Last year, Willamette University took a step toward reducing tensions surrounding the budget. As we planned for the current year, we faced the high degree of uncertainty that the financial crisis has forced on many universities. We dealt with this situation by shifting from planning a fixed budget to planning a flexible one. The process required to design this more elaborate plan resulted in unusually deep discussion between faculty members and administrators about which high-priority items needed to be included in the “base” budget and which could be deferred pending receipt of the revenue that might be generated by higher enrollment. Contingency plans were thus devised and discussed before we incorporated them into the budget.

In the past decade or so, the practice of faculty governance has become increasingly vexed by the proliferation of special interest research and teaching centers sponsored by outside benefactors who expect to be involved in the content and management of programs they pay for. University administrations, strapped for resources and hungry for fame, have found it difficult to turn down any offer of support for teaching and research, even if it comes with ideological mandates.

In the new audit, the inspector general [for the Department of Health and Human Services] reviewed data from the federal government's 2006 fiscal year and found universities almost always trust scientists to judge whether their stock holdings or payments from outside medical companies pose any conflict of interest.

In an unusual pushback against President Obama’s expansion of federal financing of human embryonic stem cell research, the University of Nebraska is considering restricting its stem cell experiments to cell lines approved by President George W. Bush.

Cole W. Camplese, director of education-technology services at Pennsylvania State University at University Park, prefers to teach in classrooms with two screens — one to project his slides, and another to project a Twitter stream of notes from students. He knows he is inviting distraction — after all, he’s essentially asking students to pass notes during class. But he argues that the additional layer of communication will make for richer class discussions.