Hartford Courant - Educators From China Visit MCC Thursday (October 18, 2011) - Educators from China are to visit Manchester Community College on Thursday. The 14 visitors from the Jilin province represent schools from the elementary level to college... MCC representatives will present an overview of the state's community colleges and specific information about the special partnerships MCC has with local high schools...

Journal Inquirer - MCC donates 200 computers to Vernon schools (October 13, 2011) - The schools will receive an infusion of fresh computer equipment after the Board of Education voted Tuesday to accept a donation of 200 computers from Manchester Community College...Some 150 will be used to replace the oldest computer systems, along with some newer computers that are having problems operating correctly, while 50 will be used for parts...

Manchester Patch - MCC Cougar Classic Golf Tournament success (October 12, 2011) - After a hiatus of several years, the MCC Cougar Classic Golf Tournament was held on September 28th at the Manchester Country Club. More than 80 participants helped raise money for student support services at the college...

New Haven Independent - East Rock Statues Have Date With An Angel (October 11, 2011) - The next hurricane might have knocked Patriotism right off her pedestal. The same goes for Victory, Prosperity, and History. A rescue crew has swooped to make sure that won't happen...Miller and his shop of several sculptors...Donovan's non-day job is teaching sculpture at Manchester Community College...

Inside Higher Ed - More Applications, More Waiting Lists (October 20, 2011) -Most four-year colleges saw an increase in applications in 2010, and more colleges used waiting lists than they did the year before, with smaller proportions of students admitted off the waiting lists, according to a report released Wednesday by the National Association for College Admission Counseling...

Chronicle of Higher Ed - Community-College Enrollments Slow After Years of Growth (October 18, 2011) - After a decade of record growth, enrollment appears to be slowing down at many of the nation's community colleges. The final figures are not out yet, but California, Connecticut, and Michigan are all predicting statewide decreases in full-time enrollment compared with last fall, and other states' numbers are uncharacteristically flat...

Community College Times - 21st-Century Commission deliberates recommendations (October 18, 2011) - To understand the challenge facing a blue-ribbon commission charged with mapping the future priorities of community colleges, look at its agenda for this week's meeting: workforce leadership, rethinking resources, technology as a tool, and connecting postsecondary education and the economy...

Inside Higher Ed - Shutting Down Open Resources (October 18, 2011) - It's been less than a month since the U.S. Labor Department announced $500 million in grants for community colleges to develop job-training programs and make them free for other institutions to use, but the program is already facing a threat to its existence...

Hartford Courant - Regents President's Contract At Odds With State Law (October 18, 2011) - The contract approved by the Board of Regents for Higher Education in early October for interim President Robert Kennedy seems to diverge from the language of state legislation passed earlier this year creating the position. The higher education reform bill said that the president's term is coterminous with the governor's, according to a summary by the state Office of Legislative Research...

Community College Times- Education Department to open clearinghouse on student success (October 18, 2011) - The U.S. Department of Education plans to start a clearinghouse for colleges to share their practices on improving student success and the evidence to prove it...

Inside Higher Ed - Who Needs to Know? (October 18, 2011) - Paul Smith's College has discovered one way technology can help with student retention: helping the college more effectively bother the hell out of students who are at risk of dropping out. The small, private college in upstate New York recently teamed up with Starfish Retention Solutions to institute an electronic "flagging" system that allows a student's instructors, adviser and other officials to keep each other apprised if the student begins to fall behind on grades, attendance, health or financial aid forms, or any other obligations the student needs to fulfill to stay enrolled...

Inside Higher Ed - JSTOR for Life (October 17, 2011) - "HOURS OF FUN AWAIT ME TONIGHT," wrote Nicole Villeneuve, a 2009 graduate of Yale University, on Twitter. She was not speaking about a party, but she was referring to a reunion of sorts. In a deal with JSTOR, Villeneuve's alma mater had just announced it was giving her - and all Yale alumni - free access to the academic journal archive's catalog...

Community College Times - Colleges address space crunch with creative solutions (October 17, 2011) - Community colleges grappling with rising enrollments-and not enough money for new building projects-have come up with a variety of solutions. Many are expanding their online course offerings and some are forging facilities-based partnerships with businesses or other colleges...

Alumni Futures - 16 Tips for Engaging Your Alumni Online: Thunderbird, Part I (October 17, 2011) - I recently noticed that the Thunderbird School of Global Management (Arizona, USA) was generating steady, relevant interaction and growth in its LinkedIn Alumni Group and its Twitter feed. I asked Thunderbird's alumni relations coordinator Katie Mayer for insight into their approach. She and Samantha Novick (T-bird's PR & new media specialist) generously provided the following tips...

Inside Higher Ed - Faculty Fears in Washington (October 17, 2011) - It just got easier to lay off full-time faculty members in Washington State, thanks to a declaration of financial emergency last month by the State Board for Community and Technical Colleges. But some faculty leaders say the board's move is more about a power grab than saving money...

The Chronicle of Higher Ed - The Time-to-Degree Conundrum (October 16, 2011) - It's job-market season again, and for those who plan to hire new assistant professors, the usual embarrassment of riches awaits. For more than a generation now, job candidates have been hitting the market with amazing qualifications...

The Chronicle of Higher Ed - Adjunct Professors Often Lack Training in How to Handle Disabilities in the Classroom, Experts Say (October 16, 2011) - The news last week that an adjunct professor had asked a student with a stutter to save questions or comments until after class highlights concerns about how well the growing cadre of part-time instructors in higher education are, or can be, trained to deal with an array of classroom dilemmas, including how to handle students with disabilities...

The Chronicle of Higher Ed - Intellectual Roots of Wall St. Protest Lie in Academe (October 16, 2011) - Academics have become frequent visitors to Zuccotti Park, the 33,000-square-foot pedestrian plaza in the heart of New York City's financial district that is now the site of a nearly monthlong protest, Occupy Wall Street...

Inside Higher Ed - Booting Down (October 14, 2011) - Walk through any campus library and you see students hunkered down in their preferred corner or comfy chair with their laptops and cell phones in hand to aid in the process of cramming for their next exam. But are they studying or goofing off? Are they capable of actually staying on (work-related) task...

Community College Times - Bill encourages more contextual learning (October 14, 2011) - A bipartisan bill introduced in the House and Senate looks to better integrate academics with career and technical education programs to help prepare high school students for college-level work and high-skill careers...

Campus Technology - The Consumerization of IT: Pendulum or Wrecking Ball? (October 1, 2011) - Smartphones, affordable software, cloud computing, crowdsourcing, social media.... The burgeoning consumer-tech market is creating new challenges for higher education IT departments. As increased expectations of mobility and connectivity have students and faculty looking to consumer technology to meet their academic needs, IT must revamp operations and infrastructure to meet the demand, while keeping security risks and budgets in check...

Inside Higher Ed - The Rapid Rise of Merit Aid (October 19, 2011) - It will shock no one who pays close attention to college enrollment and financial aid patterns that over the last 15 years, colleges and states have awarded ever-greater proportions of their financial aid based on students' academic and other merit, rather than their financial need. But what may be a surprise is that the shift is so sizable that students from low-income backgrounds have seen their share of all institutional and state financial aid drop significantly...

USA Today - Student loan debt hits record levels (October 19, 2011) - Students and workers seeking retraining are borrowing extraordinary amounts of money through federal loan programs, potentially putting a huge burden on the backs of young people looking for jobs and trying to start careers...

Inside Higher Ed - Colleges Fail U.S. Financial Test (October 13, 2011) - Scores of private nonprofit colleges, and dozens of for-profit institutions, failed the federal government's disputed test aimed at measuring the "financial responsibility" of postsecondary institutions...The test, which is one of several standards that the government uses to gauge whether a college is financially strong enough to participate in the federal student aid programs...

Hartford Courant - High School Sends 96% Of Seniors To Two- And Four-Year Colleges (October 17, 2011) - Ninety-six percent of the Glastonbury High School Class of 2011 headed off to two- or four-year colleges, according to the guidance department...Manchester Community College topped the two-year college list with 56 students attending...

CT Mirror - Controversial ads to keep students in Hartford likely to resume (October 18, 2011) - Unfazed by the backlash sparked by a similar campaign, Hartford's school board has approved another round of television and radio advertising urging city parents to forgo the opportunity to send their children to suburban schools...

Hartford Courant - Jumoke Charter School Shows Odds Can Be Beaten (October 18, 2011) - The student populations seem much the same: Minority children from mostly working-class families attending schools in the city's North End. The school buildings are separated by just a few blocks. But the achievement levels are gaping...

CT Mirror - Letting parents know the odds of getting into a magnet school (October 17, 2011) - It took Paola Arrospide four years to get her daughter out of a low-performing Hartford public school and enrolled in a magnet school... But the odds of that lottery never were clear to the Arrospide, whose daughter was one of about 13,000 students who apply every year for a seat in the Hartford area's non-traditional public schools or a chance to attend a suburban school under a voluntary choice program...

Hartford Courant - Conn. continues push for $50M in education grants (October 17, 2011) - High-ranking members of some Connecticut General Assembly legislative committees are urging federal officials to support the state's request for a $50 million grant. The state's application for "Race to the Top" early-learning program grants is due to the U.S. Department of Education by Wednesday, a deadline that state officials are confident they will meet...

Hartford Courant - Conn. creates new early childhood education agency (October 18, 2011) - Supporters of Connecticut's application for up to $50 million in federal grants say they believe the state's chances have been strongly improved by the creation of a new Early Childhood Office. Gov. Dannel P. Malloy issued an executive order Monday establishing that agency within the Office of Policy and Management...

CT Mirror - Non-union workers getting $6.2 million in longevity pay next week (October 14, 2011) - State government will issue nearly $10.3 million in longevity payments to senior employees on Thursday, including nearly $6.2 million to non-union executives, managers and other staff and $4.1 million to union workers, according to numbers released Friday by Comptroller Kevin P. Lembo...Abut 5,200 other union employees--mostly professionals in higher education and the Judicial Branch--also will be bonuses, but at a reduced rate agreed to in the concession deal. Their payments total more than $3.6 million...

Inside Higher Ed - Ask the Administrator: Improved Open Admissions (October 19, 2011) - A regular reader writes: I teach at an open admission, 4 year college. Unlike community colleges, we actually pull our students from [several states]. I was having a conversation with another faculty member about our students, many of whom aren't particularly interested or engaged in school. She suggested that we should try to improve our student base, and that we could do that while keeping our open admission policy...

Chronicle of Higher Ed - In Victory for Open-Education Movement, Blackboard Embraces Sharing (October 19, 2011) - Professors who use Blackboard's software have long been forced to lock their course materials in an area effectively marked, "For Registered Students Only," while using the system. Today the company announced plans to add a "Share" button that will let professors make those learning materials free and open online...

Chronicle of Higher Ed - A College Education With Multiple Purposes (October 18, 2011) - There seem to be a few unspoken rules among the ruling class in higher ed. Among them: Don't say a purpose of a college education is to get a job, and don't refer to students or employers as consumers of a college education...

CT News Junkie - Cost Of An Adequate Education In CT (October 17, 2011) - More than two-thirds of Connecticut's school districts - some 483,000 students - are inadequately funded. That's 87 percent of the state's PK-12 students attending traditional public schools. These students do not have access to the resources their teachers and school districts need for delivering programs and services commensurate with the 21st century...

Chronicle of Higher Ed - Profs Are People, Too: Hacking the Classroom Bringing In the Personal (October 17, 2011) - The other day I was talking to a friend who is in the process of finishing her dissertation. She was describing how she had to push through writing her final chapter. The ideas just weren't coming-but she's on a deadline and so she wrote anyway. And, after pages of jumbled and unconvincing argument, she began to understand what she was writing. The ideas came, the argument cohered. She just had to get words on paper until the ideas followed...

Chronicle of Higher Ed - Pearson and Google Jump Into Learning Management With a New, Free System (October 13, 2011) - One of the world's biggest education publishers has joined with one of the most dominant and iconic software companies on the planet to bring colleges a new-and free-learning-management system with the hopes of upending services that affect just about every instructor, student, and college in the country...