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Vol. 6, No. 1
January 2005
(Please note: articles below link to PDF files.
In order to view, you must have Adobe Acrobat which
is available for free from the Adobe
Web site.)
Welcome to another issue of Communications Resources. This is CIC’s
periodic kit of tools and ideas to help you tell your institution’s
story.
PRESIDENTS SPEAK OUT
Op-ed pieces, articles, speeches, and media interviews all provide an
outlet to make the case for your college or university, as well as for
the independent sector of higher education in general. The challenge is
finding the time and crafting the right message. Perhaps these four presidential
perspectives will provide new arguments that help you pen your next composition.
Enjoy.
- Agnes Scott College (GA) President Mary Brown Bullock
in an Atlanta Journal-Constitution article makes a very effective
case that independent colleges are accessible and affordable for all
students; and details in particular how private colleges in Georgia
continue to ensure better access to and success in higher education
than public institutions.
Private Colleges Do a Job
Worth More
- Eureka College (IL) President Paul R. Lister describes
to readers of the Chicago Tribune the reasons for and results
of eliminating his college’s practice of tuition discounting.
Lowering Tuition by Eliminating
Discounting
- In response to reports that some high-profile institutions are trying
to reduce grade inflation, Saint Anselm College (NH)
President Jonathan DeFelice in a New Hampshire Sunday News
article says, “We can show you how to do it.”
Raising the Bar - Higher Education
Must Reverse the Trend
of Grade Inflation
- Dakota Wesleyan University (SD) President Robert
G. Duffett uses the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the GI Bill
of Rights to advocate a renewal of that type of federal support of students
in an op-ed in the Sioux Falls Angus Leader.
Controversial GI Bill Has
Paid for Itself
SPEAKING OUT ON NEWS EVENTS AND PUBLIC ISSUES
Each day brings news events or public issues that call for commentary:
reauthorization of the Higher Education Act, abuses of prison detainees,
and the hotly contested presidential election, among others. The question
for presidents is always: “To speak out or not to speak out?”
The following articles illustrate how several presidents tied their opinions
to current events.
- The 2004 election spotlighted voting trends by today’s youth.
Lesley University (MA) President Margaret McKenna challenges
Boston Globe readers in “Colleges can help deliver the
youth vote.”
Colleges Can Help Deliver
the Youth Vote
- Presidents in Virginia and South Carolina opine on state and federal
higher education issues respectively. L. Wayne Markert, then acting
president of Hollins University (VA), pens a letter
to the editor of the Newport News Daily Press about Virginia’s
Tuition Assistance Grant program. Mitchell M. Zais, president of Newberry
College (SC), focuses his remarks for the Newberry Observer
on ill-conceived provisions advanced by members of Congress in the reauthorization
of the Higher Education Act.
Other Voices: TAG Enhances
Education Options (Market)
Congress Set to Intrude into South Carolina's
Colleges
and Universities
(Zais)
- The abuses of detainees at Abu Ghraib prison was the focus of a highly
personal piece penned by Cornerstone University (MI)
President Rex M. Rogers for the Grand Rapids Press. He mentions
his 19-year-old son, an Army Reserve MP, and says, “Character
is everyone’s business.”
Prisoner Abuse Shows Lack
of Character, Not Poor Training
FIFTEEN VARIATIONS ON AN ESSENTIAL PARTNERSHIP
You have by now received the latest volume in Lumina Foundation’s
New Agenda Series titled, Powerful Partnerships: Independent Colleges
Share High-impact Strategies for Low-income Students’ Success.
The essays, written by presidents from 15 very different CIC institutions,
are remarkable and worthwhile reading. They provide insights into how
the nation’s independent colleges and universities succeed in the
education of students from low-income families, and how these 15 colleges
and universities have provided distinctive and exemplary service to their
students. The publication is posted on the Lumina
Foundation’s website. Limited copies are available from CIC,
and may be ordered
online.
SCIENCE AND LIBERAL ARTS
Experts have recognized for years the critical role that liberal arts
colleges play in producing U.S. scientists. The Howard Hughes Medical
Institute tackled the subject in its magazine, HHMI Bulletin, devoting
12 pages to a cover story, “A Wellspring of Scientists.” The
magazine’s excellent coverage has liberal arts roots with its president,
HHMI President Tom Cech, a Grinnell undergraduate; and with the magazine’s
editor, Stephen Pelletier, CIC’s vice president for communications
from 1984 to 2000. The magazine’s article can be viewed
online. You can also request a copy from the editor at (301) 215-8855.
CONVOCATION SPEECHES
As you may know, CIC periodically receives convocation speeches to be
posted on its website. These speeches receive an impressive number of
visits on the website each month, and we encourage you to view
this long list of speeches to gather possible ideas for your own convocation
addresses. If you have a convocation speech of your own that you would
like to share online, please submit it to us (e-mail preferred) at lwilcox@cic.nche.edu.
WANT TO SHARE SOME OF YOUR WRITING?
If you have a short speech, op-ed, report, or other article that you
think would be of interest to your colleague presidents in CIC, send them
to us for inclusion in the next issue. For more information or to talk
about your materials, contact CIC Vice President for Communications Laura
Wilcox at (202) 466-7230; e-mail: lwilcox@cic.nche.edu.
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