Opinion
By the numbers
By Managing Board | October 3, 2013The managing board recounts some notable numerals
Serving the University Community Since 1890
The managing board recounts some notable numerals
Even if the noise concerns were valid, the way the Provost’s Office went about establishing the room-reservation policy was misguided. Administrators instituted the policy without seeking feedback from students who would be affected. For a University that prides itself on student self-governance, the failure to consult students marks a significant lapse in judgment.
The shutdown, taken as an isolated incident, will not harm the University’s research operations much, if at all. But taken as a marker of a broader trend of government dysfunction, it could strike a blow to research, especially basic research, at universities nationwide.
Correlation does not mean causation. But in light of the high proportion of Board members who gave to the governors who appointed them, the claim that political contributions have absolutely nothing to do with Board appointments is tough to swallow.
The disparity between how much energy the University invests in first-year housing and how much energy it invests in upper-class housing is undesirably large.
We can see that administrators are attempting to refashion the way the University understands itself. The school wants to be a public global university: which is not a contradiction in terms, but not a fully coherent concept either.
If the University wishes to frame itself as a globally conscious school, it must not neglect Africa.
The conventional wisdom that a college’s campus consists of above-ground buildings still holds for the University. For some schools in Singapore, however, this may not be the case for much longer
The question of who is responsible for workplace preparation — firms, schools or students — is important because the question of responsibility is, implicitly, a question of cost. It takes time and money to turn students into workers.
Regardless, the fact that students didn’t protest the Santorum event is not necessarily a bad thing. Student protests have an unfortunate tendency of sacrificing free-speech principles for the sake of another favored cause.
Dongguan’s suicide waiver reveals a wrongheaded approach toward student mental health on the part of its administration.
Our school’s fascination with Jefferson, the man who laid the school’s conceptual foundations, is longstanding. Our interest in the lives of the people who laid the school’s physical cornerstones is quite recent.
But the University’s shortcomings when it comes to faculty recruitment (and retention) do not stem primarily from a failure of strategy. These problems arise from a failure to pay top faculty members market-rate wages. Until the University can compensate faculty more generously, this element of the strategic plan will be only a partial solution.
The report tells us something interesting about the University’s oft-uneasy relationship with the commonwealth. But it’s not what you might think. The proposal for the University to strike away from the state is not a realistic suggestion. It is the result of lingering resentment. This resentment comes from two sources: first, a trend of declining state appropriations (though state funding increased by roughly $8 million in fiscal year 2013); and second, the attempted ouster of University President Teresa Sullivan, instigated by state-appointed officials, that left the school reeling last June.
Off the Hook is more than anti-hookup. It is also pro-abstinence. The organization’s AtUVa page reports that the group believes that “sex is good, but only in the context of marriage.” The group’s purpose, according to its blog, is to promote an “alternative to the hookup scene.” The alternative it offers is simple: don’t do it.
For universities that are thinking through their global initiatives, a joint effort between Yale and the National University of Singapore (NUS) provides a useful case study.
For universities that are thinking through their global initiatives, a joint effort between Yale and the National University of Singapore (NUS) provides a useful case study.
Programs such as AccessUVa give moderate help to many rather than extraordinary help to a few. The University’s financial-aid program is merit-based insofar as a student must win admission to the school to be eligible for aid. But apart from this baseline assessment of merit, AccessUVa assists students based on need alone.
To argue that national rankings help shape a university’s reputation seems like a truism. But it is worth bringing up because — pop quiz — what variable in the U.S. News methodology gets the most weight? The magazine treats a university’s reputation, weighted at 22.5 percent (tied with retention), as the most important factor in determining its rank.
Mormonism’s short history, and its continued vibrancy worldwide, makes it an exciting laboratory for scholars interested in exploring how religious movements develop, mature and gain adherents. But Mormonism, like many other minority subcultures, has only recently become an object of serious academic inquiry. The University, here, is ahead of its competitors.
