by Aman Batheja The JR Central N700 Series is a Japanese Shinkansen bullet train developed by two railway companies in Japan. One of those companies, JR Central, is the lead investor in a firm developing a high-speed rail line between Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth that would use the same type of trains. Read more…
Texas Tribune Editor’s note: This story has been updated throughout.
In a letter to the co-chairs of the House Select Committee on Transparency in State Agency Operations, a lawyer for embattled University of Texas System Regent Wallace Hall clarified some of the motivations behind Hall’s ongoing investigation into the system’s flagship university.
The committee is currently investigating whether or not Hall’s controversial behavior as a regent warrants impeachment. The lawyer, Steve Ryan, describes Hall’s actions as “not a basis for impeachment.” Read more…
NASHVILLE (AP) – A Republican state lawmaker wants to freeze tuition at Tennessee’s colleges and universities.
Sen. Jim Summerville of Dickson says he plans to file legislation during the next session to keep tuition at the current rates.
The Tennessee Board of Regents and the University of Tennessee system recently adopted tuition hikes ranging from 3 percent to 6 percent
Summerville says the hikes cause students to take out more student loans.
TBR Chancellor John Morgan says the freeze would restrict the ability of colleges and universities to fund needed programs.
For the second time this month, state Sen. Judith Zaffirini has been sued for alleged “gross mismanagement” of an estimated $150 million fortune in Laredo that she and two others help control.
Josefina Alexander Gonzalez, 98, and deceased sister Delfina Alexander, who owned about 1,000 acres of South Texas land, formed five companies between 1995 and 2002 for developing the property. Read more…
In June, a new entrant quietly joined the fray in the ongoing open records wars between the Legislature and the University of Texas System: Austin businessman Jeff Sandefer, who filed an open records request with state Sen. Judith Zaffirini, D-Laredo, the former chairmwoman of the Senate Higher Education Committee. Read more…
By Jacob Kerr
As the House Transparency Committee took a step closer to possibly impeaching UT System Regent Wallace Hall yesterday, board Chairman Gene Powell wrote a letter to Rep. Jim Pitts, R-Waxahachie, in defense of Hall’s actions.
In a recent opinion piece in the Austin American-Statesman, Pitts criticized Hall’s large open records requests for information from UT-Austin. Pitts also filed a resolution in the House to impeach Hall last month. In the letter obtained by Texas Monthly, Powell defends Hall’s actions. Read more…
by Weston Hicks of Agenda Wise
With hypocrisy so pungent only a politician would try it, Jim Pitts wrote an article decrying transparency abuse, aiming his stinky cannon at an emerging champion of good government, UT Regent Wallace Hall Jr. The Austin American-Statesman published this gem. Read more…
Newly appointed regents McAllen Judge Ernest Aliseda and Hilcorp Energy Company CEO Jeffrey Hildebrand will now begin serving on the board. Current UT Regent Paul Foster was also confirmed, and will continue serving on the board. Senator John Whitmire, D-Houston, was the sole senator to vote against the nominees. He said he would do so earlier in the week at a hearing on Monday.
BETTER GUIDANCE Engineers with the Lighting Science Group Corporation, Mark Oostdyk, right, and Ran Zhou, testing road lights.
AFTER the joy of the birth itself, parenthood sometimes brings the unwelcome news that a newborn has jaundice and must wear goggles and be placed under special lights. Imagine how different this experience might be if there were no goggles, just a warm blanket covering the tiny body, a healing frequency of blue light emanating from its folds. Read more…
Ronald Bailey | reason.com Explosions, poisons, pollution, cancer, and global warming all considered.
Gasland Part II, the sequel to director/activist Josh Fox‘s earlier anti-fracking docudrama Gasland, will run on HBO next Monday. It appears to have rounded up the usual corporate villains and appealing victims of profit-hungry capitalist skullduggery, rather than telling the more substantial story: that fracking combined with horizontal drilling has unleashed a bonanza of cheap natural gas. Read more…
by Angela Covo Last week, Rep. Rubén Hinojosa, D-Mercedes, chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute (CHCI), announced Dr. Francisco Cigarroa will be the recipient of The Chair’s Award, one of CHCI’s highest honors presented to one “who has dedicated his or her public or private career to improving the lives of Hispanic Americans.”
by Jordan Long
Let me preface the rest of the article by stating clearly that this Aggie is not especially hostile towards Longhorns unless a sports rivalry is involved.
With that in mind I think I can legitimately ask, what the heck is happening in Austin? Read more…
A civil lawsuit filed Wednesday afternoon in Webb County alleges the three co-executors of a family estate — among them state Sen. Judith Zaffirini, D-Laredo — mismanaged the trusts’ assets and ended up wrongfully taking control of “millions of dollars of real property.” Read more…
Photo provided courtesy of The Texas Tribune
Mob Ruleby Nathan Ofe of Empower Texans
If you’ve never seen mob rule in action, last night the Texas Senate was your chance. Republicans and Democrats alike used tactics that exemplify why so many are inclined to disengage from political participation. Read more…
The Huffington Post | By Tyler Kingkade
More than half of student loan borrowers are concerned about their ability to repay their college debt, including people working full time, research released Wednesday by the Urban Institute concludes. Read more…
As a part of their activities marking the second anniversary of the launch of the Materials Genome Initiative, the White House has cited the upcoming MITx massive open online course (MOOC) 3.086x Innovation and Commercialization as a key resource for bringing innovation to market more effectively. Read more…
Texas Tribune: What is your motivation for repeated requests for significant amounts of information? Why have you not been more public about your motivations?
Wallace Hall: My initial review of the pre-existing open records documents was part of an effort to make system-wide improvements in how we manage our TPIA requests. Read more…
It’s 1692 in Salem, Massachusetts and Rep. Jim Pitts has accused regent Wallace Hall Jr. of being a witch… or is it a “witch hunt?” Which witch is he referring to? Either way, there are a lot of unsubstantiated accusations toward Hall by Pitts. If you read HR 230, the subtitle should read: Pitts redefines the law and uses the term “witch hunt” to suit his needs of vengeance and retribution. Which black kettle is which witch in? Read more…
by Michael Quinn Sullivan of Empower Texans
By asking pesky questions about possible corruption and influence peddling at the state’s flagship public university, a UT regent is being threatened with impeachment by senior legislators. This is a clear abuse of power by legislative appointees of House Speaker Joe Straus and Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst. Read more…
Graham Spanier was the nation’s highest-paid public university executive the year he was fired. Jo Ann Gora, by most accounts, has done an excellent job as president of Ball State University. By one measure, she outshined all but four presidents of public universities last year: pay.
Gora’s $984,647 salary was the fifth highest among her cohorts nationwide. Read more…
Ralph K.M. Haurwitz
As parents and students struggle to keep up with rising college tuition and take on greater burdens of debt, universities are being challenged to justify the ballooning athletic fees they tack on to the bill. Read more…
3M and the Texas Alliance for Minorities in Engineering launch a new 40-foot trailer aimed to inspire science and engineering careers for Texas youth. Read more…
Fujitsu Laboratories of America and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology today announced the joint development of a personalized learning platform that enhances the effectiveness of online learning. Read more…
Natural gas is much cleaner than coal but it’s also important that its energy return on investment (EROI) – the total input energy with the energy expected to be made available to end users – is similar to coal, according to a paper in the Journal of Industrial Ecology. Read more…
jarmendariz@themonitor.com Building a new public university that encompasses the Rio Grande Valley has become the law of the land. Read more…
Texas Gov. Rick Perry has vetoed a bill from the senate that would weaken the powers of boards of regents across the state. Read more…
Susan Adams, Forbes Staff A new national study has found that the more money parents pay for their kids’ college educations, the worse their kids tend to perform, at least when it comes to grades. Read more…
Pile it on. It’s easy hide behind buzz words. Regent Hall is doing a fine job. He is performing his sworn duty with honesty, integrity and honor. Regents Hicks and Stillman are continuing poor form and are tarnishing the honor of the regents by continuing the controversy. It is time to let justice prevail. If there is an impropriety by requests, let there be hearings. If not, let regent Hall do his job. Read more…
By Josh Hicks, A form of nepotism prohibited within federal agencies has become “open and widely accepted” at the Energy Department, according to a federal watchdog report.Energy Department inspector general Gregory H. Friedman said in the report last week that one of the agency’s senior managers advocated for three of his college-age children to be hired for department internships last year. Read more…
For higher education followers, one of the great lingering mysteries of the 83rd session is the fate of a special committee that was formed to look into governance issues at the University of Texas System. Read more…
UT Austin to Expand Blended Learning Offerings to Improve Student Success and First-Year Experience Read more…
Here you have it. The words straight from The Chairman; Gene Powell. I an excellent interview by Jake Silverstein of the Texas Monthly the Chairman expressed his thoughts on Higher education, the UT controversy, and how MOOCS are changing the face of America. A good read without the usual biased negative media slant on the regents.
Regents have offered high level of support, By Red McCombs Read more…
Serving as the student regent on the University of Texas System Board of Regents offers me a unique perspective. Read more…
By Ralph K.M. Haurwitz – American-Statesman Staff
The chief financial officer of the University of Texas and a member of its governing board have reached a truce, at least for now, concerning the latter’s access to records entrusted to the former. Read more…
By Andrew Messamore Daily Texan
As the attorney general investigates the University of Texas Law School Foundation, legislators and former Foundation trustees are continuing to hammer out the fine line between the University and the private institutions that support the 40 Acres. Read more…
By Megan Strickland, Alexa Ura of Daily Texan
Recent public battles over lack of oversight in the University of Texas Law Foundation threaten to bring substantial changes to a complex mechanism of private fundraising developed over several decades that has successfully raised billions of dollars alongside internal fundraising efforts. Read more…
The University of Texas Board of Regents has been getting more than its fair share of press lately, but often for the wrong reasons. Read more…
by Reeve Hamilton of texas tribune
On Thursday night, the University of Texas at Austin opened four free online courses for open registration. By Monday morning, total enrollment stood at 14,000 and counting. Read more…
Guest Column by Thomas K. Lindsay for Texas Weekly Higher education, in Texas and nationally, faces a crisis. Read more…
The Board of Regents of The University of Texas System I believe, seek a positive direction in the current controversy before the reputation of Texas is sullied by the ongoing smear campaign against them and Gov. Perry. Read more…
Teens from 9 cities in the United States, India and the United Kingdom give a thundering answer in a global business plan competition that culminated The Indus Entrepreneurs`TiE Young Entrepreneurs program (TyE) in Raleigh, NC on April 30th at Cisco Systems and NC State University. Read more…
Let’s take a temperate step back from the “shooting war” between the University of Texas regents and the president of UT-Austin. Read more…
Here’s an academic question – or more precisely, a story about academics at the University of Texas at Austin: What’s the difference between trying to influence others’ views and “influence peddling”? Read more…
Lawmakers, Observers React to Tense UT System Meeting by Reeve Hamilton of Texas Tribune
Longtime employees of the University of Texas System said they could not recall a split vote on the board of regents, which has traditionally settled differences behind closed doors and presented a unified front. That changed on Wednesday, catching higher education observers and even some lawmakers off guard. Read more…
Just in time to celebrate Open Education Week, here comes a new initiative, the School of Open, a learning environment focused on increasing our understanding of “openness” and the benefits it brings to creativity and education in the digital age.
Developed by the collaborative education platform Peer to Peer University (P2PU) with organizational support from Creative Commons, the School of Open aims to spread understanding of the power of this brave new world through free online classes.
We hear about it all the time: Universal access to research, education and culture—all good things, without a doubt—made possible by things like open source software, open educational resources and the like.
But what are these various communities and what do they mean? How can we all learn more and get involved? Read more…
ACTA Univision Austin
