The University of Southern Maine (USM) designed and implemented an internal Research Cluster Seed Fund competition with the goals of building USM faculty expertise to address industry and community needs, deepening the impact of research through an interdisciplinary approach to solving problems, and leveraging external funding to sustain…

When colleges look to compare themselves with others, they are not much different from high-school students chasing popularity: Everyone wants to be friends with the Ivy League, but the Ivy League is really picky about whom it hangs out with. Each year colleges submit "comparison groups" to the U.S. Department of Education to get…

The Spring 2012 SQR: "Framing Campus Sustainability," features stories that frame the evolving concept of sustainability in higher education. Included in this issue are a snapshot of ratings-to-date, a focus on credits within the Operations (OP) category, and insights into how institutions are defining and interpreting the evolving…

This paper explores the nature and extent of outsourcing by higher education institutions, benefits and challenges associated with outsourcing, and the implications of outsourcing for effective management. The principal investigator conducted a national study of outsourcing by four-year colleges and universities at two points in time, 1998-99 and…