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A new Web site helps parents and students sort through factors to consider when choosing a college. Higher-education officials had better get used to such tools to judge them, writes Jeff Selingo.

College commencement season is upon us, and in just a few weeks, the Class of 2013 will begin their post-college life. Those entering the job market seem to be hedging their bets: 1 in 3 soon-to-be graduates report applying for more than 40 jobs, according to one survey. For them, the news continues to be [...]

My 3 1/2 year-old daughter recently saw me wearing a sweatshirt from my undergraduate alma mater (Ithaca College) and asked me what it spelled. When I told her, she replied: What is college? A profound question from a 3 1/2 year-old and one being asked by college leaders and students alike these days as tuition [...]

At a conference this week in Arizona, Steve Case, the AOL founder, offered colleges three key lessons from the changes sweeping the sector, writes Jeff Selingo.

College professors increasingly complain about the consumer mentality of their students: In exchange for shelling out ever greater amounts of tuition dollars, students expect to be treated to easy A’s and maximum flexibility in assignments and class attendance. Students should be savvy consumers of higher education—but not in the classroom. Instead, they, and their parents, [...]

Innovation needs risk-taking as its fuel, but according to a recent article in The Wall Street Journal, workers are increasingly afraid to take chances on the job: “After years of high employment and scared from rounds of company cost-cutting and layoffs, managers say their workers seem to have become allergic to risk.” A college campus [...]

The Education Department’s clarification on “competency-based” programs has potentially far-reaching consequences that could allow colleges to reimagine the entire academic calendar and provide much-needed flexibility for students, writes Jeff Selingo.

When my parents bought their first house in the early 1960s, they focused on buying a place to live in and raise their children. By the time I purchased my first house early last decade, buying a house was as much about the “investment” as it was about buying something in order to put a [...]

By focusing on rankings and emulation, the prestige race doesn’t reward experimentation or differentiation, leaving most colleges unready for the challenges of the future, writes Jeff Selingo.

Nothing moves fast in higher ed, except for MOOCs. A year ago very few people had heard of the acronym for Massive Open Online Course. Now stories about the courses attracting tens of thousands of people for free are almost a weekly occurrence in The New York Times. Times columnist Tom Friedman writes about MOOCs [...]