The more things change… | Remembering the Flexner Report as a drug firm pays $520 million for misleading marketing
COMMENTARY| May 15, 2010
According to company e-mail unsealed in civil lawsuits, AstraZeneca 'buried' - a manager's term - a 1997 study that showed Seroquel users gained 11 pounds a year, while publicizing a study that claimed users lost weight.

Allowances for tuition, housing and supplies | New GI Bill is expected to draw hundreds of thousands of veterans to college this fall
ASK THIS| July 02, 2009
Aug. 1 is implementation date; reporters can track progress in their states. Benefits may be uneven from state to state—because of a quirk, for example, California private colleges are less likely to participate.

A higher eduction ‘Armageddon?' | Some state colleges face drastic cuts
ASK THIS
Applications are up but many schools may have to cap enrollment, freeze hiring, cut programs, delay maintenance and raise tuition.

The ‘Post 9/11 GI Bill’ | It’s time to report on the new GI Bill
ASK THIS
The new GI bill offers extensive tuition coverage—100 percent at state universities—and other benefits to soldiers who were on active duty for at least 90 days after 9/11. What impact will it have?

Behind the Federal Direct Loan Program | Sweeping change for the better in student loans
ASK THIS
Obama’s proposed overhaul of the student financial aid system would pump in more funding and still result in savings to taxpayers. Naturally, therefore, it is generating controversy and misinformation.

Look for a student loan controversy | Following up on Obama’s plans for higher education
ASK THIS
Can the U.S., now lagging badly, regain a position as one of the world leaders in educational attainment? Pedro de la Torre III poses some questions and offers leads for reporters.

Recalling Upton Sinclair | Who decides higher ed issues? Try the trustees
ASK THIS
On key matters at colleges and universities, trustees often have a bigger role than school presidents. Yet, as Wick Sloane writes, reporters hardly ever go to them, leaving many questions unanswered.

Kickbacks and conflicts of interest | Stop killing kids softly with loan rip-offs
COMMENTARY
Danny Schechter sees student loans as a noose around the neck – a collision between desire for a college education and an $85 billion-a-year industry with substantial corruption.

Generation X is now Generation Debt | Educational attainment drops as student debt goes up
ASK THIS
On average, U.S. students must take on larger student debt loads than ever to go to college and in amounts greater than their counterparts internationally. How is Generation Debt dealing with or avoiding student loans?

What about poor kids? | 'A crazy idea that the U.S. can educate everyone'
COMMENTARY
A Boston hearing by a Federal commission on higher education probably cost the equivalent of two Pell grants. Wick Sloane questions whether it was worth it.

Where's the outrage? | Just who decided that higher education is for elites only?
COMMENTARY
Wick Sloane, former CFO of the University of Hawaii system, has an expert’s view of the strangling of college access for so many Americans, and it’s a story begging to be covered by every news organization.

Profits up, jobs down | 'Comfortable media companies losing sight of their mission'
COMMENTARY
Michael Bugeja of Iowa State questions internships without pay, convergence, and the proper place for reporters’ posteriors.

Face to face is best | It’s hard to bump into stories if you don’t leave the office
SHOWCASE
'Greed, downsizing and computerization eventually may create an investigative void,' writes Michael Bugeja, director of the Greenlee School of Journalism and Communication at Iowa State University.

Cost of education | Update: Tuition at public universities rises another 10.5 percent
ASK THIS
2004 increase is second highest ever; highest was last year.

College admissions | Bush says he opposes 'legacy admissions;' how about asking once more, just to make sure?
ASK THIS
Persistent, tactful questioning gets the president to express a position. But does he mean it?

Watchdog Blog
Bob Giles
Overcoming the U.S. Visa Denial of a Colombian Nieman Fellow
This column first appeared in the Fall 2010 issue of Nieman Reports. The e-mail message from Hollman Morris was unexpected. It was “urgent,” he said. “Please call im- mediately on Skype.” I reached him and his brother, Juan Pablo, in Bogota. His image on the computer screen revealed a stricken man at pains to say that [...]

Herb Strentz
Des Moines Fair Coverage, Part 2
Cleaning up in the wake of the 2010 Iowa State Fair will be daunting this year. In addition to the mess left by nearly 1 million visitors and thousands of farm animals, we have a continuing saga of news coverage that told of possible racial assaults and then, in Saturday Night Live fashion, appears [...]

Herb Strentz
On ‘Beat Whitey Night’ in Des Moines
(Editor’s note: The incidents described here have become part of a developing story, as this Google link shows.) The Des Moines Register’s reluctance to identify criminal suspects or victims by race has turned into an outright refusal to do so. The closing night of the Iowa State Fair was marked by an observance not exactly on the [...]

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TWITTER
Follow Nieman Watchdog on Twitter.
(Nieman Watchdog)

Talking to the media outside channels
The Pentagon increases its efforts to have contacts with the press monitored and approved by DoD public affairs officials.
(Secrecy News)

Telecoms charging more to do nothing
It's getting more expensive to have an unlisted phone number. What's the logic behind that?
(Center for Media and Democracy)

Prosecute those leaks
The Obama administration has indicted another alleged leaker, this time for reportedly passing along to Fox News an intelligence assessment that North Korea was likely to respond to U.N. sanctions by conducting another nuclear test.
(Secrecy News/Federation of American Scientists)

A broad array of massive financial crimes
As PRWatch.org shows, court-imposed settlements have only skimmed the surface of big banks' wrongdoing in the financial crisis.
(Center for Media and Democracy)

More Spotlights >>