On August 9, the Secretary of Education’s Commission on the Future of Higher Education published a draft report of suggestions on how to improve the nation’s universities. The commission should be applauded for recommending that more need-based financial aid be distributed to low-income students, and for recognizing that cost has become a major deterrent for many who might otherwise seek a higher education.
Unfortunately, the report uses language better suited for corporate America, recommending decreasing costs to students through “cost-cutting and productivity improvements,” without specifying what parts of their budgets universities should cut. The report also, somewhat paradoxically notes that the biggest increase in institutional spending has been in financial aid to students, which seemingly conforms to the commission’s recommendations.
Furthermore, the report says tuition should rise no faster than median family income, but also contradictorily states that price controls should not be implemented. Contrary to what the commission seems to believe, public universities do not arbitrarily raise tuition for students, but rather do so to increase or maintain services in an era of paltry state funding for higher education. Without an enforcement mechanism in addition to adequate state funding, efforts to control costs are largely symbolic, and will inevitably fail.
Instead of forcing public universities to cut spending, which results in decreased financial aid, larger class sizes and decreased student services, they should be given enough funding to run at a level that allows all services to fully function and serve all students.
The commission’s recommendation that universities should be held accountable for students who do not complete their studies is also misguided. Universities give students every tool they need to succeed, but students must take it upon themselves to have the initiative to utilize them. A large part of the value inherent in a college degree stems from the fact that not everyone has one. That the commission calls for increased rigor, bemoaning graduates’ unpreparedness for the workplace, and contradicts its criticism of institutions with students unable to achieve a degree. The commission should decide between these two arguments before issuing its final report. Are universities responsible for providing a tough academic environment, or should they increase the number of graduating students with no regard for students’ individual work ethics?
Perhaps the most ill-advised recommendation in the report is for standardized tests to be administered at the university level. Introducing standardized tests would give universities incentive to prepare their students for the tests, rather than for the students’ chosen fields. This would change the focus of education from gaining knowledge to learning test preparation skills, a switch that has already occurred to some extent in lower educational institutions. Institutions of higher learning should take utmost care to ensure that learning at the university level does not follow along the same path. Any standardized attempt to
compare universities will be ineffective as a result of institutional differences not present at the high school level. At the university level, curricula are not standardized, which would make meaningful comparisons among programs at different institutions extremely difficult to conduct.
Although we applaud an effort at the federal level to evaluate our nation’s colleges and universities, and the draft report from this education commission unfortunately reflects much of what is skewed with the way the federal government currently thinks about higher education. The commission should change its focus from cutting costs and doling out standardized tests and instead concentrate on its laudable goal of making sure all citizens – regardless of income – have an equal opportunity to receive a satisfactory education.