Donors from Academe Favor Obama by a Wide Margin

In The Chronicle of Higher Education this week, we take a look at giving to presidential candidates from college employees.

Professors, college administrators, and other educators have donated eight times as much to Barack Obama as they have to John McCain, the widest gulf in giving to presidential candidates by academics in the past five presidential elections, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics.

Through the end of last month, donors from academe had contributed just over $12.2-million to Mr. Obama, compared with just over $1.5-million to Mr. McCain, according to the center, a nonprofit research group whose data on giving to presidential candidates date to the 1992 election.

For more details on giving from academe, see our story here.

Last Presidential Debate Includes First Direct Exchanges on Education

In the last question in the last of three presidential debates, John McCain and Barack Obama fielded their first, and only, question in these forums that focused squarely on education policy.

Near the end of the 90-minute event at Hofstra University, the debate’s moderator, Bob Schieffer of CBS News, asked the candidates to respond to trends that show that the United States spends more per capita on education than other countries yet trails many nations on measures such as students’ abilities to compete in mathematics and science. Mr. Schieffer asked whether that posed a national-security threat.

Senator Obama responded first, saying “this probably has more to do with our economic future than any” issue. He agreed that the problems Mr. Schieffer identified do have an effect on national security.

He said the nation’s education problems need to be fixed by spending more money and by reforming the system. He touted the importance of early-childhood education, said the United States needed to recruit a new generation of teachers, especially in math and science, and argued that the government should provide teachers with more professional development and better pay in exchange for being required to meet higher standards.

The Democrat said the United States needed to make college more affordable and help students who are taking on high levels of debt. Graduating from college with large amounts of loans, he said, deters students from pursuing some careers. He pitched his plan to provide students a tax credit of up to $4,000 for tuition in exchange for performing community service.

Senator Obama also challenged Senator McCain’s commitment to improving college access and affordability. The Democrat said one of his opponent’s advisers had responded to a question about why Mr. McCain didn’t have more-detailed higher-education proposals by saying that the government can’t give money to every interest group that comes along. “I don’t think America’s youth are interest groups,” Senator Obama said. “They’re our future.”

Senator McCain didn’t respond directly to that charge. In his answer to Mr. Schieffer, the Republican called education the “civil-rights issue of the 21st century” and said providing choice and competition among elementary and secondary schools would help improve inequities in the quality of education children receive.

He voiced support for programs like Teach for America and Troops to Teachers. He also urged changes in the student-loan programs that would make sure graduates are given repayment schedules they can meet and that would raise the maximum amount students can borrow in federally supported loans, pegging those increases to the rate of inflation.

Both candidates made passing references to college issues and education policy in other portions of the debate.

During a discussion about trade and energy policy, Senator McCain touted the need to create education and training programs for displaced workers at community colleges.

Senator Obama spoke several times about the need for the nation to make sure more people can go to college and said the government should put more money into education to make sure every young person can learn. He noted that his running mate, Joseph R. Biden Jr., shares his priority about expanding college access.

Crossposted from The Chronicle of Higher Education's Campaign U. blog.

When a Debate Comes to Campus ...

The four colleges that are playing host to presidential or vice-presidential debates this year have had to raise (or spend) millions of dollars and navigate an array of logistical complexities to prepare for the events as they take a turn in the national spotlight.

For a glimpse at what it was like for the chancellor of the University of Mississippi to guide the campus through a day of worry and festivity as the first presidential debate took place there, see The Chronicle of Higher Education's account from behind the scenes here.

We also have published a video that shows how students and college employees basked in the spotlight, with the atmosphere seeming akin to a political version of ESPN's College Gameday.

Education and Spending in Last Night's Debate

In Tuesday night’s town-hall debate at Belmont University, Barack Obama and John McCain spent much of the 90-minute event discussing the nation’s economic turmoil, government reform, and energy, tax, health-care, and foreign policies. But the presidential candidates did touch on spending and policy issues that would affect higher education.

Senator Obama spoke about making college affordability a priority even as he would rein in government spending in other areas. Senator McCain focused on eliminating spending he considers wasteful, including federal earmarks that often benefit college projects, and advocated an across-the-board freeze in federal spending.

When responding to a question by the debate’s moderator, Tom Brokaw, about how he would prioritize the issues of energy, health care, and entitlement reform, Senator Obama said energy would be his top priority, health care would be his second, and education his third. Education, the Democratic nominee said, has to be near the top of the list so the nation can help young people be competitive in the global economy.

In response to a separate question about what sacrifices he would ask the American people to make to help fix the economy and improve the nation, Senator Obama said he would seek incentives to decrease energy consumption and also to encourage volunteerism (including by doubling the ranks of the Peace Corps), something he said he found young people to be especially interested in.

Senator Obama also said that the federal government needed to cut spending, but he singled out efforts to improve college affordability as an area where spending should be increased and not decreased. Citing his own past, and his ability to attend college with the help of scholarships, he said the American dream seemed to be diminishing, in part because young people “who’ve got the grades and the will and the drive to go to college” don’t attend because they don’t have the money.

Senator McCain, meanwhile, focused on reining in government spending by eliminating earmarks — spending that individual lawmakers allocate on a noncompetitive basis to colleges and other entities — and by freezing most federal spending. The areas he singled out as exceptions that might receive more government support were defense and veterans affairs.

“Obviously we’ve got to stop the spending spree that’s going on in Washington,” the Republican candidate said, adding that he wanted to reduce the debt that is being left to young people.

(This item was crossposted from The Chronicle of Higher Education's Campaign U. blog.)

The candidates on tuition costs

Associated Press reporter Justin Pope offers this comparison of the candidates on college affordability.

The Republican Student Vote

Eight years ago, when he ran against George W. Bush in the Republican primary, John McCain held both the maverick label and the support of many college students.

But in this year's Republican contest, Ron Paul was the darling of many students on college campuses, even after he left the Republican race, and that support was still evident among the many young voters who skipped class to be at his daylong rally on Tuesday in Minneapolis.

The presence of thousands of supporters of Representative Paul, a septuagenarian libertarian from Texas, is a reminder to Mr. McCain and his supporters, gathered this week across the Mississippi River in St. Paul, that they will have to compete for the youngest voters. And they face a tough fight against the Democratic candidate in the general election, Barack Obama, who even the president of the College Republicans says sometimes seems like he's "running to be a pop star."

While Mr. McCain leads Mr. Obama among all other age groups of voters, he trails him among those ages 18 to 34, 37 percent to 55 percent, according to a Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll conducted late last month.

So, what happened? Did Senator McCain change? Or did young voters?

Read The Chronicle's story, by Karin Fischer, to find out what political scientists and others say.

We also have this video of students explaining why they support Mr. Paul.

Other Chronicle coverage of the Republican convention, including reports on student protests, what college students are doing at the convention, how young delegates responded to Sarah Palin's speech, and other topics can be followed on our Campaign U. blog.

GOP Platform on Higher Education

The party platform Republicans approved this week in St. Paul provides red meat to conservative voters, decrying the "leftist dogmatism that dominates" many colleges and opposing efforts to provide education benefits to some illegal immigrants, a break once strongly advocated by John McCain.

In another difference with Senator McCain's positions, the platform advocates a total ban on research using embryonic stem cells. Senator McCain has said he supports federal financing of programs that use amniotic fluid and adult stem cells and "other types of scientific study that do not involve the use of human embryos." As a senator, Mr. McCain has voted in favor of allowing research on human embryos left over from fertility treatments.

On other fronts, the platform document singles out for praise colleges that spend more of their endowment funds on student aid, a cause championed by some Congressional Republicans, and calls for a presidential commission to examine the "tuition spiral." And it acknowledges the key role that higher education must play in maintaining the United States' innovative edge in an increasingly competitive global economy.

Unlike the policy statement approved last week by Democrats at their convention in Denver, the Republican platform says little about expanding student aid, even as it decries the increase in college costs. Instead, it notes Republicans' past advocacy of measures to provide tax incentives for families to save for college and expresses support for private lenders in the student-loan marketplace.

See The Chronicle's story, by Karin Fischer, for more details about the Republican platform's provisions related to higher education.

Sarah Palin on Higher Education

When Sarah Palin, John McCain's running mate, ran for governor of Alaska two years ago she touted her support for the state's university system, calling it a resource, an economic driver, and a cornerstone of pride for Alaskans.

Ms. Palin, who is the first woman and youngest person to have been elected governor of Alaska, has not made higher education an especially prominent priority of her administration. But the state's government--which is enjoying an economic boom, thanks to rising oil and natural-gas prices--has recently been treating the University of Alaska system well, at least in terms of its budget.

For the 2008-9 budget year, the university system received a 7-percent increase in funds, only the fourth time in 20 years that the system has won an increase greater than the state's fixed-cost requirement. The university plans to use the extra money to expand programs in high-demand fields, such as health and engineering, and to support research into climate change, energy, and biomedical sciences. The state also provided a fourfold increase in the university's budget for deferred maintenance, which rose to $48-million.

When she was running for governor in 2006, Ms. Palin laid out several plans for the university system. She said her administration would provide "an appropriate level" of funds for the system, adding that it had been "consistently under-funded" since the mid-1980s.

She also touted the importance of generally supporting university research and the role of the system in work-force development, including preparing people for jobs building and operating a natural-gas pipeline. "The time is now," she said on her "Sarah Palin for Governor" Web site, "to prepare the workforce for the gasline economy."

She also promised to expand nursing programs, touted the need to create a state need-based aid program, and committed to helping reduce the university's backlog of deferred-maintenance projects.

Here is the link to our original post on The Chronicle's Campaign U. blog.

College Students at the Convention

Chronicle reporter Kelly Field has continued to file a series of dispatches from Denver at our Campaign U. blog.

Among the items that have been posted there over the past two days are:

A video in which college students who supported Hillary Clinton explain how they now feel about Barack Obama;

An item about professors and students who are using the convention as a teaching tool; and

A summary of a panel discussion about activists' efforts to get out the youth vote in new ways.

You can also read about how students rate Jill Biden as a community-college instructor.

For-Profit Colleges Want to Hear More About Higher Ed

The Career College Association didn't need to hire a caterer for the reception it threw this week in Denver aimed at keeping higher education front and center in the minds (and stomachs) of delegates to the Democratic National Convention. That's one of the advantages of being an association with a nearby culinary college in your membership ranks.

Using the Art Institute of Colorado as its venue, the association feted a couple of hundred delegates and others with dishes prepared by students -- grilled skirt steak garnished with pesto, Gorgonzola cheese, and arugula, a chicken-and-penne pasta dish, and tiramisu for dessert -- while also entertaining them with demonstrations of the ice- and watermelon-sculpting skills and industrial-design techniques taught at the institute.

Harris Miller, president of the association, said he hoped the event's message would stick with the delegates long after the rich food had been digested. "Neither presidential campaign has spoken enough about higher education and the importance of career education to our economy," said Mr. Miller, in an telephone interview with Chronicle reporter Goldie Blumenstyk.

Mr. Miller said the political leaders needed to focus more on how education could help the country improve its economic competitiveness, but so far, he said, those debates have centered on other issues. "The people who hate immigrants and the people who hate trade are more vocal," he said. "It's kind of frustrating."

The association plans to hold a similar event at an Art Institutes International of Minnesota next week, during the Republican National Convention in St. Paul.

Democratic Platform Proposes More Money for Student Aid and Research

The policy platform that Democrats approved at their convention yesterday promises more federal student aid, greater support for research, and an end to the politicization of science.

It largely mirrors Barack Obama's plans for education and science, including proposals the presumed nominee has pressed to provide a refundable $4,000 education tax credit in exchange for public service and to simplify the process of applying for student aid by allowing families to apply by checking a box on their federal income-tax forms.

The document also promises to double federal funds for basic science research, make the research-and-development tax credit permanent, and lift the ban on the use of federal money for research involving embryonic stem cells that would otherwise have been discarded.

And on the subject of racial preferences, the document states: "We support affirmative action, including in federal contracting and higher education, to make sure that those locked out of the doors of opportunity will be able to walk through those doors in the future."

See The Chronicle's story today, written by Kelly Field, for more details about what the document proposes for higher education.

For continuing coverage of the convention, check out our Campaign U. blog.

Biden's Record on Higher Education

U.S. Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. is better known for his role as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee than for his higher-education proposals. But the six-term congressman from Delaware has championed college-affordability issues during his tenure and is also pretty familiar with the inside of a college classroom.

Senator Biden, tapped on Saturday as the Democratic vice-presidential candidate, has taught a seminar on constitutional law at Widener University School of Law since 1991. His wife, Jill, is a longtime educator who teaches English at Delaware Technical & Community College.

During Senator Biden's brief Democratic presidential primary run last fall, he made college access and affordability some of the major themes of his campaign. Among other proposals, Senator Biden recommended replacing two existing federal tax breaks for college expenses with a refundable tax credit of up to $3,000 per year meant to cover the average cost of tuition and fees at a public two-year college and more than half of those at a public four-year college.

For more on Senator Biden's higher-education background and record, see The Chronicle's story today and also our Campaign U. coverage of his campaign for the presidential nomination last fall.

McCain Takes a Stand Against Affirmative Action

John McCain has come out in support of a proposed ballot initiative in his home state of Arizona that would bar public colleges and other state agencies from using racial and ethnic preferences.

He announced his support for the measure in an interview last month on ABC’s This Week.

The position that Senator McCain took was regarded as a reversal of his stand on the issue a decade ago. Back in 1998, he had called such measures “divisive.” Referenda with language like the Arizona ballot measure’s also have been proposed in Colorado and Nebraska.

Barack Obama told a gathering of minority journalists in Chicago that he was “disappointed” in the position Senator McCain had taken and described such ballot measures as “all too often designed to drive a wedge between people.”

Senator Obama provided detailed responses to questions about his stance on affirmative action in an interview with The Chronicle of Higher Education conducted last fall.

GOP Asks Public for Input on Accountability in Education

The Republican national committee is asking for public input as it constructs the party's policy platform.

Among the issues the Republican platform committee is urging online visitors to weigh in on is "accountability in education."

"Republicans will develop a party platform that seeks to improve the American educational system at all levels," party officials declare on their Web page where they then provide visitors a series of questions designed to provoke input.

Among them are: How should government address high tuition expenses? Is there a problem with too much ideological dogmatism in higher education? How should the federal government respond to colleges and universities that insist upon discriminating against the United States military?

Within a week after Republicans unveiled their online platform building project, Democrats announced that they would provide a similar venue for public input.

Clinton Weighs in on Tumult in Student-Loan Industry

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton last week unveiled a plan to ensure that students are not left without money for college as a result of the withdrawal over recent weeks of dozens of lenders from the guaranteed-student-loan program.

Her ideas, outlined in this news release, largely mirror action Congress is already taking or urging.

Here's a link to The Chronicle's Campaign U. blog item on Senator Clinton's plan.

A Scholarly Take on the Iowa Caucus

For all the hype that it generates, does the Iowa caucus actually play a major role in shaping the presidential race? Should it?

Political scientists have chewed over those questions since 1972, when the Iowa Democratic Party moved its caucus from April to the then-startlingly-early date of January 24. (Iowa Republicans followed suit four years later.)

At our Campaign U. blog, we spoke with Christopher C. Hull, an adjunct assistant professor of government at Georgetown University and a former legislative aide in Des Moines, about his take. He wades into these debates over the Iowa caucus in a new book, Grassroots Rules: How the Iowa Caucus Helps Elect American Presidents (Stanford University Press).

Mr. Hull concedes that New Hampshire packs a stronger punch than Iowa. But he argues that the New Hampshire vote is partly shaped by the Iowa results — and that Iowa’s mediating role appears to be growing stronger over time, perhaps because the Internet allows candidates to quickly exploit shifts in momentum. (John Kerry, for example, had an online fund-raising windfall during the days between the Iowa caucus and the New Hampshire primary in 2004.)

The full Q&A can be found here.

Obama the Clear Favorite of Academic Donors

College administrators, faculty members, and other educators have donated just over $6.2-million to the presidential candidates so far this election season, with more than three-quarters of the donations going to Democrats.

A package of stories and graphics running in The Chronicle of Higher Education this week provides details about some of the top academic donors to the candidates and why they are giving.

Sen. Barack Obama is the clear favorite of college employees. The Democrat from Illinois has received about one-third of the total, or slightly more than $2.1-million, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics, a Washington-based nonpartisan research group.

The amount donated to Mr. Obama is nearly 30 percent more than what Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, of New York, has received. She ranked second with about $1.6-million.

Mitt Romney, the top Republican on the list, received less than one-third of the amount Mr. Obama got from academe. The former governor of Massachusetts raked in close to $564,000 from higher education.

By institution, the employees of Harvard, Stanford, and Columbia Universities top the list of total donations to presidential candidates. Harvard's employees were the top donors to Mr. Obama, Ms. Clinton, and Mr. Romney.

Edwards: Tapping Working-Class Roots to Focus on Opportunity

Few contenders this presidential season have made higher education as fundamental to their candidacy as has John Edwards, the former U.S. senator from North Carolina. He has called for simplifying federal financial aid, overhauling the student-loan system, and providing a year’s free tuition to all college students. For Mr. Edwards, who grew up making do in small, Southern towns, the issue of college access feeds into a broader theme of his campaign, that of providing economic, educational, and social opportunity to all Americans.

In the the latest installment of The Chronicle's series of profiles of the leading candidates for president, we take a look at Mr. Edwards’s efforts to establish a pilot college-access program in his home state and how his own experience could shape his perspective as president.

We have also posted a Q&A from a Chronicle interview Mr. Edwards that was conducted in 2006, when he was director of the Center for Poverty, Work, and Opportunity at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Romney Brings a Businessman's Perspective to Higher Education

After being elected governor of Massachusetts, one of Mitt Romney’s first acts was to propose far-reaching changes in the state’s public-college system.

Mr. Romney’s audacious overhaul failed, felled by opposition from a Democratic legislature and public colleges themselves. But political observers say his effort offers insight into the Republican presidential hopeful’s leadership style as well as the way in which he uses data to drive policy decisions.

In the fifth of The Chronicle's series of profiles of the leading presidential candidates, we look at how Mr. Romney’s four years as governor may offer important clues about how he might tackle higher-education issues if elected president.

Obama: A Favorite of Academe Who Once Led Harvard Through a Racial Storm

One of the early tests of Barack Obama’s political skills came when he was a law student at Harvard University in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

In the midst of intense campus debates over faculty diversity and other divisive issues, Mr. Obama became the first black student to be elected president of the Harvard Law Review. At the law journal, he presided over difficult discussions among intellectuals with widely different views. Yet his professors say he was able to set an amicable tone and, at the same time, hold fast to his own beliefs.

In the fourth of The Chronicle's series of profiles of the leading candidates for president, we take a look at how Mr. Obama has won the favor of many in academe and the kind of “professorial president” he might make if he were elected.

On our Campaign U. blog we have also published the full transcript of a Q&A we conducted via email with Mr. Obama's campaign. In it, he discusses his views and positions on various higher-education topics, including affirmative action, the federal government's role in reining in college costs, and the importance of education in preparing working families for a global economy.