A World without Women’s Colleges and Universities

Guest post by Kristen A. Renn The recent and—to many—unexpected announcement of the fast-track closing of Sweet Briar College has sent shockwaves through the private liberal arts college sector. Nearly all of the remaining women’s colleges in the U.S. are also in this sector and thus face a dual threat to continued existence: the decreasing…

Is mental health among college students continuing to decline?

Guest post by Doris Iarovici Is mental health among college students continuing to decline, as various headlines suggest? This year’s “The American Freshman: National Norms 2014” survey, released at the beginning of February, again found “record” lows. Among the more than 150,000 first-year students from more than two hundred universities, only about half—the lowest number…

Diagnosis and shades of grey

Guest post by Annemarie Jutel Diagnoses are by their very nature well-defined categories. That’s what a diagnosis is: a label for grouping things that are more like X than like Y. It’s influenza, not pneumonia, or it’s rheumatoid arthritis, not multiple sclerosis, and so on. If we didn’t group symptoms and give them diagnostic labels, we…

Diagnosis and shades of grey

Guest post by Annemarie Jutel Diagnoses are by their very nature well-defined categories. That’s what a diagnosis is: a label for grouping things that are more like X than like Y. It’s influenza, not pneumonia, or it’s rheumatoid arthritis, not multiple sclerosis, and so on. If we didn’t group symptoms and give them diagnostic labels, we…

What if we expected science literacy in our presidents? Reflections on the anniversary of DeWitt Clinton’s birth (March 2, 1769)

Guest post by David Spanagel On 12 December, 1822, Thomas Jefferson opened a letter to the sitting governor of New York State as follows: “I thank you dearly for the little volume sent me on the Natural History and Resources of N York. It is an instructive, interesting and agreeably written account of the Riches…