Chicago's Arne Duncan Nominated as Education Secretary

Arne Duncan is President-elect Obama's choice for Secretary of Education. Duncan has administered Chicago's public-school system for the past seven years and is credited with increasing enrollment opportunities, raising test scores, and replacing ineffective teachers. According to the NY Times, "He argued that the nation's schools needed to be held accountable for student progress, but also needed major new investments, new talent and new teacher-training efforts." Duncan's position straddles the two major camps of American educators, and he often strives for compromise between opposing parties. He also helped draft Obama's education platform which emphasizes investments in early childhood education, teacher recruitment, performance-based teacher pay initiatives, training of principals, and the importance of science and math.

Are you satisfied with Obama's choice? How do you think Duncan could address the problems facing higher education? Your comments are welcome.

Anthropology Graces YouTube

The Chronicle of Higher Education published an article yesterday about how Kansas State University anthropologist, Michael Wesch, and his students are using video blogs to highlight the impact that Web 2.0 technologies can have on human interaction. He also gave a talk at the Library of Congress on Monday detailing the importance of social media. Wesch has become somewhat of a YouTube star, with his most popular video, “A Vision of Students Today,” receiving close to 2.4 million hits. His videos are available on YouTube and at mediatedcultures.net

Links:
Michael Wesch: Toward and ethnography of YouTube (PBS)

House Passes Student Loan Bill

"The Ensuring Continued Access to Student Loans Act of 2008" (H.R. 5715) easily passed through the House after receiving approval from both the House Education and Labor Committee and the House Rules Committee. However, the bill is expected to face some roadblocks in the Senate, and negotiations are likely to occur before it is finally passed. This legislation will increase limits on federally backed student loans by $2,000 per student, and will increase the total amount of federal loans students can borrow.

Additional information can be found below:

Copy of the bill [pdf]

Committee press release