Discussions of higher education tend to focus on one VERY big issue: the high cost of tuition, and how much it puts students deep into debt. There's another angle Jacques Berlinerblau wants people to consider: who's actually doing the teaching. At many schools, the day-to-day classroom duties are handled by underpaid and overworked "adjunct" faculty. In his book Campus Confidential: How College Works, or Doesn’t, for Professors, Parents, and Students , Berlinerblau lays out some details of the

Will they or won't they? Oregon legislators have had their faces in the legislative process for five months now, and the end approaches. They did recently pass a budget for schools, which is most of the state general fund. But high hopes for new revenue streams and a plan to spruce up Oregon's transportation system faded as the end of the session approached. We've invited legislators and/or reporters to join us with word of the final days.

Ask anybody from the OTHER end of the country about Oregon, and they'll probably tell you about misty mountains and rainy evergreen forests. True, that's where most of the people live in Oregon, but the largest landform in the state is high desert; pretty much everything east of the Cascades. The Oregon Natural Desert Association works to preserve the high, dry spaces. And ONDA celebrates its 30th birthday this year.

Parents always hope at least ONE little piece of wisdom they share with their children will stick. But they always share more than one piece. Becky Blades wrote a whole bunch of things to her daughter as she departed for college, and that turned into a book: Do Your Laundry Or You'll Die Alone . Way to play the lonely card, mom. Book and pictures provide laughs and even a few tears.

"Fat shaming" might not even have been a term yet when we talked to Dr. Robert Lustig early last year. But he's well aware of obesity, especially in kids, in his job as a pediatric endocrinologist. Lustig does not hold the kids responsible, but he has choice words for the food industry in his book Fat Chance: Beating the Odds Against Sugar, Processed Food, Obesity, and Disease .

You know how people say to go to the edges of the grocery store, because that's where the fresh, whole foods are? That was Megan Kimble's domain for an entire year. She avoided the middle aisles of the store by skipping processed food almost completely, a story she tells in her book Unprocessed .

While Congress is still debating the near future of the American health insurance system, how about a refresher course in the healthcare system itself? Sociologist Paul Starr won a Pulitzer Prize for his 1983 book The Social Transformation of American Medicine . It tracks huge changes over the country's life... like the huge rise in money for practitioners, the rise in corporate control, and the constant blocking of a truly national health insurance. And it's newly updated, with a fresh preface

We have mixed feelings in our country about refugees who arrive on our shores seeking a safe place far from wars. But we forget that human beings in our own region felt the same impulse in the middle of the 19th century. That's when the series of battles and skirmishes collectively known as the Rogue Indian War disrupted life in the region. One site of particular interest to archaeologists is the Harris Cabin, near Merlin in Josephine County. The Southern Oregon University Laboratory of

Break out the tie-dye, the Country Fair is back soon. The R is not an accident. The Oregon Country Fair is different from a county fair: less livestock, more sustainability. What began as a renaissance fair decades ago stuck around, something of an outpost of 60s counter-culture in our time. Charlie Ruff is the boss of the OCF and our guest once again.

Marissa Ross is fond of wine, you might learn from the picture. There are several iterations of that pose, with different outfits and wines and backdrops. One thing stays the same: Marissa writes about wine and has few qualifications to do so. Think of her as writing wine-for-dummies blogs and books. One book, anyway, called Wine. All The Time: The Casual Guide to Confident Drinking .