Sometimes it’s easy to draw a direct line between the skills you learn in a particular college course and your intended career. Other times, you might be sitting in a general education class and asking yourself, “How will this help me?” In this op-ed, Angeline Thomas, a first-year pre-med student at Rutgers University, makes a …
Continue reading Books as medicine: Angeline Thomas on why reading matters for future doctors
Some say there is a vast “cheating epidemic” in colleges today. Writing studies scholar and Miami University professor Elizabeth Wardle disagrees. Instead of putting all the focus – and the blame – on students, Wardle argues that the problem lies in colleges themselves: how they are staffed, how they are funded, and what they say …
Continue reading Toward a better university: Elizabeth Wardle on how to fix higher education
College campuses have a long history of student protests, and these demonstrations invite questions about the limits of free speech. How far is too far? In this pair of essays, University of Pennsylvania law professor Claire Finkelstein and Trinity Washington University president Patricia McGuire present two different views of the role of free speech in …
Generative A.I. tools are rapidly evolving, and universities are quickly developing guidelines for how – and if – students should use them in the classroom. But what do students think? This op-ed, written by first-year college student Tylar Macintyre, responds to the growing use of A.I. detector tools to determine whether students have illicitly used …
We are “slowly becoming Homo plasticus,” scientist Megha Satyanarayana warns, citing increasing evidence of the pervasive presence of plastics in our bodies, water, air, and soil. In her argument, Satyanarayana describes how a consumer and convenience culture, a desire to make profits, and a slow regulatory process make it hard to address microplastic pollution. Megha …
It seems like everyone is talking about TikTok: its security risks, its seeming ubiquity among teenagers and adults alike. Writer Roxane Gay––whose father introduced her to the app––describes the problem of “pleasurably wasting hours and hours of time” on TikTok and warns about its purposeful addictive and exploitive nature. Is TikTok worth it? Roxane Gay, …
Continue reading It’s never enough: Roxane Gay on desire, addiction, and TikTok
Trash is piling up around the globe, from overflowing landfills to plastic waste washing up on shorelines. However, this problem extends beyond Earth itself. In this essay, Iris Gottlieb highlights a newer and often overlooked dumping ground: outer space. Gottlieb describes the human-made debris orbiting the planet and littering the Moon, arguing that outer space …
Continue reading Space junk: Iris Gottlieb on the growing problem of garbage in outer space
Could a generative AI chatbot have a real relationship with a person? Allison Pugh, a sociologist, argues no: “there is no human relationship when one half of the encounter is a machine,” she writes. In her argument, Pugh describes how care-focused generative AI platforms–such as the ones being used in education, medical, and therapy settings–damage …
College tuition costs continue to rise in the U.S., and even with student loan debt and college affordability reforms, middle-class students often struggle to pay for a college degree. The college affordability crisis matters beyond higher education: researchers have connected it to the shrinking middle class in the U.S. In this op-ed, Christine Schueckler, a …
Consider the expansive parking lots that surround buildings and the curbside parking spots that line many city and suburban streets. One study estimated that there are 3.4 parking spots per vehicle in the U.S. What could that space be used for instead? In this essay, researcher Henry Grabar examines the environmental, economic, and social costs …
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