Outside the Beltway

IBM’s Watson computer crushed human competitors on Jeopardy. What does it mean?

Was the 2011 SOTU a blatant rip-off of past speeches? Or simply banal?

In chapter three of Liberty and Tyranny, Mark Levin applies his typical standards of logic and evidence to matters of faith.

An Ohio woman was convicted of two felony counts for sending her kids to good schools.

A new study casts new light on the importance of testing students to reinforce their grasp of information.

We’re producing more PhDs and JDs than there are full time openings for professors and lawyers.

President Obama’s comments about the “relatively modest pay” earned by Robert Gibbs and other high level government workers may be a bit tone deaf. But they’re right.

Just over 100 years after his death, Mark Twain’s two greatest novels are once again the subject of controversy.

208 years ago today, Thomas Jefferson wrote a letter to The Danbury Baptist Association that has resonated through the years.

The institutions charged with solving our Information Age social problems are stuck in the Industrial Age.

Do graduates of elite colleges earn more because of where they went to school? Or because of the traits that got them selected?

The archaic practice of calling one’s seniors by titles rather than their first name is actually quite useful.

A new study seems to show that student evaluations of teachers are something other than a popularity contest.

Those of us who think we’re overreacting to terrorism should remember that we’re in a tiny minority.

Iowa Republicans are targeting professor sabbaticals, thus demonstrating that they understand neither higher ed nor economics.

Meghan McCain doesn’t know what a “blue blood” is but doesn’t want to be called one.

Richard Quinn, a business professor at the University of Central Florida, got suspicious after a historically high grade distribution on the midterm for his capstone course and decided to scare his students.

An incident at a school in England provides us with an object lesson in why the often derided concept of separation of church and state is an important part of protecting individual liberty.

There’s a trend toward using metrics to identify ways to stem the skyrocketing cost of higher education. The likeliest result is to devalue the “education” component.

The skyrocketing cost of tuition makes it harder for students to justify getting a liberal arts education rather than training for a high paying job.

Should members of the Armed Forces and other public employees have the same rights under the 1st Amendment as the rest of us? Or should they be more like journalists?

Michelle Rhee is stepping down as chancellor of DC’s school system by “mutual consent” with the newly elected mayor.

Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo has won the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize. He probably doesn’t know it, though, because he’s currently sitting in a Chinese prison.

A history book used in Texas until 2003 mentions Islam more than Christianity. Much outrage ensues.

The earnings gap between those with and without a college education continues to grow. But this masks other realities.

Bryan Caplan argues that the fact so many kids in the developing world don’t go to school proves that education isn’t very valuable.

An academic study reveals that police officers with college education are less violent than their peers. But the real story is how violent cops are, period.

Most of what passes for conventional wisdom about learning is wrong.

President Obama will be giving an address to schoolkids again this year. Stay tuned for the cries of “indoctrination !”

When professors blog, they send signals to their students about their attitudes. Where do we draw the line between free expression and unprofessional conduct?

Harvard has overtaken Princeton to retake the top spot in the US News college rankings.

General Stanley McChrystal has been hired to teach leadership at Yale.

An essay claiming that the TED talks are “the new Harvard” is gaining some traction from a lot of people who ought know better.

Conservatives have long complained about liberal media bias. But conservative media seems to be much worse.

Most academic journal articles are unreadable dreck. So, why are we demanding that more of them be produced?

The Fox News headline “University of Illinois Instructor Fired Over Catholic Beliefs” is grossly misleading.

Teaching college is a lot more work than outsiders think — although probably not as much work as professors think.