U.S. and China: When giants meet
By Jaime FlorCruz, CNN
"We now have normal relations, frequent exchanges and intensive coordination. This visit will build on very sound basis and provide a clear direction for the future. It will give our people great hope and the rest of world reassurance that China and the U.S. will work together to address common concerns."
Cui, 58, is China's point-person on America. Fluent in English, he has spent seven years in Chinese diplomatic missions in the U.S.
"What do you think is the most common misperception of China among Americans?" I asked.
"It's the so-called China threat," he said. "I really do not understand why some people in the U.S. believe that China is posing a threat to the U.S.
"China's development has offered great opportunities to the U.S. When the international financial crisis came, China's economy played a great role to restore global economic growth."
The United States is the unchallenged world superpower, but its clout has declined in recent years, bogged down by economic crisis at home and military conflicts overseas.
China is catching up, its firepower backed by economic clout. China is boosting its military capacity and increasing its diplomatic and economic reach into Africa, the Middle East and Latin America. In the past few months, it has formed closer ties to Europe.
How does the United States deal with this?
"China has become increasingly confident and assertive in recent years," notes Willem van Kemanade, a Dutch writer based in Beijing. "The U.S. had better get used to that."
When Hu Jintao sits down with President Barack Obama next week, both sides will be bringing tough issues to the table.
China is especially upset over U.S. arms sales to Taiwan. Beijing considers the island a breakaway province that is part of China. Lately it has stressed peaceful reunification while warning that independence for Taiwan will not be tolerated.
Washington irked Beijing last year when it approved the sale of a $6.4 billion package of arms to Taiwan. China protested, saying it was an "interference in China's internal affairs" and noting that it comes at a time when the mainland's relations with Taiwan have warmed. In protest, Beijing suspended military exchanges with the United States.
China earlier this week hosted a long-postponed visit by U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates, marking the resumption of military exchanges. But mistrust lingers.
In its 2009 budget, China allocated a 14.9 percent rise in military spending to $70.3 billion. Some observers say actual Chinese military spending is much higher.
David Zweig, a political science professor at the Hong Kong University of Science Technology, said: "As China's need for imported oil grows, it has to think about ways to protect its own sea lanes. Does it build a blue-water navy, does it build aircraft carriers, expand its naval presence around the world? There are now people in China who are advocating that."
Cui dismisses such concerns. "China's military expenditure is very, very small compared to the military expenditure of the United States," he said. "So the U.S. has nothing to worry about. China follows a defensive defense policy. China does not threaten anyone."
So why, I asked, does China need to develop aircraft carriers and stealth jet-fighters?
"May I ask you," he retorted, "why do you have so many [of them]? We still don't have them. We are only developing."
Other bread-and-butter irritants could crop up. The U.S. complains that China is undercutting American exports and stealing American jobs by keeping its currency artificially low.
Is China ready to act to placate its critics in Washington?
"The value of China's currency is determined by the market fundamentals, not by any politicians," Cui replied. "This has nothing to do with the economic difficulties the U.S. might have for the time being. We will continue our currency reform but it will be determined by China's economic development, not by politicians."
No big breakthroughs are expected from the summit. Drew Thompson, director of China Studies at The Nixon Center, said: "The relationship is being updated, but the U.S. is focusing on Iran, North Korea and currency and trade as topics for the summit, so there is little likelihood that there will be dramatic progress on any one item."
Cui is optimistic about the chemistry between Hu and Obama. "They have a very good working relationship," he said. "Every time they met, they spent longer time than planned. That means they have very substantive discussion and are both very serious about our relationship."
Just as Nixon and Mao did 39 years ago, China's diplomats hope Hu Jintao and Obama can turn competition into a peaceful coexistence.
In this blog, teachers, students and all those who have some kind of interest in the English language will find useful, interesting, curious and funny things to be used in their classes or for their personal enjoyment.
Saturday, April 30, 2011
CNN-Will the Age of America end in 2016?
Will the 'Age of America' end in 2016?
(CNN) -- Is the "Age of America" drawing to a close? According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), its demise as the leading economic power is five years away and the next president of the United States will preside over an economy that plays second fiddle to China's.
The lender posted data on its World Economic Outlook that puts 2016 as Year Zero for China as the world's dominant economic power -- the year when China's growth trajectory intersects the decline of the U.S.'s share of world gross domestic product in terms of purchasing price parity.
According to the figures, the Chinese economy would grow from $11.2 trillion in 2011 to $19 trillion in 2016. Over the same period, the U.S. economy will rise from a dominant $15.2 trillion to a trailing $18.8 trillion.
But, as the saying goes, statistics are often used like a drunken man uses a lamp-post -- for support rather than illumination.
An analyst at the IMF said in a statement much hinges on whether economic size is measured by purchasing power parity -- what your money can actually buy on the ground in any given economy, the basis of the famous "Big Mac" index -- or GDP at market rates -- which is measured by converting the national currency into a common currency (normally the U.S. dollar) and measuring how much is flowing through the economy.
The IMF projects U.S. GDP in dollars will be $15.2 trillion this year while China's will be $6.5 trillion, rising to $18.8 trillion and $11.2 trillion respectively by 2016. Under this measure, the US looks likely to stay the world's No. 1 economy if current growth rates are maintained.
"The IMF considers that GDP in purchase-power-parity (PPP) terms is not the most appropriate measure for comparing the relative size of countries to the global economy, because PPP price levels are influenced by non-traded services, which are more relevant domestically than globally," the IMF said.
"The Fund believes that GDP at market rates is a more relevant comparison. Under this metric, the U.S. is currently 130% bigger than China, and will still be 70% larger by 2016."
Nevertheless, the PPP index still has its fans, with some contending that China could be even stronger than it appears on paper thanks to the current artificially suppressed level of its currency.
"China actively suppresses the renminbi on the currency markets through massive dollar purchases. As a result the renminbi is deeply undervalued on the foreign-exchange markets. Just comparing the economies on their exchange rates misses that altogether," said MarketWatch columnist Brett Arends.
"Purchasing power parity is not a perfect measure. None exists. But it measures the output of economies in terms of real goods and services, not just paper money. That's why it's widely used to compare economies. The IMF publishes PPP data. So does the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). Many economists rely on them," he said.
While the slope of the graph is declining for the U.S. and rising for China, reports of the death of the U.S. economy look certain to be greatly exaggerated and could still be many decades away.
Other measures such as per capita income as a proportion of GDP still sees the United States many years ahead of China and other readings that measure social and structural problems could still see the Chinese juggernaut blow a tire yet.
(CNN) -- Is the "Age of America" drawing to a close? According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), its demise as the leading economic power is five years away and the next president of the United States will preside over an economy that plays second fiddle to China's.
The lender posted data on its World Economic Outlook that puts 2016 as Year Zero for China as the world's dominant economic power -- the year when China's growth trajectory intersects the decline of the U.S.'s share of world gross domestic product in terms of purchasing price parity.
According to the figures, the Chinese economy would grow from $11.2 trillion in 2011 to $19 trillion in 2016. Over the same period, the U.S. economy will rise from a dominant $15.2 trillion to a trailing $18.8 trillion.
But, as the saying goes, statistics are often used like a drunken man uses a lamp-post -- for support rather than illumination.
An analyst at the IMF said in a statement much hinges on whether economic size is measured by purchasing power parity -- what your money can actually buy on the ground in any given economy, the basis of the famous "Big Mac" index -- or GDP at market rates -- which is measured by converting the national currency into a common currency (normally the U.S. dollar) and measuring how much is flowing through the economy.
The IMF projects U.S. GDP in dollars will be $15.2 trillion this year while China's will be $6.5 trillion, rising to $18.8 trillion and $11.2 trillion respectively by 2016. Under this measure, the US looks likely to stay the world's No. 1 economy if current growth rates are maintained.
"The IMF considers that GDP in purchase-power-parity (PPP) terms is not the most appropriate measure for comparing the relative size of countries to the global economy, because PPP price levels are influenced by non-traded services, which are more relevant domestically than globally," the IMF said.
"The Fund believes that GDP at market rates is a more relevant comparison. Under this metric, the U.S. is currently 130% bigger than China, and will still be 70% larger by 2016."
Nevertheless, the PPP index still has its fans, with some contending that China could be even stronger than it appears on paper thanks to the current artificially suppressed level of its currency.
"China actively suppresses the renminbi on the currency markets through massive dollar purchases. As a result the renminbi is deeply undervalued on the foreign-exchange markets. Just comparing the economies on their exchange rates misses that altogether," said MarketWatch columnist Brett Arends.
"Purchasing power parity is not a perfect measure. None exists. But it measures the output of economies in terms of real goods and services, not just paper money. That's why it's widely used to compare economies. The IMF publishes PPP data. So does the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). Many economists rely on them," he said.
While the slope of the graph is declining for the U.S. and rising for China, reports of the death of the U.S. economy look certain to be greatly exaggerated and could still be many decades away.
Other measures such as per capita income as a proportion of GDP still sees the United States many years ahead of China and other readings that measure social and structural problems could still see the Chinese juggernaut blow a tire yet.
Work-Life Balance-5 Tips
5 Tips for Better Work-Life Balance
Beat burnout by discovering ways to devote more time to the activities and people that matter most to you.
By Jen Uscher
If you're feeling overworked and finding it more challenging than ever to juggle the demands of your job and the rest of your life, you're not alone.
"A lot of people are having a more difficult time finding balance in their lives because there have been cutbacks or layoffs where they work. They're afraid it may happen to them, so they're putting in more hours," says psychologist Robert Brooks, PhD, co-author of The Power of Resilience: Achieving Balance, Confidence, and Personal Strength in Your Life.
But even if you don't have much control over the hours you have to work, you can ask yourself: In what other ways am I bringing greater enjoyment into my life?" Brooks says. "Focus your time and attention on things you can control."
Here are five ways to bring a little more balance to your daily routine:
1. Build downtime into your schedule.
When you plan your week, make it a point to schedule time with your family and friends and activities that help you recharge.
If a date night with your spouse or a softball game with friends is on your calendar, you'll have something to look forward to and an extra incentive to manage your time well so you don't have to cancel.
"It helps to be proactive about scheduling," says Laura Stack, a productivity expert in Denver and author of SuperCompetent: The Six Keys to Perform at Your Productive Best. "When I go out with my girlfriends, we all whip out our cell phones and put another girls' night out on the calendar for one month later," she says.
Stack also plans an activity with her family -- like going to a movie or the park -- every Sunday afternoon. "We do this because if there's nothing on the schedule, time tends to get frittered away and the weekend may end without us spending quality time together," she says.
Michael Neithardt, an actor and television commercial producer in New York City, wakes up three hours before he has to leave for work so he can go for a run and spend some time with his wife and baby.
"A lot of my friends tend to wake up, shower, and go straight to work. And they often complain about having no time to do anything," he tells WebMD in an e-mail. "I find that if I can get those three hours in the morning, I have a more productive and peaceful workday. I can sure tell the difference when I don't."
2. Drop activities that sap your time or energy.
"Many people waste their time on activities or people that add no value -- for example, spending too much time at work with a colleague who is constantly venting and gossiping," says Marilyn Puder-York, PhD, a psychologist and executive coach in New York and Connecticut. She recommends taking stock of activities that aren't really enhancing your career or personal life and minimizing the time you spend on them.
You may even be able to leave work earlier if you make a conscious effort to limit the time you spend on the web and social media sites, making personal calls, or checking your bank balance. "We often get sucked into these habits that are making us much less efficient without realizing it," Stack says
3. Rethink your errands.
Consider whether you can outsource any of your time-consuming household chores or errands.
Could you order your groceries online and have them delivered? Hire a kid down the street to mow your lawn? Have your dry cleaning picked up and dropped off at your home or office? Order your stamps online so you don't have to go to the post office? Even if you're on a tight budget, you may discover that the time you'll save will make it worth it.
Stack also suggests trading services with friends. Offer to do tasks that you enjoy or that you were planning to do anyway.
"You could exchange gardening services for babysitting services," Stack says. "If you like to cook, you could prepare and freeze a couple of meals and give them to a friend in exchange for wrapping your holiday gifts."
4. Get moving.
It's hard to make time for exercise when you have a jam-packed schedule, but experts say that it may ultimately help you get more done by boosting your energy level and ability to concentrate.
"Research shows exercise can help you to be more alert," Brooks says. "And I've noticed that when I don't exercise because I'm trying to squeeze in another half hour of writing, I don't feel as alert."
Samantha Harris, a lawyer who works for a nonprofit organization in Philadelphia, says she recently started sneaking in a trip to the gym two or three mornings a week before her family wakes up. "It's been a real boost in terms of the way I feel for the rest of the day," she says. "I feel like my head is clearer and I've had a little time to myself."
5. Remember that a little relaxation goes a long way.
Don't get overwhelmed by assuming that you need to make big changes to bring more balance to your life. Brooks recommends setting realistic goals, like trying to leave the office earlier one night per week.
"Slowly build more activities into your schedule that are important to you," he says. "Maybe you can start by spending an hour a week on your hobby of carpentry or planning a weekend getaway with your spouse once a year," he says.
Stack points out that even during a hectic day, you can take 10 or 15 minutes to do something that will recharge your batteries. "Take a bath, read a trashy novel, go for a walk, or listen to music," she suggests. "You have to make a little time for the things that ignite your joy."
Source: www.webmd.com
E-Mail Writing-2011
SHOULD WE DITCH “DEAR…” FROM OUR E-MAILS?
By James Morgan BBC News
January 2011
Should e-mails open with Dear, Hi, or Hey?
It's time we ditched "Dear..." from work e-mails, according to a US political figure, who says it's too intimate. So what is the most appropriate way to greet someone in an e-mail - hi, hey or just get straight to the point?
Two words. That's all Giselle Barry needed to leave a lasting impression.
The spokeswoman for US congressman Ed Markey was e-mailing a group of reporters, to alert them to an important announcement.
"Hey, folks," she began.
Such a casual salute raised eyebrows at the Wall Street Journal, which interpreted the beginning of her e-mail as the end of a centuries-old written tradition.
"Across the internet the use of 'dear' is going the way of sealing wax," noted the newspaper.
"'Dear...' is a bit too intimate and connotes a personal relationship," Ms Barry told the paper. And as she strives to maintain what she calls "the utmost and highest level of professionalism", she sees no need for old-fashioned graces.
E-mail has changed the rules of engagement. The language of business is evolving. Our old "dears" are withering away, replaced in the top perch by "hello", "hi" and "hey".
And not everyone is quite so relaxed about this as Ms Barry.
"I'm fed up with people writing 'Hi Jean' when they've never met me," says etiquette guru Jean Broke-Smith.
"If you're sending a business e-mail you should begin 'Dear...' - like a letter. You are presenting yourself. Politeness and etiquette are essential.
"We are losing the art of letter writing. E-mails are becoming like texts. If we don't get a handle on it, future generations won't be able to spell at all."
But why are so many of us culling "Dear..." from our e-mails, even in the workplace? The simplest answer for its detractors is that it no longer says what it means, it feels cold and distant.
"The only time I write 'Dear...' is if I'm making a complaint," says Dan Germain, head of creative at Innocent smoothies. "If I'm writing to someone I am trying to impress, I would simply say 'Hello'. Losing 'Dear...' does not equal rudeness."
The word also implies being of a certain age, says Jon King, managing director of the digital marketing agency Story Worldwide, who adds: "I never use 'Dear...' It's old-dearish."
Mr King was the frontman in post-punk band the Gang of Four. His clients today include luxury brands like Faberge and Estee Lauder.
So how does he greet them? "Often with no intro line at all. I assume they know who they are, and cut to the chase."
It is this race to communicate that leaves old-school etiquette trailing in the wake, according to social behaviour expert Liz Brewer, star of ITV's Ladette to Lady.
"With social networking, we do everything in three seconds - reply, type, send - and often without due consideration," she explains.
"We have to remember that at the start of an e-mail we are sending a subtle message. If I write 'hi' to a person I don't know, I risk falling into a pit. I shouldn't presume I can be so familiar."
Introducing an e-mail is a lot like arriving at a party, she says. "Better to be overdressed. You can always take off the pearls."
As e-mail greetings go, "Hey folks" sure ain't pearls.
"Hey" sounds more like the brash, surfy American cousin of "hi". But is it really Bermuda shorts and bare feet?
That all depends on the recipient, says Anna Post, spokeswoman for the Emily Post Institute, which is based in Vermont and provides etiquette experts and advice to corporations in the US.
"'Hey' is a funny one. I never used to have a problem with it," she says. "Until I met the CEO of a young, hip company, who said she hated it. She said it sounds like a sharp jab. 'Hey!' Whereas to me, 'hey' sounds jaunty and uplifting."
And since we have no control over our e-mail recipient's perception, greetings like "hey" are not worth the risk in business, she adds.
"I would use 'Dear...' with people I don't know particularly well, because it corresponds to respect. I disagree with people who say 'Dear...' means 'you are particularly dear to me'. To convey that kind of 'Dear...' you need to write 'my dearest'."
But if introductions are a dilemma, sign-offs are a social networking minefield.
"Yours faithfully" can't be trusted. "Sincerely" feels insincere. And your "kindest regards" sound like anything but.
Liz Brewer believes you can never go wrong with 'best wishes'. "People put 'XX' all the time - and that's fine, but only if you would kiss the person in the street."
The trouble with sign-offs is you have so many options, says Anna Post. "It's the hottest question I get asked at my business comms classes. If it's business, I would stick to 'regards', 'kind regards' or 'best'.
"'Cheers' is too warm for some industries. But the one I really don't like is 'BR'. How could they be your 'best regards' if you couldn't even be bothered to type them out?"
The trick with sign-offs is to choose a phrase that's almost invisible, she says, because if the phrase looks odd "then people are no longer thinking about the content of your message", says Anna Post.
________________________________________
Dear James,
I'm fed up with people writing "Hi Jean" when they've never met me. Or putting "cheers" at the end of an e-mail. What is 'cheers'? Clinking a glass? It's an irrelevant word.
If you're sending a business e-mail you should begin "Dear..." - like a letter. You are presenting yourself. Politeness and etiquette are essential.
We're losing the art of letter writing. E-mails are becoming like texts - everyone is abbreviating. If we don't get a handle on it, future generations won't be able to spell at all.
I don't know you, so I'm not going to sign off "love" or "best wishes". And I'm banning the word "cheers".
Regards,
Jean Broke-Smith
Dan Germain Head of creative, Innocent
________________________________________
Hello James,
The only time I write "Dear..." is if I'm making a complaint. If I'm writing to someone I am trying to impress, I would simply say "hello". Losing "Dear" does not equal rudeness.
I work at Innocent smoothies, with a bunch of young 'uns. What I get from them in e-mails is "hi" and "hey" and the occasional "yo", but not often. Our smoothie marketing might have a casual tone of voice, but we're still a business.
Yes, we do use a conversational tone of voice on our packaging. You've already invited us into your fridge, so let's have a natter. But that for me is different to having a business conversation with an agency or a supplier.
In fact we have a policy about e-mails. "Don't write anything that could be misunderstood." Irony and sarcasm never work. And don't think that adding a smiley and three trillion exclamation marks will help. It just makes people think you're an idiot.
All the best,
Dan
Katie Craig English teacher
________________________________________
James!
It absolutely isn't weird to write "Dear..." at the start of an e-mail if that e-mail has replaced the function of letter-writing. So, my students' parents get a "Dear..." in the first couple of responses. Once we get to know each other, I take my lead from them.
The rule is, address your reader as you would in the context with which you are replacing the e-mail.
I find good friends often get no sort of greeting at all. Similar to the way, in life, we'd simply smile and resume the previous night's conversation.
With someone I haven't spoken to in a while, but am glad to, it tends to be their name and an exclamation mark, or, disgustingly, several (never let my pupils know this).
I think this makes sense - it's the lexical equivalent of running up to someone on the street and giving them a hug.
Let's meet soon,
Katie x
________________________________________
21st January 2011 - 23:15
I sent my first email in 1984 (on a DEC VAX). The rule then was that the "to" line takes the place of "dear", so the body of the email has no salutation. The only time that "dear X" or even just the first line of the body starting with "X" was allowed, was when one is sending to several people and it was more polite to emphasize the distinction between recipient, and bystanders.
________________________________________
21st January 2011 - 23:15
The only reason there's a debate about this is because many people cling to the belief that an email is like a letter. It is not. It depends on the recipient but if you're getting 20 emails a day from suppliers and need to negotiate back and forth, you do not have time to treat each reply as a letter. Googlemail has the right idea, grouping emails of the same subject into a 'Conversation'.
________________________________________
Final del formulario21st January 2011 - 23:06
I always start with their name, or if its a teacher or professor (I'm at university) I say Professor whomever.
Example:
Professor Windstein
Thanks again for whatever.
All the best/thanks again/ cheers/sincerely,
Me
Also, cheers is not shallow. It's a happier less drab way of saying thank you. I say it in everyday conversation, including professionals, and I see no problem using it in emails.
________________________________________
21st January 2011 - 23:04
An American colleague emailed a UK colleague "My dearest ...." and both got terrific ribbing about it. We never did find out if it was meant as a joke, attempting to be very English or if he felt this conveyed greater respect in the office.
Final del formulario329. Claire Bear
________________________________________
21st January 2011 - 19:17
many of my work colleagues, especially those in the states, don't bother with niceties such as dear, hi or hello - preferring to start them with my christian name. Personally I find this quite rude. I am in my 30s and guilty of using kind regards. Oh and another thing, if I read one more sentence that starts with "Because" I think I will pack up and go home. Don't they teach grammar in the US!
© 2011 by BBC News
By James Morgan BBC News
January 2011
Should e-mails open with Dear, Hi, or Hey?
It's time we ditched "Dear..." from work e-mails, according to a US political figure, who says it's too intimate. So what is the most appropriate way to greet someone in an e-mail - hi, hey or just get straight to the point?
Two words. That's all Giselle Barry needed to leave a lasting impression.
The spokeswoman for US congressman Ed Markey was e-mailing a group of reporters, to alert them to an important announcement.
"Hey, folks," she began.
Such a casual salute raised eyebrows at the Wall Street Journal, which interpreted the beginning of her e-mail as the end of a centuries-old written tradition.
"Across the internet the use of 'dear' is going the way of sealing wax," noted the newspaper.
"'Dear...' is a bit too intimate and connotes a personal relationship," Ms Barry told the paper. And as she strives to maintain what she calls "the utmost and highest level of professionalism", she sees no need for old-fashioned graces.
E-mail has changed the rules of engagement. The language of business is evolving. Our old "dears" are withering away, replaced in the top perch by "hello", "hi" and "hey".
And not everyone is quite so relaxed about this as Ms Barry.
"I'm fed up with people writing 'Hi Jean' when they've never met me," says etiquette guru Jean Broke-Smith.
"If you're sending a business e-mail you should begin 'Dear...' - like a letter. You are presenting yourself. Politeness and etiquette are essential.
"We are losing the art of letter writing. E-mails are becoming like texts. If we don't get a handle on it, future generations won't be able to spell at all."
But why are so many of us culling "Dear..." from our e-mails, even in the workplace? The simplest answer for its detractors is that it no longer says what it means, it feels cold and distant.
"The only time I write 'Dear...' is if I'm making a complaint," says Dan Germain, head of creative at Innocent smoothies. "If I'm writing to someone I am trying to impress, I would simply say 'Hello'. Losing 'Dear...' does not equal rudeness."
The word also implies being of a certain age, says Jon King, managing director of the digital marketing agency Story Worldwide, who adds: "I never use 'Dear...' It's old-dearish."
Mr King was the frontman in post-punk band the Gang of Four. His clients today include luxury brands like Faberge and Estee Lauder.
So how does he greet them? "Often with no intro line at all. I assume they know who they are, and cut to the chase."
It is this race to communicate that leaves old-school etiquette trailing in the wake, according to social behaviour expert Liz Brewer, star of ITV's Ladette to Lady.
"With social networking, we do everything in three seconds - reply, type, send - and often without due consideration," she explains.
"We have to remember that at the start of an e-mail we are sending a subtle message. If I write 'hi' to a person I don't know, I risk falling into a pit. I shouldn't presume I can be so familiar."
Introducing an e-mail is a lot like arriving at a party, she says. "Better to be overdressed. You can always take off the pearls."
As e-mail greetings go, "Hey folks" sure ain't pearls.
"Hey" sounds more like the brash, surfy American cousin of "hi". But is it really Bermuda shorts and bare feet?
That all depends on the recipient, says Anna Post, spokeswoman for the Emily Post Institute, which is based in Vermont and provides etiquette experts and advice to corporations in the US.
"'Hey' is a funny one. I never used to have a problem with it," she says. "Until I met the CEO of a young, hip company, who said she hated it. She said it sounds like a sharp jab. 'Hey!' Whereas to me, 'hey' sounds jaunty and uplifting."
And since we have no control over our e-mail recipient's perception, greetings like "hey" are not worth the risk in business, she adds.
"I would use 'Dear...' with people I don't know particularly well, because it corresponds to respect. I disagree with people who say 'Dear...' means 'you are particularly dear to me'. To convey that kind of 'Dear...' you need to write 'my dearest'."
But if introductions are a dilemma, sign-offs are a social networking minefield.
"Yours faithfully" can't be trusted. "Sincerely" feels insincere. And your "kindest regards" sound like anything but.
Liz Brewer believes you can never go wrong with 'best wishes'. "People put 'XX' all the time - and that's fine, but only if you would kiss the person in the street."
The trouble with sign-offs is you have so many options, says Anna Post. "It's the hottest question I get asked at my business comms classes. If it's business, I would stick to 'regards', 'kind regards' or 'best'.
"'Cheers' is too warm for some industries. But the one I really don't like is 'BR'. How could they be your 'best regards' if you couldn't even be bothered to type them out?"
The trick with sign-offs is to choose a phrase that's almost invisible, she says, because if the phrase looks odd "then people are no longer thinking about the content of your message", says Anna Post.
________________________________________
Dear James,
I'm fed up with people writing "Hi Jean" when they've never met me. Or putting "cheers" at the end of an e-mail. What is 'cheers'? Clinking a glass? It's an irrelevant word.
If you're sending a business e-mail you should begin "Dear..." - like a letter. You are presenting yourself. Politeness and etiquette are essential.
We're losing the art of letter writing. E-mails are becoming like texts - everyone is abbreviating. If we don't get a handle on it, future generations won't be able to spell at all.
I don't know you, so I'm not going to sign off "love" or "best wishes". And I'm banning the word "cheers".
Regards,
Jean Broke-Smith
Dan Germain Head of creative, Innocent
________________________________________
Hello James,
The only time I write "Dear..." is if I'm making a complaint. If I'm writing to someone I am trying to impress, I would simply say "hello". Losing "Dear" does not equal rudeness.
I work at Innocent smoothies, with a bunch of young 'uns. What I get from them in e-mails is "hi" and "hey" and the occasional "yo", but not often. Our smoothie marketing might have a casual tone of voice, but we're still a business.
Yes, we do use a conversational tone of voice on our packaging. You've already invited us into your fridge, so let's have a natter. But that for me is different to having a business conversation with an agency or a supplier.
In fact we have a policy about e-mails. "Don't write anything that could be misunderstood." Irony and sarcasm never work. And don't think that adding a smiley and three trillion exclamation marks will help. It just makes people think you're an idiot.
All the best,
Dan
Katie Craig English teacher
________________________________________
James!
It absolutely isn't weird to write "Dear..." at the start of an e-mail if that e-mail has replaced the function of letter-writing. So, my students' parents get a "Dear..." in the first couple of responses. Once we get to know each other, I take my lead from them.
The rule is, address your reader as you would in the context with which you are replacing the e-mail.
I find good friends often get no sort of greeting at all. Similar to the way, in life, we'd simply smile and resume the previous night's conversation.
With someone I haven't spoken to in a while, but am glad to, it tends to be their name and an exclamation mark, or, disgustingly, several (never let my pupils know this).
I think this makes sense - it's the lexical equivalent of running up to someone on the street and giving them a hug.
Let's meet soon,
Katie x
________________________________________
21st January 2011 - 23:15
I sent my first email in 1984 (on a DEC VAX). The rule then was that the "to" line takes the place of "dear", so the body of the email has no salutation. The only time that "dear X" or even just the first line of the body starting with "X" was allowed, was when one is sending to several people and it was more polite to emphasize the distinction between recipient, and bystanders.
________________________________________
21st January 2011 - 23:15
The only reason there's a debate about this is because many people cling to the belief that an email is like a letter. It is not. It depends on the recipient but if you're getting 20 emails a day from suppliers and need to negotiate back and forth, you do not have time to treat each reply as a letter. Googlemail has the right idea, grouping emails of the same subject into a 'Conversation'.
________________________________________
Final del formulario21st January 2011 - 23:06
I always start with their name, or if its a teacher or professor (I'm at university) I say Professor whomever.
Example:
Professor Windstein
Thanks again for whatever.
All the best/thanks again/ cheers/sincerely,
Me
Also, cheers is not shallow. It's a happier less drab way of saying thank you. I say it in everyday conversation, including professionals, and I see no problem using it in emails.
________________________________________
21st January 2011 - 23:04
An American colleague emailed a UK colleague "My dearest ...." and both got terrific ribbing about it. We never did find out if it was meant as a joke, attempting to be very English or if he felt this conveyed greater respect in the office.
Final del formulario329. Claire Bear
________________________________________
21st January 2011 - 19:17
many of my work colleagues, especially those in the states, don't bother with niceties such as dear, hi or hello - preferring to start them with my christian name. Personally I find this quite rude. I am in my 30s and guilty of using kind regards. Oh and another thing, if I read one more sentence that starts with "Because" I think I will pack up and go home. Don't they teach grammar in the US!
© 2011 by BBC News
The New York Times-The Royal Wedding-2011
April 21, 2011
The Real Royals Say ‘I Do’
By ROGER COHEN
LONDON — It has to be said that the British monarch and newspaper columnists are diametric opposites: in 59 years on the throne, Queen Elizabeth II has never expressed a public opinion on anything.
No wonder she’s so popular. Even in an age when the royals are busy putting servers to work (Facebook and Twitter are their new domain), this head of state retains a strand of mystery from another age. Britain has no written constitution yet excels in constancy.
I resisted. I did. I ignored all the amblers in the parks saying, “What are you doing for the wedding?” I averted my eyes from the bunting along Regent Street, the stands outside Buckingham Palace, the commemorative china. I was not, whatever the pressure, going to write a column about the royal wedding.
It’s hard to say when I buckled. These are not things one likes, as a small-r republican, to talk about. Perhaps it was a businessman friend, after a conversation with colleagues in Bombay, telling me all India cares about is the wedding. Perhaps it was radiant Kate from Central Casting with the touch of whimsy in her hats. Or was it The Evening Standard’s screaming headline, “Kate to Say I Do Live on YouTube,” that tipped the balance?
There are some serious things to say about the union of Prince William, second in line to the throne, and Catherine Elizabeth Middleton — but they elude me. I will say this: At a time when Brits are learning to live without public libraries (not to mention jobs) as a result of budget cuts, they are enthused by this lavish ceremony that will see the daughter of millionaires (a commoner in local parlance) wed to the helicopter pilot who will one day head the sprawling enterprise royals call the Firm.
Bread and circuses, the Romans noted, are what people need. Circuses, it seems, are what they need most. No nation can script a feel-good moment, a global fantasy, quite like Britain, where class is the sediment of centuries. In the age of “Celebrity Apprentice,” the British royals are the time-honed pros.
There’s been a nod to straitened times. Kate will forsake a horse and carriage for a car. Prime Minister David Cameron, who flew the budget airline easyJet for a recent break in Spain — Michelle Obama, take note — was to wear a lounge suit in his ongoing campaign to prove he’s not what he is: an Eton-educated toff. That was before vociferous complaints led Downing Street to say he’d don tails.
America is entranced. As Hamish Bowles, who will cover the wedding for Vogue, told me, “There’s something mesmerizing to Americans about the idea of a society structured with this impenetrable citadel at the top.” A U.S. society whose self-defining myths include the myth of classlessness needs the spectacle of class at work.
So Kate, at some level, is a 29-year-old Cinderella, the commoner ushered into the citadel, the pretty girl who now has her own coat of arms (three acorns separated by gold and white chevrons.) She’s played her hand well. As Bowles noted, “There’s something of a kind of poised and manicured Upper East Side girl about her, with classic dress sense. A KM dress has iconicity: understated, pared-down, a dramatic solid color.” And then, of course, there’s the hat.
In fact, the Cinderella thing is wrong. She’s Marlborough-educated to his Eton-educated, a partner in a moneyed elite. They’re a modern couple: they met at college, broke up, and, as the dyspeptic father of the groom, Prince Charles, noted, “They’ve been practicing long enough.” He’s got a real job. He’s not found himself in the wrong company, like his Azerbaijan-attracted uncle Prince Andrew, or in the wrong inner-Fascist attire, like Prince Harry. In short, far from fairy tales, they seem grounded and real.
I think that’s what the Brits like — as well as the chance, with Easter and then the wedding, to take an 11-day break on just three days’ leave at multi-billion cost to the nation. In fact they like the couple so much they want to skip Charles (who may be in his 80’s before he gets the top job) and go straight to William. That won’t happen. On abdications the royal view is: been there, done that, didn’t like it.
Of course, King Edward VIII’s decision to quit has been much aired in the movie, “The King’s Speech.” And there, as a little girl, is the present queen! She’s met, as monarch, with every prime minister since Churchill — 12 of them. Another sharp contradistinction with columnists is she really knows what’s going on.
In truth, that’s what made me snap: her ever-presence. Just to remind myself of the British miracle, I strolled through Westminster Hall, its magnificent timber roof arching over the flag-stoned expanse that has seen coronation banquets from Richard I in 1189 to George IV in 1821, trials including that of Guy Fawkes, and Winston Churchill lying in state.
The genius of Britain is continuity, a very serious idea of which William and Kate now become part. It’s enough to make a republican dabble in monarchism.
You can follow Roger Cohen on Twitter at twitter.com/nytimescohen.
The Real Royals Say ‘I Do’
By ROGER COHEN
LONDON — It has to be said that the British monarch and newspaper columnists are diametric opposites: in 59 years on the throne, Queen Elizabeth II has never expressed a public opinion on anything.
No wonder she’s so popular. Even in an age when the royals are busy putting servers to work (Facebook and Twitter are their new domain), this head of state retains a strand of mystery from another age. Britain has no written constitution yet excels in constancy.
I resisted. I did. I ignored all the amblers in the parks saying, “What are you doing for the wedding?” I averted my eyes from the bunting along Regent Street, the stands outside Buckingham Palace, the commemorative china. I was not, whatever the pressure, going to write a column about the royal wedding.
It’s hard to say when I buckled. These are not things one likes, as a small-r republican, to talk about. Perhaps it was a businessman friend, after a conversation with colleagues in Bombay, telling me all India cares about is the wedding. Perhaps it was radiant Kate from Central Casting with the touch of whimsy in her hats. Or was it The Evening Standard’s screaming headline, “Kate to Say I Do Live on YouTube,” that tipped the balance?
There are some serious things to say about the union of Prince William, second in line to the throne, and Catherine Elizabeth Middleton — but they elude me. I will say this: At a time when Brits are learning to live without public libraries (not to mention jobs) as a result of budget cuts, they are enthused by this lavish ceremony that will see the daughter of millionaires (a commoner in local parlance) wed to the helicopter pilot who will one day head the sprawling enterprise royals call the Firm.
Bread and circuses, the Romans noted, are what people need. Circuses, it seems, are what they need most. No nation can script a feel-good moment, a global fantasy, quite like Britain, where class is the sediment of centuries. In the age of “Celebrity Apprentice,” the British royals are the time-honed pros.
There’s been a nod to straitened times. Kate will forsake a horse and carriage for a car. Prime Minister David Cameron, who flew the budget airline easyJet for a recent break in Spain — Michelle Obama, take note — was to wear a lounge suit in his ongoing campaign to prove he’s not what he is: an Eton-educated toff. That was before vociferous complaints led Downing Street to say he’d don tails.
America is entranced. As Hamish Bowles, who will cover the wedding for Vogue, told me, “There’s something mesmerizing to Americans about the idea of a society structured with this impenetrable citadel at the top.” A U.S. society whose self-defining myths include the myth of classlessness needs the spectacle of class at work.
So Kate, at some level, is a 29-year-old Cinderella, the commoner ushered into the citadel, the pretty girl who now has her own coat of arms (three acorns separated by gold and white chevrons.) She’s played her hand well. As Bowles noted, “There’s something of a kind of poised and manicured Upper East Side girl about her, with classic dress sense. A KM dress has iconicity: understated, pared-down, a dramatic solid color.” And then, of course, there’s the hat.
In fact, the Cinderella thing is wrong. She’s Marlborough-educated to his Eton-educated, a partner in a moneyed elite. They’re a modern couple: they met at college, broke up, and, as the dyspeptic father of the groom, Prince Charles, noted, “They’ve been practicing long enough.” He’s got a real job. He’s not found himself in the wrong company, like his Azerbaijan-attracted uncle Prince Andrew, or in the wrong inner-Fascist attire, like Prince Harry. In short, far from fairy tales, they seem grounded and real.
I think that’s what the Brits like — as well as the chance, with Easter and then the wedding, to take an 11-day break on just three days’ leave at multi-billion cost to the nation. In fact they like the couple so much they want to skip Charles (who may be in his 80’s before he gets the top job) and go straight to William. That won’t happen. On abdications the royal view is: been there, done that, didn’t like it.
Of course, King Edward VIII’s decision to quit has been much aired in the movie, “The King’s Speech.” And there, as a little girl, is the present queen! She’s met, as monarch, with every prime minister since Churchill — 12 of them. Another sharp contradistinction with columnists is she really knows what’s going on.
In truth, that’s what made me snap: her ever-presence. Just to remind myself of the British miracle, I strolled through Westminster Hall, its magnificent timber roof arching over the flag-stoned expanse that has seen coronation banquets from Richard I in 1189 to George IV in 1821, trials including that of Guy Fawkes, and Winston Churchill lying in state.
The genius of Britain is continuity, a very serious idea of which William and Kate now become part. It’s enough to make a republican dabble in monarchism.
You can follow Roger Cohen on Twitter at twitter.com/nytimescohen.
Friday, April 29, 2011
TED-Talks-Nigel Marsh-How to Make Work-Life Balance Work
TRANSCRIPT-Nigel Marsh-How to Make Work-Life Balance Work
What I thought I would do I would start with a simple request. I´d like all of you to pause for a moment, you wretched weaklings, and take stock of your miserable existence. Now that was the advice that St Benedict gave his rather startled followers in the Fifth century. It was the advice that I decided to follow myself when I turned 40. Up until that moment, I had been that classic corporate warrior-I was eating too much, I was drinking too much, I was working too hard, and I was neglecting my family. And I decided that I would try and turn my life around. In particular, I decided I would try to address the thorny issue of work-life balance. So I stepped back from the workforce, and I spent a year at home with my wife and four young children. But all I learned about work-life balance from that year was that I found it quite easy to balance work and life when I didn´t have any work. Not a very useful skill, especially when the money runs out. So I went back to work, and I´ve spent these seven years since struggling with, studying and writing about work-life balance. And I have four observations I´d like to share with you today. The first is , if society´s to make any progress on this issue, we need an honest debate. But the trouble is so many people talk so much rubbish about work-life balance. All the discussions about flexi-time or dress-down Fridays or paternity leave only serve to mask the core issue, which is that certain job and career choices are fundamentally incompatible with being meaningfully engaged on a day-to-day basis with a young family. Now the first step in solving any problem is acknowledging the reality of the situation you´re in. And the reality of the society that we´re in is there are thousands and thousands of people out there leading lives of quiet screaming desperation, where they work long, hard hours at jobs they hate to enable them to buy things they don´t need to impress people they don´t like. It´s my contention that going to work on a Friday in jeans and T-shirt isn´t really getting to the nub of the issue. The second observation I´d like to make is we need to face the truth that governments and corporations aren´t going to solve this issue for us. We should stop looking outside; it´s up to us as individuals to take control and responsibility for the type of life we want to lead. If you don´t design your life, someone else will design it for you, and you may just not like their idea of balance. It´s particularly important- this issue isn´t on the World Wide Web is it, I´m about to get fired- it´s particularly important that you never put the quality of your life in the hands of a commercial corporation. Now I´m not talking here just about the bad companies-the abattoirs of the human soul as I call them. I´m talking about all companies. Because commercial companies are inherently designed to get as much out of you as they can get away with. It´s in their nature, it´s in their DNA, it´s what they do-even the good, well-intentioned companies. One the one hand, putting child care facilities in the workplace is wonderful and enlightened. On the other hand, it´s a nightmare; it just means you spend more time at the bloody office. We have to be responsible for setting and enforcing the boundaries that we want in our life. The third observation is we have to be careful with the time frame that we choose upon which to judge our balance. Before I went back to work after my year at home, I sat down and I wrote out a detailed, step-by-step description of the ideal balanced day that I aspire to. And it went like this: Wake up well-rested after a good night´s sleep. Have sex. Walk the dog. Have breakfast with my wife and children. Have sex again. Drive the kids to school on the way to the office. Do three hours work. Play sport with a friend at lunch time. Do another three hours work. Meet some mates in the pub for an early evening drink. Drive home for dinner with my wife and kids. Meditate for half an hour. Have sex. Walk the dog. Have sex again. Go to bed. How often do you think I had that day? We need to be realistic. You can´t do it all in one day. We need to elongate the time frame upon which we judge the balance in our life, but we need to elongate it without falling into the trap of the “I´ll have a life when I retire, when my kids have left home, when my wife has divorced me, my health is failing, I´ve got no mates or interests left.” A day is too short, after I retire is too long. There´s got to be a middle way. A fourth observation: We need to approach balance in a balanced way. A friend came to see me last year-and she doesn´t mind me telling this story- a friend came to me last year and said, “Nigel, I´ve read your book. And I realize that my life is completely out of balance. It´s totally dominated by work. I work 10 hours a day, I commute two hours a day. All my relationships have failed. There´s nothing in my life apart from my work. So I´ve decided to get a grip and sort it out. So I joined a gym.” Now I don´t mean to mock, but being a fit 10-hour a day office rat isn´t more balanced, it´s more fit. Lovely though physical exercise may be, there are other parts to life. There´s the intellectual side, there´s the emotional side, there´s the spiritual side. And to be balanced, I believe we have to attend to all of those areas-not just do 50 stomach crunches. Now that can be daunting. Because people say, “Bloody hell mate, I haven´t got time to get fit; you want me to go to church and call my mother.” And I understand. I truly understand how that can be daunting. But an incident that happened a couple of years ago gave me a new perspective. My wife, who is somewhere here in the audience today, called me up at the office and said, “Nigel, you need to pick our youngest son up, Harry from school.” Because she had to be somewhere else with the other three children for that evening. So I left work an hour early that afternoon and picked Harry up at the school gates. We walked down to the local park, messed around on the swings, played some silly games. I then walked him up the hill to the local cafe and we shared pizza for tea, then walked down the hill to our home, and I gave him his bath and put him in his Batman pajamas. I then read him a chapter of Roald Dahl´s “James and the Giant Peach.” I then put him to bed, tucked him in, gave him a kiss on his forehead and said, “Goodnight, mate,” and walked out of his bedroom. As I was walking out of his bedroom, he said, “Dad?” , “Yes, mate?” He went, “Dad, this has been the best day of my life, ever.” I hadn´t done anything, hadn´t taken him to Disneyworld or bought him a Playstation. Now my point is the small things matter. Being more balanced doesn´t mean dramatic upheaval in your life. With the smallest investment in the right places, you can radically transform the quality of your relationships and the quality of your life. Moreover, I think, it can transform society. Because if enough people do it, we can change society´s definition of success away from the moronically simplistic notion that the person with the most money when he dies wins, to a more thoughtful and balanced definition of what a life well-lived looks like. And that, I think, is an idea worth spreading.
Mc Kinsey Quarterly-Boosting Productivity in US Higher Education-2011
Boosting productivity in US higher education
America’s economic health depends on additional college-trained workers. Some universities are showing how to graduate more students at lower cost.
APRIL 2011 • Adam Cota, Kartik Jayaram, and Martha C. A. Laboissière
Source: Social Sector Practice
Exhibit: The best performing schools are achieving measurable improvements in the areas targeted by five strategies.
The United States needs more college graduates. Opinions vary on exactly how many, but McKinsey estimates that the nation will need an additional one million each year by 2020 to sustain its economic health. That would mean increasing today’s annual total—2.5 million—by 40 percent.
To meet this goal, universities and colleges would have to increase their output of graduates by 3.5 percent a year over the next decade. That’s a daunting task for two reasons. First, it would cost an additional $52 billion a year, based on 2008 costs to produce a graduate. Yet many states, plagued by fiscal woes, have recently lowered spending on higher education, a trend that’s unlikely to be reversed. Second, to achieve this increase, colleges would need to enroll many more than 3.5 percent more freshmen each year, because today, on average, only 40 percent of students who enroll go on to graduate.
To meet the target without spending more, colleges would simultaneously have to attract additional students, increase the proportion of them who complete a degree, and keep a tight lid on costs. Gaming the target by lowering the quality of the education or granting access only to the best-prepared students obviously wouldn’t count. Not surprisingly, many people within and beyond higher education say that colleges can’t possibly do all these things at once.
But McKinsey research suggests that many already are, using tactics others could emulate. In fact, the potential to increase productivity across the varied spectrum of US higher education appears to be so great that, with the right policy support, one million more graduates a year by 2020, at today’s spending levels, begins to look eminently feasible. The quality of education and access to it could both improve at the same time.
Good education, good management
How a college manages its resources shows up in its cost per degree, found by dividing the institution’s total annual costs by the number of degrees awarded. The measure sounds simple, but it captures the two key components of higher education’s productivity: cost efficiency and completion rates. Some colleges have a high cost per degree because they produce many graduates, but their overall costs are excessive. Others graduate relatively few students, though keep their costs in check. Some struggle on both counts. Institutions become more productive by increasing graduation rates while controlling overall costs.
To understand what makes institutions more productive, McKinsey examined the education and management practices of eight colleges with productivity levels up to 60 percent greater than average, measured by the cost per degree (see sidebar, “About the research”). These highly productive colleges are a mix of private and public, for profit and nonprofit, with more or less competitive entry. All perform highly on measures of educational quality and openness of access, and all belong to the groups of colleges that award associate’s or bachelor’s degrees after two or four years of study, respectively. We chose schools from these groups because they represent the bulk of higher education: similar segments of institutions educate 51 percent of all college students in the United States.
The eight colleges share some organizational and cultural features that facilitate high productivity. These features notably include smooth-running operational and managerial systems, a policy framework that encourages their ongoing improvement, and, above all, leaders and staff dedicated to combining good education and good management. The schools achieve high productivity largely through five strategies: two that increase the number of students completing their degrees and three that keep costs under control.
Helping students to graduate
The eight highly productive institutions design their education systems expressly to help as many students as possible achieve degrees. Indiana Wesleyan University’s College of Adult and Professional Studies (IWU–CAPS), for example, achieves a six-year graduation rate of 65 percent—19 percentage points above its peer average—by constructing clear-cut pathways to degrees and encouraging students to support one another. Early assignments have the dual purpose of helping students get together and learn how they can succeed academically at college, whether on campus or online. With few pathways to a degree, students generally move through the sequence of classes as a single cohort, keeping each other up to the mark.
Similarly, in Florida, Valencia Community College’s three-year graduation rate—35 percent—is 15 percentage points above that of peer institutions, partly because the college provides students with support and tools for planning their path to graduation. It also tailors support to its different student segments and has redesigned support services to improve their quality.
Reducing nonproductive credits
Up to 10 percent of all credits taken by US students are in excess of the number required to graduate. True, such credits may expand students’ minds, but they add cost to a degree. Tracking students’ progress and skillfully intervening when necessary can help reduce that cost. Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU), for instance, has a monitoring system that discourages students from embarking on redundant credits altogether: no bachelor’s graduate at SNHU completes more than 150 credits en route to a degree, while 20 percent of graduates at similar institutions have upward of 150. Better preparation for college work and a policy of allowing transfer students to conserve credits help reduce redundant credits too.
Failed courses and courses from which students withdraw account for an additional 7 percent of all credits taken. Targeted policies can help institutions to cut this waste. Brigham Young University–Idaho (BYU–Idaho) has implemented policies to prevent redundant teaching and learning, including strict guidelines on course withdrawal and academic progress. Partly as a result, BYU–Idaho’s rates of failure and withdrawal are as much as 32 percent lower than its peer average. In addition, BYU–Idaho insists that students gain at least 75 percent of their intended credits each semester or risk suspension. By contrast, many colleges review a student’s rate of credit completion only once a year.
Redesigning instruction
Using new teaching technologies can lower costs substantially and raise quality at the same time. Rio Salado College, in Arizona, substitutes part- for full-time faculty. Western Governors University (WGU), in Utah, uses course mentors—one for academic and one for life-coaching purposes—to augment online teaching materials. Both schools develop “master courses” centrally instead of asking individual professors to create their own material. High-tech teaching systems are understandably controversial, but their results have been verified. Since 1999, the National Center for Academic Transformation (NCAT) has helped 150 institutions make the best use of technology in their teaching. NCAT found that costs at its partner institutions decreased, on average, by 37 percent in redesigned courses. Learning outcomes improved after 72 percent of the redesigns, and the other 28 percent produced learning of a quality comparable to that of traditional formats. NCAT has six alternative redesigns ready and waiting for colleges to introduce.
Technology isn’t the only way to cut teaching costs. More conventionally, BYU–Idaho revamped the academic calendar to include a third (full spring) semester, serving the same number of students as the fall and winter semesters. The college increased faculty pay somewhat but hired only a handful of new staff members. As a result, BYU–Idaho cut teaching costs per student by 32 percent while paying its faculty more than peer institutions do.
Improving efficiency in core support and services
Introducing leaner processes is one way to reduce the cost of core support and services, such as management functions, student services, academic support services, and plant operations. Organizational redesign and better purchasing also help. BYU–Idaho, Rio Salado, and DeVry University, for example, succeeded in bringing down costs in this area by converting paper-based systems to electronic ones, cross-training to eliminate staff downtime, and using self-service online portals to administer financial aid. BYU–Idaho and IWU–CAPS have markedly lower ratios of administrative staff to students than their counterparts, but with no outsourcing of operations. On the contrary, these schools spend less than peers do buying goods and services but pay their staffs as much as or more than peer institutions.
Running noncore services and other operations efficiently and selectively
Top-performing institutions also continually check to ensure that any noncore service and other operation they must offer to fulfill their missions are run efficiently. Many aren’t. Although some noncore services—catering, for instance—generate revenues and are self-supporting, 49 percent of all US higher-education institutions report that noncore-service revenues are too low to cover related costs.
DeVry University, SNHU, and WGU, as part of their effort to control total costs, offer almost no noncore services. Of course, many institutions must offer some, notably research, to fulfill their missions. But even these institutions can drive down costs by paying closer attention to mandatory operations while improving efficiency across all noncore services.
Doing better
Could other schools raise their productivity by adopting these strategies? The good news is that many appear to be using them already. Laying the cost-per-degree yardstick across all US higher-education institutions1 shows an average gap of 34 percent between the most productive quartile and the mean level of productivity. This difference doesn’t exist solely because some types of higher-education institutions—private universities, say—are more productive than others: there are big gaps between the average and the best in every cohort of peer institution. While we don’t know if schools in the highest quartile are using exactly the same tactics as the highly productive eight in our sample, the former too are achieving measurable improvements in all five areas targeted by the five strategies (exhibit).
Achieving one million extra graduates a year by 2020 without any increase in public funding would depend on lowering the nation’s average cost per degree by 23 percent. (This estimate assumes that total tuition revenues rise in line with student numbers but that tuition fees do not rise.) Since a quarter of the nation’s colleges and universities already produce graduates 34 percent more productively than the average, the 2020 target begins to look doable. Although eight colleges can’t represent the breadth of US higher education, the productivity impact of the five strategies we found them to be using suggests that these strategies could play a useful part in meeting the target.
Smarter policy needed
Policy makers can do their bit too. For starters, both state and federal governments could push productivity in higher education further up their agendas. Any higher-education institution aiming to improve its productivity will need to begin by appraising its current performance against reliable benchmarks. Governments should therefore require institutions to collect data on their degree productivity, to signal its significance. States should agree with colleges on standard practices for recording and measuring productivity and publish the data they collect. Without such comprehensive, accessible data, institutions cannot be held accountable for their progress (or the lack of it).
Funders too can draw attention to productivity—for example, by paying colleges to share best practices or introducing competitive grants and results-based financing. But funders should not dictate how better productivity is achieved: creative institutions can improve their performance in different ways, as long as they stick to the goals of helping more students attain degrees at a stable cost while maintaining or raising quality and access.
US living standards could falter unless most US higher-education institutions achieve these goals. Thankfully, today’s most productive colleges appear to be blazing a trail to a future when more Americans fulfill their educational potential at a cost the nation can afford.
About the Authors
Adam Cota is an associate principal in McKinsey’s Miami office, Kartik Jayaram is a principal in the Chicago office, and Martha Laboissière is an associate principal in the San Francisco office.
America’s economic health depends on additional college-trained workers. Some universities are showing how to graduate more students at lower cost.
APRIL 2011 • Adam Cota, Kartik Jayaram, and Martha C. A. Laboissière
Source: Social Sector Practice
Exhibit: The best performing schools are achieving measurable improvements in the areas targeted by five strategies.
The United States needs more college graduates. Opinions vary on exactly how many, but McKinsey estimates that the nation will need an additional one million each year by 2020 to sustain its economic health. That would mean increasing today’s annual total—2.5 million—by 40 percent.
To meet this goal, universities and colleges would have to increase their output of graduates by 3.5 percent a year over the next decade. That’s a daunting task for two reasons. First, it would cost an additional $52 billion a year, based on 2008 costs to produce a graduate. Yet many states, plagued by fiscal woes, have recently lowered spending on higher education, a trend that’s unlikely to be reversed. Second, to achieve this increase, colleges would need to enroll many more than 3.5 percent more freshmen each year, because today, on average, only 40 percent of students who enroll go on to graduate.
To meet the target without spending more, colleges would simultaneously have to attract additional students, increase the proportion of them who complete a degree, and keep a tight lid on costs. Gaming the target by lowering the quality of the education or granting access only to the best-prepared students obviously wouldn’t count. Not surprisingly, many people within and beyond higher education say that colleges can’t possibly do all these things at once.
But McKinsey research suggests that many already are, using tactics others could emulate. In fact, the potential to increase productivity across the varied spectrum of US higher education appears to be so great that, with the right policy support, one million more graduates a year by 2020, at today’s spending levels, begins to look eminently feasible. The quality of education and access to it could both improve at the same time.
Good education, good management
How a college manages its resources shows up in its cost per degree, found by dividing the institution’s total annual costs by the number of degrees awarded. The measure sounds simple, but it captures the two key components of higher education’s productivity: cost efficiency and completion rates. Some colleges have a high cost per degree because they produce many graduates, but their overall costs are excessive. Others graduate relatively few students, though keep their costs in check. Some struggle on both counts. Institutions become more productive by increasing graduation rates while controlling overall costs.
To understand what makes institutions more productive, McKinsey examined the education and management practices of eight colleges with productivity levels up to 60 percent greater than average, measured by the cost per degree (see sidebar, “About the research”). These highly productive colleges are a mix of private and public, for profit and nonprofit, with more or less competitive entry. All perform highly on measures of educational quality and openness of access, and all belong to the groups of colleges that award associate’s or bachelor’s degrees after two or four years of study, respectively. We chose schools from these groups because they represent the bulk of higher education: similar segments of institutions educate 51 percent of all college students in the United States.
The eight colleges share some organizational and cultural features that facilitate high productivity. These features notably include smooth-running operational and managerial systems, a policy framework that encourages their ongoing improvement, and, above all, leaders and staff dedicated to combining good education and good management. The schools achieve high productivity largely through five strategies: two that increase the number of students completing their degrees and three that keep costs under control.
Helping students to graduate
The eight highly productive institutions design their education systems expressly to help as many students as possible achieve degrees. Indiana Wesleyan University’s College of Adult and Professional Studies (IWU–CAPS), for example, achieves a six-year graduation rate of 65 percent—19 percentage points above its peer average—by constructing clear-cut pathways to degrees and encouraging students to support one another. Early assignments have the dual purpose of helping students get together and learn how they can succeed academically at college, whether on campus or online. With few pathways to a degree, students generally move through the sequence of classes as a single cohort, keeping each other up to the mark.
Similarly, in Florida, Valencia Community College’s three-year graduation rate—35 percent—is 15 percentage points above that of peer institutions, partly because the college provides students with support and tools for planning their path to graduation. It also tailors support to its different student segments and has redesigned support services to improve their quality.
Reducing nonproductive credits
Up to 10 percent of all credits taken by US students are in excess of the number required to graduate. True, such credits may expand students’ minds, but they add cost to a degree. Tracking students’ progress and skillfully intervening when necessary can help reduce that cost. Southern New Hampshire University (SNHU), for instance, has a monitoring system that discourages students from embarking on redundant credits altogether: no bachelor’s graduate at SNHU completes more than 150 credits en route to a degree, while 20 percent of graduates at similar institutions have upward of 150. Better preparation for college work and a policy of allowing transfer students to conserve credits help reduce redundant credits too.
Failed courses and courses from which students withdraw account for an additional 7 percent of all credits taken. Targeted policies can help institutions to cut this waste. Brigham Young University–Idaho (BYU–Idaho) has implemented policies to prevent redundant teaching and learning, including strict guidelines on course withdrawal and academic progress. Partly as a result, BYU–Idaho’s rates of failure and withdrawal are as much as 32 percent lower than its peer average. In addition, BYU–Idaho insists that students gain at least 75 percent of their intended credits each semester or risk suspension. By contrast, many colleges review a student’s rate of credit completion only once a year.
Redesigning instruction
Using new teaching technologies can lower costs substantially and raise quality at the same time. Rio Salado College, in Arizona, substitutes part- for full-time faculty. Western Governors University (WGU), in Utah, uses course mentors—one for academic and one for life-coaching purposes—to augment online teaching materials. Both schools develop “master courses” centrally instead of asking individual professors to create their own material. High-tech teaching systems are understandably controversial, but their results have been verified. Since 1999, the National Center for Academic Transformation (NCAT) has helped 150 institutions make the best use of technology in their teaching. NCAT found that costs at its partner institutions decreased, on average, by 37 percent in redesigned courses. Learning outcomes improved after 72 percent of the redesigns, and the other 28 percent produced learning of a quality comparable to that of traditional formats. NCAT has six alternative redesigns ready and waiting for colleges to introduce.
Technology isn’t the only way to cut teaching costs. More conventionally, BYU–Idaho revamped the academic calendar to include a third (full spring) semester, serving the same number of students as the fall and winter semesters. The college increased faculty pay somewhat but hired only a handful of new staff members. As a result, BYU–Idaho cut teaching costs per student by 32 percent while paying its faculty more than peer institutions do.
Improving efficiency in core support and services
Introducing leaner processes is one way to reduce the cost of core support and services, such as management functions, student services, academic support services, and plant operations. Organizational redesign and better purchasing also help. BYU–Idaho, Rio Salado, and DeVry University, for example, succeeded in bringing down costs in this area by converting paper-based systems to electronic ones, cross-training to eliminate staff downtime, and using self-service online portals to administer financial aid. BYU–Idaho and IWU–CAPS have markedly lower ratios of administrative staff to students than their counterparts, but with no outsourcing of operations. On the contrary, these schools spend less than peers do buying goods and services but pay their staffs as much as or more than peer institutions.
Running noncore services and other operations efficiently and selectively
Top-performing institutions also continually check to ensure that any noncore service and other operation they must offer to fulfill their missions are run efficiently. Many aren’t. Although some noncore services—catering, for instance—generate revenues and are self-supporting, 49 percent of all US higher-education institutions report that noncore-service revenues are too low to cover related costs.
DeVry University, SNHU, and WGU, as part of their effort to control total costs, offer almost no noncore services. Of course, many institutions must offer some, notably research, to fulfill their missions. But even these institutions can drive down costs by paying closer attention to mandatory operations while improving efficiency across all noncore services.
Doing better
Could other schools raise their productivity by adopting these strategies? The good news is that many appear to be using them already. Laying the cost-per-degree yardstick across all US higher-education institutions1 shows an average gap of 34 percent between the most productive quartile and the mean level of productivity. This difference doesn’t exist solely because some types of higher-education institutions—private universities, say—are more productive than others: there are big gaps between the average and the best in every cohort of peer institution. While we don’t know if schools in the highest quartile are using exactly the same tactics as the highly productive eight in our sample, the former too are achieving measurable improvements in all five areas targeted by the five strategies (exhibit).
Achieving one million extra graduates a year by 2020 without any increase in public funding would depend on lowering the nation’s average cost per degree by 23 percent. (This estimate assumes that total tuition revenues rise in line with student numbers but that tuition fees do not rise.) Since a quarter of the nation’s colleges and universities already produce graduates 34 percent more productively than the average, the 2020 target begins to look doable. Although eight colleges can’t represent the breadth of US higher education, the productivity impact of the five strategies we found them to be using suggests that these strategies could play a useful part in meeting the target.
Smarter policy needed
Policy makers can do their bit too. For starters, both state and federal governments could push productivity in higher education further up their agendas. Any higher-education institution aiming to improve its productivity will need to begin by appraising its current performance against reliable benchmarks. Governments should therefore require institutions to collect data on their degree productivity, to signal its significance. States should agree with colleges on standard practices for recording and measuring productivity and publish the data they collect. Without such comprehensive, accessible data, institutions cannot be held accountable for their progress (or the lack of it).
Funders too can draw attention to productivity—for example, by paying colleges to share best practices or introducing competitive grants and results-based financing. But funders should not dictate how better productivity is achieved: creative institutions can improve their performance in different ways, as long as they stick to the goals of helping more students attain degrees at a stable cost while maintaining or raising quality and access.
US living standards could falter unless most US higher-education institutions achieve these goals. Thankfully, today’s most productive colleges appear to be blazing a trail to a future when more Americans fulfill their educational potential at a cost the nation can afford.
About the Authors
Adam Cota is an associate principal in McKinsey’s Miami office, Kartik Jayaram is a principal in the Chicago office, and Martha Laboissière is an associate principal in the San Francisco office.
McKinsey Quarterly Interview-Video-Innovating US Higher Education-2011
A P R I L 2 0 11
Innovating US higher education:
Arizona State University’s Michael Crow
A pace-setting university president explains why US universities
need to become more productive, and how to advance reforms.
s o c i a l s e c t o r p r a c t i c e
2
When Michael Crow became president of Arizona State University, in 2002, the
former Columbia University vice provost had ambitious plans to turn the school into a
new American university devoted to educating a wider swath of students and focused on
higher productivity in cultivating competitive graduates who can succeed in today’s volatile
job market.
Nine years and a 25 percent increase in student enrollment later, Crow, 56, has delivered
big changes in those areas and others at ASU and has garnered a growing reputation as a
pace-setting thinker on higher education. He has made strides toward expanding ASU in
areas such as ethnic and economic diversity, graduation rates, freshman retention rates, and
in the number and intellectual reach of graduates. In fall 2010, ASU boasted an 83 percent
first-year retention rate, up from 75 percent in the mid-2000s, and a record enrollment of
more than 70,000 undergraduate and graduate students. A survey of recruiters by the Wall
Street Journal in September 2010 ranked ASU as the fifth-best American university in terms
of quality of graduates.
Crow has been outspoken on the topic of government support for schools, pushing for
an output-based model that links funding with the ability of universities to produce large
numbers of graduates with literacy across multiple disciplines. He has developed close
working ties with businesses to develop a higher profile and value proposition for ASU in
its surrounding community. In this video interview at his office in Tempe, Arizona, Crow
sat down with McKinsey’s Lenny Mendonca to discuss the challenges of restructuring the
intellectual enterprise of today’s public universities.
A global edge in higher ed?
You know, what’s interesting about the global position of American universities is that
people often think that it’s only the rankings of who are the top research performers. It’s
that, and then some. And so [with] that, relative to research, I think American universities
are well positioned to maintain their dominance, in terms of fundamental knowledge
production and so forth.
Where American universities are having some difficulty is in educating the broader
populace. We’ve got 310 million people. Our universities have difficulty scaling and
innovating. And so that’s where I think other universities in other places may have
the opportunity to be more innovative. And that’s where we’ve got to be alert to the
competitive challenges. American universities are going to have to learn how to scale.
They’re going to have to learn to perform multiple missions and multiple functions with
greater intensity.
It’s clear to almost everyone that we’re going to be going through multiple careers, and
multiple jobs [with] lots of changes as we ebb and flow with the changes in the economy.
Well, if that’s the case, which it in all likelihood will be, then our job is not to produce the
3
history major or the civil-engineering major but to produce the history graduate, or the
civil engineering graduate who is capable of learning across, basically, all disciplines. And
so you have to change your logic of what you’re actually producing. And we’re not there yet.
We’re underperforming right now in our public institutions, particularly for a whole wide
range of reasons—principally, I think, a lack of focus on innovation and a lack of focus on
producing that as an important outcome.
Changing an institution’s clock speed
When you think about change inside a university, I think the most fundamental thing
that I’ve worked on in the last nine years is changing the focus from being an institution
measuring itself based on its inputs—you know, what’s the selectivity of the students?
You certainly have to have students that are qualified. But somehow that’s [become] the
measure of success. That, of course, has nothing to do with what you do once students
come to the university.
And so we’ve flipped it on its head, and we said, now the university will be measured by
what we are able to achieve—what’s the quality of the learner that we’re producing, what’s
the speed capacity of the learner that we’re producing. And so once you are able to focus on
that, then change comes from this change in mission, change in direction. Once you have
a change in mission and a change in direction, then you can focus on change in routine.
And you start tearing down the routines that are standing in the way of actually achieving
the institution’s actual goal. Well, when you look at a public university, and you think about
a public university versus a private university, or you think about a university versus a
corporation, or something else, are there differences when you think about efficiency or
ineffectiveness?
The answer is yes, but not meaningfully so. When you think about efficiency and
effectiveness, what you’re really talking about is, how can you structure your learning
environment to operate at the highest level of performance? And if you’re a true public
university, you’re very committed to access. So therefore, at the lowest possible cost, what
are the differences? The differences are in terms of mission.
So our mission is to educate as broad a cross section of students that we possibly can in
large numbers in ways that they can be competitive in whatever field they happen to be in,
and then more broadly they can be really educated as critical thinkers and as high-speed
learners.
How do you do all of that and still be efficient? It means you have to fundamentally go back
and look at the fundamental model of the curriculum, the nature of the semester, the clock
speed of the institution—all of those things. And so right now, we have decided to look
at everything. There are no sacred cows. We’re looking at every single aspect of how the
institution works.
4
Technology: ‘Our dear and intimate friend’
When you think about technology and the role of technology, we believe that just in the
last couple years, just since 2008 and 2009, we have been able to apply technology to our
tremendous benefit. For instance, in teaching 10,000 [students] freshman English, we
have found a way to lower the cost and improve the outcomes. And [we are] doing the same
with freshman math.
Before, we had students who were fully capable—based on their SAT scores or their ACT
scores—to do very well in freshman math who were still failing in freshman math. What
we did is we restructured how we teach. We use new technologies, artificial-intelligencebased
algorithms, and new platforms—new ways of learning. We not only improved our
success rate dramatically, we also lowered our costs by 50 percent at the same time. So
technology has been our dear and intimate friend.
Overcoming barriers to reform
The hardest part of actually accomplishing change either in a university or another
institution—but I think particularly hard in universities—is to overcome an innate
conservatism, which operates on the basis that what one needs to do is to protect the
routine, protect the methodological content, protect the social constructs, in a sense not
even remembering where most of those things came from. Or what they were derived from.
Or that they themselves were innovations at one point.
And somehow the biggest challenge is getting people to realize that they can be courageous.
They can advance change as an objective and actually attain a measurable and better
outcome as a result of that. There never has been one way to do something. Universities
have not operated the same way throughout the eons. They have changed. And they have
adjusted. And they need to accelerate their change and their ability to adjust in moving
forward.
Mastering the future
I think in the next five or so years, ASU will definitively master the performance of the
immersion part of the university, the physical part of the university, where a broader crosssection
of students than most research universities have will be performing at the same
level in terms of retention, graduation, success of our students, and so forth.
So we will have mastered that through innovation. Then we’ll be looking in that context
to accelerate learning. So that you can either get in and get out quickly, if that’s what you
choose, or you can take not two majors or three majors or four, but four, five, or six. That
is, you could master more subjects, not for the sake of mastering the subjects but for
expanding your learning capability.
I think then beyond that, we’ve also figured out how to project the university with our
content. And so we’re looking in the next five years to have as many as 30,000 or 40,000
5
online students who are not in the immersion part of the university but are connected to
the immersion part of the university, getting an unbelievably technologically advanced
access platform into fantastic degrees.
And so we’re going to be doing both of those things. That, by the way, is different than the
model that most of the online purveyors of educational content are working in, because
in this case that content will be derivative of the same faculty working in the immersion
environment—in a sense doubling down their impact. And so, could we affect 100,000
students with a small, elite, highly compensated, high-performing, fantastic faculty rather
than just growing the faculty and growing the faculty with each increment of growth at the
University? That’s what I think that we will have mastered in that five-year time frame.
Copyright © 2011 McKinsey & Company. All rights reserved.
Related thinking
“Boosting productivity in US
higher education”
“How does a school system
improve?”
“The economic cost of the
US education gap”
Innovating US higher education:
Arizona State University’s Michael Crow
A pace-setting university president explains why US universities
need to become more productive, and how to advance reforms.
s o c i a l s e c t o r p r a c t i c e
2
When Michael Crow became president of Arizona State University, in 2002, the
former Columbia University vice provost had ambitious plans to turn the school into a
new American university devoted to educating a wider swath of students and focused on
higher productivity in cultivating competitive graduates who can succeed in today’s volatile
job market.
Nine years and a 25 percent increase in student enrollment later, Crow, 56, has delivered
big changes in those areas and others at ASU and has garnered a growing reputation as a
pace-setting thinker on higher education. He has made strides toward expanding ASU in
areas such as ethnic and economic diversity, graduation rates, freshman retention rates, and
in the number and intellectual reach of graduates. In fall 2010, ASU boasted an 83 percent
first-year retention rate, up from 75 percent in the mid-2000s, and a record enrollment of
more than 70,000 undergraduate and graduate students. A survey of recruiters by the Wall
Street Journal in September 2010 ranked ASU as the fifth-best American university in terms
of quality of graduates.
Crow has been outspoken on the topic of government support for schools, pushing for
an output-based model that links funding with the ability of universities to produce large
numbers of graduates with literacy across multiple disciplines. He has developed close
working ties with businesses to develop a higher profile and value proposition for ASU in
its surrounding community. In this video interview at his office in Tempe, Arizona, Crow
sat down with McKinsey’s Lenny Mendonca to discuss the challenges of restructuring the
intellectual enterprise of today’s public universities.
A global edge in higher ed?
You know, what’s interesting about the global position of American universities is that
people often think that it’s only the rankings of who are the top research performers. It’s
that, and then some. And so [with] that, relative to research, I think American universities
are well positioned to maintain their dominance, in terms of fundamental knowledge
production and so forth.
Where American universities are having some difficulty is in educating the broader
populace. We’ve got 310 million people. Our universities have difficulty scaling and
innovating. And so that’s where I think other universities in other places may have
the opportunity to be more innovative. And that’s where we’ve got to be alert to the
competitive challenges. American universities are going to have to learn how to scale.
They’re going to have to learn to perform multiple missions and multiple functions with
greater intensity.
It’s clear to almost everyone that we’re going to be going through multiple careers, and
multiple jobs [with] lots of changes as we ebb and flow with the changes in the economy.
Well, if that’s the case, which it in all likelihood will be, then our job is not to produce the
3
history major or the civil-engineering major but to produce the history graduate, or the
civil engineering graduate who is capable of learning across, basically, all disciplines. And
so you have to change your logic of what you’re actually producing. And we’re not there yet.
We’re underperforming right now in our public institutions, particularly for a whole wide
range of reasons—principally, I think, a lack of focus on innovation and a lack of focus on
producing that as an important outcome.
Changing an institution’s clock speed
When you think about change inside a university, I think the most fundamental thing
that I’ve worked on in the last nine years is changing the focus from being an institution
measuring itself based on its inputs—you know, what’s the selectivity of the students?
You certainly have to have students that are qualified. But somehow that’s [become] the
measure of success. That, of course, has nothing to do with what you do once students
come to the university.
And so we’ve flipped it on its head, and we said, now the university will be measured by
what we are able to achieve—what’s the quality of the learner that we’re producing, what’s
the speed capacity of the learner that we’re producing. And so once you are able to focus on
that, then change comes from this change in mission, change in direction. Once you have
a change in mission and a change in direction, then you can focus on change in routine.
And you start tearing down the routines that are standing in the way of actually achieving
the institution’s actual goal. Well, when you look at a public university, and you think about
a public university versus a private university, or you think about a university versus a
corporation, or something else, are there differences when you think about efficiency or
ineffectiveness?
The answer is yes, but not meaningfully so. When you think about efficiency and
effectiveness, what you’re really talking about is, how can you structure your learning
environment to operate at the highest level of performance? And if you’re a true public
university, you’re very committed to access. So therefore, at the lowest possible cost, what
are the differences? The differences are in terms of mission.
So our mission is to educate as broad a cross section of students that we possibly can in
large numbers in ways that they can be competitive in whatever field they happen to be in,
and then more broadly they can be really educated as critical thinkers and as high-speed
learners.
How do you do all of that and still be efficient? It means you have to fundamentally go back
and look at the fundamental model of the curriculum, the nature of the semester, the clock
speed of the institution—all of those things. And so right now, we have decided to look
at everything. There are no sacred cows. We’re looking at every single aspect of how the
institution works.
4
Technology: ‘Our dear and intimate friend’
When you think about technology and the role of technology, we believe that just in the
last couple years, just since 2008 and 2009, we have been able to apply technology to our
tremendous benefit. For instance, in teaching 10,000 [students] freshman English, we
have found a way to lower the cost and improve the outcomes. And [we are] doing the same
with freshman math.
Before, we had students who were fully capable—based on their SAT scores or their ACT
scores—to do very well in freshman math who were still failing in freshman math. What
we did is we restructured how we teach. We use new technologies, artificial-intelligencebased
algorithms, and new platforms—new ways of learning. We not only improved our
success rate dramatically, we also lowered our costs by 50 percent at the same time. So
technology has been our dear and intimate friend.
Overcoming barriers to reform
The hardest part of actually accomplishing change either in a university or another
institution—but I think particularly hard in universities—is to overcome an innate
conservatism, which operates on the basis that what one needs to do is to protect the
routine, protect the methodological content, protect the social constructs, in a sense not
even remembering where most of those things came from. Or what they were derived from.
Or that they themselves were innovations at one point.
And somehow the biggest challenge is getting people to realize that they can be courageous.
They can advance change as an objective and actually attain a measurable and better
outcome as a result of that. There never has been one way to do something. Universities
have not operated the same way throughout the eons. They have changed. And they have
adjusted. And they need to accelerate their change and their ability to adjust in moving
forward.
Mastering the future
I think in the next five or so years, ASU will definitively master the performance of the
immersion part of the university, the physical part of the university, where a broader crosssection
of students than most research universities have will be performing at the same
level in terms of retention, graduation, success of our students, and so forth.
So we will have mastered that through innovation. Then we’ll be looking in that context
to accelerate learning. So that you can either get in and get out quickly, if that’s what you
choose, or you can take not two majors or three majors or four, but four, five, or six. That
is, you could master more subjects, not for the sake of mastering the subjects but for
expanding your learning capability.
I think then beyond that, we’ve also figured out how to project the university with our
content. And so we’re looking in the next five years to have as many as 30,000 or 40,000
5
online students who are not in the immersion part of the university but are connected to
the immersion part of the university, getting an unbelievably technologically advanced
access platform into fantastic degrees.
And so we’re going to be doing both of those things. That, by the way, is different than the
model that most of the online purveyors of educational content are working in, because
in this case that content will be derivative of the same faculty working in the immersion
environment—in a sense doubling down their impact. And so, could we affect 100,000
students with a small, elite, highly compensated, high-performing, fantastic faculty rather
than just growing the faculty and growing the faculty with each increment of growth at the
University? That’s what I think that we will have mastered in that five-year time frame.
Copyright © 2011 McKinsey & Company. All rights reserved.
Related thinking
“Boosting productivity in US
higher education”
“How does a school system
improve?”
“The economic cost of the
US education gap”
Thursday, April 28, 2011
Wednesday, April 27, 2011
Monday, April 25, 2011
The Secret Lessons of Venn Diagrams-2011
Summit on Science, Entertainment, and Education - Sekou and Steven Connell from The Science and Entertainment Ex on Vimeo.
The Secret Lessons of Venn Diagrams - Sekou, poet
Joint Performance - Sekou and Steven Connell
Session 3: Technically Speaking - Making movies, teaching students, creating video games, spreading knowledge, producing a television series, and learning science all depend on technology. Which means that televisions, game decks, desktops, laptops, and hand-held tablets entertain as well as educate. Given this shared dependence on technology, you have to ask: What's next?
After hearing from the techies, we'll take a look at where the intersections lie among science, entertainment, and education.
On February 4, 2011, a carefully selected group of individuals met in Los Angeles to help us discover how film, television programming, video games, and other entertainment media can be systematically adopted to enhance student learning at the middle school and high school level. For more information visit seenas.ning.com/page/about-the-summit
Sunday, April 24, 2011
TED Talks-2010-Liza Donnelly-Drawing upon Humor for Change-Video
Transcript: Drawing on humor for change
(Laughter)
I was afraid of womanhood. Not that I'm not afraid now, but I've learned to pretend. I've learned to be flexible. In fact, I've developed some interesting tools to help me deal with this fear. Let me explain. Back in the '50s and '60s, when I was growing up, little girls were supposed to be kind and thoughtful and pretty and gentle and soft, and we were supposed to fit into roles that were sort of shadowy -- really not quite clear what we were supposed to be.
(Laughter)
There were plenty of role models all around us. We had our mothers, our aunts, our cousins, our sisters, and of course, the ever-present media bombarding us with images and words, telling us how to be. Now my mother was different. She was a homemaker, but she and I didn't go out and do girlie things together, and she didn't buy me pink outfits. Instead, she knew what I needed, and she bought me a book of cartoons. And I just ate it up. I drew, and I drew, and since I knew that humor was acceptable in my family, I could draw, do what I wanted to do, and not have to perform, not have to speak -- I was very shy -- and I could still get approval. I was launched as a cartoonist. Now when we're young, we don't always know. We know there are rules out there, but we don't always know -- we don't perform them right, even though we are imprinted at birth with these things, and we're told what the most important color in the world is. We're told what shape we're supposed to be in. (Laughter) We're told what to wear -- (Laughter) -- and how to do our hair -- (Laughter) -- and how to behave.
Now the rules that I'm talking about are constantly being monitored by the culture. We're being corrected, and the primary policemen are women, because we are the carriers of the tradition. We pass it down from generation to generation. Not only that -- we always have this vague notion that something's expected of us. And on top of all off these rules, they keep changing. (Laughter) We don't know what's going on half the time, so it puts us in a very tenuous position.
(Laughter)
Now if you don't like these rules, and many of us don't -- I know I didn't, and I still don't, even though I follow them half the time, not quite aware that I'm following them -- what better way than to change them [than] with humor? Humor relies on the traditions of a society. It takes what we know, and it twists it. It takes the codes of behavior and the codes of dress, and it makes it unexpected, and that's what elicits a laugh. Now what if you put together women and humor? I think you can get change. Because women are on the ground floor, and we know the traditions so well, we can bring a different voice to the table.
Now I started drawing in the middle of a lot of chaos. I grew up not far from here in Washington D.C. during the Civil Rights movement, the assassinations, the Watergate hearings and then the feminist movement, and I think I was drawing, trying to figure out what was going on. And then also my family was in chaos, and I drew to try to bring my family together -- (Laughter) -- try to bring my family together with laughter. It didn't work. My parents got divorced, and my sister was arrested. But I found my place. I found that I didn't have to wear high heels, I didn't have to wear pink, and I could feel like I fit in.
Now when I was a little older, in my 20s, I realized there are not many women in cartooning. And I thought, "Well, maybe I can break the little glass ceiling of cartooning," and so I did. I became a cartoonist. And then I thought -- in my 40s I started thinking, "Well, why don't I do something? I always loved political cartoons, so why don't I do something with the content of my cartoons to make people think about the stupid rules that we're following as well as laugh?"
Now my perspective is a particularly -- (Laughter) -- my perspective is a particularly American perspective. I can't help it. I live here. Even though I've traveled a lot, I still think like an American woman. But I believe that the rules that I'm talking about are universal, of course -- that each culture has its different codes of behavior and dress and traditions, and each woman has to deal with these same things that we do here in the U.S. Consequently, we have. Women, because we're on the ground, we know the tradition. We have amazing antennae.
Now my work lately has been to collaborate with international cartoonists, which I so enjoy, and it's given me a greater appreciation for the power of cartoons to get at the truth, to get at the issues quickly and succinctly. And not only that, it can get to the viewer through not only the intellect, but through the heart. My work also has allowed me to collaborate with women cartoonists from across the world -- countries such as Saudi Arabia, Iran, Turkey, Argentina, France -- and we have sat together and laughed and talked and shared our difficulties. And these women are working so hard to get their voices heard in some very difficult circumstances. But I feel blessed to be able to work with them.
And we talk about how women have such strong perceptions, because of our tenuous position and our role as tradition-keepers, that we can have the great potential to be change-agents. And I think, I truly believe, that we can change this thing one laugh at a time.
Thank you.
(Applause)
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