Higher Education Policy

BERKELEY VERSUS THE SAT: A Regent, a Chancellor and a Debate on the Value of Standardized Testing in Admissions by John Aubrey Douglass CSHE 3.19 (January 2019)

John Aubrey Douglass
2019

The following essay details a debate between UC Berkeley and a Regent who made charges of discrimination against Asian-American students that are similar to the current legal challenges facing Harvard University. The crux of such charges: on average, that one racial or ethnic group is more “qualified” than other groups, often underrepresented minorities, yet they have lower admissions rates. In 2004, Regent John Moores, convinced of discriminatory practices toward Asian-American students in the admissions process at Berkeley, did his own analysis of UC admissions data focused on SAT scores...

Huijie Zhang

Institute of Educational Assessment, and Department of Education Management, Faculty of Education, East China Normal University (ECNU) , China

EDUCATION: Ph.D., Education Management, 2013, East China Normal University. (Shanghai); M.Ed, Higher Education, 2004, Xi’an Jiao Tong University. (Shanxi Province);

B. S., Mathematics Education, 2001, Xin Yang Teacher College. (Henan Province)

PROFESSIONAL EMPLOYMENT: 2014- Lecturer, Associate professor, Institute of Educational Assessment, Faculty of Education, East China Normal University; 2004 - 2014 Assistant, Lecturer, Higher Education Research Center, Shandong University.

Social Service: 2006 - 2014 Team member, Shandong Higher Education Evaluation Center,...

Michele Meoli

Associate Professor, Department of Management, Information and Production Engineering, University of Bergamo

Michele Meoli is Associate Professor of Finance at the Department of Management, Information and Production Engineering, University of Bergamo, and Deputy Director of the CISAlpino Institute for Comparative Studies in Europe (CCSE), University of Bergamo and University of Augsburg, where he coordinates the Research Group on Higher Education. He was Marie Curie Research Fellow at the Centre for Econometrics Analysis, Cass Business School (City University, London). His research interests include Corporate Governance, Corporate Finance, Academic entrepreneurship, Higher Education and Science...

David P. Earwicker, Ph.D.

David Earwicker is Principal and Founder of Aspen Insight Consulting, a higher education research development firm. He holds a PhD in Education Policy from the University of California, Davis, an M.A. in Middle East Affairs/Islamic Culture Studies from Columbia University, and a B.A. in Economics and International Relations from UC Davis.

During 2022-23 he is a Visiting Scholar with the Center for Studies in Higher Education (CSHE) at the Goldman School of Public Policy, University of California, Berkeley. At CSHE, under the sponsorship of John Aubrey Douglass, his research work is...

Amal Kumar

Assistant Professor, CSU Sacramento

Amal Kumar is an Assistant Professor of Public Policy and Administration at the California State University, Sacramento. His teaching and research explore the evolving relationships between public higher education and its institutional, political, and social contexts through rigorous interdisciplinary engagement between organizational theory, public policy, and history. Current interests include policy intermediaries, educational innovation and entrepreneurship, and equity in the American professoriate. His work has been published in Higher Education, CSHE’s Research and Occasional Paper...

Ellen Switkes

Ellen Switkes is Senior Associate and Co-founder of the “Breakfast with George” mentoring program for higher education executives who are ready to move into senior executive positions. She also is co-founder and Director of CSHE’s Berkeley Institutes on Higher Education (BIHE), targeted to higher education leaders from nations outside the United States. BIHE focused on the essential characteristics of major research universities in the United States, with particular emphasis on the University of California as a case study, and on linking Institute programs with CSHE-based policy research...

John Douglass Featured in CSSN Article on Global University Rankings

March 6, 2025

We are pleased to announce that John Aubrey Douglass, Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Studies in Higher Education (CSHE), was recently featured in an article by the Chinese Social Sciences Net (CSSN). The article, titled "Reflecting on the Deficiencies and Shortcomings of Global University Ranking Systems," delves into the origins, impacts, and inherent flaws of global university rankings, drawing insights from experts including Douglass.

In the article, Douglass discusses the emergence of global university rankings as tools for governments to assess the value and quality...

https://www.cssn.cn/skgz/bwyc/202503/t20250305_5855661.shtml

Maresi Nerad

SERU Senior Researcher, Professor Emerita, Higher Education, University of Washington, Seattle

Maresi Nerad is the founding director of the Center for Innovation and Research in Graduate Education (CIRGE) and a full Professor (tenured) for Higher Education, in the Leadership in Higher Education Program, College of Education, at the University of Washington, Seattle. A native of Germany, Dr. Nerad received her doctorate from the University of California, Berkeley; directed research in the central Graduate Division of UC Berkeley, served as Dean in Residence at the Council of Graduate Schools, D.C., and as Associate Dean of the UW central Graduate School. She was appointed as...

Robert C. May

Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Philosophy & Linguistics, UC Davis

Robert C. May is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Philosophy and Linguistics at UC Davis. He received his Ph.D. in Linguistics and Philosophy from MIT in 1977, and his Bachelor’s degree from Swarthmore College. Prof. May joined the UC Irvine faculty in 1986, and moved to UC Davis in 2006. He held the Venice Chair in Philosophy of Language and Theoretical Linguistics, a Fulbright Distinguished Professorship, and visiting positions at Columbia University, Ecole Normale Superieure, and Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales.


Prof. May’s research interests span areas in...

James Johnsen

Senior Fellow, National Association of System Heads

Jim is Senior Fellow at the National Association of System Heads (NASH) and Lecturer in the School of Management at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. At NASH Jim is working with leaders and scholars on a major “rethink” of the role of public university systems in achieving societal goals in an increasingly volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous world. He is a member of the Westerrn Commission on Higher Education.

Jim was President of the University of Alaska system from 2015 to 2020 during a period of severe state funding cuts, administrative consolidation, and academic...