During its long history, the University of Michigan has grown along with our state: from an entering class of 7 in 1841 to a total enrollment of 44,718 in 2016. Along the way, we built a large faculty, growing from just two in 1841 to 6,884 in 2016. This growth has been essential to meeting…

This post is the first in what will probably be a long series dedicated to something new I’m working on: the University of Michigan’s Foundational Course Initiative, or FCI. For me the launch of this initiative is a big thing. Partly, it’s the culmination of several years of work, a confluence of work done on…

I know. I know. You’ve already heard me complain about this. I hate it when vendors sell digested student data back to a campus and call it “predictive analytics.” But they’re not stopping, so neither am I. Predictive analytics is a name we should reserve for actually predicting something. Let’s talk about a real prediction….

Performance prediction is all the rage in higher education. Testing agencies, researchers, and software vendors all promise to “predict” student outcomes. Some find this prospect alarming, imagining that predictions might determine a student’s fate, or somehow restrict their potential. It’s all a little less scary if we take a step back and think about what…

An academic transcript – the infamous permanent record – looms over the life of every college student. Items recorded there play an outsize role in shaping the student experience. By auditing degree requirements and counting up accumulated credit hours, transcripts guide course selection. By calculating grade point average to the third decimal place, transcripts help…

What does it mean to personalize education? Here at the University of Michigan, we are busy educating more than 28,000 full-time undergraduate students. Every single one has a unique background, current state, and set of interests and goals. These factors evolve constantly from admission to graduation. To educate each of these students well, we must…

Educational institutions like the University of Michigan are, on the surface at least, deeply committed to fairness. This commitment is often tested: any time we select students for admission, evaluate their work for grades, or decide who to honor. Although the commitment is simple, living up to it is not. Creating an educational system that…

Grades are important. Instructors structure their courses around deciding them; students expend enormous effort pursuing them; they form the only record of student performance every University feels obligated to retain. They’re also consequential. Grades provide students with their primary performance feedback, threshold course passage and the award of diplomas, and are combined to rank students…

On September 29th, Michigan launched a new Academic Innovation Initiative.