At one point in time, Frontiers of Science would have dedicated several lectures to the butter churn

Purdue becomes the first of the 27 schools pursuing construction of a NYC science campus to drop out of the running. (WSJ)

Le Monde (the French magazine, not the restaurant you eat at when your parents visit) is fascinated by Barnard and education at an all girls’ school. Oh, can’t read French, can’t you? Well here’s Google’s not-so-perfectly translated version. (Le Monde)

A conservative nonprofit is worried that sex education, including Columbia’s very own Go Ask Alice, is promoting bestiality and S&M role-playing among the youth of our generation. Apparently someone forgot to tell them that no one at Columbia has sex anyway. (Gothamist)

Blew off your LitHum assignment again? Reading Don Quixote might be more important for your intellectual development than you think. (NYT)

Research on the numbers of high school and college graduates indicates that college rankings aren’t the problem with America’s higher education system—it’s that so few students enter the system at all. (Atlantic)

Director of Columbia’s Center for Iranian Studies Ehsan Yarshatar is spearheading the creation of Encyclopedia Iranica to better educate the world on the history and culture of the Middle Eastern nation, and has been doing so for 37 years. Now aged 91, he’s reached the letter K—halfway there. (NPR)

Little schoolhouse on the snowbank via Wikimedia Commons