By Kylar Loussikian for The Australian. A squat, anonymous office block on the industrial outskirts of Colchester, north of London, doesn’t appear to be the likeliest place for the headquarters of an international fraud operation. Read more...
Detecting Essay Fraud
Sweet Briar Survives
By Scott Jaschik. In a deal announced Saturday evening by Virginia's attorney general, the college's current leaders agreed to relinquish control to a new president and a largely new board. Saving Sweet Briar, an organization of alumnae who have fought the planned closure of the college, has agreed to raise $12.5 million to continue operating the college in the 2015-16 academic year. Read more...
Arizona's Online Holdout
By Carl Straumsheim. The University of Arizona, the last holdout in a state investing heavily in distance education for undergraduates, will this fall join the state’s other public universities in offering online bachelor’s degrees, as UA Online opens its virtual doors. Read more...
Humanities Windfall
By Ashley A. Smith. Cuyahoga Community College in Ohio just received its largest donation ever, but the $10 million gift is notable for other reasons. Read more...
Universities Under Attack
By Elizabeth Redden. An April attack on Kenya’s Garissa University College by Shabab militants that left 147 people dead. The disappearance -- and presumed killing -- of 43 students at Mexico’s Raúl Isidro Burgos Rural Teachers’ College of Ayotzinapa last fall. Read more...
Reminding States to Regulate
By Doug Lederman. After years of delays spurred by concerns from states and colleges, a new federal requirement that colleges obtain authorization from regulators in each state in which they are physically located is finally due to take effect. Read more...
Senate Plan Portends Budget Battles
By Michael Stratford. A U.S. Senate subcommittee on Tuesday passed a spending bill for health, labor and education programs that would increase funds for biomedical research and boost the maximum Pell Grant -- but slash spending on workforce training and AmeriCorps and block the Obama administration from implementing regulations relating to gainful employment for vocational programs and its college rating system. Read more...
Debt-Free and (Mostly) Detail-Free
By Michael Stratford. As the idea of debt-free college swirls around the Democratic presidential campaign and some liberal policy circles, the groups that represent colleges and universities are sizing up what it might mean for them. Read more...
Debt-Free Plans
By Michael Stratford. Debt-free college has emerged in recent months as a popular idea among Democrats and progressive advocates. But details about what, exactly, debt-free college means -- and how it would be accomplished -- remain scant. Read more...
Finding a New Compass
By Paul Fain. ACT is phasing out Compass, a popular but controversial college placement test that colleges use to determine whether students need to take remedial courses. Read more...