Cover Story
Looking Back on 2020
The pandemic exacerbated long-simmering problems confronting colleges.
Highlights
The Pandemic
At Cornell University, few students who got Covid-19 fell seriously ill. But Stella Linardi did.
The Review
Selfish, hard-partying students make an easy villain. Uncovering the truth about Covid-19’s spread, on campus and off, is harder.
Also in the Issue
Pandemic Aid
Congress Will Give Colleges $20 Billion in Relief and — Surprise! — Some Long-Awaited Policy Reforms
While leaders said the Covid-19 stimulus bill offered far less than what higher ed needs, they cheered policy reforms like the second-chance Pell and a simplified application for student aid.
Academic Freedom
The dismissal of Garrett Felber, a tenure-track scholar of history, has ignited charges of retaliation by the University of Mississippi.
Fresh Data
Numbers of undergraduates, men, and at community colleges are all down. But they’ve increased at the graduate level and at for-profits.
Advice
A new book offers a prescription for how to “build a better graduate education.”
Advice
Protection against disgruntled students, dangerous colleagues, and abusive administrators.
The Review
No, it’s not OK to scrub an emeritus faculty member from a university website.
Advice
Unlike professors and administrators, staff members have few-to-no options for moving up.