Elites to 99%: Resistance is Futile

Today my Twitter feed brought a swan song for public higher education, sung by a chorus of elites.  It was accompanied in harmony by some   public higher education leaders who are surrendering and turning in their badges.

A few highlights:

• The co-founder and former chief executive officer of CarMax told a crowd attending the Association of Governing Boards of Colleges and Universities 2012 National Conference on Trusteeship that public universities should strive for major tuition increases. Reports the Chronicle of Higher Education, "Poor kids borrow money so that the rich kids can get a tuition discount," said Mr. Auston Ligon, now a member of the Board of Visitors at St. John's College in Annapolis, Md. "Quit subsidizing people like my kids."   
• Gordon Gee of The Ohio State (and buddy of Biddy Martin) is promoting a forthcoming book from Stanford University Press called "Public No More."  This little ditty plays a familiar tune, sung by two business school types. Again we are told, the current business model of higher education is broken (duh) and public higher ed's "longstanding dependence on state subsidies...is unsustainable...recent cuts are permanent...public universities either recognize this...or face decline....attempts to block competitive forces by resistance and delaying actions are self-defeating."  Apparently these dudes never heard of the need to present and evaluate without pre-judgement alternative models in policy prescriptions.
• According to Inside Higher Ed, some educators are full-on gung-ho about privatization and not even experiencing "angst" about it (sidenote to IHE--nice framing, making having reservations sound like neuroses). The chancellor of Maricopa Community College, a man in charge of guiding the futures of thousands of black and brown students, apparently has an oracle.  Rufus Glasper tells us "We have no choice. The state funds are gone forever."  There's no point in anything but his kind of "realism," and his so-called solution is a private for-profit model. 

Just a few questions. Why is the CarMax guy being invited to talk with AGBCU?  What's his expertise-- oh right, car sales. Discounting.  Clearly buying college is like buying a car--all about the transaction. And we all know that poor people with their complete information totally understand how discounting works, that's why high tuition-high aid is so successful...  Say it with me now: puhleese.

Second, when did smart people all start singing in unison about simplistic, singular solutions to complex problems?  Did they all attend a special dinner party together where primers were distributed, and the private monetary incentives for making the education "public no more" were explained?  Sure seems like it.  Because they are talking to highly educated people in a way that is utterly pedantic-- there is one solution and one solution only -- pass the buck onto the "consumer"? Can you imagine if instead they said, "Hey 5th graders, pay your own way through elementary school?" 

Third, how much longer are you people (yes you, our readers) going to take this?  For-profit leaders clearly worked this out quite well ages ago, using their massive profits paid for with your federal tax dollars to lobby legislators and university leaders into believing the future lies in private, for-profit education.  They're doing it from up high in the skyscrapers around the world, while many higher ed leaders are out there wittingly and unwittingly carrying their water and doing their bidding.  We mere "academics" and "students" who won't admit that really we are "obstacles" and "consumers" are simply in the way.

 PUBLIC NO MORE. WE HAVE NO CHOICE. RESISTANCE IS FUTILE. 

Where have we heard that before? 

You have read this article Biddy Martin / Campaign for Future of Higher Education / for-profit / funding / Gordon Gee / high tuition high aid / higher education / neoliberalism / privatization / public education / trustees with the title Campaign for Future of Higher Education. You can bookmark this page URL http://apt3e.blogspot.com/2012/04/elites-to-99-resistance-is-futile.html. Thanks!

National Assault on Community Colleges

A thought-provoking new report just out from the Center on the Future of Higher Education documents and laments the assault on community colleges underway across the country.

Bucking historic trends in rising college enrollments, there's been a startling stagnation or even a downturn in enrollment in community colleges, not because demand has declined but because there is insufficient capacity.  In some places and in some programs, thanks to substantial and sustained budget cuts, the community colleges are literally tapped out.

That's right-- students are showing up at "open door" colleges and being effectively turned away.  Welcome to the "new normal."

If you believe that the purpose of public postsecondary education is to provide opportunities to the most advantaged, this is insane. Clearly, the current model for public higher education is broken, and as the report argues, it's time for a "reboot." If you believe that college endows social goods, which entire communities benefit from, then you will support greater public investment in community colleges to reverse this trend. If you believe in equity, and actually understand how people with fewer resources make decisions, rather than assuming they are econometricians, then you'll demand change now.

If on the other hand, if you think that college is merely a private investment that accrues to individual people and you think that markets actually solve more problems than they create, and if you believe education is an economic good comparable to any other product then you probably think public higher education is in exactly the position it deserves.  The market must be working.  Sure, demand is outstripping supply, but thank goodness the private sector is here to help!  We can simply raise tuition at community colleges to fund them, and in the meantime pave the road for private institutions where the public has no say over governance or spending, or for that matter quality. (No, sorry, accreditation isn't going to ensure quality, and just as consumers demonstrate time and again, neither are the students.)  All that matters is that we provide the mirage of opportunity to satisfy our own appetite for the meritocracy narrative, right? And heck, maybe this will finally provide a way of telling everyone outside of the elite classes that they shouldn't be going to college anyway!


Read the report. Either this is a crisis we have to resolve, or we are denying the existence of a crisis because the assault on community colleges is an intentional one designed to promote the growth of private and for-profit institutions.  "Stealth privatization" of higher education, as Richard Vedder called it at a conference my department hosted last week, is no longer so stealth at all.  The Campaign for the Future of Higher Education-- and students nationwide-- want to know, isn't it time to DO something about it?

You have read this article Campaign for Future of Higher Education / community colleges / Gary Rhoades with the title Campaign for Future of Higher Education. You can bookmark this page URL http://apt3e.blogspot.com/2012/04/national-assault-on-community-colleges.html. Thanks!