Teach Impediment

When the student can't understand the instructor, who is to blame?

By JOHN GRAVOIS

On the phone from Fargo, N.D., State Rep. Bette Grande's voice rings with clarity. "Colleges are a business," she says in a starched Midwestern accent. "When we put research as our No. 1 focus, we forgot the student," she says. "We got ourselves all turned around."

Ms. Grande could be talking...