If leaders in Washington, D.C., do not come to an agreement, we will see not just massive cuts in funding. We will see lives diminished, futures put on hold, and opportunities lost.
Consider for a moment how many of us have benefited from U.S. research universities' advances in antibiotics, X-rays or transistors -- and how many mo...
Perhaps the most important contribution of professors doing research is that it creates (or at least enforces) lifelong learners, learning that involves making mistakes while pursuing the joy of discovery.
They're the pride and backbone of American higher education, doing essential research and educating en masse the next generations of scientists and en...
Sometimes, with great science and great care, we save lives. Simple concepts; profound impact.
America has always had a pioneering spirit, and we have always admired pioneers. They may not wear buckskin anymore or climb into space capsules. They just may be the quiet person in the lab of a research university, studying particles too small to be seen.
There are the drawbacks to being a professor. I love my job, but it is becoming increasingly difficult for me to do it well -- or even to do it at all.
President Obama's budget proposal for the 2013 fiscal year would beef up spending on higher education. Appropriately, he unveiled it at a community c...
With $250 billion in endowment and a group of the most accomplished individuals on the planet, research universities have no choice but to gear up to attack the world's biggest problems and provide a jump start to getting the pie growing.
Research universities' problem is not that they have many functions, it's that they engage in false and misleading accounting practices that result in escalating costs and decreased educational quality.
As our leaders prepare for the next round of debilitating budget cuts, we must appreciate just how much we all owe to UCLA, the UC system and all of our public universities and colleges.
Ironically, many of the budgetary forces at universities work to drive up tuition costs and lower educational quality; and most of the reasons for this strange combination have to do with compensation.
In the last 30 years, higher education programs have expanded to embrace a panoply of sub- departments. Universities overpromise and under-deliver in many cases with their specialized programs.
College presidents now threaten to supplant high school principals as the new national symbol of moral and intellectual bankruptcy, imbecility, and incompetence.
