College Shorts - 1/21/10

Pressure to work linked to dropout rates

A recent study found that students who drop out of college do so because they feel pressure to work.

The survey, conducted by Public Agenda, a nonpartisan, nonprofit research firm with support from the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation, determined that 71 percent of students who leave school do so at least partially because of work. Of those, half cited pressure to work as a major reason for dropping out.

Thirty-five percent of the dropouts attempted to balance work and school, but left their studies because they found the combination of the two too stressful. The survey interviewed 614 adults, aged 22 to 30 with at least some postsecondary education.

Results from the survey support the national trend in thinking, which suggests that part-time students, who account for 40 percent of undergraduates nationally, fare worse than their full-time counterparts.

— The Chronicle of Higher Education

Animal rights groups protest pig burials

Constant protests from animal rights activists forced Austrian and Italian scientists to cancel a controversial experiment that involved burying pigs alive in snow to monitor their deaths.

The study, conducted by Institute of Mountain Emergency Medicine in Bolzano, Italy, and the Medical University of Innsbruck, Austria, attempted to determine what factors would increase the odds of survival in an avalanche.

Following the administration of an anesthetic and a sedative, the pigs would be buried in the snow and the scientists would monitor deaths. A total of 29 pigs had already participated in tests.

Animal rights activists claimed the experiments served no useful purpose for humans and forced the pigs to suffer horrible deaths.

“It is absolutely unacceptable that these highly sensitive, helpless animals are killed for such an unnecessary test,” said Johanna Stadler, head of the group Four Paws.

— Associated Press

NYU mourns professor’s sudden death

Popular New York University (NYU) computer scientist Sam Roweis jumped to his death from a 16th-floor balcony, Jan. 13.

Roweis worked in NYU’s Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences. His wife had recently given birth to premature twins and an argument about caring for them preceded his death.

Roweis earned an undergraduate degree from the University of Toronto and earned his doctorate from the California Institute of Technology in 1999. He did postdoctoral work at the Gatsby Unit in London. He was at the University of Toronto from 2001 to 2009, and arrived at NYU in October.

On his Web site, he described his interests as machine learning, data mining and statistical signal processing.

Roweis garnered several accolades, including the University of Ottawa’s Premier’s Research Excellence Award.

“It’s a matter of great sorrow to us to lose one of our faculty members so abruptly,” said university spokesman John Beckman. “Our hearts go out to his family.”

— New York Post