Current State of the Debate

The Current State Of The Debate

The chart below summarizes the “state of the debate” among different higher education stakeholders and suggests why more focus on dialogue and consensus building may be so crucial to progress. This summary draws on interviews conducted for this report and on other research and analysis Public Agenda has completed.

Group	Understanding of the Problem	Possible Solutions
State higher education officials	See higher education institutions as not producing enough graduates.	Productivity—asking hard questions about things such as class size. Focus on retention—easier to keep students than to get them. Incentives—incentivize schools for students completing programs, not for enrolling in programs. Technology—expand online education. Dual enrollment—students take college classes in high school.

College and university presidents^*	See institutions as caught between declining state revenues and rising expenses. Result: either higher prices, decreased availability or lower quality.	Productivity—colleges have already done most of what can be done; only marginal efficiency gains possible. Redefine education as public good—deserves massive increase in funding, e.g., portion of stimulus package.

Higher education CFOs	See institutions caught between declining state revenues and rising expenses.	Productivity can be increased. Willingness to explore alternatives such as larger classes, distance education; new ideas should all be on the table.

Faculty	Seldom focus initially on declining revenues and increasing costs, or sometimes blame increasing costs on higher administrative costs. Major problem: quality. Declining quality of incoming students. Remediation dilutes quality. Too many students going to college (not too few), drags down quality for good students. Administrative pressure to retain students, leads to lowering standard.	Skeptical of many solutions proposed above, fearing they will decrease quality. Concerns include: College classes in high school aren’t equivalent to collegiate courses. Distance education; good only for most motivated; requires more work from faculty. Rewarding completion: more graduates does not mean more educated citizens. Business models inappropriate. Productivity means asking faculty to do more with less. Raise standards; produce better-educated individuals—more important to produce fewer better-educated graduates, even if it means fewer people will have degrees.

Public^†	Students and individuals are caught between growing sense that a college education is absolutely necessary for success and growing fear that increasing college tuitions/fees make college out of reach.	Protect access to higher education. High support for measures that protect access. Growing sense that colleges are inefficient and can educate more students without necessarily needing more money.