UNH's Thompson Hall. (Media Credit/Jimmy Emerson via Flickr)

The University of New Hampshire ranked number one in a recent Daily Beast list about the nation’s top 50 “druggiest” colleges. Bryant University follows at number two, with the University of Maine taking the number three spot.

The Daily Beast based its rankings on the prevalence of drugs on campus as reported by students to the website College Prowler, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services statistics measuring drug use by state and U.S. Department of Education data for on-campus drug-related arrests in 2009.

Williams College, Northeastern University and the University of Vermont are a few of the other New England colleges that made the list.

Other Daily Beast lists include the 30 Deadliest Meals of 2010 and America’s 25 Coldest Cities.

PISA, Italy — Student protests literally exploded all over the Italian peninsula this week in an effort to block the approval of the new infamous Gelmini reform, which aims at privatizing the public university and turning it into a profit-making machine.

Thousands of students have held demonstrations all over the peninsula and occupied university buildings. In Rome protests were held in front of the Senate, and students tried to break into the building. Another group of hundreds of people broke into the Colosseum and hung a banner saying “No profit on our future.” In the ancient Roman monument that was originally used for gladiatorial contests involving predatory animals, the students sang “Today we are the lions!”

In Pisa and in Bologna the students targeted the train station and the airports. Similarly, students occupied the port in Palermo, the Mole Antonelliana in Turin, the Ministry of Treasure in Milan, the Basilica of San Marco in Venice, and so on. The government’s response has been to issue charges and make some arrests, but his hasn’t broken the spirit of the protesters.

The key points of the Gelmini reform: Grants and scholarships won’t be given according to the student’s family income anymore, but only on a “merit” basis, which is revolutionary in the Italian education system.

This means that if you’re poor and you have bad grades, don’t even try to go to university.

Another major criteria will be the career students choose: students who pick practical subjects that create useful workforce (e.g. Engineering) will be much more likely to get a scholarship than students who would like to study Philosophy or History. In addition students will be in debt before even graduating for paying university.

Postgradute researchers, already symbol of precarious work in Italy, will be hit even harder: the reform states that any researcher who doesn’t have a permanent contract after 6 years of working can and should be sacked by the same university who has been exploiting them.

SAN DIEGO — The California Supreme Court ruled unanimously Monday that illegal immigrants are still eligible to pay in-state tuition for public college.

The court ruled on a suit originally filed in 2005 but a group of students and parents from 19 states outside of California. The plaintiffs claimed that a 2001 state law improperly circumvented a federal law intended to prevent in-state tuition to illegal immigrants.

According to the Los Angeles Times, 25,000 illegal aliens get in-state tuition rates.

Monday’s ruling guarantees lower tuition to students who attended high school for at least three years in the state of California. This includes students who live in other states but attended boarding school in California.

The law was carefully drawn to avoid conflict with the federal statute, according to Ethan Schulman, a San Francisco attorney who represented the University of California system.

“We’re really pleased with this judgment,” said Constance Carroll, chancellor of the San Diego Community College District, which advocated for that outcome. “As we said in our brief, this is really a matter of California law and California decision making. We feel that these young immigrants, who have bright futures, are being treated fairly.”

Nine other states have already adopted similar tuition laws. Similar legislation is pending in 12 additional states, including Massachusetts, according to www.finaid.org.

What did you study in college? Are you satisfied with your degree? A tight job market might make some workers look back at their educational paths and going back to school.

According to a new CareerBuilder survey which was conducted among more than 2,000 workers with college degrees between August 17 and September 2:

• 36 percent of workers with college degrees said they wish they had chosen a different major in college.
• 26 percent of them said the market for jobs in their chosen field worsened from the time they entered college and when they graduated.
• 56 percent of all workers with college degrees reported they found a job in their desired career path within one year of graduation and others still haven’t come to fruition.
• 19 percent of all workers with a college degree still have not found a job in their desired field.
• 27 percent who graduated from college ten years ago or longer reported they still haven’t found a job related to their college major.
• 21 percent said it took them three years or longer to find an opportunity in their desired career path while 12 percent said it took five years or longer.

Also, the concern regarding building new skill sets is a priority for 13 percent of workers who said they have plans to go back to school this year to make themselves more marketable.

As families around the nation struggle to afford college — and as graduates struggle to make the minimum payments on their student loans — the University of Massachusetts Amherst plans to introduce a 3-year degree program this fall, according to the Boston Globe.

Dozens of other colleges around the country have made this step already. As tuition and other costs climb in public and private schools, many students are left with six-figure loan packages when they graduate. Money has become more important in many respects than having a traditional 4-year education — and having the social development that comes with that.

“As the state backs out of support for public higher education, and families take on a bigger chunk of the burden, we need to try to mitigate that,” James Staros, UMass Amherst provost, told the Globe. “We thought, ‘What can we do to shorten the time and cost for a UMass education, without diluting the degree?’”

Lesley University in Cambridge will also add a 3-year option next year. Southern New Hampshire University already offers a 3-year program.

Amherst plans to allow students with significant Advanced Placement credits to meet with their advisers this year and craft out a 3-year graduation plan if they wish.

A stream of homophobia has hit Williams College, in Williamstown on the quiet northwest corner of Massachusetts.

On November 28, a “junior advisor” in a dorm notified security that his common room was vandalized, and paint and condiments were smeared all over the floors. Phalluses and sexist slurs including the word "fag" were drawn all over the walls. No one has been held responsible, but the college’s Queer Student Union has been working with the Dean and the college co-council presidents to address the situation.

"Campus security cannot figure out if this was a targeted attack," said student activist Tracey Vichers, "but it was waved off as an act by a drunken group of kids. No one has been held responsible."

This incident has been the focus of a week-long series of forums and luncheons discussing homophobia and sexism. A building on campus called The Hardy House recently became the new Gender and Sexuality Resource Center, where students lead their peers in conversations about LGBTQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer) life.

"There have been unexpected people coming to meetings and forums," said Chelsea Luptre, a student in the Hardy House. "They have been able to understand more about why homophobic slurs are hurtful."

The college says it’s working on the matter.

"I’ve been addressing these issues head on," said Justin Adkins, the college’s queer life coordinator, "I’ve been holding staff LGBT diversity training, department by department.”

But Williams College has had issues with homophobia before. It saw a rise in homophobic incidents in the 90s, students said. Then in these past few years there was an increase, Luptre said. And she experienced this first hand.

"Freshman year, this student living across from me would yell things like homo or dyke at me all the time,” Luptre said. “It really made me scared."

When a student is accused of this kind of conduct, the consequences can get serious. The school’s administrators can suspend the student or even expel them. But Vichers said most disciplinary actions never make it that far.

"Most things like that don’t even get reported," said Vichers, "In fact, most incidents don’t make it on a record."

Vichers said that sexist and homophobic incidents spike during the last few weeks before finals. This pattern occurs every year, and little is done to stop it, the student leader said. Some students think its because of the school’s “junior advisors” — similar to Resident Assistants, except they don’t answer to or work for the school. “JA’s” are elected by the students to supervise their dorms. They are given light responsibility training, but they have never been mandated to take diversity training for sexual orientations until this year. Even then, the optional lesson offered is only 45 minutes long, the students said.

Despite the recent issues, students said that they have enjoyed their time at Williams.

"It’s a very positive and accepting community," said openly gay student, Michael Semensi. “Williams draws people from all over the world, and depending on where they are from, some students might never have met a queer person before."

The Queer Student Union is trying to show that Williams College is an LGTBQ-friendly school. Now they are communicating with other schools such as Amherst College and Wellesley College to draft new measures to combat homophobia.

"With this," said Semensi, "we can expand these measures to even more schools, and create a movement to openly discuss these issues.”

There are the obvious things that will give you swine flu”"like getting sneezed on, for instance”"and then there are the painfully obvious things that will give you swine flu”"like playing beer pong.

We could probably file this under “Obvious Science” but officals at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in upstate Troy, NY have warned students that the sharing of cups during games of beer pong lead to the spread of disease, and especially of the spread of H1N1 this flu season. The same officials sent out a campus-wide email detailed a group of students who had all come down the virus after a weekend game.

Area schools are reporting many cases of the swine flu; RPI, a school of about 7,000 total students has reported 21 cases this semester so far.

(photo via)

Sorry Northeastern — this is one list you aren’t climbing. Too bad, Harvard — you’re not in the top three this time.

Dr. Evan Dobelle, president of Westfield State College announced today the list of the “Top 25 Best Neighbor Colleges and Universities” at the 15th annual conference of the Coalition of Urban and Metropolitan Universities in Philadelphia.

“It’s regrettable that with almost a trillion dollars in bailout or stimulus money that more of these funds are not being invested in projects sponsored by campus-based civic engagement initiatives,” Dobelle said in a statement. “Projects don’t come much more turn-key than those in the higher education-community alliance sphere.”

New England just isn’t on the list, with the exception of the Rhode Island School of Design is Providence. None of the 50+ colleges or universities in Boston made the list.

The list:
1. University of Pennsylvania “" Philadelphia, PA
1. University of Southern California “" Los Angeles, CA
2. University of Dayton “" Dayton, OH
2. University of Pittsburgh “" Pittsburgh, PA
5. Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis “" Indianapolis, IN
6. Creighton University “" Omaha, NE
7. Case Western Reserve University “" Cleveland, OH
8. Tulane University “" New Orleans, LA
9. Portland State University “" Portland, OR
10. Drexel University “" Philadelphia, PA
11. Virginia Commonwealth University “" Richmond, VA
12. University of Louisville “" Louisville, KY
13. University of Rochester “" Rochester, NY
14. University of Houston “" Houston, TX
14. University of Missouri at Kansas City “" Kansas City, MO
14. University of Missouri at St. Louis “" St. Louis, MO
17. Emory University “" Atlanta, GA
18. University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee “" Milwaukee, WI
19. Carnegie Mellon University “" Pittsburgh, PA
20. Rhode Island School of Design “" Providence, RI
21. Miami-Dade College “" Miami
22. St. Louis University “" St. Louis, MO
23. Rutgers-Newark, State University of New Jersey “" Newark, NJ
24. George Washington University “" Washington, DC
25. University of Nebraska-Omaha “" Omaha, NE

Criteria for assessment in the survey included length of involvement in the community, dollars invested in local efforts, community service, students in local K-12 schools going on to attend the college/university and recognition of positive community impact from those living in the community.

Oh, September. The air is getting crisp. Sweaters are finding their way back into your wardrobe…

and Boston has yet again been inundated with college students.

This leaves two challenges to those in the midst of it all. First challenge, to the college students: Stuff to do, places to go…without breaking the bank (Does Sallie Mae own your soul? Maybe just a part of it). And the second challenge, to those out of college, hoping to now escape the College Bubble: avoiding the college kids – there are places you’ll have to proceed with caution.

Luckily for us, Places to Go/Proceed with Caution all fit into one category.

After all, college is getting more and more impossibly expensive, and not every student has mommy and daddy’s plastic. To those of you who busted your butt for scholarships and worked summers and weekends to save money, fear not! There are things to do that won’t make you fear graduating with only enough money left to buy your cap and gown.

And, for those who want to forget or let go of the College Bubble, you will certainly enjoy these places, but here is a warning: The College Bubble may find its way in.

Boloco:

The ultra-popular burrito company has been Certified Green, the meat that they do use has no added growth hormones, no antibiotics, and is vegetarian fed, and the fact that their menu itself offers gluten-free, vegan, and vegetarian options…

For one, I have never been in a Boloco where the people working there weren’t way too friendly and nice for people whose job it is to wrap up burritos all day long. I don’t know if it’s the music, the food or happy pills…everyone is always courteous and smiling.

I once ordered a burrito unaware that its ingredients were not all vegetarian-friendly. Not only did the girl taking my order notify me before I paid, she gave me an email address to contact the company with, since many vegetarians had tried to order the menu item. I thought, why not? Not only did the company let me know they were in the process of making a vegetarian option, they gave me a free burrito!

Last, but not least: discounts. Though, let’s face it, Boloco’s prices are much better than some other city options, especially for the quality you get in return, but it doesn’t stop there! Even if you can’t get Boloco with your student meal plan, you don’t have to feel guilty. Boloco is often included in student coupon books, and if you sign up for a Boloco card, you get perks: free birthday burrito, the chance to try new types of burritos for free, and you can build points toward…you guessed it, free food.

Bookstore:

Ok, anti-College Bubble-ites, I know you’re probably thinking ‘bookstores? How dare you stop me from going to the bookstore!’ but let’s not jump to conclusions. We’ll just give you a ‘be prepared’, that’s all.

Think about it. Most bookstores have coffee shops (caffeine!), comfy chairs (not a dorm chair!) and lots of different things to read (not your research paper!). Be warned, once you find a good book, you’re either stuck on that comfy chair until that last drop of espresso runs dry, or you may (gasp!) purchase something. I’m talking to you, freshman-who-just-paid-for-that-latte-with-all-dimes.

Come on, support bookstores! Support the magazine and newspaper industry!

MFA:

Aside from the fact that many college students may want to visit the MFA if they are attending an art school or are genuinely interested in art, some schools in the Boston area are offered free general admittance for students with a student ID.

For full info on admission to the museum, community days and more, visit http://mfa.org/visit/

But wait! There’s more!

The MFA has a theater, where you can view films from all over for the cost of $6-10.

ICA:

In general, the ICA is an interesting way to spend an evening, from its exhibits and programs to its unique location. Just keep in mind, if you want to avoid the college crowd you may want to watch out for…
Target Free Thursday Nights! Every Thursday from 5-9PM when admission is free. Go ahead and turn on your iPod to drown out the student reflections on last night’s episode of Gossip Girl. After all, a museum visit is a great way to relax and reflect after work.

The Otherside Cafe:

Loud noises!

The music, the food, the waitstaff…and yes, the very loud music is one-of-a-kind in this terminally hip joint across the street from Berklee. If you’re trying to avoid college students you might be in trouble, but if you are longing for some good food an earful of an entire album on full blast, by all means get to the other side of that street and wait for a table (because you’ll almost definitely have to wait)! While the prices may be slightly more, it’s not outrageous for the location or the portion of food you get. And I’ve never heard a complaint about the food, whether it be breakfast, sandwich, baked goods…and oh yes, I’ve spent more than a few minutes debating over the Brie Cheese Sandwich or a slice of Pecan Pie.

…I know, I know, why not get both?

College students – grab those student coupon books. Grab a buy one, get one free coupon to a coffee shop and go with a friend! Get a few dollars off your next ice cream sundae! You can even get deals on hair cuts and manicures, or you could always go to Blaine Beauty School for a reduced rate on hair and nail treatments. If you’re interested in theater, there are always student rush tickets and student discounts. Or if you’d like to listen to some spectacular music in one of the best sounding music halls in the world, The Boston Symphony offers tickets to open rehearsals for $19, a college card for $25 dollars (see up to 25 performances), and rush tickets for $9.

Have a Charlie Card? Use it! And we don’t just mean for hoppin’ on the B line. Many places accept the Charlie Card for discounts.

So there you have it. Even if you’re trying to avoid a swarm of college students, you may find it difficult to avoid any of these favorite places. We don’t blame you. Who doesn’t love burritos, art and music? Take advantage of some of the offers here as well – we won’t tell anyone.

College students need all the discounts they can get, and this fall, Edhance, Inc. is giving them a new way to get them.

The Boston-based company is offering students across the country a free discount program that works through existing debit and credit cards. Students can register up to five cards online at Edhance.com by entering basic information, including a university email address and the name of the school.

Once they’re registered, they can use those cards in-store and online with registered merchants. They pay full price upfront, Edhance software verifies the consumer is a student, and when the money saved on various discounts reaches $10 or $25, that money is deposited back into their bank accounts.

“Today’s young consumers are more demanding than ever before, and asking them to pay for having a discount card mailed to them didn’t seem like something that would fly in a couple of years,” said Bjorn Larsen, president of Edhance, in an email. “So, we developed a free service where students don’t have to show anything, and merchants know that discounts are only given to verified students.”

Stores can customize their discount rates and even create specials offers like a “Tuesday Night Special” or “Back-to-School” promotion, Larsen said. The Edhance website will also utilize Google Maps to help students locate participating stores in their area. An Edhance iPhone app is also in the making.

Edhance is also beneficial to the merchants who sign up to offer discounts. Currently, stores can’t always trust a student ID card or university email address as verification – alumni can use old IDs, students can share their email address with non-students, and so on. Edhance automatically verifies the card holder is a student when the card is swiped, and it’s done without any additional machines for the store to buy. Plus, it’s free for them to sign up too.

“We only charge a commission when we drive business to our merchant partners, so everything is pay-for-performance. If it doesn’t work for them, it doesn’t work for us either,” said Larsen.

The first in-store discounts will be offered in Boston in September, but they will then expand nation-wide.

“We recently signed a deal with a national financial services company that issues debit cards to over 700,000 students,” said Larsen. “These are located at schools across the country, but we’ll focus on cities like Boston with a heavy college concentration, such as Ann Arbor, MI and Austin, TX.”

Some companies that have already signed up are Apple, Barnes&Noble.com, Toshiba, Puma.com and select New England locations of Qdoba.

Matt Weiss, marketing director for Chair5, the company that operates Qdoba in New England, said they’re going to start offering discounts within a few weeks at some college locations in Boston.

“It’s a really seemless way to engage with this demographic. There’s no heavy lifting on our end,” he said. “The nature of it is just so simple and easy, not only for us but for the customer.”

We’re surprised that there’s not more of this, given the fact that most colleges are run like greedy Fortune 500 companies lately.

The New York Post reported that a New York City woman who recently graduated from Monroe College can’t find a job and says her school isn’t helping her land gainful employment. Trina Thompson filed a lawsuit last week against Monroe in Bronx Supreme Court. The 27-year-old is seeking a return of the $70,000 she spent on tuition.

A spokesman for the college called the suit “completely without merit.”

The First Ever Boston Graduate Student Party — billed as the hottest party for Boston College, Boston University, Brandeis, Emerson College, MIT, Northeastern, Suffolk, Tufts, etc., grad students — will be held April 30 from 8 p.m. to 1 a.m. at the Roxy Nightclub on Tremont Street.

Email boston-party@mit.edu to get on the list if you’re a grad student!

This is one of the most exciting social mixers in the area for students. All graduate students are welcome, and it’s only $4 at the door!

21+ and bring your college ID!

The Sunday comics have always been the best, though in an increasingly paperless world, we often forget that the comic section even exists.

Now there’s a new comic strip to look forward to every Sunday without having to buy a paper: 6 or 7 Popes, a webcomic developed by You & What Productions, a group of college students mostly from Emerson University. Chaz Formichella and Matt Durman, the founders of You & What, came up with the comedy group for a speech class and through developing it, came up with “6 or 7 Popes”.

“We were actually talking about another idea. . . and in brainstorming ideas for that, we started talking about the Pope. We thought we could probably come up with 6 or 7 different popes, and really liked the sound of that, like what could they be — space pope, chocolate pope?‚  Well why is it 6 or 7? Well 2 of them would have to work together,” Formichella explained.

The popes live in an elaborately planned out universe where each pope represents a different world. There are five regularly sized popes: Birthday Pope, Chocolate Pope, Pope Benedict XVI, Space Pope and Ape Pope, and two tiny popes, with their own tiny subplot, that sometimes have to combine their powers to create one slightly larger pope. It all starts at a Popes of the Universe Convention, which suffers a surprise attack, leaving only our characters to fight for justice and Catholicism across space. Speaking of space, Space Pope happens to be a woman, making a statement on progression — maybe the sky’s the limit?

A few popes didn’t make the final cut; for example, Roomba Pope, which according to the comic combines “cleanliness and Godliness” in this bit.

Cleanliness is next to godliness

Every comic strip will contain the same popes, but there will be no continuous plot to save the world. “Each strip is a little window into the “6 or 7 Popes” world, so they don’t really build on each other. Eventually, and I don’t know when, we are going to put together a script and a plot for something big – like a graphic novel or maybe just a long series that we put online where we go into the actual story going on around the webcomic, sort of the origin story,” Formichella said enthusiastically.

For now, You and What will simply be trying to get out a strip a week while dealing with school and winter break. “It’s going to be weekly, we’re trying our hardest to keep it weekly since we’re all away from school right now. We’re trying to have one up each Sunday.”

With the ambitious goal of having a strip planned, drawn, and published each week, a lot of the work lies on You & What’s lone artist, Nick Mcgee, the only member of the group who doesn’t currently attend Emerson. Admitting to the pressure, McGee said “it is actually really hard at the moment. I’m kind of starting to find myself a routine to make sure I can get out all this artwork and do what I do all the time. The most stressful part is that I’m doing it all by hand.”

McGee explained his involvement in the project: “I met Matt, who was roommates with a guy I worked with at the time, and he said he had a project and found out I was an artist”. The guys meet once a week to write out the strip and revise it, though Chaz and Matt have a few back stocked just in case, and Nick scratches out a rough draft in pencil. “I just use pencil and marker and then we scan it in and Steve Donovan puts in all the text,” Nick explained. While his artwork is truly impressive, he’s actually new to comic-style illustrations.

“This isn’t necessarily the type of art I do – I haven’t actually done any comics before. I’ve done more serious work so this is my first time doing something comedy based with a group that’s producing something on a regular basis,” he said.

You & What Productions is growing, surpassing the numbers of their beloved popes to 8 or 9 members: Chaz Formichella, Matt Derman, Ed Reed IV, Nick Mcgee, Gaby Dunn, Steve Donovan, Charles Pieper, John Barrett and their most recent addition, Gregory Goodness. “6 or 7 Popes” has only been out for a month, but keep an eye out for updates each Sunday and future projects coming from You & What Productions including a podcast coming out this spring.

The new school year has arrived and college freshmen, like millions who have come before them, are facing the daunting challenge of dorm eating.

Most will come to realize that after orientation, the quality of their school’s food drops drastically and is not at all worth the wait in line. Luckily, there are easy ways to eat well without leaving the dorm.

A large part of eating in a dorm involves finding ways around regulations. For instance, most schools will include hot plates on their lists of forbidden things. The clever, if not smart-alec, way around that regulation is to bring a hot pot. In fact, a hot pot is probably more useful. You can use it to make soup, pasta, tea or anything else you can imagine.

On the more creative side, an iron makes a decent substitute for a frying pan. It wouldn’t be the greatest idea to fry eggs that way, but according to Northeastern University junior, Brennan Degan, grilled cheese will come out nicely.

“You take a piece of bread, put a little butter on it, then two pieces of cheese and another piece of bread,” said Degan. “You put it on a hot iron for a few minutes and it’s done, it’s as easy as that.”

Of course, you’re not limited to just grilled cheese. It’s easy to imagine what else you could cook up, like toast or quesadillas. Just try to keep the iron clean, for the sake of you clothes and your stomach.

In a more conventional vein, the mini-fridge and microwave are key items, so don’t forgo them. With these, your food choices are nearly endless. You won’t be making steak, but good meals are very possible.

Susan Barnes, a Bucknell University junior, is starting her third year of dorm living and has always relied on the mini-fridge and microwave.

“Right now, I believe there is jelly, water and chocolate (in my refrigerator),” she said with a laugh. “I usually eat soup and sometimes I have salad stuff in my room, or peanut butter and jelly. I did lean cuisine for a while too.”

The mini-fridge provides storage for fruits and vegetables, which gives you the obvious option of making salads. You can also throw vegetables into the hot pot and use them to mix in with some pasta or add some fruit to your cereal.

There are also plenty of snacks you can keep in a mini-fridge. Things like yogurt, cheese and applesauce make great snacks and take up minimal space. Storing juice, milk, soda or water is another obvious but wise use of a mini-fridge.

The microwave is useful for the things a hot pot can’t help you with, like popcorn for movie time. It also doubles as storage space, just incase you need a little extra.

On that note, you’ll need a decent food storage space. In a dorm, that can mean and empty drawer or just a cardboard box. Here you can store college staples like cereal, which makes the perfect breakfast or snack.

With all of these options right in your room, it can be easy to get carried away. The “freshman 15″ is no myth, most college freshman gain around 15 pounds in their first year. That’s why it’s important to control your portions and keep primarily healthy food in your room.

“You have to be creative, keep stuff in your room that’s easy to eat when you’re snacking,” said Roger Williams University junior, Cora Tetreault. “I take deli turkey and roll it up in lettuce.”

Tetreault, who successfully kept the “freshman 15″ off, recommends that 50 percent of each meal be made up of fruits and vegetables. When she doesn’t have time for a meal, she snacks on nuts for protein.

Of course, everyone has a weakness. “When I really want chocolate, I eat chocolate,” she said. The trick is not to get carried away.

These are the basics of college eating. They are the tried and true methods of dorm dwellers — truly the only people who could think of grilled cheese on an iron.

More women attend college than men, and several private colleges across the country find themselves working to recruit more men to balance out the ratio and enhance social appeal. 

Yearly tuition at many private universities has topped $40,000 per year. At that price, college administrators realize that they must offer much more than an education.  They must offer an experience. 

That experience includes anything and everything from activities to real-life work experience to a vibrant social life. A key ingredient to a memorable social life is a good mix of men and women. 

The New York Times article found that women make up 58 percent of those enrolled  part-time or full-time in college. In the late 60s, there were more men, and in the mid 70s, the genders were equally represented. But since the mid 80s, there have been more women than men.  That gap continues to widen. 

Admission offices at universities across the country are reacting with new strategies to attract more men to their colleges with the primary purpose of creating a more gender-balanced social and learning environment. 

Admissions materials 

Recruiting starts with admissions brochures sent to students at their homes. Dickinson College, a Carlisle, Penn. liberal arts school,  is actively recruiting more men than women, Time Magazine reports.  Since Vice President of Admissions Robert Massa started working at Dickinson College, the percentage of men on campus has jumped from 36 percent to 44 percent. 

Dickinson College’s website features proportionally more pictures of men and athletics.  They highlight their new physics, computer science and math buildings, and they started an international business program with the intent of appealing to potential male recruits. 

Several private colleges, including Dickinson and Chicago’s DePaul University send more admissions brochures to men than women, hoping to generate more interest from prospective male students.   

Athletic Presence 

Seattle University switched athletic conferences, moving up to a more competitive conference where other colleges have stronger athletic programs, reports PBS’ News Hour. The University has seen a drop in their winning percentages, but hopes to see an increase in the percentage of male students on campus.   

Women comprise 61 percent of the student body at Seattle University. Mike McKeon, the director of admissions, believes that “more prominent athletic programs — clearly male athletic programs — are going to help us to attract more men.”  

Other colleges are also using athletics to attract male students.  Shenandoah University in Virginia started a football program to not only lure football players but men who are looking for a college with a football team. 

Inequality in the response?

Susan Seckor, associate provost at Seattle University, fought for women’s equality in education for many years and wonders why there was no concern when more men attend college than women.   

“There’s a part of me that finds it outrageous and ridiculous that anybody would have the gall to suggest that when we’re now finally willing to recognize and applaud the gifts of over half of humanity, that there is this reaction that somehow sees it as alarming instead of exciting,” Seckor said in a PBS interview.  “I think it’s a sad day, frankly, and I think it’s a disgusting day.” 

A survey by the Council for Advancement and Support of Education said men still hold more of the upper management and decision-making positions at universities.  The survey also found that men also earn higher salaries. 

While women have made great strides, serving as college presidents of some of the nations top universities, including Harvard, UPenn, Princeton and Brown, women still account for only 20 percent of college presidents.   

The debate will continue, for now, as to how to best serve the students, effectively manage the university and properly represent both sexes, in both the student body and in upper administration.

Dear EarthTalk: What initiatives are taking place on college campuses to reduce the footprints of these large users of energy and other resources? – Shawna Smith, Hamilton, NY 

Microcosms of the world at large, college campuses are great test beds for environmental change, and many students are working hard to get their administrations to take positive action. The initiatives that are emerging are models for the larger society, and the students pushing for them will be taking these lessons with them, too, as they enter the work force after graduation. 

Foremost on the minds of green-leaning students today is global warming, and many are joining hands to persuade their schools to update policies and streamline operations so that their campuses can become part of the solution. Largely a result of student efforts, for example, nearly 500 U.S. colleges and universities have signed the American College and University Presidents (ACUP) Climate Commitment. 

This agreement requires schools to put together a comprehensive plan to go “carbon neutral” in two years of signing. (Carbon neutral means contributing no net greenhouse gases to the atmosphere either by not generating them in the first place or by offsetting them somehow, such as through tree-planting or by buying “offsets” from companies that fund alternative energy projects.) 

ACUP also commits schools to implementing two or more tangible (and easily implemented) policies right away, such as improving waste minimization and recycling programs, reducing energy usage, providing or encouraging public transportation to and from campus (and switching campus buses over to bio-diesel fuel), constructing bicycle lanes, and implementing green building guidelines for any new construction. 

Signatory schools also pledge that they will integrate sustainability into their curricula, making it part of the educational experience. 

One place where students are forcing green changes on campus is the dining hall. According to the Sustainable Endowments Institute’s 2007 report card, which looks at environmental initiatives at the 200 colleges and universities with the largest endowment assets in the U.S. and Canada, 70 percent of such schools now “devote at least a portion of food budgets to buying from local farms and/or producers,” while 29 percent earned an “A” in the “food and recycling” category. Yale University even has organic gardens that are student-run and that supply an on-campus farmer’s market for use by campus food services, the local community and students alike. 

Another area where college campuses are leading the way is in water conservation. Colleges consume huge quantities of water in dormitories, cafeterias, at athletic facilities and in maintaining their rolling green grounds. According to Niles Barnes of the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE), most of the 3,800 institutions of higher education in the U.S. have engaged in some sort of water-saving program. Low-water-volume toilets and urinals, as well as low-flow showerheads and faucets, are “pretty much standard practice across U.S. colleges today,” says Barnes. 

CONTACTS: ACUP, www.presidentsclimatecommitment.org; Sustainable Endowments Institute, www.endowmentinstitute.org; AASHE, www.aashe.org. 

Dear EarthTalk: What is the status of wetlands in North America? Years ago I remember that wetlands loss, due to development and sprawl, was accelerating fast, but I haven’t heard much on the topic of late. – John Mossbarger, La Jolla, CA 

Wetlands serve as primary habitat for thousands of wildlife species-from ducks to beavers to insects-and form an important ecosystem link between land and water. They also play a key role in maintaining water quality, as they filter out agricultural nutrients and absorb sediments so that municipal water supplies don’t have to. On and near shorelines, wetlands provide a natural buffer against storm surges and rising floodwaters, helping to disperse and absorb excess water before it can damage life and property. 

The eradication of wetlands in the so-called New World began when white settlers, intent on taming the land, started developing homesteads and town sites throughout what was to become the United States and Canada. Researchers estimate that at the time of European settlement in the early 1600s, the land that was to become the lower 48 U.S. states had 221 million acres of wetlands. By the mid-1980s, following another great period of loss after World War II when army engineers drained huge swaths of formerly impenetrable marshes and swamps, the continental U.S. had only 103 million wetland acres remaining. 

Across the U.S. and Canada, the vast majority of wetlands-about 85 percent-have been destroyed in the name of agricultural expansion. Other major factors include road building, residential development, and the building of large facilities like shopping malls, factories, airports and, ironically, reservoirs.  

But growing awareness about the importance of wetlands has led to new regulations aimed at protecting those that remain. A variety of state and federal programs, such as the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Wetland Reserve Program (whereby landowners voluntarily protect, restore and enhance wetlands on their own private property), have been effective in stemming the tide of wetlands loss. During the 1990s the rate of wetlands loss in the U.S. declined by some 80 percent over previous decades. But the nation is still losing upwards of 50,000 wetland acres per year, according to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service. 

The issue is of even greater concern in Canada, which harbors a quarter of the world’s remaining wetlands in its northern boreal forests. According to Natural Resources Canada, fully 14 percent of Canada’s total land mass is in the form of wetlands. Researchers believe that about 50 million acres of wetlands have been lost in Canada since European settlement. Underscoring the correlation between urbanization and wetlands loss, less than .2 percent of Canada’s wetlands lie within 25 miles of major urban centers today. 

On the global level, 158 governments are signatories to the 1971 Ramsar Convention on Wetlands, an international treaty that provides a framework for international cooperation in the conservation and wise use of wetlands. Some 1,743 wetland sites-totaling almost 400 million acres-have been protected as “Wetlands of International Importance” under the terms of the treaty. Although the Ramsar treaty can do little to stop illegal or legal draining of wetlands, its very existence highlights how seriously the majority of the world’s countries take protecting land formerly thought of as God-forsaken and useless.  

CONTACTS: Wetlands Reserve Program, www.nrcs.usda.gov/Programs/WRP/; Natural Resources Canada, www.nrcan-rncan.gc.ca; Ramsar Convention on Wetlands, www.ramsar.org. 

GOT AN ENVIRONMENTAL QUESTION? Send it to: EarthTalk, c/o E/The Environmental Magazine, P.O. Box 5098, Westport, CT 06881; submit it at: www.emagazine.com/earthtalk/thisweek/, or e-mail: earthtalk@emagazine.com. Read past columns at: www.emagazine.com/earthtalk/archives.php