurpose into charts on Facebook and Twitter. The frustrating part is that I’ve found the numbers erratic, … Continue reading Why are COVID-19 Data so Inconsistent?
By Dr. Watson Scott Swail, President & Senior Research Scientist, Educational Policy Institute News out of California is that the University of California system is dropping the ACT and SAT as a requirement for admissions into one of the country’s largest and most selective college systems, serving over 285,000 students each year. For equity activists, this is a big win as testing has historically been shown to … Continue reading Dropping the SAT and ACT? Good Luck with That
By Dr. Watson Scott Swail, President & Senior Research Scientist, Educational Policy Institute Larry Gladieux passed away last week in Eugene, Oregon due to complications from Alzheimer’s disease. He was 76. Many of you may not know who Larry was, but he was, for over a quarter century, a giant in higher education. He wasn’t a president. Or dean. He was a policy wonk. He studied higher … Continue reading Lawrence E. Gladieux
