By Thomas P. Oles. The campus divestment movement is losing. The wealthiest, most prestigious colleges and universities are declining to divest. News reports indicate that Harvard actually increased substantially its holdings in oil and gas companies in the fall of 2014. The message is clear. Market logic rules. Profits come first, even for not-for-profit institutions. More...

By Lisandro Pérez. A new era in U.S.-Cuba relations was ushered in on December 17th when the presidents of both countries announced they were prepared to end nearly six decades of estrangement. I had nearly lost hope that in my lifetime there would be a rapprochement between my adopted nation and the island where I was born and which I left 55 years ago with my parents. More...

By Ted Purinton. Even people who complain that university rankings do not provide very useful information are still inclined to look at them.
On many levels, rankings appear valid: Princeton (ranked first by U.S. News & World Report, seventh by Times Higher Education) is really good; Rutgers (ranked 70th and 144th, respectively) is just plain good.
Recently, however, two university rankers decided to venture into new territory by ranking universities in the Middle East. U.S. News released its list of Best Arab Region Universities in November 2014—its first attempt to rank non-U.S. universities. And in February 2015, Times Higher Education released its MENA (Middle East and North Africa) Top 30, noting that only three Middle Eastern universities showed up in its World University Rankings’ top 400. Both publications say that they will continue to work on their methodologies — Times Higher Education calls its Top 30 a “snapshot” that is part of a much larger planned ranking of Middle East universities. More...