Higher education

Border communities struggle to keep younger, educated residents when larger cities dangle economic and quality-of-life opportunities. They're afflicted with the reputation of being black holes of talent — where escape is necessary in order to prosper.

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In 2008, the file at DPS headquarters in Austin still said Scotty Caven III caused the August 2004 car crash that killed him and two others. Officials there had declined to reopen and investigate the case. But his father, UT System regent Scott Caven Jr., wouldn’t take no for an answer.

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After his son and two others died in a horrific car wreck in 2004, former UT Regent Scott Caven Jr. set out to prove that his namesake, Scotty, wasn't to blame. He eventually persuaded the Texas Department of Public Safety to change its accident report — a rare feat: In the last five years, DPS has changed the final reports in fewer than 1 percent of fatal crash investigations.

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Researcher finds social networking allows genuine, not idealized, personalities to shine through

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A shortage of a particular sort of medical care could have a far-reaching effect on the state’s economy — in a very unexpected way.

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Should Texas medical schools be responsible for relieving the state’s primary care shortage? Advocates for family physicians think so. They want state lawmakers to reward medical schools that groom young doctors for family medicine — and penalize those that don’t.

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The number of Mexican-born professionals living in the United States has more than doubled since 1995. They're not the undocumented workers you see in evening-news mug shots or aerial photographs of a littered and barren desert. They're college graduates — some with multiple degrees — who join their blue-collar counterparts in their journeys north.

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Multi-part stories from Ramshaw and Grissom and Stiles on mental health services for detained immigrants and on payday lenders who provide exorbitantly priced credit to people with nowhere else to turn... Twitter, word clouds and the race for governor — a Stiles joint... Farouk Shami is in and Hu was there to watch... Philpott went to Bastrop for a gather of Republican governors... Rapoport finds a State Board of Education that's trying to control itself... and we have the skinny on legislative races that are likely to be competitive (only about 5 percent of the races on the ballot). It's the best of The Texas Tribune from November 14 to 20, 2009.

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Your afternoon reading.

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Mark Yudof vs. the crappy California economy.

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Our searchable database of public employees' pay — now featuring data from universities and eight of the state's largest cities.

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Federal officials say Texas' testing standards in reading are below the “basic” proficiency standards — and that low bar means those passing the TAKS may not be as proficient as advertised.

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Under new legislation, school districts for the first time can spend a portion of state “book” money on computer hardware and digital content. Some fear the explosion of choice will produce an erosion of quality content.

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“It’s both an ideological concern and a safety concern,” one of the student plaintiffs said. “Obviously college campuses aren’t some magical zone where no violence occurs, and so I feel particularly strongly that every student that feels the need to carry handgun anywhere in their lives should also be able to do so on a college campus.”

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Although Texas has more massive universities and small colleges than just about any other state, higher education doesn't rank high among issues in play during the governor's race. Reporting on the 2010 election for Tribune partner KUT-FM, Nathan Bernier explains why some people think it deserves greater attention.

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