Notes in the Margins: Essay mills, core values and Khan Academy

Core values If the core of an MBA programme itself has a core, then it is the finance and strategy courses. Nothing could be more fundamental; they are the building blocks on which nearly all other business knowledge is built. Interesting, then, that a new survey of applicants, current students and recent graduates, conducted by Which MBA?, suggests that it is in these subjects that business schools are failing. (The Economist)

Bogus college essays graded F As part of an experiment to test the abilities of term-paper mills, Duke University professor Dan Ariely ordered essays from four companies. “What we got back from the mills can best be described as gibberish,” he wrote. “A few of the papers attempted to mimic APA style, but none achieved it without glaring errors. Citations were sloppy. Reference lists contained outdated and unknown sources, including blog posts.” (The Washington Post)

Khan Academy: The hype and the reality The narrative surrounding Khan Academy has, it seems, gotten a bit out of hand. (The Washington Post)

The New Community College, CUNY’s Multimillion-Dollar Experiment in Education CUNY experiments with rebuilding the two-year college, to help students finish what they start. (The New York Times)

The Trouble With Online Education Internet courses are monologues. True learning is a dialogue. (The New York Times)

Create a More Connected Minnesota

MPR News is your trusted resource for the news you need. With your support, MPR News brings accessible, courageous journalism and authentic conversation to everyone - free of paywalls and barriers. Your gift makes a difference.