The Missouri Department of Higher Education has given the state’s public colleges and universities an October 21 deadline to explain what they will do with certain “low-producing” degree programs, according to today's Columbia Missourian. The state has compiled a list of programs that produce few graduates, using thresholds of 10 graduates or fewer per year for bachelor’s programs, five graduates for master’s-level programs, and three graduates for doctoral programs. Campuses are supposed to declare by October 21 whether they will eliminate, merge, or defend the existence of the programs. The state hopes to develop a final list of proposed mergers and terminations by December 2. At the University of Missouri’s flagship campus, the state has tagged 75 programs as “low producers.” Several of those are Ph.D. programs that were included in the National Research Council’s new assessments and ...

A three-member delegation from the American Association of University Professors will visit Louisiana State University's Baton Rouge campus this week to investigate two high-profile academic-freedom disputes, according to a report in The Daily Reveille, a student newspaper. The fact-finding committee will study the cases of Dominique Homberger, a biology professor who was removed from her classroom in April because administrators felt her students' grades were too low, and Ivor van Heerden, a former deputy director of LSU's hurricane center who says he lost his job in retaliation for his criticisms of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

The National Research Council’s long-awaited assessments of American doctoral programs will finally be released on September 28, according to an announcement posted Monday on the council’s Web site. The report, which will assess more than 4,800 programs in 62 fields, is a sequel to the council’s widely cited assessments of 1982 and 1995. In an effort to make the rankings fairer and more accurate, the council has used a much more ambitious methodology for this third round. But many scholars are concerned that the survey data that underlie the new report, which were largely gathered in 2006 and early 2007, are now badly out of date.

A federal judge has told the University of Arizona and Arizona State University to reveal the names of the schools where their researchers studied programs for English-language learners, Education Week reports. The ruling, which was handed down last week, was a partial victory for the state, which had also wanted to subpoena the names of the individual teachers and students who took part in the studies. The dispute is part of a long-running legal challenge to Arizona's system of educating English-language learners. In a hearing scheduled to begin next week, at least two researchers at the universities are expected to testify as expert witnesses. State officials say they need the raw data in order to assess the experts' testimony. But the state's subpoena has angered some scholars, who draw parallels to the dispute in Virginia over the disclosure of climate-research data.

Five foundations have announced the names of 19 community colleges that will take part in a two-year, $14-million experiment aimed at improving remedial courses in mathematics, which are a central challenge for such institutions. The project is based on two accelerated courses known as Statway and Mathway. Two officials at the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, which is leading the endeavor, wrote about their work in The Chronicle in April. And WestEd, a regional educational laboratory, has posted a series of videos about the project.

A U.S. senator weighed in today on the long-running dispute between Yale University and Peru over Inca-era artifacts that were gathered at Machu Picchu during the 1910s. The objects belong to the Peruvian people and should be returned to "their rightful owners," said U.S. Sen. Christopher J. Dodd, a Democrat of Connecticut, according to the Associated Press. Senator Dodd, who recently visited Peru, said he would try to mediate the dispute. In federal court last week, Yale filed a motion to dismiss Peru's lawsuit. At this late date, the statutes of limitations in both Connecticut and Peru bar any legal claims over the artifacts, according to Yale's motion.

In a move designed to save $2-million without cutting any jobs, Kean University will eliminate 38 department-chair positions, The Star-Ledger reported. Those 38 faculty members will move back into classroom teaching at the public institution in New Jersey, and their administrative duties will be assumed by "executive directors" and "program coordinators." The restructuring, which has been strongly opposed by the faculty union, will also eliminate majors in educational psychology, graphic communications, and mathematics education.

The Howard Hughes Medical Institute today announced its latest round of grants for the improvement of science education. Fifty research universities will receive a total of $79-million. Among the recipients, Georgetown University and the University of California at Davis will receive money to create research opportunities for students at community colleges.

Esther Duflo, a professor of economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has won the John Bates Clark Medal, the American Economic Association announced today. The award, which is given to an economist under the age of 40, is one of the field's most prestigious prizes; previous winners include Milton Friedman, Paul Krugman, Paul Samuelson, and Lawrence Summers. Ms. Duflo co-directs MIT's Poverty Action Lab, which conducts randomized trials of policy interventions in the developing world. The topics she has studied there include cash payments to encourage school attendance in Morocco, health insurance and microcredit in India, and retirement-plan participation in the United States.

Arizona State University has settled a long-running lawsuit over blood samples that its researchers collected from members of the Havasupai tribe, according to reports by the Associated Press and The New York Times. The plaintiffs alleged that university-affiliated researchers had obtained permission to use the blood samples only for a short-term diabetes study in the early 1990s, but actually kept the samples for many years and used them in genetic research that had nothing to do with diabetes. Legal scholars have closely followed the lawsuit as a test case for medical volunteers' control over the use of their genetic materials. The lawsuit had sought $50-million, but under the settlement the university will make only a $700,000 payment. It will also return the blood samples and provide other assistance to the Havasupai.