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Dispatches of a Microaggression Scout

Welcome, everyone. I want to say a few things, in no particular order, as I don’t see hierarchy. Let me put my glasses on: 1. You belong here.2. This is a safe space. 3. No one is an expert; we are here to learn as we go. Before we get started, I’d like to ask you to fill out a privilege check. . . . . Continue Reading »

A Loss of Trust

The ordeal is over; my niece has chosen Tulane. A buddy in Wisconsin has a daughter, and she’s headed to Washington University. Another friend lives in Chicago, but he’s in Boston this week accompanying a daughter on campus tours. For him, the application season has just begun. I see people like . . . . Continue Reading »

Marquette's Gender Regime

W orking in my Marquette office one afternoon in the spring of 2010, I heard unusual sounds coming from the normally quiet lawns outside my window. I was surprised to see a modest assembly of students and professors preparing to march in protest. Against what? Minutes later, an email arrived . . . . Continue Reading »

Mother Church or Uncle Sam

Wyoming ­Catholic College, of which I serve as ­president, recently ­determined that it has a duty to abstain from federal student-loan and grant programs. As a new college that received the accreditation necessary for federal funding only this year, Wyoming Catholic faced a stark choice for or . . . . Continue Reading »

More on Union University and the CCCU

In his recent article responding to Carl Trueman, Provost of Union University C. Ben Mitchell makes the point again—joining his President—that Union’s reason for disunion with the CCCU was theological fidelity in the face of Goshen and Eastern Mennonite's theological unfaithfulness. . . . . Continue Reading »

The Perils of “Preferred Peers”

On Catholic campuses that aspire to Top Ten or Top Twenty status in publicity sweepstakes like the U.S. News and World Report college rankings, one sometimes hears the phrase “preferred peers.” Translated into plain English from faux-sociologese, that means the schools to which we’d like to be compared (and be ranked with). At a major Catholic institution like the University of Notre Dame, for example, administrators use the term “preferred peers” to refer to universities like Duke, Stanford, and Princeton, suggesting that these are the benchmarks by which Notre Dame measures its own aspirations to excellence. Continue Reading »

Announcing New Multimillion Dollar Aid-for-Adjuncts Grant

In what is being hailed as a revolutionary solution to the overpopulation problem of adjuncts in higher education, the Bench Foundation has announced a multi-year program called Aid-for-Adjuncts. The program is the result of a ten-year study of the rapid proliferation of part-time instructors in college, university, and seminary classrooms. For the first time, administrative centers will be established across America, helping school officials formulate proper guidelines for the use and abuse of adjuncts. Continue Reading »

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