Back in my youth, I was a precocious and ambitious achiever who parsed the NY Times and political blogs with the enthusiasm of a child scrutinizing the back of a Fruit Loops cereal box. Maybe it was genetics, maybe it was circumstance but probably it was my poor athletic skills and the futility of a career in ping-pong that motivated my interest in politics.
Fortunately, I fell into Cornell’s School of Industrial & Labor Relations (ILR) …

The challenges of 21st century higher education are unprecedented.  In the wake of the recent economic crisis, universities have had to cut programs, eliminate entire academic departments, trim organizational layers, centralize administrative functions, and  move seriously toward distance learning as a core pedagogical technology. In this arena where hard decisions are being made on a daily basis, senior administrators and faculty members need to develop the necessary skills to get things done.
In this context, the …

If you are at all curious about the invisible flow of on-line information you need to see and hear this TED talk by Eli Pariser. It will make you take a second look at the Internet and your place within the new world it is shaping.
Oh and I should also note that I stumbled across this video in my Facebook feed today. Trust me, after you watch the video this seemingly minor bit of information will become much more than just a …

Motivation has to do with how you help others answer the question, “Why should I do it?” On the surface this “why-should-I-do-it?” mentality smacks of the cheapest form of Machiavellianism and seems to be a model of calculated opportunism. However, all social relationships are inevitably sustained by the answer to the “why-should-I-do-it” question. Implied in this question is the notion that we have some degree of volition—some choice.  You can choose to continue a relationship …

We spend an inordinate amount of time assisting young people to get into college. We spend a fortune on prep courses, we travel across the country going on college tours, we calculate the right advanced placement courses, we try to figure out whether early admission is the right move, we sit with their counselors, and then, finally, when they make it across the finishing line—when they arrive on campus in their freshman year—we drop them, …

When I was an undergraduate at NYU, commuting by subway to the Washington Square campus, the path was laid out for me:  economics or medical school.  In my last year I stumbled into a passion for art history when I completed a course on the French impressionists.  The course made me entertain the possibility of diverting from my path and getting a Ph.D. in art history.  I approached my instructor …