To make up a more than $700,000 loss in support, the University of Wisconsin-Superior is making some difficult decisions. A community event is being canceled, building hours will be reduced, and vacant jobs will remain unfilled to address the decreased support caused by the state's budget lapse. The Wisconsin Department of Administration announced Oct. 14 that the University of Wisconsin System would lose $65.6 million in taxpayer support over the next two years to help cover a shortfall or "lapse" in the state budget. UW-Superior's share of the lapse is $700,290 this year, followed by a $298,176 loss next year...

The University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point will leave positions open, forgo maintenance and technology upgrades and delay new campus security systems to meet a new round of state-mandated budget cuts. UWSP has to give $1.9 million back to the state by June 2012 and another $820,000 by June 2013, as part of a recently announced effort to balance the state budget. Those totals could grow to $3.1 million and $1.6 million, respectively, if state revenue decreases. The UW System as a whole must cut $65.8 million during the next two years...

More than half of the 447 people UW-Madison rehired after they retired have been on the job for more than one year, the limit set by the university under a new policy last month, according to a State Journal analysis of data provided by the school...

Thirty-five people reported symptoms of vomiting and diarrhea after sharing a buffet line at the Pyle Center at the University of Wisconsin in Madison...

Jeff Morin, dean of the College of Fine Arts&Communication at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, is currently exhibiting artwork in Wisconsin, California and Washington, D.C. Morin has his own works on exhibit as well as pieces that he has collaborated on with other UWSP staff members...

What is the dollar value of the resources devoted to promoting racial and ethnic diversity at UW-Madison? Though campus administrators regularly extol the educational benefits of diversity, they say little about the costs of achieving those benefits. How substantial are these costs? The quick answer is they are large and exceed the official published figures...

A man is suing two University of Wisconsin-La Crosse police officers after he was arrested last year for trying to use his videocamera at a debate. Ron Clark of La Crosse attended a congressional debate on campus with a friend. Posted signs said videotaping wasn't allowed but photographs were permitted...

Weather forecasting isn't as easy as it looks. It's a sophisticated science that requires computers to crunch data throughout the world ranging from ocean temperatures and winds to precipitation and humidity levels. Computer models can quite accurately predict when and where a hurricane will make landfall, how much rain or snow will fall and how hot or cold it will be. Maybe that's why so many people gripe when the forecast is wrong. But with a new supercomputer now running weather prediction models at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, forecasters will be able to improve the accuracy of their weather predictions...

Disappointment tonight for leaders at UW Oshkosh after a plan to buy the City Center Hotel falls through. The univeristy was hoping to use the building for a new hospitality program while the city was banking on the hotel and conference space to bring more visitors to the downtown...

A local investment group's plan to buy and renovate the City Center Hotel collapsed this week under the weight of renovation costs that increased as investors got a more extensive look at the downtown property's condition. Wogernese Hotel Group LLC and the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh Foundation reached a tentative agreement in late August to purchase the hotel from Nashco Hospitality Group LLC and had until late November to secure financing for the purchase and renovation...

A percussionist from Tomah has written the winning fanfare for the Nov. 15 Boston Brass concert at Viterbo. Branden Steinmetz, a graduate of the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse and now a first-year gradute student at the University of Minnesota, found out about the fanfare competition from his mom, who read about it in the Tribune and figured it would be perfect for her son...

Freshmen have been given a pretty easy assignment this fall at University of Wisconsin-Stout. It takes only 10 to 20 minutes, they won't be graded -- although there will be plenty of feedback -- and they have the entire semester to finish the task...For the first time, UW-Stout is requiring all new freshmen to answer questions about alcohol use...

Two members of the University of Wisconsin-Marshfield/Wood County faculty and staff were honored by the UW System this fall. Mathew Bartkowiak, assistant professor of English, received the Barrington-Musolf Faculty Research Award for his book, "The MC5 and Social Change: A Study in Rock and Revolution." Steve Kaiser, Learning Center coordinator, received the Chancellor's Award for Excellence...

Stephen Marcus grew up during a bygone era in the hospitality industry...Marcus, 76, chairman of Marcus Corp., told University of Wisconsin-Stout students  that they are poised to take the reins of today's "high-speed, worldwide economic system"...

A panel presentation and discussion on "Inequality, Protest and Democracy" hosted by the Social Science Speaker Series at University of Wisconsin-Stout will be held at 5 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 9, in room 131 of Heritage Hall...

The cost of a college degree has ballooned, and so has the nation's student loan debt to pay for it. Many recent graduates say they aren't getting a return on their college investment because they can't find good-paying jobs, and they face crushing debt. The stress is intense, as Colin Senteney can attest to after accumulating $125,000 in student loan debt while studying economics and finance at American University, a private East Coast college. He's finishing his final semester in Waunakee, near Madison - living with his parents and taking his last two classes online - because banks declined to lend him more money to stay in expensive Washington, D.C...

The state retirement system needs to be fair for everyone -- including taxpayers. The troubling "retirement" and quick re-hiring of a top UW-Green Bay administrator suggests that it isn't. The Legislature should adopt tighter limits on the ability of public sector employees to draw both a pension and a large paycheck, which has been dubbed "double-dipping"...

The American Public University System wants to get more bang for its buck with e-textbooks, so the for-profit college system is enlisting its professors to write and edit digital course materials...The plan has led to grumbling among faculty members, some of whom worry about quality control for the new digital texts and about whether they will be paid enough for the new work. Internally published texts also raise challenging questions about professors' intellectual property rights...

A new study says that students die at rates much lower than same-aged people who are not in college, but the methodology is likely to have some health professionals questioning the results...

New data from the World Economic Forum show that gender gaps in higher education leave some countries (including the United States and many other developed nations) with female enrollments significantly outpacing male enrollments, while other countries face the opposite situation...

The presidents of public universities in Illinois have issued a joint letter opposing a pension reform plan that would give their faculty members -- and other state employees -- the option of paying more for current benefit levels, or of receiving smaller payments at various points in the future, The Pantagraph reported. "Reducing (faculty) benefits or forcing them to pay significantly more for benefits that were promised to them is likely to cause a significant migration of talented people out of this state," said the letter from the presidents...

...Studies have found that roughly 40 percent of students planning engineering and science majors end up switching to other subjects or failing to get any degree. That increases to as much as 60 percent when pre-medical students, who typically have the strongest SAT scores and high school science preparation, are included, according to new data from the University of California at Los Angeles. That is twice the combined attrition rate of all other majors. For educators, the big question is how to keep the momentum being built in the lower grades from dissipating once the students get to college...

First the dot.coms popped, then mortgages. Are student loans and higher education the next bubble, the latest investment craze inflating on borrowed money and misplaced faith it can never go bad?...

Good teaching and exposure to students from diverse backgrounds are some of the strongest predictors of whether freshmen return for a second year of college and improve their critical thinking skills, say two prominent researchers...

The American Council on Education plans to increase its efforts as an advocate for international education and to help colleges and universities internationalize, according to a new report from the organization...

The fiscal collapse of 2008 exacerbated a malaise for many of us in colleges and universities. We feel besieged from within and without, as the public seems to have turned against us...We are searching for models that will make us relevant, make sense to the public in this political and economic reality, and better serve our students...