When the playful, 84-page viewbook showed up in the University of Dayton last fall, not everybody was impressed. Some faculty members were taken aback. The student newspaper, the "Flyer News," pronounced it a "fully color, glossy orgy," unbefitting a Roman Catholic college. The admissions office, it said, had hit an…

The service learning movement has gained new energy with the election of President Obama, who has made increasing service a central plank of his higher-education agenda. But across the board, colleges and universities struggle with service learning's twin goals of providing meaningful help to the community and academic rigor to students. The…

Fourteen years ago, Bruce A. Jackson was doing his postdoctoral work at the Boston University School of Medicine and working nights teaching at nearby Roxbury Community College. But his exhausting shuttle between two colleges was about to come to an end. Mr. Jackson, a biochemist, had recently received word from the National Science Foundation…

As community colleges have matured, many presidents' jobs--especially at the largest colleges in the country--have grown to become those of college president, entrepreneur, lobbyist, global ambassador, county leader, and fund raiser rolled into one. Their compensation has grown as well. At the largest two-year colleges and college systems in the…