Effective next school year, Lynn University will require all of its students to purchase iPad minis pre-loaded with summer reading and curriculum texts, Inside Higher Ed reported. The iPads will be priced at less than half the cost students had previously paid for print versions of the same materials. Colleges nationwide are beginning using iPads and other Apple educational products to standardize and modernize core curriculums. Between January and July 2012, 125 colleges and universities enrolled in iTunes U, a platform created to help professors post course content and communicate with students. While some educators have voiced concerns that Apple products are too expensive, switching to Apple products will help foster greater innovation in the classroom, according to Josh Kim, director of learning and technology for the Dartmouth Master of Health Care Delivery Science program. The Geisel School of Medicine has recently implemented a pilot project that integrates iPads into the classroom for the Class of 2016, Inside Higher Ed reported.
Wilson College, currently an all-women's institution, will begin accepting male applicants to its undergraduate program in order to alleviate its deficit issues, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education. The decision, made by the college's Board of Trustees on Sunday, is aimed to increase the enrollment at the college to 1,500 students from 700 students by 2020. The college made the decision after consultants said only a small number of female high school students consider enrolling in an all-female university. Wilson has run a budget deficit in three out of the past four years, mainly due to stagnant enrollment. The college aims to avoid a budget complication in 2019, when it will begin to repay a loan for a science building that opened in 2009, according to The Chronicle.
Two prominent Mexican activists demanded that Harvard University explain its decision to grant former Mexican president Felipe Calderon a fellowship at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government in a letter on Jan. 13, according to Univision News. The letter, drafted by human rights activists Javier Sicilia and Sergio Aguayo, claims that Calderon should be held accountable for the deaths of over 60,000 people in Mexico's drug wars and that he ignored forced disappearances related to the conflict. Calderon is set to begin his one-year post this month which will involve delivering lectures, working with students and producing scholarship. Kennedy School dean David Ellwood said that while some of Calderon's actions may have been controversial, bringing him to Harvard allows students to examine difficult policy issues, according to Univision News. Ellwood has not yet given a response to the letter.
