Talking About a Digital Public Library of America

I prefer the original term “National Digital Library” to “Digital Public Library of America” because the latter is ambiguous. The phrase “public library” means something that is probably not what the organizers of this effort mean. Is it going to have 1,000 copies each of the latest Hollywood movies and popular novels? Is it going to offer some kind of digital versions of children’s storytelling hours? Is it going to be subject to pressure to remove “offensive” books or put up barriers to children accessing certain content, moving them to the “adult stacks” section of the site?
Names mean something, and can over time affect the direction of drift of the mission of an organization, especially as the original visionaries leave and others who weren’t involved in the original planning take their places. Tell the American people that there’s a “Public Library of America” and see how fast the loonies come out of the corners demanding only the new “sanitized” version of Huckleberry Finn be included.

(By the way, if this seems like an attack on public libraries, it isn’t meant to be. I have nothing but sympathy for the nonsense my brethren have to put up with.)

I find it interesting that an academic institution would decide that it is qualified to be the coordinator of a “public” library service. It has been my experience with academic institutions that thy are not given to sharing library resources, especially digital resources, with the public. Even their own students cannot access most academic libraries’ digital resources from outside the library itself. Some of this attitude is part of the academic culture but some is due to the digital rights agreements forced on them by the publishers of digital resources. These publishers have demonstrated a business model that all but excludes public use. All in all, I find it hard to believe that an academic institute that has a profit-drive as notorious as Harvard’s is going to champion a digital library that freely serves the public. I fear that this “Digital Public Library of America” will ultimately increase the divide between the “haves” and “have-nots” by providing digital access for a price and excluding those who cannot pay for the service.

I am in complete favor of such a national digital repository (NDR? No, that might confuse public broadcasting foes…); however, I would like to see a more global collaborative effort with such entities as international academic and scientific journal databases, as well as the European Digital Libraries initiative: http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/activities/digital_libraries/index_en.htm

I think it was selective monitoring that was the issue – they only recorded Arab/Muslim events. See http://www.academicfreedom.co.uk for more on the leaks

Yes, they are a few and do very poorly in enrollment especially with high end students. Most students want the entire college experience (even if they never go to a game) and to them that includes having sports on their campus.

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“I think the bloated athletic costs might be reduced if we had some real competition. It would be nice if every state had at least one college with no athletics.  Then families could vote with their pocketbook.  Are there any state 4 year universities like this?  I personally don’t know of any”.

“A ‘great’ higher education reporter, Mary Beth Marklein (USA Today)…”. I don’t know what else Professor Vedder said after that because any semblance of objectivity was destroyed, so I quit reading the article. It would be appropriate to use terms such as award winning, respected, or widely published with examples of how the author came to describe her as such. I do hope this is type of toady, fawning cronyism is not on display when teaching in the classroom.

They may post tuition and fees on their websites, but the promote their tuition. Personally, I think any required cost should be considered tuition and that is what they should advertise. Schools are now charging more in fees than they do for tuition, all luring in folks by advertising just their tuition amount.

This is an interesting point, differentiating fees vs. tuition.  Cost of delivery is, in reality, what one might ask.  At least that is what our department did a year ago.  And what we starkly found was that no funding is in place to address the life cycle costs for what students expect relating to architectural education facilities that our majors rely upon.  In effect, as students take a toll on facilities there is no funding model in place to replace the degraded equipment.  Still, students expect quality facilities (as if that occurs by magic).  They don’t know how you (as a department) fund them, they just expect them.

Universities “lure” students by many means, not the least of which are the learning environment and associated activities. So many consumers today want the experience and not a bunch of details.  Responsible academics will need to have a funding model in place that provides for that expectation while also responding to the decreasing likelihood that Facilities, the dean, or the state legislature will be able to pony up large sums for remodels and replacements.  

I don’t often agree with Vedder’s rightwing agenda. However, in this case, I couldn’t agree more. My daughter attends a public university and receives a full tuition merit scholarship (so far so good). We were shocked with the sticker price of her fees, which add up to several thousand dollars per semester. We don’t know what most of these fees are for, and some of them, she may not even use the service for which the fee is collected, but we have to pay them for her to continue to enroll. Here are her fees for last semester:
-Fees per each credit hour—varies between lower division and upper division courses
-Lab fees for science courses as well as fees for art courses and language courses
-Academic excellence fee
-Additional academic fees (several of these)
-Security Services fee
-Residential Housing Program fee (in addition to R&B)
-Fine Arts Enrichment fee
-International Program fee
-Transit fee
-Health & Wellness fee (in addition to Health Center fee & Student Insurance)
-Library Excellence fee
-Connectivity fee
-Arts & Sciences Technology fee
-Academic Records fee
-Student Advising fee
-Special Event fee
-Education Enrichment fee
-Technology fee
-Arts & Sciences Enrichment fee
-Activity fee
-Facility fee
-Cultural Recreation Services fee
-Student Assessment fee

This was a serious problem even before the current, severe cutbacks in higher education funding and is more serious now.   It seems to me that tuition ought to pay the cost of the educational program.  Fees should be limited to elements of the program that are not generally used.  So a fee for art supplies provided in the studio for the use of individual students might warrant a fee as might breakables and disposable items in a science lab.  The costs of instruction that don’t relate to such “consumables” ought to be part of tuition.   It’s a toiugher question whether an athletics facilities fee ought to be levied.   Many students don’t us campus athletic facilities–gyms, pools, etc.  Yet there is a health benefit if they do, so a case can be made for levying the fee on all students so that all have access when/if they are motivated–as hopefully they will be–to engage in healthy physical activity.

A good step is to have all fees or fee increases annually approved by a university-wide committee that would include administrators from both sides of the divide (finance people but also student affairs or other personnel who presumably at watchdogs for students) and students who represent the student body and feel a duty to protect them from being gouged.   And, of course, the final decision should be made by the president or chancellor because he/she is finally answerable to the public, to students, and to others who are “stakeholders” in the university.

But, yes, fees have gotten seriously out of control, not only in this recession for but most of the past decade.  

Liberal arts colleges are not the only entities to suffer from a remarkable degree of self-absorption. Our students tend to be entirely self-absorbed as well. So how should we respond? Collaboration is certainly one way to meet the challenge, and the collaborative methods suggested are legitimate. However, let us be aware of the need to connect to our students. Our students should also have the opportunity to collaborate, and I suggest that collaborative efforts be made with service learning opportunities. Service learning connects students to their communities, and as population demographics change I believe we need to be aware of an increasing need to connect with the community. Of course I bemoan the apparent loss of respect for the Liberal Arts, which form the foundations of our civilization. What if, one day, no one reads Plato, or Shakespeare, or …. oh, but almost no one does now, right? At least among many of our students. Perhaps that’s presumptious. But we’ll survive: perhaps LA scholars will be hurled into  some far-off corner of the galaxy to discuss the fine points of something or other. But for now, let’s help our students develop strong, constructive critical thinking skills by collaborating with their community resources. Within the university system they can construct problem/solution groups across the disciplines, putting feet to their dreams and making positive changes that will impact their families, their work environments, and their living environments. This may bring about an actual resurgence of interest in the Liberal Arts, as they connect to art, music, literature and those social opportunities that are such a strong aspects of service learning.

 ”The opportunity problem is that corporate America has decided not to
train its employees anymore, and has passed that chore off to higher
education.” Bingo. Yet one more way in which the corporations have figured out how to socialize risk and the cost of doing business. Corps. whine that they can’t find people with the skills to fill their open positions, even while they sit on trillions of dollars that, in part, could go to training their workforce (as was done for years in days gone by when the economy was, you know, _growing_).

THANK YOU PRES WEISS: “The market is happening to us” is the most realistic acknowledgement yet that the stewardship paradigm has changed, in highered as everywhere. Please LEAD DON’T REACT.

You didn’t answer the question that I asked of Unemployed_Northeastern.  Again: Can you provide us with the evidence to back up your statement that
there are more unemployed graduates of Wesleyan, Hamilton, Bates, and
Bowdoin wandering the streets of Boston and NYC than there are biz
admin graduates from Whatever U.?

Here’s an interesting ranking of schools called “What’s Your College Degree Worth.”  I don’t really put much stock in such things, but I cannot help but notice that liberal arts colleges do pretty well.

http://www.businessweek.com/interactive_reports/colleges_return_on_investment.html

Daniel Weiss of Lafayette College, I do hope you take note of this survey.  #17 ain’t bad.

For fun: http://historianwalking.blogspot.com/

herter, as the Business Week page says “The ranking was prepared by PayScale and is based on self-reported pay data obtained through its online salary survey tools” so an even more skewed basis for analysis.

The CHE article “Brown and Cornell are Second Tier” based on a paper indicates elite employers tend not to bother with most LACs.
http://chronicle.com/blogs/percolator/brown-and-cornell-are-second-tier/27565

The 2010 Wall Street Journal survey of recruiters for large corporations showed that recruiters mainly ranked certain specific state colleges in their top x, with different rankings for a short list of different majors (Engineering, Accounting, Computer Science etc. but no ranking for Philosophy etc.).  

* “Penn State Tops Recruiter Rankings”
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704358904575477643369663352.html

* “Rankings by Major”
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703376504575491704156387646.html

* “Employers Favor State Schools for Hires”
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703597204575483730506372718.html
 
So “biz admin graduates from Whatever U.?” may not have an advantage.
But the 25 “Best Schools: Business/Economics” has among others Michigan, Ohio State, Rutgers and Harvard, but not the colleges Unemployed_Northeastern listed.

There seemed to be a lack of interest among the corporate recruiters for Liberal Arts grads. “Best Schools: Liberal Arts” only lists 3: Georgetown, Duke and NYU, so again none in the UN list.

“Employers Favor State Schools for Hires” gives reasons for “U.S. companies largely favor graduates of big state universities over Ivy League and other elite liberal-arts schools when hiring to fill entry-level jobs.”

What “gainful employment” data is available on recent Wesleyan, Hamilton, Bates and Bowdoin grads?  Or similar data that also excludes those hired by relatives?

It should be noted that UN is commenting based personal experience and the experience of friends and acquaintences so his information is “anecdotal”.

herter, regarding the your 2nd link, I think that rather than be homeless, at least some live at home or with friends or relatives. They probably don’t find it amusing.

Then there is the question of those who are volunteering or interning at NGOs, non-profits and for-profits. Plus those who are minimum wage adjuncts. There is also the question of those who having failed to find a job go to graduate or professional school.

You still have not answered the question.   Saying that employers prefer state school grads (liberal arts majors anyone?) is not the same thing as supplying employment data on the specific schools in question, or other liberal arts colleges.   You’re basically saying that all the graduates of liberal arts colleges are unemployed.  That’s patently absurd.  You’re also making gross assumptions that unpaid internships last forever and do not lead to higher wage and more prestigious jobs.  That’s also absurd.  For that matter, not everyone who works for an NGO or non-profit is unpaid.  Adjuncting also has nothing to do with the the employment prospects of graduates of liberal arts colleges.  

As for Wesleyan’s ranking, yes, #45 is damn good given that there are thousands of colleges in the US.  Even more important, if you go to Wes you come out with far more than the ability to get a job. 

For the record, I went to a state school.  Even with that education I still got the joke in the blog, but I don’t think you did.

herter, I wrote in my original post, “Arum and Roksa’s second report illustrates the lack of added value of SAT and High Selectivity college.

‘Less Selective’ colleges have the highest full-time employment rate
with only a slightly lower full-time employment income than the ‘Highly
Selective’ colleges!  $32,419 vs $32,740 so less than a 1% discount on
‘Highly Selective’!”

Yet somehow, you wrote, “You’re basically saying that all the graduates of
liberal arts colleges are unemployed.  That’s patently absurd.” This seems a very peculiar claim, clearly refuted.

As I noted in a subsequent post, the colleges involved in the Arum and Roska were not revealed (or at least not known to me, plus the data is based on their small sample of students).  There often seems a strategy to hide what institutions are involved in such studies or even if some are listed (see my earlier post on the 2011 paper by Stacy Dale and Alan Krueger), the specific results by college are not revealed.