Yale-NUS College is now being built in Singapore. Ground was broken in early July, and faculty and deans are being hired. A number of the new professors are in fact spending this academic year in New Haven, Conn., not teaching anyone, but rather planning the curriculum that will be launched when the new college opens its doors next fall. They are not merely working on lesson plans, they say, but striving to “re-imagine undergraduate education for the 21st century.”

Meanwhile, in the spring, the Yale-New Haven faculty woke up from a long somnolence and found itself in a Brave New University: full of “best practices,” “shared services,” vice presidents, and deanlets, and with a name that had been franchised to Singapore. A burgeoning administration and an aggressive Board of Trustees (some with financial interests in Singapore) had far outrun the faculty and changed…

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