More and more job fields require some form of higher education, and the pressure is on for schools to adequately prepare our students to compete both nationally and globally and help drive economic growth.

It takes bold direction and leadership to heal a divided nation.

The job of the press is to defend their institution, hold the government accountable and freely report and gather information.

Solutions and ideas should come from the bottom up, generated by local communities and not mandated from Washington.

Mainstream American society finds it easiest to be tolerant when the outsider chooses to minimize the differences that separate him from the majority. The country club opens its doors to Jews. The university welcomes African-Americans. Heterosexuals extend the privilege of marriage to the gay community.

I don't think that because I'm not married it's made my life any less. That old maid myth is garbage.

Kim Kardashian's marriage to Kris Humphries famously lasted 72 days, and was reported in the tabloids as being all about the big bucks paid by magazines for the bridal photos: it is a spectacle of a bride-to-be as entrepreneur, not as romantic heroine; the groom, in this scenario, is nothing but a prop.

On my own or with a friend, I'm a shopaholic, and I particularly love the cleaning aisle in the supermarket. But when I'm with my husband, I'm shop shy because he can't bear it. It always ends up with us making a huge scene on the High Street and then going off in a huff in separate directions.