Browsing: Higher Education

When Wisconsin’s high school graduates find out the rest of life hasn’t lowered the bar for “proficiency,” when they find out they’ve been misled, it will be a cruel slap of reality.

UW-La Crosse saw an explosion of nonprofessional teaching staff over the past two decades. Teaching staff and enrollments rose, too.

Enrollment in Wisconsin’s system of two-year branch colleges has declined steadily since its peak in 2011, data from the UW Office of Policy Analysis & Research show.

Of the seven remaining two-year branch colleges in the Universities of Wisconsin system, three are within walking distance and the rest are within easy driving distance of technical colleges that now are offering many of the same liberal arts courses.

A legislative committee formed to study falling enrollment across the University of Wisconsin System could recommend putting an end to what’s left of a tottering two-year branch campus system.

When it comes to UW-Madison faculty in social sciences and the humanities, the odds of finding a Republican donor are just 1 in 530.

There is a crisis in Wisconsin higher education, brought about by costs and demographics. There are, however, ways for colleges to adapt, overcome and improve — if they’re willing to take advantage of technology and the brainpower already in-house.

“We could do so much better but we’re not right now because the universities are one-sided and need to have more people to engage in a robust dialogue over what it is that we should be doing. We just don’t have that right now, and I think, as a consequence, we’re suffering, our students are suffering, the taxpayers are suffering, and the long-term success of universities is suffering.”

Many campuses in the University of Wisconsin System have been described by analysts as struggling financially and at risk for future financial troubles. Here is presented the staffing and enrollment trends for UW-Green Bay.

When the president tells borrowers not to bother paying back what they owe, it isn’t relief in the way medicine relieves your pain — it doesn’t alter any painful underlying causes. It isn’t forgiveness in the divine sense, metaphysically washing away the stain. The stain remains in the form of blood-red ink on the federal books.

The number of tenured faculty in the University of Wisconsin System has fallen roughly in line with the decrease in student enrollment since 2015.

The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee recently announced that its Waukesha campus will close after the spring 2025 semester. Using data from the UW System’s accountability dashboard, we analyzed UWM’s enrollment and staffing levels relative to those of 20 years ago.

The law does not allow Wisconsin to give anyone a free ride based on racial identity such as being Native American. So instead, UW-Madison is basing the cost waiver on membership in one of 11 federally recognized Wisconsin tribes.

“I have seen my fair share of ridiculous ideas, but this one might be near the top,” said State Sen. Duey Stroebel. “The notion that it is government’s job to subsidize and prop up a dying industry like journalism is preposterous.”

Two state Assembly members have proposed giving a $25 starter for a state-administered educational savings account to every child born or adopted in Wisconsin.

A formal agreement passed by the regents says that UW-Madison will seek philanthropic support to create an endowed chair that will focus on conservative political thought, classical economic theory or classical liberalism, depending on the donor’s interest.

The average annual wages paid to professors at University of Wisconsin campuses have generally risen, but the rate at which they’ve risen varies widely — as do the campus averages.

Saying they “have not given up on a colorblind society,” Wisconsin Republicans have filed a bill to remove race-based considerations from an array of UW System and technical college financial aid programs.

The University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh plans to cut about 200 staff and administrators as it deals with an $18 million deficit in its budget.

For years, I’ve wondered when and how the University of Wisconsin-Madison would deal with the odious history of its one-time president, Charles Van Hise — a eugenicist who wanted to rid the “race” of “defectives” so that future humans could have a “godlike destiny.”