THE CHRONICLE
of Higher Education®
chronicle.com
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SPECIAL REPORT
Inside the Clash Over Climate Change
Beneath the ;
scientific
consensus,
researchers
grapple with
uncertainty: A15
Social Scientists
Try to Break
the Impasse
Dealing with the ;
public, experts
take different
tacks: A18
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Graphic: The ;
remarkable
growth of climate
research: A16
2 state ;
climatologists
in the political
cross hairs: A20
Whatever ;
happened to
colleges’ climate
pledge? A21
Some Americans see
global warming as
a distant problem,
“for polar bears or
smaller islands in the
middle of the ocean.
Not for me, my town,
or my community,”
says a Yale scientist.
K;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;; has a folder full of hate mail. It started coming in when Ms. Nor-
gaard, an associate professor of sociology and
environmental studies at the University of Or-
egon, spoke in March at a London conference
titled “Planet Under Pressure 2012.”
Rush Limbaugh, the radio commenta-
tor, and a global-warming skeptics’ Web site
called Climate Depot got hold of a news re-
lease describing a presentation about those
not taking action to ease climate change: “Re-
sistance at individual and societal levels must
be recognized and treated.”
The use of the verb “treated,” later cut
from the release, was all it took for Ms. Nor-
gaard, the author of Living in Denial: Climate
Change, Emotions, and Everyday Life (MIT
Press, 2011), to get the full, unpleasant ver-
sion of the skeptic assault: phone calls to the
university president and her department chair,
and lots of unpleasant e-mail, attacking her
appearance and using the four-letter word that
rhymes with “but.”
Continued on Page A12
PAUL SOUDERS, DANI TA DELIMON T PHOTOGRAPH Y, NEWSCOM
The Ph.D. Now Comes With Food Stamps
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“I ;;;;;;;a welfare queen,” says Melissa Bruninga- Matteau.
That’s how she feels compelled to
start a conversation about how she,
a white woman with a Ph.D. in medieval history and an adjunct professor, came to rely on food stamps
and Medicaid. Ms. Bruninga-Matteau, a 43-year-old single mother
who teaches two humanities courses at Yavapai College, in Prescott,
Ariz., says the stereotype of the
people receiving such aid does not
re;ect reality. Recipients include
growing numbers of people like
her, the highly educated, whose advanced degrees have not insulated
them from ;nancial hardship.
“I ;nd it horrifying that some-
one who stands in front of college
classes and teaches is on welfare,”
she says.
Ms. Bruninga-Matteau grew up
LAURA SEGALL FOR THE CHRONICLE
Melissa Bruninga-Matteau, a medieval-history Ph.D. and adjunct professor
who gets food stamps: “I’ve been able to make enough to live on. Until now.”
in an upper-middle class family in
Montana that valued hard work and
saw educational achievement as the
pathway to a successful career and a
prosperous life. She entered gradu-
ate school at the University of Cali-
fornia at Irvine in 2002, idealistic
about landing a tenure-track job in
her ;eld. She never imagined that
What’s in a Name? For Yale
in Singapore, a Whole Lot
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T;;; ;;;;;;;; conversations for a new East-meets-West liberal-arts college were
held, ;ttingly, at an annual meet-
ing of global political and busi-
ness leaders in Switzerland.
It was at the World Economic
Forum in Davos, in January 2009,
that Richard C. Levin, president
of Yale University, and Tan Chorh
Chuan, president of the Nation-
al University of Singapore, be-
gan discussing what has become
a deep-seated collaboration be-
tween the two institutions to cre-
ate the ;rst liberal-arts college in
the island nation.
But three years after that ;rst
handshake, Mr. Levin faces vocal
campus resistance to the project,
which is known as Yale-NUS Col-
lege. In April, members of Yale’s
arts-and-science faculty approved
a resolution expressing concern
over Singapore’s record on civil
and political liberties. Adminis-
trators have maintained that fac-
ulty don’t get an up-or-down vote
on the project because Yale-NUS
College will neither offer Yale
courses nor award a Yale degree.
So the resolution served as a proxy
for their displeasure.
A WEEKLYMAGAZINEOFIDEAS The Chronicleof Higher Education Section B May11,2012
INSIDE
Sometimes a Fail Is Actually a Win ;
Computer programmers’ training includes learning
from their mistakes. Humanities students need
to be shown the good in failure, too. A60
‘You Feel Powerless’ ;
Complaints about
student-loan collections
are on the rise. A3
Freeing Yourself ;
Today’s students are too
dependent, Terry Castle
writes. Section B
The
Case for
Breaking
Away
