At their best, common reading (CR) programs are a high-impact educational practice. By bringing the campus community together to read and discuss the same book as a common intellectual experience, CR programs create the sense of belonging and thirst for learning that position students for success at their new university. Discussions and…

In this article, the authors report on the results of a three-year study they conducted on assessment practices in general education courses at Duke University as part of a three-institution (Duke, the University of Kansas, and the University of Nebraska) research project funded by the Spencer Foundation. At all three institutions, researchers…

Generally speaking, whenever teachers are mentioned, so too are teachers' unions. However, that is not the case in "right-to-work" states. Teachers in North Carolina, for example, do not have a collective voice to represent them in local or state political arenas, where politicians are usually not well versed in educational practices. As…

Author Peter Felten reflects on the shifting of his institutional position over the past seven years or so away from the teaching center into the provost's office at Elon University. In this article he discusses the fact that the transition has challenged his assumptions about the most effective ways of cultivating inclusive learning environments…

The religious dynamics of higher education are changing rapidly. College campuses have become prime sites for conflicts involving religious identity. Few issues touch more broadly or more deeply on complexity, diversity, and change in the twenty-first-century world than those related to how people who orient differently around religion interact…

During the first sixty years after the founding of the Association of American Colleges (AAC) in 1915, it was an association of institutions and their presidents; faculty members were conspicuous by their absence. Jerry Gaff is senior scholar at the Association of American Colleges and Universities. He arrived in 1975 to direct a project on…

The Lilly Endowment's Programs for the Theological Exploration of Vocation offered a range of educational activities and opportunities for students, faculty, and staff to reflect on and discern their values, beliefs, and goals across a wide spectrum of collegiate life. Tim Clydesdale has found that these opportunities were of much value to those…