By Lawrence Biemiller. Dartmouth College said on Thursday that it had joined edX, the massive open online course provider established by Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dartmouth will offer its first MOOC this fall, and three more are planned, but the university did not say in what disciplines. At a meeting in November, members of the nonprofit edX consortium discussed a possible expansion of the group, in part because it is currently too small to offer as many courses as there appears to be demand for. Including Dartmouth, the consortium has 31 members. More...

By Geoffrey Pullum. “Concern trolls thrive on passive constructions the way vultures thrive on carcasses,” says Alexandra Petri in a Washington Post blog. My attention was captured not so much by the weird vulture comparison (she really hasn’t thought that through), but by the question of whether she had correctly diagnosed the “passive constructions” to which she refers. I’ll answer that question shortly. (In the meantime you might like to guess.)
But first, some context. Petri is commenting on a New York Times article by Bill Keller about Lisa Bonchek Adams, who blogs and tweets about her cancer. Petri charges Keller with adopting a “concern troll” tone in his discussion of her. More...

By Nick DeSantis. The Education Management Corporation has received inquiries from a dozen states about the company’s business practices, the for-profit-college company said on Friday in a corporate filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The office of the attorney general of Pennsylvania notified the company that it would serve as the point of contact for those inquiries, the company said. More...

By Lawrence Biemiller. Regent University unveiled a Christian massive open online course platform called Luxvera on Thursday, but the initial offerings are limited to three courses asking “Who Is Jesus?” and a series of “great talks” by conservative figures connected to the university, including Pat Robertson, the university’s chancellor and the founder of the Christian Broadcasting Network. In a statement announcing MOOC platform, the university said that in the future it “plans to confer actual college credit at the university as a paid option.” It also plans to offer degree programs through the platform. More...