Table showing average faculty salaries by rank and adjusted to a standard, 9-month basis are presented. The salaries are those of full-time members of the instructional staff, excluding those at medical schools. The average salary of faculty members of all ranks at all institutions combined is $33,090. (MLW)

Increasing, high-achieving Black high school students are choosing Black colleges over traditionally more selective schools. Aggressive marketing and racist incidents at White colleges have contributed to this trend resulting in many Black institutions becoming more selective. Some educators worry they will abandon their traditional mission of…

A National Collegiate Athletic Association study indicates Black athletes (n=835) entering Division I colleges in 1984 and 1985 were half as likely as White athletes (n=2,453) to graduate. Results seem unlikely to resolve the debate over the NCAA's Proposition 48 concerning eligibility standards. (MSE)

A far-reaching plan to create a European system of higher education, complementing development of a single economic market, is near approval. Eventually, curricula, standards, policies, and financing would converge in member countries. The political mood is currently supportive, and the plan would extend existing successful cooperative…

Living with the Kaluli of Papua New Guinea and completing his anthropology dissertation, Steven Feld saw ceremonial life begin to die and the sounds of helicopters and drill rigs compete with birds and waterfalls. Feld's sophisticated recordings preserve some ways in which the people act and blend with their environment. (MSE)

Challenged by rising production costs, competition from computer software, and demands for better teaching, publishers, authors, and higher education officials are examining ways to improve textbooks. Publishers don't want to invest as much, students don't want to pay so much, and many faculty want to get back to good teaching. (MSE)

Most college fundraisers are women and most donors are men. The conditions of fundraising may make sexual harassment an important issue by creating opportunities for confusion and abuse. A growing need for colleges to address the issue is seen. (MSE)

Vanderbilt University (Tennessee) involves students in faculty research projects to enrich the undergraduate experience. The summer program offers stipends to students to work with faculty or graduate students on specific projects. Students are exposed to the processes of research and better able to choose or reject a research career. (MSE)

The trend toward hiring of part-time faculty, most evident at two-year colleges, angers many faculty groups. Critics contend the practice exploits part-time teachers to help colleges balance their budgets, erodes educational quality, and threatens tenure. These faculty are also most likely to be laid off during retrenchment. (MSE)

Twenty-two states now specifically outlaw such activities as entering a research laboratory without permission, releasing animals, disrupting experiments, and removing documents and photographs related to research. Several expand the definition of criminal activity to include videotaping or photographing facility interiors. Penalties vary by…

An American Council on Education survey of almost 360 colleges and universities found that few institutions have experienced controversy over course content, speeches, or faculty lectures, suggesting that reports of widespread efforts to impose "politically correct" thinking on college students and faculty are exaggerated. Some professors…

The Supreme Court's ruling in a flag-burning case raises questions about whether antiharassment policies that colleges and universities have adopted, penalizing slurs and epithets used by students to harass others, violate the First Amendment to the Constitution. If public college policies were found unconstitutional, private colleges would not…

After a painful period of belt tightening and learning to pay more attention to the financial side of publishing, university presses have emerged as bigger, healthier, more diverse, and more interesting. They are publishing and selling more books than ever, in greater variety. Some fear publication of pure scholarship is endangered. (MSE)

Hoping to gain prestige and financial support for research, many four-year institutions have toughened faculty tenure and promotion standards to require more and better research. Some older faculty have been surpassed in salary and perquisites by younger, more aggressive scholars. Morale problems and concern over evaluation criteria have resulted.…

Data on 106 university and 12 nonuniversity research libraries include rankings based on a national index, the number of volumes held, volumes added during the year, current serials, total staff, and total expenditures. Most data are for main campuses only. (MSE)