By Kevin Carey. Americans have a split vision of education. Conventional wisdom has long held that our K-12 schools are mediocre or worse, while our colleges and universities are world class. While policy wonks hotly debate K-12 reform ideas like vouchers and the Common Core state standards, higher education is largely left to its own devices. Many families are worried about how to get into and pay for increasingly expensive colleges. But the stellar quality of those institutions is assumed. More...

By Guest Writer. The following is by Peter N. Stearns, provost of George Mason University. Mr. Stearns plans to retire this summer after more than 14 years in the role.
One of the reasons I wanted to become the provost of George Mason was the opportunity to help shape a more global university. Of course, given Mason’s Northern Virginia location near the nation’s capital and faculty talent, a good bit was going on already, but as an institution we had the chance to accelerate global education in a number of ways. That effort formed a key part of what proved to be an exhilarating job. More...