If you could be University President Dan Mote for one day, what would you do? Increase financial aid? Send the Purple Line down Campus Drive? Just order a whole boatload of lobster from dining services?

While it’s unlikely any of us will be stepping into Mote’s shoes anytime soon, Widener University in Chester, Pa. gives one student a year the chance to swap places with the president. And this isn’t just fun and games. The students actually have a chance to implement policy initiatives that they design. From the Associated Press:

The annual President for a Day switch gives undergraduates a taste of the responsibilities of running the 4,800-student campus outside Philadelphia. It also reminds Harris of the challenges students face in balancing work and education.

“It gives me a firsthand experience of what they go through every day,” [Widener President James T. Harris III] said. “It makes me a better administrator in the long run.” …

[21-year-old Doug] Shultz, an environmental science major from Halifax, Pa., beat out 16 other applicants by wowing the selection committee with a comprehensive plan to expand Widener’s recycling and sustainability initiatives.

As president last week, Shultz presented the proposal to top administrators, university staff and other students. Widener officials say they plan to implement it in full.”

Shultz also got to use the president’s parking space and “fire” one of his favorite staff members, giving them the day off. He also met with a major donor and handled other presidential responsibilities.

Quick hits

• Virginia wins! The battle between Maryland and our southern neighbor has been decided, and Northrop Grunman is moving its headquarters there.
• Virginia loses! Tuition is going up 10 percent at the University of Virginia and 8.5 percent at James Madison University.
• Gov. Martin O’Malley kicked off his re-election bid yesterday

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• University of Washington President Mark Emmert is the new chief executive of the NCAA.
• Metro workers rallied on Capitol Hill yesterday, asking for more federal funds.

A crotchety old man living near Georgetown University is fed up with scolding the intoxicated college kids who keep him up all night.

So Stephen R. Brown, 62, launched the website drunkengeorgetownstudents.com, where he posts illicit photos of noisy backyard keggers in an effort to give the university a bad name and lead to more crackdowns.

It seems that Brown has exhausted other efforts, including knocking on doors, writing letters and calling the cops to bust parties. The intro to his blog offers some tips on what other sleepless residents could do if they witness a rowdy scene.

—First, call the University Hotline (202-687.8413) and you will get an answering machine. Leave a message for the”nationally renowned” SNAP vehicles who will attempt to quiet things down. Unfortunately, they have no legal authority and drunks are notoriously unstable.
—Second, call 911. You probably feel foolish calling the emergency services number but Georgetown University has made it known that they don’t care so this is your only alternative.

Brown also lambasts the university’s lack of on-campus housing and told Washington Post higher education reporter Jenna Johnson, “If the university would let me have a night’s sleep, I might take it down. The students call me a ‘grumpy old man.’ That’s fine. I have been called a lot worse than that.”

Brown plans to post video soon and encourages neighbors to contribute their own pictures to the site, although he cautions them not to confront partygoers when snapping shots: “Be careful, drunken persons are frequently violent and unreasonable so “reasoning” with them isn’t a great plan. Keep your distance!”

Meanwhile, Georgetown’s blog Vox Populi warns students to be careful when venturing off-campus to drink their faces off, lest they end up plastered all over the Internet by some old guy in the bushes with a camera, like these guys:

A captain of the University of Pennsylvania football team was found dead in his home yesterday afternoon.

Owen Thomas

Wharton junior Owen Thomas was found in his off-campus residence, but university officials believe no foul play was involved.
Thomas played defensive end and was a second-team All-Ivy player in 2009.

Quick Hits:

>> George Washington University may be increasing their financial aid pool by $5 million, The GW Hatchet reports.

>> Anne Arundel Community College will now be offering midnight classes in order to handle high demand.

>> Indiana University will allow students to rent textbooks next fall in a new agreement with Barnes and Noble.

Though the university counts Jim Henson, Connie Chung, Larry David, and Google co-founder Sergey Brin among its celebrity graduates, the one and only Liz Lemon of 30 Rock has now joined the Terp elite.

During last Thursday’s episode of 30 Rock, “Lee Marvin vs. Derek Jeter,” Lemon announced that she had attended this university on a “partial competitive jazz dance scholarship.”

The only problem with that is, this university does not even have a competitive jazz dance team. Turns out it is as fictitious as Lemon herself.

Played by Tina Fey, Lemon is a quirky, self-deprecating comedy writer who is addicted to junk food and chronically single. Lemon is said to be a fictionalized version of Fey. Up until last week, however, nothing was known of her College Park connection.

On the show, one of the writers decides to quit after he finds out he was only hired because of Affirmative Action. Lemon decides to respect his decision, because she said she never got a “hand-up.” Her co-worker, determined to hire the writer back, pulls Lemon’s file:

Pete: You attended the University of Maryland on a partial competitive jazz dance scholarship.
Lemon: So?
Pete: So, NCAA competitive jazz dance was created as part of Title IX — because of a program that favored women.
Lemon: Favored women to correct an imbalance.

Who should control what students pay for college?

In this state, the governor prepares a tuition proposal that is typically approved by the University System of Maryland’s Board of Regents — a group of 17 gubernatorial appointees.

In Florida, the Associated Press reports, the state legislature is vying for control of the state’s college tuition rates against a citizens group that wants the authority to be solely in the hands of universities.

The citizens group has expressed concern that the legislature is too willing to keep tuition low for political reasons, starving the state’s 11-university system of necessary funding.

Legislators have been fighting for the better part of this decade against what the consider to be reckless overspending by the university system.

Although the university system’s Board of Governors has recently reached a compromise with the Florida legislature — granting university leaders the right to raise tuition by as much as 15 percent in a year without seeking legislative approval, until Florida’s inexpensive schools reach the national tuition average — the citizens group remains opposed to any political influence in determining tuition.

Florida lawmakers have already approved an 8 percent increase in the state’s universities this year. In Maryland, meanwhile, the Board of Regents just approved a 3 percent increase — the first time tuition has changed since Gov. Martin O’Malley took office in 2007.

Florida may have the palm trees. But Maryland has the tuition stability.

College students who tan compulsively may not be doing so merely for that golden glow, according to a study published recently in the medical journal Archives of Dermatology. It’s because they’re dangerously hooked – on ultraviolet rays.

Of more than 400 students surveyed, tanning bed enthusiasts matched two different psychological criteria for addiction, the study found. This propensity also caused the compulsive tanners to binge on alcohol and drugs more frequently: 42 percent of tanning addicts reported using more than one drug in the previous month, double the rate of casual sun-seekers.

A co-author of the study theorized that the endorphins released in a tanning bed session might be the reason tanning addicts also turned to mind-altering substances as well. Compulsive tanners suffer disproportionately from anxiety, which could in turn lead to behaviors that help them relax and decompress.

A vicious cycle of booze, drugs and tanning: who knew? Oh, wait, these guys did:

A small student group of Islamic extremists have been wreaking havoc at Paktistan’s premier institution of higher education, the University of the Punjab.

Iftikhar Baloch, a professor at the university, was attacked with metal rods and hit over the head with a flower pot after expelling several members of the group. After the incident university professors went on a three week strike that ended Monday.

University of the Punjab

The New York Times reports:

Its members block music classes, ban Western soft drinks and beat male students for sitting near girls on the university lawn.

The student group called Islami Jamiat Talaba has apparently terrorized the university for years, but has recently been gaining more power despite their small numbers. The group is against religious minorities and western countries. The government often looks the other way because the group has ties to the country’s oldest religious party.

“They are hooligans with a Taliban mentality and they should be banned, full stop,” Maliha A. Aga, a teacher in the art department, told The New York Times. “That’s the only way this university will survive.”

And the students’ control is organized and widespread.

The group created a parallel administration, according to a former member, Nadim Jamil, and has divided the university into five zones, with a nazim, or mayor, assigned to each. The dormitories are their fiefdoms, he said, where mayors monitor movements, hold Koran reading classes and recruit members.

The dominance of males in higher education may finally be ending. New Census data indicates the percentage of men and women with bachelor’s degrees is roughly equal, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education:

About 29 percent of women 25 and older had attained at least a bachelor’s degree in 2009, compared with 30 percent of men. A decade earlier, the proportions were 23 percent and 28 percent, respectively….

The pattern of women’s academic achievement outdoing men’s, on average, goes back more than a decade, and is now expressing itself in the awarding of both undergraduate and graduate degrees. According to the newly reported data, young women have widened the gap in achieving postsecondary degrees in the past decade. In 2009, 35 percent of women ages 25 to 29 held at least a bachelor’s degree, compared with 27 percent of men. A decade earlier, the numbers were much closer: 30 percent versus 27 percent.

And in a speech at George Washington University yesterday, Vice President Joe Biden unveiled a policy change that should strengthen Title IX, the famous legislation that ensures equal funding for men’s and women’s sports.

Quick hits

• An MTA official working on the development of the Purple Line fears former Gov. Robert Ehrlich might slow the project if he defeats Gov. Martin O’Malley this fall, Capital News Service reports.
• Ocean City, Md. is dropping its recycling program, according to The Sun.
• Washington Post metro columnist Courtland Milloy says Prince George’s County Police Chief Roberto Hylton is reaching out to community leaders for support in the wake of the controversy over county police officers beating a university student.
• Prairie View A&M has disbanded a fraternity whose hazing resulted in the death of a pledge, according to The Dallas Morning News.

Though Apple’s ipad may be the hottest new technology at the moment, some universities are less than pleased with the devices since they have been causing problems on their campus Internet networks.

Princeton University has blocked 20 percent of iPads after the tablet computers have interfered with other devices on the university’s wireless network. Apparently, the iPad has “malfunctions that can affect the entire school’s computer system.”

Meanwhile, closer to home, George Washington University has also been having troubles with Apple’s new tablet. The university’s authentification system is not registering the iPads or iPhones, preventing students from logging on to the wireless network. University officials predict it could be up to a year before the problem is fixed.

But, universities are not the only ones banning iPads. Israel has also banned iPads in the country, preventing any travelers from bringing them in. Israel says the tablets will interfere with other devices, since it was built to function with a stronger U.S. signal, compared to the weaker signal strengths in Europe and Israel.

Quick Hits:

>>Sarah Palin is set to testify in a trial of a University of Tennessee student who hacked into her e-mail account. The jury selection process begins this week. The student has been charged with identity theft, wire fraud, hindering an FBI investigation and accessing Palin’s account without authorization.

>>A new study by the Pew Internet and American Life Project found that teens today send on between 50 and 1,500 texts a day. Four in five teens sleep with their cell phones in their bed.

>> Throngs of students at the University of Denver are expected to toke up today in the yearly unofficial public smoking event to celebrate the unofficial holiday dedicated to all that is marijuana, 4/20.

Playboy magazine released their list of top ten party schools, with University of Texas at Austin taking home first prize.

Shots all around.

Here’s what Playboy had to say about the Longhorns:

The Longhorns football team fell just short in the national championship game, but here’s a victory the entire school can claim a part of. We’re talking to you, bikinied coed in Devil’s Cove, and you, star wide receiver Jordan Shipley, and even the humanities library, which just purchased David Foster Wallace’s papers. When you add up academics, the weather, the liberal atmosphere, South by Southwest, game day and the nightlife on Sixth Street, UT Austin is one heck of a school. Hook ’em, Horns!

Texas was followed by the West Virginia University, where let’s face it, as Playboy points out, there is not much else to do. Some freshman in the magazine claims, “We drink two percent of all the world’s beer.” University of Wisconsin-Madison took third place followed by University of Miami, Florida and East Carolina University.

A few shockers included Florida’s Rollins College, which only has 1,785 undergrads, and Plymouth State University in New Hampshire, which has apparently not made the list in 20 years.

The article also handed out a handful of other very prestigious awards. The University of Southern California Song Girls were designated the “Hottest Cheerleaders.” Marquette was deemed the best “Catholic Party School.” Nursing won hottest major and the magazine named The Flabongo (a beer bong made out of a lawn flamingo) the best drinking invention.

The honor of worst party school was a tie between Brigham Young University and Oral Roberts (go figure) and the title for “Best Ivy League Party School” was deemed “N/A.”

Though this university did not make Playboy’s list this year, we have been recognized for our party credentials in the past. We just missed cracking Playboy’s Top Ten last year, coming in at #11, for “Making it happen since 1856.” In 2007, the Princeton Review ranked the university as the #14 party school, but since then, we have not even cracked the top 20.

But, despite our lack of recent reputation for having a good time (I mean, have Princeton or Playboy seen The Thirsty Turtle?), we at least can boast the most co-eds (three) in last fall’s Playboy “Girls of the ACC” spread. Now, if that’s not partying, we don’t know what is.