---Selected Harper's Index Stats---
Number of U.S. presidents who have held a Ph.D. : 1 Source: Center for Presidential Studies, Texas A&M University (College Station)
Number of U.S. schools that use E-rater, a software program that reads and grades student essays : 95
Number of these schools that are colleges or universities : 9 Source: Educational Testing Service (Princeton, N.J.)
Percentage change since 1999 in the number of U.S. public schools that are run by private companies : +111
Source: Center for the Analysis of Commercialism in Education, University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee
Ratio of the number of pupils per teacher in Michigan's schools to the number of inmates per guard in its prisons : 18:5 Source: Center for Educational Performance and Information (Lansing, Mich.)/Department of Corrections (Lansing)
Number of American states that permit public-school teachers to inflict corporal punishment on students : 23
Source: U.S. Department of Education
Number of states in which biology classes are a high-school graduation requirement : 8
Number in which foreign-language classes are required : 9 Source: Council of Chief State School Officers (Washington)
Minimum number of baboons forced to smoke crack in a 1989 study testing the efficacy of cigarettes as a drug delivery device : 3 Source: American Lung Association (Grand Junction, Colo.)
Endowment a tobacco company gave a U.K. university last year for a "corporate social responsibility" center : £3,800,000 Source: University of Nottingham (Nottingham, U.K.)
Number of U.S. college students who were denied federal financial aid last year because of a prior drug conviction : 9,605 Source: U.S. Department of Education
Chance that a Denver middle-school student was suspended at least once during the 1999-2000 school year : 1 in 4 Source: Colorado Department of Education (Denver)
Chance that a U.S. sixth- to tenth-grader reports being bullied weekly : 1 in 11
Chance that a sixth- to tenth-grader reports bullying others : 1 in 12
Source: National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (Bethesda, Md.)
Percentage of U.S. ninth-grade boys who say we should stop "outsiders" from influencing American traditions and cultures : 53 Percentage of ninth-grade girls who say this : 36
Source: National Center for Education Statistics (Washington)
Amount the federal government paid Harvard researchers in the 1990s to help design Russian market reforms : $40,000,000 Source: Harvard University (Cambridge, Mass.)
Amount the head researchers invested in Russian securities during this period, prompting a federal lawsuit : $1,300,000 Source: U.S. Attorney's Office (Boston)
Number of Austrian skinheads who have attended college classes this year as an alternative to criminal prosecution : 33 Source: Johannes Kepler University (Linz, Austria)
Minimum number of countries in which at least half the children are no longer in school by the age of eleven : 11 Number of these countries whose foreign debt exceeds half their GDP : 8 Source: Harper's research
Price of Bob Dylan's high-school essay on The Grapes of Wrath, from a New York City collectibles dealer : $35,000 Source: Gotta Have It Collectibles (N.Y.C.)
Percentage of Men's Health readers who say they have learned most of what they know about sex from television : 18 Source: Men's Health (Emmaus, Pa.)
Chance that an eighty-year-old American is left-handed : 1 in 100 Chance that a ten-year-old is : 1 in 7 Source: Berger Institute for Work, Family, and Children, Claremont McKenna College (Claremont, Calif.)
Percentage of African-American children in the South attending majority-white schools in 1976 and 1996, respectively : 38, 35 Source: The Civil Rights Project, Harvard University (Cambridge, Mass.)
Maximum fine in 1829 for teaching an African American living in Georgia to read or write : $500 Source: The Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition (New Haven, Conn.)
Amount the Cedar Rapids, Iowa, police began offering high-school students this year to inform on their classmates : $50 Source: Cedar Rapids Police Department (Cedar Rapids, Iowa)
Number of times the President has met with Miss America this year to discuss her interest in "character education" : 2 Source: Miss America Organization (Atlantic City)
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Figures cited have been adjusted for inflation and are the latest available as of July 2001. "Harper’s Index" is a registered trademark. harpers.org |
