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Friday, February 11, 2011

190. MVCAP fyi

See free MVCAP e-books on college admissions and financial aid for sharing, printing, and downloading at our online resource library: http://issuu.com/mvcap

1. More Women Earn Bachelor's Degrees Than Men, Study Shows -http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/10/post_644_n_821577.html

"The data, mined from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth of 1997, shows that by the age of 23, 23% of women surveyed earned a bachelor's degree -- compared with only 14% of men
. . . . By the age of 23, 22% of non-Hispanic whites surveyed reported earning a bachelor's degree, as opposed to only 9% of blacks and Hispanics and 8% of Hispanics or Latinos."

2. Colleges with the Best Graduation Rates -http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/10/colleges-with-the-highest_2_n_820990.html#s236902&title=Thomas_University_100

"At the College of the Holy Cross, which has a 98.1% grad rate, V. P. for Academic Affairs & Dean Timothy Austin said graduating -- and doing so in 4 years -- is a matter of student culture. "Students here don't call themselves freshmen, sophomores, juniors and seniors," he said. "They call themselves class of [graduation year]. So right from the get-go they are targeting that date when they are going to cross the stage together."

3. California District Pushes Digital-Text Initiative Forward, by Katie Ash - http://www.edweek.org/dd/articles/2011/02/09/02books.h04.html

“We don’t care what the device is, just that the resources are in a format that makes sense [to the students],” McPhail says. “The kids are our customers.”

4. For-Profit Colleges Discuss How to Make the Sector More Accountable, by Goldie Blumenstyk -http://chronicle.com/article/At-Closed-Door-Summit/126331/

"Several of the colleges at the meeting are being investigated by state and federal regulators, and by their own accreditors, for abusive student-recruiting tactics; several also face lawsuits from students and former employees on similar grounds."

5. Harvard Considers Bringing Back Early Adm,by Justin C. Worland - http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2011/2/10/early-admissions-harvard-students/#

"Harvard decided to eliminate its non-binding early action program in 2006. At the time, College officials stated that the early admissions program—regarded by many as an advantage in the admissions process—disproportionately benefited affluent students, who were more likely to have access to resources that could help them prepare their applications for an early deadline."

6. Guide to Admissions - US News and World Report - http://www.usnews.com/education/features/guide-to-admissions

‎"Getting Into College Guide To Admissions"


‎"The new name emphasizes the critical need to create a college-going culture across the region, helping students reach their full potential through college education and increasing the economic vitality of Greater Cleveland. College Now assists over 20,000 students each year, through college access and success advising, financial aid counseling and scholarship services."









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Thursday, February 10, 2011

189. MVCAP fyi

See free MVCAP e-books on college admissions and financial aid for sharing, printing, and downloading at our online resource library: http://issuu.com/mvcap

1. MLK lecture tackles achievement gap, by Shanoor Seervai - The Brown Daily Herald: http://t.co/I6n3CPk

"During a question and answer session after the lecture, Ferguson addressed the issue of education perpetuating social hierarchy. "People who already have privilege tend to award it," he said, and the students whose parents are not as well-off most need to be advocated for."

2. Q&A with Ronald Ferguson - The Brown Daily Herald: http://t.co/ifq4SaR

"The thesis of my book is that we need a 21st century movement built around helping students from all different backgrounds to realize their full potential. . . . it is time for a widespread social movement. Every day, I get two to three calls from people trying to organize around the issue of equality in education. There is a sense that the current configuration is not just."

3. School scraps race-specific mentoring program, by Monika Plocienniczak - http://bit.ly/e6ypIU #cnn

"When we talk about reducing the achievement gap, do we mean merely reducing the discrepancy of test scores of white students and students of color?" asked education consultant Sam Chaltain. "Or do we mean reducing the predictive impact that things like race, class and gender have on all aspects of student engagement, performance and learning?"

4. Minority Students and A.P. Program, a Mixed Report Card, by Maria Newman - http://nyti.ms/fwxEi5

‎"But the gap between how those students performed, compared to nonminority students, is still great in most states in the country. African-Americans, for example, represented just over 14.6 percent of the total high school graduating class last year, but made up less than 4 percent of the A.P. student population who earned a score of 3 or better on at least one exam."

5. Dream On, by David Moltz - Inside Higher Ed http://t.co/ZRh8n21

"Yet according to the report, most of the measures of student success for the overall populations at the institutions did not change in a statistically significant way after five years, less because programs used were unsuccessful -- many individual efforts have been publicly lauded as successful -- than because they touched too few students."

6. Turning the Tide: Five Years of Achieving the Dream in Community Colleges - http://www.mdrc.org/publications/578/overview.html

"Trends in student outcomes remained relatively unchanged, with a few exceptions. On average, after Achieving the Dream was introduced, colleges saw modest improvements in the percentage of students completing gatekeeper college English courses and courses completed. In contrast, students’ persistence and the percentage of students completing developmental math, developmental English, developmental reading, and gatekeeper math courses remained substantially the same."

7. Assessing Developmental Assessment in Community Colleges, CCRC - http://ccrc.tc.columbia.edu/Publication.asp?UID=856

"More than half of entering students at community colleges are placed into developmental education in at least one subject as a result. But the evidence on the predictive validity of these tests is not as strong as many might assume, given the stakes involved—and recent research fails to find evidence that the resulting placements into remediation improve student outcomes."

8. Community College Student Survey, Pearson Foundation - http://www.pearsonfoundation.org/downloads/Community_College_Survey_Summary_201102.pdf

"This summary of results highlights the major conclusions from a nationally represented online poll of 1,434 U.S. community college students ages 18–59. The Pearson Foundation Community College Student Survey was conductedby Harris Interactive between September 27 and November 4, 2010."

9. The Achievement Gap: Am I Part of the Problem? by Chris Myers Asch - http://t.co/p3Em0TV via @educationweek

‎"By kindergarten, the achievement gap is already in place, and parents like me are at least partly to blame. Parents, not teachers (no matter how effective), are the single most important educational influence in a child’s life. And that means that parents are also part of the reason for the achievement gap."

10. Number of AP Test Takers Has Nearly Doubled Since 2001, by Lauren Sieben - http://chronicle.com/article/Number-of-AP-Test-Takers-Has/126313/

"In 2010, 853,314 graduating seniors at public high schools had taken at least one AP exam. That's an increase of more than 55,000 students since 2009. The number of students who performed well on the exams—a score of 3 or better—is also up from 2009. In 2010, 16.9 percent of test takers met that mark on at least one AP exam, a slight increase from 16 percent in 2009."

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Wednesday, February 9, 2011

188. MVCAP fyi

See free MVCAP e-books on college admissions and financial aid for sharing, printing, and downloading at our online resource library: http://issuu.com/mvcap

1. Fraternity official reacts to shooting - TribToday.com - Tribune Chronicle - Warren, OH: http://t.co/ACjh8AU

"This senseless act of violence has stunned the fraternity, the collegiate community and all who respect civility in our nation. The weight of this tragedy strengthens our resolve to uplift humanity at every station in life as we carry the hope and promise of our Brother, Jamail Johnson," Ray said."

2. Jamail Johnson, YSU Shooting Victim, Died Trying To Save Others - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/08/jamail-johnson-youngstown_n_820296.html

‎"As gunfire rang out and people ran for their lives, 25 year old Jamail Johnson ran toward the shooters. Johnson pushed them out of the fraternity house, potentially saving dozens more people from injury or death.Johnson continued on, even after being shot, eventually losing his life trying to protect others."

3. College Warns Accepted Applicants: Keep ‘Shoulder to Wheel’, by C. O. Gerszberg - http://thechoice.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/08/mom-u-02-08/#more-27735
"To be more specific, we expect you to continue the courses that you committed to take, to maintain achievement commensurate with your ability, and to sustain your extra-curricular commitments and leadership."

4. Left in the Hall, by David Moltz - Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/hCVUNY

"Even the 22 percent of community college students who took placement tests had difficulties enrolling in the courses in which they placed. Nearly 30 percent of students who took English or mathematics placement tests were unable to enroll in all of their recommended courses last semester."

5. Classroom Matters, by Steve Kolowich - Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/fAxDIg

“The majority of students who had Spanish in high school found it helpful,” says Glynis Cowell, director of the Spanish program there. However, she added, “For the true beginner it probably wasn’t as smooth a transition.” The university attracted a lot of attention a year and a half ago when it announced it was going to start teaching entry-level Spanish only on the Web."

6. Harkin Calls On For-Profit Colleges To End Deceptive Recruiting Practices - http://help.senate.gov/newsroom/press/release/?id=068bd7c1-0311-447a-97b3-66eb01337012&groups=Chair

“Rather than offering students a better life, these types of strong-arm, emotionally abusive tactics are all too typical of schools that have little or no interest in providing students the academic help and support they need to succeed," Harkin said. "When these types of deceptive and exploitative tactics are used to enroll students, we should not be surprised to see high drop out and high default rates . . . .”

7. AdmissionSplash: Facebook Application Predicts Likelihood of Getting Into College - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/08/facebook-application-pred_n_820277.html

‎"AdmissionSplash asks students to submit a short or long personal profile including quantitative and qualitative characteristics, such as test scores, grades and extra-curricular activities, which colleges consider when making admissions decisions. The program then uses this information, along with public admissions statistics, to predict the student's chance of getting into any of the 1,500 colleges . . . ."

8. Perry to Push Texas Colleges to Offer $10,000 Degree, by Ross Ramsey - http://t.co/rHjvyd6 via @TexasTribune

"Gov. Rick Perry will challenge the state's colleges and universities to offer a $10,000 bachelor's degree, including books, in his State of the State speech later this morning, according to sources familiar with some of the proposals. Perry also wants lawmakers to consider outcome-based financial support for those schools . . . ."

9. 25 Private Colleges With the Best Graduation Rates, by Lynn O'Shaughnessy - http://t.co/kXyrCi5

‎"The schools that enjoy that nation’s highest graduation rates are among the country’s most elite private universities and liberal arts colleges. The students who attend these schools are high achievers and the institutions are among the wealthiest, which permits them to offer an abundance of resources to their students."

10. Big, Big Money Problem: Finding Funds for Pell Grants, by Alyson Klein - http://t.co/kITZzHc

‎"There is a major, major shortfall in the Pell Grant program, which finances scholarships to help low-income students attend college. . . . That means that in order to keep grants at their current levels (the maximum is $5,550), Congress will have to find more than $5 billion in fiscal year 2011. Part of that money was included in the stop-gap measure that's currently funding the entire federal government . . . ."

11. 'Achieving the Dream' Produces Little Change at Community Colleges, by Jennifer Gonzalez - http://chronicle.com/article/Achieving-the-Dream-Produces/126304/

‎"Most of the original 26 colleges in the Achieving the Dream project have relied on data to drive strategies designed to increase student achievement—for example, the introduction of learning communities and courses in how to succeed in college. But those efforts have not resulted in more students' completing developmental courses, a necessity for the many underprepared students who hope to complete degree or certificates. . . ."




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Tuesday, February 8, 2011

187. MVCAP fyi

See free MVCAP e-books on college admissions and financial aid for sharing, printing, and downloading at our online resource library: http://issuu.com/mvcap

1. Party ejection led to Ohio frat house shooting, police say - http://bit.ly/f1lMHP #cnn

"Six of the 11 people hurt in the shooting were students. The injured ranged in age from 17 to 31, Youngstown Police Chief Jimmy Hughes said."

2. Why government must rein in for-profits colleges, by Benjamin Todd Jealous and Marian Wright Edelman - http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/forum/2011-02-08-jealous07_ST_N.htm?loc=interstitialskip: http://usat.ly/dTBjeb

"The worst offenders target low-income people — many of them people of color, often the first in their families to seek higher education — who are struggling to gain new skills and find scarce jobs."

3. Happily, Bryn Mawr Wins in a Coin Toss, by Hannah Smith - http://nyti.ms/fb0CfV

"In truth, I liked Smith, Bryn Mawr and Mount Holyoke exactly the same, and although they differed slightly, each one bore the prestigious title of “Seven Sisters.” (Holyoke, by the way, was “heads” in that coin toss.)"

4. Most New York Graduates Are Ill Prepared, Data Show, by Sharon Otterman - http://nyti.ms/eJsu5I

"But New York City is still doing better than the state’s other large urban districts. In Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse and Yonkers, less than 17 percent of students met the proposed standards, including just 5 percent in Rochester."

5. Why Kids Bully: Because They're Popular, by Belinda Luscombe - http://t.co/0HIHzL7 via @TIMEHealthland

"Contrary to accepted ruffian-scholarship, the more popular a middle- or high-school kid becomes, the more central to the social network of the school, the more aggressive the behavior he or she engages in. At least, that was the case in North Carolina, where students from 19 middle and high schools were studied for 4.5 years by researchers at the University of California-Davis."

6. Financial aid doesn't mean free, by Pat Restaino - NorthJersey.com http://t.co/Psbh1P1 via @NorthJerseybrk

‎"First, you file the FAFSA. After you file, you'll receive a Student Aid Report (SAR). The SAR includes your Expected Family Contribution (EFC), which is the amount of money your family is expected to contribute to the cost of attending college. Each school listed on your FAFSA will receive a copy of your SAR. Schools use the SAR to determine if you're eligible for federal student aid, as well as the type of aid package you'll receive. After you're accepted, the college will send an "Award Letter," which spells out the type of financial aid you can expect.
Financial aid packages will vary from one school to another school, so don't be surprised by any differences. Now you can easily compare the cost of attending one institution versus another. How much aid a family receives from a college is often the primary factor when it comes to choosing a school, especially in a slow economy."

7. Countdown to college: Don't procrastinate, juniors, by Lee Bierer - http://www.sacbee.com/2011/02/07/3383001/countdown-to-college-dont-procrastinate.html#

"Calling all families with high school juniors: time to get started on the college admissions process--don't procrastinate. The good news is it's not too late. Here's a primer on what you should be thinking about over the next several months:"

8. College Admissions: The 7 Hottest Colleges, by Cristiana Quinn: http://www.golocalprov.com/lifestyle/6450/

"So, what were the hottest schools this year? Columbia applications surged 32%. Dartmouth was up 18%. UPENN and Harvard saw a 15% increase. Yale increased 5%. Brown and Princeton received 3% more apps. Among the Ivy League, only Cornell saw a decline in applications, with a minimal decrease of 1%."

9. Students Negatively Impacted by Strained Financial Aid Offices – American Consumer News: http://t.co/J9k9Xw6 via @ConsumerFeed

‎"The survey—fielded in October 2010—demonstrated that 9 in 10 of the more than 1,000 responding NASFAA members reported having fewer resources to dedicate to critical student services that promote college access, success, and successful student loan repayment. Services feeling the pinch included face-to-face counseling, extra attention for target student populations and outreach efforts."

10. Bridging the Achievement Gap: The Importance of Words, by Reginald Richardson - Bed-Stuy, NY Patch: http://t.co/Ik8m5bT

"The best thing that any parent can do to make sure that his or her child is not on the wrong side of the academic achievement gap is to power up their own vocabulary. According to a 2001 study by George Farkas, a sociologist at Penn State University, children who grow up poor or close to being poor, were adversely affected by their parent’s vocabulary deficit."

11. Ravens' Michael Oher tells his side in memoir, by Deirdre Donahue - http://usat.ly/hZMTTX via @USATODAY

"Most of all, he wants his book to reach the more than 500,000 American children in foster care, and the millions more living in homes where dreams never come true and few beat the odds because of poverty, crime, drugs and despair. Kids just like the young Oher, back when he called the Memphis housing project Hurt Village home. Or when he lived in shelters. Or in a car, or under a bridge."

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Monday, February 7, 2011

186. MVCAP fyi

See free MVCAP e-books on college admissions and financial aid for sharing, printing, and downloading at our online resource library: http://issuu.com/mvcap

1. Student killed in shooting near Ohio university - http://bit.ly/gQdh1S #cnn

"Hughes said the shooting is a surprise. "It's sad because young people here are trying to turn around a lot of things," he said. "That campus is a bright shining star."

2. Tragedy at a Party, by Scott Jaschik - Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/fu8HZF

‎"A statement from Youngstown State said that university police believe that there is no threat to the campus, but that security there has been heightened as a precaution. Cynthia E. Anderson, president of the university, went to the local hospital where shooting victims were treated to talk with students and their families. In a statement, she said that the "tragic act of violence" made Sunday "a sad day for the YSU family."

3. Bad Apples or More? by Doug Lederman - Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/g3gqjx

"The review finds that 53 of the 120 universities in the NCAA’s top competitive level, the Football Bowl Subdivision, were found by the NCAA's Division I Committee on Infractions to have committed major rules violations from 2001 to 2010. That number appears to have held largely constant from the previous two decades, but the 2000s show that the number of colleges that committed serious violations of the association’s academic rules nearly doubled, to 15 from 8 in the 1990s."

4. Toughen NCAA Academic Rules, by Gerald S. Gurney - Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/gQnAHI

‎"A more critical analysis suggests that the recent patterns of serious institutional involvement in academic fraud may be related to predictable consequences of changes in the 2003 NCAA initial eligibility legislation that certify woefully underprepared athletes as qualified to compete in the college classroom."

5. New Data Show Students at For-Profit Colleges Twice As Likely To Default On Loans - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/03/for-profit-students-default-loans-new-data_n_818507.html?ir=College

"In addition, students taking out loans at for-profit schools were responsible for nearly half of all federal student loan defaults within the three-year timeframe, even though students enrolled at such institutions made up less than 15 percent of college students nationwide."

6. What to Expect From the Revised AP U.S. History Program, by Erik Robelen: http://t.co/qaMEpuR

"Unlike the current AP U.S. history course, the new curriculum framework lays out clear expectations for what students need to understand about different periods in American history," he writes. "These understandings are written at a high conceptual level in order to allow teachers to illustrate them with appropriate examples of historical actors and events drawn from each period."

7. A Letter to My President—The One I Voted for... by Paul Karrer: http://t.co/7mGX0dN via @educationweek

"It’s not bad teaching that got things to the current state of affairs. It’s pure, raw poverty. We don’t teach in failing schools. We teach in failing communities. It’s called the ZIP Code Quandary. If the kids live in a wealthy ZIP code, they have high scores; if they live in a ZIP code that’s entombed with poverty, guess how they do?"


‎"After receiving it again recently, I found the the author, a writer named Hugh Gallagher, to find out the real history of the piece. Gallagher told me that he wrote the essay when he was 17 for a high school writing contest. He won (and the essay was published in Harper's Magazine). He did then use the essay as part of his applications when he applied to five colleges about two decades ago. He attended New York Univ. . . ."

9. Financial Aid Fundamentals: File the FAFSA Now! -

‎"That means it is critically important for students – those that are college bound or already enrolled in degree programs – to file the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) as soon as possible. Almost all forms of financial aid – including scholarships, grants and student loans – use the FAFSA as the foundation for award decisions."

10. College search would end with Harvard’s ‘yes,’ by Richard O. Jones - http://t.co/EHUnnOk via @oxfordpress

"Although he’s applied to 17 colleges — large and small, near and far — if Badin High School senior Raymond Dong gets the acceptance letter he most wants, he’ll be heading to Harvard next fall."

11. Are football stars really heroes, or just famous? by Sharon Jayson -USATODAY.com http://t.co/MCFwnMm

"But are the players on the field really heroes, or just celebrities?
Those who study heroism say there is a tendency to confuse it with fame or celebrity worship, which has sparked some researchers to take a closer look at just what makes a hero in the 21st century."

12. Footballer: 'Are you OK with destroying a kid's brain for this game?' by Stephanie Smith - http://bit.ly/fakTTc #cnn

‎"Can you ever make football so that no one gets hurt? No. People are going to get hurt," said Nowinski, president of the Sports Legacy Institute. "But you can eliminate certain drills, you modify certain drills, minimize certain drills...eliminate dumb things like 'bull in the ring.'"

13. To Close Gaps, Schools Focus on Black Boys, by Winnie Hu - http://nyti.ms/gh0mHj

“I think this is a form of racial profiling in the public school system,” said the coalition’s executive director, Michael Meyers. “What they’re doing here, under the guise of helping more boys, is they’re singling them out and making them feel inferior or different simply because of their race and gender.”

14. New NAEP Science Scores Reveal Significant Achievement Gaps, by Jasmine Harley - http://www.civilrights.org/archives/2011/02/1140-naep.html

"Black 4th-graders and 8th-graders scored on average 36 pts lower than their White counterparts and Black 12th-graders scored on average 34 pts lower than their White counterparts; Hispanic 4th-graders scored on average 32 pts lower than their White counterparts. The gap decreases to 30 pts in 8th grade and to 25 pts in 12th grade. . . ."

15. Why the stakes are so much higher now, by Audrey Kahane - NorthJersey.com http://t.co/CNn1zIg via @NorthJerseybrk

"The college admission process wasn't nearly as anxiety-producing 30 years ago. As I often tell parents, we probably wouldn't be admitted if we had to apply to our alma maters today. Parents have heard enough stories from friends and relatives whose high-achieving children have been turned down by schools that would have been considered "safe" 30 years ago to know that this is true, but they still don't understand why things are so different now."

16. What Is The Achievement Gap? Education Equality Project: http://t.co/64ElJ3h

"The huge difference in academic performance between students from different economic circumstances and racial/ethnic backgrounds is what we call the achievement gap."

17. Educators missed lesson on segregation, by Tony Norman - http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/11035/1122872-153.stm

"At McCaskey East High School in Lancaster, 11th-grade black students were placed in separate homerooms with black teachers for six minutes a day, starting in December. The theory was that black students are more likely to take education seriously if they have a mentor who shares their racial background."

18. The Harvard Effect, by Timothy Noah - http://www.slate.com/id/2283744/

"At the end of 2007, Harvard announced that it would limit tuition to no more than 10% of family income for families earning up to $180,000. (It also eliminated all loans, following a trail blazed by Princeton, and stopped including home equity in its calculations of family wealth.) Yale saw and raised to $200,000, and other wealthy colleges weighed in with variations."

19. 8 Big Changes to College Admissions in 2010 and 2011, by Kim Clark - US News and World Report: http://t.co/uVIryt4

"Interviews with admissions officers at some of the nation's most popular colleges reveal recent and important shifts in the weighting of traditional admission factors. . . . College officials outline 8 major changes to their admissions practices that will affect applicants from now on:"




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Friday, February 4, 2011

185. MVCAP fyi

See free MVCAP e-books on college admissions and financial aid for sharing, printing, and downloading at our online resource library: http://issuu.com/mvcap

1. Plea to Expand Enrollment at Top Colleges, by Jacques Steinberg- http://nyti.ms/dOMLs9

‎"Twenty of the wealthiest, most selective private colleges enroll a total of about 20,000 first-year students each year. If they enrolled 30,000, there would be a significant reduction in the number of rejection letters sent to highly qualified students."

2. Ready for the Transfer Wave? by Marc Cutright - Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/hrOgya

"These new community college students, however, still intend to get the bachelor’s degree, even if there’s an unanticipated detour on the route. So it is likely that we’ll see even stronger growth in demand for transfer credit acceptance. The issue is that students entering higher education through community colleges generally have not been as successful at getting four-year degrees."

3. College Affordability A Top Priority, New Study Shows - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/03/college-affordability-a-t_n_818273.html

"Reducing college costs -- which was picked as the best means of helping Americans with financial woes by 63 percent of the nationally representative 1,004 Americans surveyed -- beat out social security (58 percent) and cutting taxes (48 percent) as well as "reducing the deficit" (40 percent), "providing financial help to people whose owe more on their mortgage than their house is worth" (22 percent) and others. . . ."

4. Study Finds Social-Skills Teaching Boosts Academics, by Sarah D. Sparks - http://t.co/ZtGPwvp via @educationweek

"In the report published today in the peer-reviewed journal Child Development, researchers led by Joseph A. Durlak, a professor emeritus of psychology at the University of Chicago, found that students who took part in social and emotional learning, or SEL, programs improved in grades and standardized-test scores by 11 percentile points compared with nonparticipating students."

5. For-Profit Colleges and Foes Await U.S. Rules, by Tamar Lewin - http://nyti.ms/i97XKt

“The for-profits want to underscore the importance of the needy population they serve. Critics want to undermine the sector. It’s very hard to separate fact from fiction, given all that’s taken place.”

6. Loan-Default Percentage at For-Profit Colleges Would Double Under New Formula, by Goldie Blumenstyk - http://chronicle.com/article/Loan-Default-Rate-at/126250/

"According to the department's figures, of the nearly 3.4 million students entering repayment status in 2008, 466,000 would be considered in default under the three-year measurement, while just under 239,000 were in default under the two-year calculation. About 222,000 of the defaulters in the three-year calculation attended for-profit colleges, 186,000 attended public colleges, and about 58,000 attended private nonprofit colleges."

7. Teens Answer: Why I Had a Baby, by Belinda Luscombe - http://t.co/9sIx0bg via @TIMEHealthland

"It is real hard being a single mother. I'm no longer with their father. Teenage males aren't looking for responsibilities at a young age. My mother and sister were also teenage mothers. It's hard for me to get a job, so now I'm being supported by my mother. . . . If I had a chance to wait 'til I was stable I would take it."

8. Default rate for repayment of for-profit college loans hits 25 percent, by Nick Anderson - http://t.co/waGrtOW via @washingtonpost

‎"The 25% default rate in the for-profit sector, part of an Education Department report to be published Friday, was up from a 21% rate estimated in December 2009. Loan defaults are on the rise throughout higher ed because of economic troubles. The three-year default rate for public colleges is now about 11%, up from about 10% in the previous report. The rate for private nonprofit colleges is about 8%, up from about 7%."

9. BBC News - Rich-poor pupil gap 'not closing,' by Sean Coughlan: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-12344501

"But this study from the University of Manchester says schools alone are not going to be able to bridge this divide. It says that previous attempts to narrow the gap have not made "substantial sustained improvements". The review, published by the British Educational Research Association, says schools can make a big difference to some individual pupils - and individual schools in disadvantaged areas can have high results.
But overall it suggests that schools have struggled to break the stubborn link between a poor background and low academic achievement."

10. 13 reasons I applied to 13 colleges, by Mackenzie Mennucci - http://t.co/gqnbjJj

"On that sunny September afternoon, somehow I came to the conclusion that it would be a bloody brilliant idea to apply to 13 colleges. I’m still trying to figure out why."

11. 6 Steps to Beating the Shortage of Financial Aid, by Kim Clark - US News and World Report: http://t.co/2NYtoq1

‎"Although nearly every college student wants a scholarship to help pay tuition, only about 50 percent of college students are expected to receive free money in 2011 and 2012. And the shortage of scholarships is expected to be especially severe in 2011 and 2012. But financial aid experts say there are six steps students can take right now to improve their odds of being in the lucky 50 percent:"

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Thursday, February 3, 2011

184. MVCAP fyi

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1. How federal spending cuts trickle down to you, by Charles Riley - http://t.co/G8Pf7VK via @CNNMoney

"Take, for example, the Department of Education. It made $36 billion in grants and other payments to states in fiscal year 2008 -- before the Recovery Act kicked in -- according to the Census Bureau. . . . Once the funds make their way from the Education Department to state and local governments, they are used to fund special education, vocational, English language acquisition and adult literacy programs."

2. High Enrollers, by Steve Holowich - Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/hpanE4

"In fall 2009, during one of the most devastating years of the current financial crisis, 7.1 percent more students enrolled in college than had the previous fall, according to data released Wednesday by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES). And while all types of institutions -- public, private nonprofit, and private for-profit -- saw a bump, for-profit institutions easily outpaced the other sectors, growing their rolls by nearly 25 percent and their revenues by 21 percent, the federal study found."

3. Slip-Sliding Away: An Anxious Public Talks about Today's Economy and the American Dream - http://j.mp/gJnRS0

"Not surprisingly, the struggling are dramatically more worried about their financial well-being. Fully 77 percent of the struggling who are also parents say they're "very worried" about paying for their child's college education."

4. Honesty on Application Essays, by Scott Anderson - Inside Higher Ed: http://bit.ly/egYvh9

"When I received Dean Blackburn’s invitation to join the university’s first-year class, what I could not see was the unwritten acknowledgment hidden between the lines of his gracious welcome: I was admitted in spite of my writing, not because of it."

5. Pathways To Prosperity Report: Students Need More Paths To Career Success - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/02/pathways-to-prosperity-re_n_817374.html

‎"What I fear is the continuing problem of too many kids dropping by the wayside and the other problem of kids going into debt, and going into college but not completing with a degree or certificate," said Robert Schwartz, who heads the project and is academic dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education."


"Below, check out the top five colleges and universities in the large, medium and small categories, and see how many of their grads are currently serving. The Peace Corps (PDF) has additional rankings. Did your school make the cut? Let us know in the comments section."

7. 25 Universities With the Worst Graduation Rates, by Lynn O'Shaughnessy - http://t.co/5M61cEC

"I’d argue that what these schools do excel at is producing students who end up leaving college with no degree, but lots of student debt and that’s disgraceful."

8. One College Applicant Puts Her Testing Gripes On Film, by Eric Hoover: http://chronicle.com/blogs/headcount/one-college-applicant-puts-her-testing-gripes-on-film/27821

"Mr. Kauffmann says he and his daughter hope the film will convince students and parents that admissions entrance exams are “unfair, biased, and illogical.” To that end, the Kauffmanns have started an online petition urging colleges to stop using the ACT and SAT."

9. What the NFL Can Teach Teachers, by Andrew J. Rotherham - reading from @time Super Bowl School: http://bit.ly/glOXDo

"We evaluate everything. When we start training camp, we watch every practice with the players, and at the end of the day, we give a numeric grade to each player, so two practices a day means two grades. During the regular season, we don't grade practice but grade every play of every game. We grade on technique, and we grade on production. Players have each other's grades in front of them as we go through this."

10. 8 subtle ways to prepare middle schoolers for college, by Jay Mathews - http://voices.washingtonpost.com/class-struggle/2011/02/8_sneaky_ways_to_ready_middle.html

‎"I have asked several college admissions and education experts about positive steps that middle-school parents can take. Some of the ideas don’t sound like college prep at all, but they are. If you help a preteen get ready for life, there will be some preparation for college in there somewhere. Here are eight suggestions:"





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