Education News

MPR News keeps track of the latest education news in Minnesota so you can understand the events shaping the future of learning and how it impacts students at any level.

Stay informed about local education events, policies and more happening in schools and colleges across Minnesota.

How a scandal brought down Joe Paterno
The tipping point came when the state's top cop said what everyone was thinking: Why didn't Joe Paterno do more? Why didn't anyone at Penn State?
ARW Podcast: Occupy Students
Students are protesting rising tuition costs and poor job prospects. Could cutting costs and streamlining college course offerings produce graduates with more long-term earning potential?
What the U's McMaster said about the cutback in transfer students
I spoke yesterday with Bob McMaster, the University of Minnesota’s dean of undergraduate education, about the decision to cut back a little on the number of transfer students the U will accept in coming years. I had raised the question in a previous post about what that means for access for community college students as…
The St. Cloud school district expects to spend about $37,000 on legal fees to defend itself in a federal discrimination investigation that ended in a settlement.
Public Insight Network member Lisa Nordeen, a former athlete and coach as well as Minnesota professor and sport sociologist with extensive Division I experience, said calls for reform can only go so far: Sure, reform is needed. However, college athletics has become so imbedded within our society that it would be next to impossible to…
Should college sports be broken off into separate businesses?
The Public Insight Network query on the meaning behind the Penn State scandal has brought out a lot of folks who think college sports have grown too big and need to be separated from the schools themselves. (One could argue that wouldn’t solve the actual problem, but would remove that section of it from higher…
College Tuition is the Innovation-Killer It’s getting to a point where no graduate of a four-year college or graduate degree program can go out on their own and start their business because they have this incredible weight, this Albatross around their neck called student loan debt. (BigThink) New holiday tradition: Students spending Thanksgiving on campus It…
What a retired professor says about the Penn State case
The responses to our Public Insight Network query on the Penn State child sex-abuse scandal are starting to roll in. John Sievert of Lakeland writes that the case: “… says that the money has become too important – a case of the tail wagging the dog. Joe Paterno is a decent and honorable man and…
So what does the Penn State scandal mean?
News of the Pennsylvania State University child sex-abuse scandal is all over the news today. To what extent is what’s happening on the Penn State campus reflective of American higher education and how it handles big-time college sports? We’ve asked folks in our Public Insight Network to give us their perspectives, and we’d love to…