The year is nearly over, which means it’s time to see how closely you’ve been paying attention to the news. For this week’s Briefing, we’re asking you to pick up your pencils and test your powers of recollection.
1. Donald J. Trump said he possesses a “natural instinct for science” because:
A. His uncle, John Trump, was a professor at MIT.
B. He had “chemistry” with women in college.
C. He has spent time in science labs at Liberty U.
D. He took a meteorology course at Wharton.
2. After the killing of Jamal Khashoggi, an MIT associate provost recommended that the university not sever its ties with Saudi donors for which of the following reasons:
A. None of the partnering entities helped plan the journalist’s murder.
B. Severing ties with these donors would likely do little to make the Saudi government less repressive.
C. MIT can use the money for good.
D. All of the above.
3. Donald Trump this year expressed confusion at which of the following higher-education terms:
A. accrediting agency
B. community college
C. unit record
D. liberal arts
4. A student-loan expert named Drew Cloud was quoted in The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, and across the internet until The Chronicle reported that:
A. He is the CEO of a student-loan servicer.
B. He is himself delinquent on $45,000 of student loans.
C. He’s really a recruiter for the U. of Phoenix, moonlighting as an “expert.”
D. He’s a fictional character.
5. Which of the following was not the subject of a legitimate academic paper this year:
A. Who tends to die in the HBO television show Game of Thrones, and how.
B. What would happen if the mass of Earth suddenly became blueberries.
C. Whether women have a right to take home the placenta after giving birth.
D. A tabulation of the royalties owed to the composer of “Happy Birthday.”
6. Which of the following phrases was not used by the provost of San Diego State U. — who subsequently stepped down — in an email to a biology professor:
A. “You are showered with unending curse and harmed, hurt and visited by evil a millionfold in everything you do throughout the rest of your life.”
B.“I am not necessarily cursing or wishing you evil. I am simply invoking the natural Law of Karma; the Law of Retributive Justice.”
C. “So that locusts swarm over the land and devour everything growing in the fields, everything left by the hail.”
D. “May my Lord Jesus Christ ensure that you reap what you sowed.”
7. Then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in a speech that colleges were creating:
A.“a generation of sanctimonious, sensitive, supercilious snowflakes.”
B. “an amalgamation of silly, soft-skinned, sobbing sorry-sayers.”
C. “a formulation of sassy, sarcastic, sedentary scholars.”
D. “an installation of skinny, scaffolded soprano saxophones.”
8. Which of the following activities did not occur at this year’s Science of Consciousness conference, in Tucson?
A. A demonstration of a brain-stimulation device, in which a tube was inserted far into the subject’s nostril.
B. A gong bath, during which the subject is bathed in the musical vibrations of a gong being struck.
C. A neural-energy competition pitting men against women to determine relative metaphysical strength by gender.
D. An exhibition of “spontaneous postural alignment” technique, in which a misaligned subject’s elbow is tapped with a gold medallion while the healer intones, “boy-yoi-yoing.”
9. What was hidden in a secret room behind a paper-towel dispenser at the State U. of New York College at Purchase?
A. A $245-million Powerball ticket.
B. A tiny nuclear power plant.
C. A stolen de Kooning painting.
D. A shrine to Danny DeVito.
10. Match the college with the incident that brought it controversy:
A. The president was recorded drinking from a beer bong with students before a football game.
B. A faculty member shoved African-American graduates off the stage for excessive celebration.
C. The president brought a porn star to campus.
D. A donor offered to take female employees of a campus think tank shoe-shopping.
E. Minutes after Barbara Bush’s death was reported, a professor tweeted that the former first lady had been “an amazing racist.”
1. U. of Virginia
2. Southeast Missouri State U.
3. U. of Florida
4. California State U. at Fresno
5. U. of Wisconsin at La Crosse
Answers: 1. A. 2. D. 3. B. 4. D. 5. D. 6. C. 7. A. 8. C. 9. D. 10. A-2 B-3 C-5 D-1 E-4
