goals of higher education

Meaning, Purpose & Objectives of of Higher Education

Introduction:  Higher education, often regarded as the pinnacle of academic pursuit, represents a transformative phase in the educational journey of individuals. Beyond elementary and secondary schooling, higher education encompasses specialized and advanced learning, nurturing intellect, critical thinking, and personal growth. Through a diverse array of disciplines and fields, higher education is a gateway to knowledge, expertise, and innovation, empowering students to become specialists in their chosen areas. As an integral part of societal progress, it fosters a culture of research and intellectual curiosity, shaping well-rounded individuals poised to make meaningful contributions to their communities and the world. At its core, higher education embodies the pursuit of excellence and self-discovery, preparing learners for future challenges while enriching their lives with the transformative power of education.

1.1 What is Higher Education ?

Higher education refers to the advanced level beyond the primary and secondary levels. It typically includes education provided by universities, colleges, professional schools, and other institutions that offer specialized academic and vocational programs. Higher education focuses on in-depth learning in specific fields of study, enabling individuals to develop expertise and advanced knowledge in their chosen areas.

At the higher education level, students pursue undergraduate and graduate degrees, such as Bachelor’s, Master’s, and Doctorate degrees, depending on their academic and career aspirations. The curriculum is more specialized and research-oriented than earlier education stages, encouraging critical thinking, analytical skills, and independent research.

Higher education serves various purposes, including:

• Specialization: It allows students to focus on their areas of interest and expertise, preparing them for careers in specific industries or professions.
• Research and Innovation: Higher education institutions are centers of research and development, contributing to the advancement of knowledge and the development of new technologies, ideas, and solutions.
• Personal Growth: Beyond academic knowledge, higher education fosters personal development, character building, and a sense of social responsibility.
• Career Advancement: Higher education equips individuals with the necessary skills and qualifications to pursue higher-level positions and leadership roles in their fields.
• Lifelong Learning: It instills a love for learning beyond graduation, encouraging continuous education and personal growth.

Higher education is a key driver of societal progress and economic development. Nations with well-developed higher education systems tend to have a more skilled and innovative workforce, contributing to overall prosperity and competitiveness in the global market. It plays a crucial role in shaping the future of individuals and society, empowering learners to become responsible and contributing members of their communities.

1.2 The Objectives of Higher Education

The objectives of higher education encompass a profound and multi-faceted purpose, elevating the pursuit of knowledge beyond mere academic instruction. At the heart of this noble endeavor lies the mission to equip learners with the tools to thrive in their chosen professions and as responsible and compassionate members of society. Higher education is a bastion of academic excellence, fostering critical thinking, innovation, and research that push the boundaries of human knowledge. Beyond specialization and career preparation, it seeks to nurture holistic personal development, cultivating ethical values, leadership qualities, and a global perspective. Higher education empowers individuals to adapt to evolving challenges, contribute meaningfully to their communities, and champion progress in a rapidly changing world by instilling a love for lifelong learning.

The objectives of higher education encompass a wide range of goals that aim to fulfill various roles in individuals’ personal, academic, and societal development. These objectives include:

• Academic Excellence: One of the primary objectives of higher education is to provide rigorous and comprehensive academic programs that promote excellence in learning. Institutions strive to maintain high education standards and ensure that students understand their chosen disciplines deeply.
• Specialization: Higher education allows students to specialize in specific fields of study, enabling them to acquire advanced knowledge and expertise in their areas of interest. The specialization prepares individuals for specialized careers and positions in their respective industries.
• Critical Thinking and Problem-Solving: Higher education fosters critical thinking skills, encouraging students to analyze and evaluate information critically. It cultivates problem-solving abilities that empower graduates to address complex challenges in their professional and personal lives.
• Research and Innovation: Higher education institutions are hubs of research and innovation. Encouraging students and faculty to engage in research contributes to advancing knowledge, technological breakthroughs, and developing solutions to real-world problems.
• Personal Development: Higher education aims to nurture holistic personal growth in students. It focuses on character building, ethical values, leadership qualities, and a sense of social responsibility, preparing individuals to be responsible and compassionate citizens.
• Global Awareness and Cultural Understanding: Higher education encourages exposure to diverse perspectives, cultures, and ideas. Promoting global awareness and cultural understanding helps students develop a more inclusive and open-minded worldview.
• Lifelong Learning: Instilling a love for learning that extends beyond graduation is an essential objective of higher education. Graduates are encouraged to embrace lifelong learning to adapt to changing circumstances, pursue professional development, and stay relevant in a rapidly evolving world.
• Employment and Career Preparation: Higher education equips students with the skills and qualifications to enter the workforce and pursue successful careers. It provides internships, practical experiences, and networking opportunities, enhancing graduates’ employability.
• Social and Economic Mobility: Higher education has the potential to uplift individuals from disadvantaged backgrounds, providing opportunities for social and economic mobility. It can break barriers and open doors to better opportunities and improved quality of life.
• Contribution to Society: A significant objective of higher education is to foster a sense of civic responsibility and encourage graduates to contribute positively to their communities. Higher education is crucial in producing responsible and active citizens committed to making a difference in society.

Higher education institutions aim to empower individuals with the knowledge, skills, and values needed to lead fulfilling lives, positively impact society, and advance knowledge and human progress by pursuing these objectives.

The Radhakrishnan Commission 3 presented a comprehensive set of objectives and purposes for higher education, acknowledging the evolving political, social, and economic landscape. These aims are as follows:

• The Commission emphasized the development of an intellectual attitude among university students, fostering a thirst for knowledge and critical thinking.
• Higher education was seen as a means to create visionary and courageous leaders who would champion social reform, addressing societal challenges with intelligence and insight.
• The universities were encouraged to assume a pivotal role as cultural organs and intellectual leaders, guiding civilization’s progress and promoting scholarly pursuits.
• Higher education was envisioned as a catalyst for the success of democracy, nurturing informed and engaged citizens who actively participate in the democratic process.
• The Commission advocated for discovering and enhancing individuals’ innate qualities through suitable training, empowering them to realize their potential.
• Higher education aims to instill sentiments of national discipline, international awareness, justice, freedom, equality, and brotherhood, nurturing global citizens committed to ethical values and unity.

The Kothari Commission has articulated its vision for the objectives and ideals of higher education as follows:

• Pursuit of Knowledge and Truth: Higher _ education aims to seek knowledge within the framework of truth, blending tradition with new insights to adapt to changing circumstances.
• Contribution to Society: The commission stresses on producing educated and skilled individuals who can serve society in various domains such as arts, sciences, agriculture, medicine, and industries.
• Leadership Development: Higher _ education strives to nurture leadership qualities in students, empowering them to excel and take charge in every sphere of life.
• Promotion of Social Justice: The commission advocates for higher _ education to encourage social justice, fostering a more equitable and inclusive society.
• Nurturing Values: Higher _ education seeks to instill the correct values among students and teachers, promoting ethical behavior and a sense of responsibility towards society.
• Reducing Disparities: Addressing social and cultural disparities is an essential objective, ensuring that education becomes a pathway for bridging gaps and promoting equality.
• National Consciousness: Higher _ education is a means to develop a sense of national consciousness, nurturing a deep understanding of one’s cultural identity and contributing to the nation’s growth and unity.
• Adult Education Program: The commission emphasizes the development of programs for adult education, recognizing the importance of learning opportunities for individuals beyond traditional schooling age.

Through these multifaceted objectives, the Kothari Commission envisions higher education as a transformative force that enriches individuals, empowers society, and fosters a better future for the nation.

1.3 The Purpose of Higher Education:

The purpose of higher education is multifaceted and encompasses a broad range of objectives aimed at intellectual, personal, and societal development. While the specific goals and emphasis may vary among institutions, cultures, and individuals, the overarching purposes of higher _ education include:

• Knowledge Acquisition: Higher _ education is fundamentally about acquiring and deepening knowledge in various fields of study. It allows students to delve into subjects of interest, develop critical thinking skills, and gain expertise in specific disciplines.
• Critical Thinking and Problem-Solving: Higher _ education fosters critical thinking and problem-solving skills, encouraging students to analyze information, evaluate arguments, and develop creative solutions to complex problems.
• Personal Growth: College experiences contribute to personal growth and self-discovery. Students often better understand their values, beliefs, and identities, preparing them for a more meaningful and purposeful life.
• Professional Skills: Higher _ education equips students with the practical skills and knowledge needed for specific careers and professions. This preparation includes internships, hands-on experiences, and exposure to industry-relevant practices.
• Career Advancement: A college degree is often a key factor in career advancement. Higher education provides the qualifications and credentials necessary for entry into many professions and can enhance job opportunities and earning potential.
• Global Citizenship: Higher _ education promotes a sense of global citizenship by fostering an awareness of global issues, cultural diversity, and interconnectedness. It encourages students to engage in social and civic activities to contribute positively to their communities and the world.
• Ethical Decision-Making: Through exposure to ethical theories and discussions, higher _ education helps students develop a strong sense of ethics and integrity, preparing them to make principled decisions in their personal and professional lives.
• Advancement of Knowledge: Higher _ education institutions contribute to advancing knowledge through research and innovation. Faculty and students engage in cutting-edge research that expands the boundaries of human understanding in various fields.
• Technology and Discovery: Colleges and universities drive technological advancements and scientific discoveries. Research conducted in higher education institutions often leads to breakthroughs with broad societal impact.
• Artistic and Cultural Appreciation: Higher _ education encourages an appreciation for the arts, literature, and cultural diversity. Exposure to different perspectives fosters creativity, cultural competence, and a deeper world understanding.
• Intellectual Dialogue: Colleges and universities are hubs for intellectual dialogue and academic discourse. Students engage with diverse ideas, challenge assumptions, and participate in conversations that broaden their intellectual horizons.
• Adaptability and Lifelong Learning: Higher _ education instills a commitment to lifelong learning. It equips individuals with the skills to adapt to a rapidly changing world, fostering a mindset of continuous education and personal development.

In essence, the purpose of higher _ education extends beyond acquiring degrees and credentials. It seeks to cultivate well-rounded individuals who are intellectually curious, socially responsible, and equipped to contribute meaningfully to their communities and the broader global society. Higher education serves as a transformative journey that prepares individuals for the challenges and opportunities of the future.

Reference Articles:

• 1. Hijam, R. D. (2012). Management of the higher education in Manipur since 1972.  http://hdl.handle.net/10603/39238
• 2. Rao, M. S., & V, K. V. (2011). Quality management in higher education: A case study of MBA colleges in select districts coastal Andhra Pradesh, India. http://hdl.handle.net/10603/8364
• 3. Barnet.R. 1992 Bernett R. (1992). Learning to Effect. Buckingham: Society for Research into Higher Education and Open University Press.
• 4. Bhatnagar Suresh: Modern Indian Education & its Problems, Surya Publication, Meerut, 1996.p/223

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What’s the Value of Higher Education?

Have political and fiscal debates about higher education lost sight of the value of education for individuals and society? Dr. Johnnetta Cole discusses how universities can inform and inspire.

• Dr. Johnnetta Cole President Emerita, Smithsonian National Museum of African Art; President Emerita, Spelman College and Bennett College

This interview was conducted at the Yale Higher Education Leadership Summit , hosted by Yale SOM’s Chief Executive Leadership Institute on January 30, 2018.

The value of a college degree can be measured in a number of different ways: increased lifetime earnings potential, a network of classmates and fellow alumni, subject-matter expertise, a signal of stick-to-itiveness, potentially a marker of class or the capacity to move across classes. There are also less tangible benefits, like becoming a more well-rounded individual and part of a well-informed public.

Yale Insights recently talked with Dr. Johnnetta Cole about how she measures the value of higher education. Cole is the former president of Spelman College and Bennett College, the only two historically black colleges and universities that are exclusively women’s colleges. After retiring from academia, she served as the director of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African Art. In addition, she served on the boards of a number of corporations, including Home Depot, Merck, and Coca-Cola. She was the first African-American chair of the board for the United Way of America.

Q: Why does higher education matter?

I would say that we could get widespread agreement on what I’m going to call the first purpose of higher education: through this amazingly powerful process of teaching and learning, students come to better understand the world.

There might be some disagreement on the second purpose. I’d say it is to inspire students to figure out how they can contribute to helping to make the world better. Certainly, higher education is about scholarship, but it’s also about service. It’s about creativity. It’s about matters of the mind, but it’s also, or at least it should be, about matters of the heart and the soul.

Q: Has the public perception of universities changed in recent years?

Throughout the history—and herstory—of higher education, there have been doubters, those who have critiqued it. But I have a concern, and some polls tell us, in this period in which we are living, many people believe that higher education is not contributing in a positive way to American life.

That’s something that we need to work on, those of us who are deeply engaged in and care about higher education, because I think when one looks with as much objectivity as possible, the truth is, and it’s always been, that higher education contributes substantially.

Q: You’ve led two historically black colleges for women. What is the role of special mission institutions?

In my view, we still need special mission institutions. Remember Brandeis, Notre Dame, and Brigham Young are special mission institutions.

With respect to historically black colleges and universities (HBCU), not every African American wants to or does go to an HBCU. The same is true of women and women’s colleges. But for those who wish that kind of education, and if the fit is right, it’s almost magical.

I think it is as basic as having an entire community believe that you can. On these campuses, we believe that black students can do whatever they set their minds to do. On the women’s campuses, we believe that women can reach heights that have not been imagined for women.

HBCUs are not totally free of racism. Women’s colleges are not utopias where there are no expressions of gender inequality or sexism. But they come far closer than at our predominately white and co-ed institutions.

Q: One of the big issues with higher education now is cost. How do we solve the affordability problem?

The affordability question is highly complex and serious. James Baldwin said, “Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed that is not faced.” I believe that this is a perfect example. Colleges and universities are not just raising tuitions so they can make big profits. Pell grants are no longer at least a reasonable response to the affordability question.

We’ve got to figure this out because, in a democracy, accessibility to education is fundamental. The idea that something as precious, as powerful, as a solid education is only accessible to some and not to others, is an assault upon democracy.

Q: You came out of retirement to lead the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art. Why was the draw so strong?

I’ve managed, systematically, to get a failing grade in retirement.

I grew up in the South, in the days of legalized segregation—you could also call it state-sponsored racism. I didn’t have access to symphony halls. I didn’t have access to art museums. I still remember the library that I went to in order to travel the world through books, was the A. L. Lewis Colored Public Library.

As a young girl, I fell in love with the visual arts, especially African and African-American art. I went off to Fisk University at age 15 and began to see the real works of art for which we only had reproductions in my home. From Fisk, I went to Oberlin, where the Allen Memorial Art Gallery was a special place of solace for me

The opportunity with the Smithsonian wasn’t something I sought; I was asked to apply. My doctorate is in anthropology, not art history, so I was reluctant, but they told me they were looking for a leader, not an art historian. It was one of the most extraordinary experiences of my life. The work was an almost indescribable joy.

Generally, our museums across America do not reflect who America is, nor do they reflect how our world looks. They need to be far more diverse in terms of their boards, staff, exhibitions, educational programs, and visitorship.

What the African art museum has is a unique opportunity because it can speak to something that binds us together. If one is human, just go back far enough, I mean way back, and we have all come from a single place. It is called Africa.

Here’s a museum that says to its visitors, “No matter who you are, by race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, age, ability or disability, or nationality, come to a place where the visual arts connect you to the very cradle of humanity.”

During those eight years when I had the joy of being the director of the National Museum of African Art, I would greet our visitors by saying “Welcome home! Welcome to a place that presents the diverse and dynamic, the exquisite arts of Africa, humanity’s original home.”

Q: Do you think that our education and cultural institutions are properly valued in our society?

I have to say no. Because if we did, we would take better care of them. If we did, we would make sure that not some but all of our educational institutions from kindergarten through post-secondary education, into graduate and professional schools, have the means to do what needs to be done.

If we really value all of our cultural expressions, whether it’s dance or music, visual arts, theater, when there is a budget shortfall, we wouldn’t say, “These are the first things to go.” We wouldn’t say, “Kids can do without music in their public school.” It’s one thing to say we love an institution; it’s another to care for and protect an institution. I think we can do far better.

What you need to know about higher education

UNESCO, as the only United Nations agency with a mandate in higher education, works with countries to ensure all students have equal opportunities to access and complete good quality higher education with internationally recognized qualifications. It places special focus on developing countries, notably Africa. 

Why does higher education matter?  

Higher education is a rich cultural and scientific asset which enables personal development and promotes economic, technological and social change. It promotes the exchange of knowledge, research and innovation and equips students with the skills needed to meet ever changing labour markets. For students in vulnerable circumstances, it is a passport to economic security and a stable future. 

What is the current situation? 

Higher education has changed dramatically over the past decades with increasing enrolment, student mobility, diversity of provision, research dynamics and technology. Some 254 million students are enrolled in universities around the world – a number that has more than doubled in the last 20 years and is set to expand. Yet despite the boom in demand, the overall enrolment ratio is 42% with large differences between countries and regions. More than 6.4 million students are pursuing their further education abroad. And among the world’s more than 82 million refugees, only 7% of eligible youth are enrolled in higher education, whereas comparative figures for primary and secondary education are 68% and 34%, respectively ( UNHCR) . The COVID-19 pandemic further disrupted the way higher education was provided.

What does UNESCO do to ensure access for everyone to higher education? 

UNESCO's work is aligned with Target 4.3 of SDG 4 which aims, by 2030, “to ensure equal access for all women and men to affordable quality technical, vocational and tertiary education, including university”. To achieve this, UNESCO supports countries by providing knowledge, evidence-based information and technical assistance in the development of higher education systems and policies based on the equal distribution of opportunities for all students. 

UNESCO supports countries to enhance recognition, mobility and inter-university cooperation through the ratification and implementation of the Global Convention on the Recognition of Qualifications concerning Higher Education and regional recognition conventions . To tackle the low rate of refugee youth in higher education UNESCO has developed the UNESCO Qualifications Passport for Refugees and Vulnerable Migrants , a tool which makes it easier for those groups with qualifications to move between countries. The passport brings together information on educational and other qualifications, language, work history. UNESCO places a special focus on Africa with projects such as the Higher Technical Education in Africa project for a technical and innovative workforce supported by China Funds-in-Trust.  

​​​​​​​How does UNESCO ensure the quality of higher education? 

The explosion in demand for higher education and increasing internationalization means UNESCO is expanding its work on quality assurance, helping Member States countries to establish their own agencies and mechanisms to enhance quality and develop policies particularly in developing countries and based on the Conventions. Such bodies are absent in many countries, making learners more vulnerable to exploitative providers.  

It also facilitates the sharing of good practices and innovative approaches to widen inclusion in higher education. As part of this work, it collaborates with the International Association of Universities to produce the World Higher Education Database which provides information on higher education systems, credentials and institutions worldwide. 

​​​​​​​How does UNESCO keep pace with digital change?  

The expansion of connectivity worldwide has boosted the growth of online and blended learning, and revealed the importance of digital services, such as Artificial Intelligence, Big Data and Higher Education Management Information Systems in helping higher education institutions utilize data for better planning, financing and quality. 

The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated this transformation and increased the number of providers and the range of degree offerings from cross-border to offshore education. The Organization provides technical support and policy advice on innovative approaches to widening access and inclusion including through the use of ICTs and by developing new types of learning opportunities both on-campus and online. 

How does UNESCO address the needs of a changing job market?

Labour markets are experiencing rapid changes, with increased digitization and greening of economies, but also the rising internationalization of higher education. UNESCO places a strong emphasis on developing science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education, indispensable to sustainable development and innovation. It aims to strengthen skills development for youth and adults, particularly literacy, TVET, STEM and higher education to meet individual, labour market and societal demands.  

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What Is the Purpose and Future of Higher Education?

A sociologist explores the history and future of higher education..

Posted February 18, 2019 | Reviewed by Jessica Schrader

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A recent story asked, “ Can small liberal arts colleges survive the next decade? ” This question is important as we see the closure of some small schools, mostly in areas away from big cities. Yet, as University of California Riverside sociology and public policy distinguished professor Steven G. Brint notes based on his new book Two Cheers for Higher Education , “There’s always been a small number of colleges that close every year—usually fewer than a dozen—and more are opened for the first time than closed.” This illustrates, among other things, why it is important to consider a historical perspective on higher education to place recent individual news stories in context. That’s exactly what his latest book does: It explores the rich history of higher education, leading him to argue that overall higher education appears to be doing quite well, but also that there remain important concerns for higher education on the horizon.

I asked Steven questions about the purpose of higher education, why he argues higher education is doing quite well, and what his concerns are for its future. Anyone interested in the rich history of higher education and how that informs the future of higher education should read this book. Going to college or university is increasingly a fixture and perhaps even an obsession for parents and students, and understanding the history of that industry is useful to help us think about why we encourage students to go to college in the first place.

What, in your view, is the purpose of higher education?

The aims of higher education change over time. In the United States, the original purposes were to prepare students for a few “learned professions,” especially the clergy, and to provide a strong, religiously tinged moral education. Many of the activities that we now associate with higher education—extra-curricular clubs, majoring in a defined specialization, faculty research, access for socioeconomically disadvantaged students—came later.

Today, we would have to start by recognizing the fundamental fact that the purposes of higher education are highly differentiated by the stratum in the system institutions occupy. The aims of community colleges are very different from those of research universities. I do not talk about community colleges in the book, though I did write a book on community colleges early in my career . The great majority of the 3,000 or so four-year colleges and universities are primarily devoted to teaching students, mainly in occupational fields that in theory equip graduates to obtain jobs. Students will receive a smattering of general education in lower-division and will have opportunities to participate in extra-curricular activities. The latter are more important for many students than classroom studies. Students hone interpersonal skills on campus, make contacts that can be useful for instrumental purposes as well as ends in themselves. For those who finish, their diplomas do provide a boost in the labor market, more for quantitative fields than for other fields.

Research universities are of course the most complex environments and the range of their activities is difficult to catalog in a short answer. In addition to providing instruction in hundreds of programs, they run hundreds of student clubs and organizations, contribute to the selection of high achieving students for graduate degrees, train and mentor graduate and professional students, produce thousands or tens of thousands of research papers annually, reach out to industrial partners, field semi-professional athletic teams, solve community problems, run tertiary care hospitals, patent new discoveries and attempt to create environments conducive to learning for a very wide variety of students. One could say that these activities, taken together, constitute the enacted purposes of research universities.

However, when you look at their activities from the perspective of public policy, the focus will tend to be on three main purposes: (1) human capital development (in other words, improving the cognitive and non-cognitive skills of students), (2) basic research and research in the national interest, and (3) the provision of access for students from lower-income and under-represented minority backgrounds. Implicitly, Two Cheers for Higher Education focuses more on these primary aims of public policy than on some of the ancillary activities of universities. Of course, some of the activities that could be considered ancillary—such as student clubs and the patenting of new discoveries—are clearly related to these public policy aims. For that reason, I do also discuss them at some length in the book.

At a time when we see stories of colleges closing, why is it that you argue that higher education is doing quite well?

We do see some colleges closing and more colleges merging. There’s always been a small number of colleges that close every year—usually fewer than a dozen—and more are opened for the first time than closed. We do hear a lot of talk about mergers in recent years, and some of the regional public universities in rural areas are definitely struggling. Where population is declining steadily, it becomes harder to make the case for the local college. But population is not declining in urban areas or in suburban areas around big cities. Here we see new colleges rising or existing colleges growing larger. Higher education is doing quite well in the parts of the country that are seeing growth in population and wealth. Sometimes higher education has been an important influence in attracting employers, new jobs, and new wealth. The state of Georgia is an interesting example. It now has the 10th largest economy of the 50 states, and the investments that state leaders and donors have made in Georgia Tech, Emory, the University of Georgia, and Georgia State University have played an important role in the state’s impressive development.

Though your book is largely positive about higher education, you note some concerns about the future of higher education. What are those?

According to public opinion surveys, the major concerns of Americans have to do with cost, the quality of undergraduate education, and liberal bias in the classroom. I address each of these issues in the book. One hopes that criminal justice reform may allow most of the 50 states to invest more heavily in higher education, reducing family’s burdens. I also advocate a universal, income-contingent loan repayment policy similar to the ones that already exist in England, Australia and several other countries. My research has led me to agree with the critics that the quality of undergraduate education is too low for too many. I show in the book how the lessons of the sciences of learning can be embedded without much more than forethought in even large lecture classes. The evidence on liberal bias is mixed. Clearly, minorities remain subject to many discriminatory and wounding acts on college campuses. At the same time, where we find a liberal orthodoxy there’s a risk that assumptions and commitments will substitute for evidence and reasoning. We do need more spaces on campus where contemporary social and political issues can be discussed and debated.

I also discuss what academic and political leaders can do about the threat to the physical campus represented by online competition , by the tremendous growth of campus administrative staff (compared to the slow growth of faculty), and the deplorable increase in poorly-paid and sometimes poorly-prepared adjunct instructors.

I hope that the evidence and recommendations that I provide will stimulate new thinking and action in each of these areas of concern. The U.S. is fortunate to have the strongest system of higher education in the world, but many problems arose during the period I cover. It will be important to address these problems before they undermine public support for institutions that are now central to the country’s future well-being.

Brint, S. G. (2018). Two cheers for higher education: Why American universities are stronger than ever--and how to meet the challenges they face . Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Jonathan Wai, Ph.D. , is Assistant Professor of Education Policy and Psychology and the 21st Century Endowed Chair in Education Policy at the University of Arkansas.

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American Higher Education: An Obligation to the Future

By vartan gregorian, president, carnegie corporation of new york.

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In recent years, there has been a debate raging among policymakers, students, educators, concerned parents, and many others about the purpose of higher education: is it meant to help develop an inquiring mind and a deep appreciation for the value of how knowledge enriches one’s lifelong personal and professional achievements or should it be simply focused on gaining the skills to pursue a well-paying career? In other words, we seem to have divided higher education into a black-and-white scenario in which either an individual becomes a sort of pie-in-the-sky dreamer, well-read and able to quote great thinkers but probably starving in a garret while unable to get a decent job, or else he or she graduates from college and immediately plunges into the world of technologically complex, high-stakes, high-financial-reward work and becomes a “great success.”

Perhaps the time has come to reconsider that either-or proposition about higher education. The issue is too complex to be addressed in such a simplified manner. For example, as a new study 1 from the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AACU) reports, “Students, parents, and policymakers interested in the ‘return on investment’ of college education [often assume] that a major in a liberal arts field has a negative effect on employment prospects and earnings potential.” But the AACU study makes clear there is compelling evidence that a liberal arts degree continues to be a sound investment, especially in these difficult economic times. The facts show that compared to students who major in professional, preprofessional, or STEM fields, liberal arts majors fare very well in terms of both earnings and long-term career success.

The specifics are indeed eye-opening. They reveal that over the long-term, humanities graduates actually fare better than their peers who are focused on particular professional fields. Upon graduating from college, those who majored in the humanities and social science made, on average, $26,271 in 2010 and 2011, slightly more than those in science and mathematics but less than those in engineering and in professional and pre-professional fields. However, by their peak earning age of 56 to 60, these individuals earned $66,185, putting them about $2,000 ahead of professional and pre-professional majors in the same age bracket. 2 Further, employers want to hire men and women who have the ability to think and act based on deep, wide-ranging knowledge. For example, the report finds that 93 percent of employers agree that candidates’ demonstrated capacity to think critically, communicate clearly, and solve complex problems is more important than their undergraduate major, and 55 percent said that what they wanted from potential employees was both field-specific knowledge and skills and a broad range of knowledge and skills. Even more evidence of hiring managers’ interest in richly educated individuals is the finding that four out of five employers agree that all students should acquire broad knowledge in the liberal arts and sciences. 3

Students do not have to make artificial choices between what they want to know about the world and the skills they need to succeed in it.

All this is heartening news in that it reminds us that the current generation of students—and those who follow after them—do not have to make artificial choices between what they want to know about the world and the skills they need to succeed in it. But there are some who are still not persuaded of this. In fact, it is interesting to note there is yet another choice that various pundits have recently suggested students should consider—not going to college at all. The rationale behind that notion is that while the knowledge gained in college and university classrooms may be both wonderful and enlightening, it is not necessarily useful in “real life.” That seems an empty argument to me and one that is refuted, for instance, by a quick glance at a recent list of the Forbes 400 richest people in America, which shows that 84 percent hold postsecondary degrees. Similarly, of the Fortune 500 CEOs, 93 percent have a college degree—many in the humanities and social sciences. The success of these individuals and others underscores a point I have often made to students: that one of the immeasurable values of a liberal arts education is how it can open up a world of possibilities, including life and career paths to follow that might otherwise have seemed unimaginable to a young man or woman just starting out. But that is a wonderful challenge for someone who is motivated to explore their own potential: after all, if the only purpose of education is to train an individual for a specific job or skill, life would be much simpler—and, I might add, perhaps much less interesting.

With all that said, it remains clear that increasing our expertise in technology and related fields is critical to the progress of our society. Nevertheless, it is still useful to remind ourselves that the greatest service technology can provide us is as an adjunct to knowledge, not as a replacement for it. Technology by itself is not a creator of content. Though the Internet and all the technological devices that now connect us to it have made it possible for much of humanity to have access to a virtual Library of Alexandria, access alone does not equal knowledge. The ability to carry around the entire corpus of Greek literature on an iPhone or some similar device may be astonishing, but that does not mean that the individual who possesses such a device actually knows anything about Greek literature. One still has to read. One still has to listen and see with one’s own eyes. One still has to ponder ideas, explore the realms of both material and spiritual knowledge, and discuss these matters with other people.

It is still useful to remind ourselves that the greatest service technology can provide us is as an adjunct to knowledge, not as a replacement for it.

In that connection, I would argue that the deep-seated yearning for knowledge and understanding endemic to human beings is an ideal that a liberal arts education is singularly suited to fulfill. Albert Einstein, in his inimitable fashion, went right to the heart of the matter, asserting that the practical men and women among us try to explain all phenomena by cause and effect. But, Einstein said, “This way of looking at things always answers only the question ‘Why?’ but never the question, ‘To what end?’” 4 To search for even a glimpse of the answers to such great philosophical conundrums one needs to know not only what is taught in a classroom, but also how to think for oneself.

Of course, one also has to know history, particularly the history of one’s own nation. In that regard, as Americans, we have an obligation, as citizens to whom the future of our country has been entrusted, to understand the obstacles we have faced in the past and both the problems and opportunities that lie ahead. As Benjamin Franklin said, issuing a still-timely challenge in response to a query at the close of the Constitutional Convention of 1787, what the Founding Fathers had created was “A Republic, if you can keep it.”

Keep it we must, and we will, but to do so we need an informed and educated citizenry who can take full advantage of the almost 4,200 colleges and universities in our country, including some 1,700 public and private two-year institutions. And let me point out that computers and Web sites have yet to put those colleges and universities out of business. Why is this? Because of one simple reason: we are not a virtual society yet. Not yet. Human beings, by their very nature, are rational, spiritual, and social beings. They are not abstractions. They are not socioeconomic, consumer or entertainment units destined to be confined inside the small world of their cubicles and subject to what I call “cubicle alienation.” Even though people can watch almost any movie they want on-demand from their cable service or on DVDs, men and women still go to movie houses to share the experience of being immersed in a story told through sound and images in the company of other human beings. People have Bibles, Talmuds, and Korans in their homes but they still go to churches, synagogues, and mosques to share their common bonds and traditions. People need to be part of a community—and for many, the college classroom provides an invaluable experience of community and collaboration.

The diversity of talents, interests and aims of the men and women who look to higher education to help them reach their goals is mirrored by the diversity of our colleges and universities, from which our system of higher education draws great strength. Individual institutions have traditionally emphasized different local, regional, national and international needs by providing educational opportunities to diverse populations, expanding scientific and technical knowledge, providing opportunities for continuing education, and other means.

But that certainly wasn’t always the case. Higher education was actually available to only a small proportion of America’s population until Congress enacted the Land Grant College Act in 1862. This legislation—the first Morrill Act—which was, astonishingly passed in the middle of the Civil War (making it clear how strongly both President Lincoln and Congress felt about the importance of education, as well as about the future of the nation) in effect, put universities where the people were. The Act not only provided much greater access to higher education, it also promoted specialized training and spurred the development of both theoretical knowledge and its practical application. The Industrial Revolution was in full swing and the Morrill Act helped to provide the research and the educated work-force that were desperately needed in agriculture, mining and manufacturing.

Today, there are new challenges, and one of the greatest facing higher education is how to protect the diversity of our colleges and universities at a time when it seems that instead of emphasizing variety and competition—which affects all aspects of higher education, from recruiting students to developing curricula—there is a worrisome trend towards uniformity. Joseph Aoun, President of Northeastern University, expressed similar ideas in a recent op-ed 5 in which he discusses how higher education must begin to respond to an increasingly diverse student body, with different needs, different goals, and different expectations. His particular emphasis is on the growing number of students who are not following the path directly from high school graduation to the college campus. As he points out, “The ‘traditional’ college student aged 18 to 22 is no longer the norm. Many people still think that the typical college student is an 18- to 22-year-old who’s attending a four-year residential institution. But according to some estimates, nontraditional students—returning adults, part-time students, midcareer professionals, and every other permutation of learner—now make up 85 percent of all undergraduates.”

The diversity of talents, interests and aims of the men and women who look to higher education to help them reach their goals is mirrored by the diversity of our colleges and universities.

I believe that startling statistic helps to provide an answer to the question with which I began this essay: is there a value to the kind of education that promotes the ability to become a lifelong learner? Clearly, the answer is a resounding yes, if education is going to be a resource available to all Americans that can parallel their path through life, if that is what they need. Noted author and Columbia University professor Andrew Delblanco addresses similar concerns in his recent book, College: What It Was, Is, And Should Be 6 , suggesting that higher education should offer more to students than a rigid curriculum and a lock-step parade towards a degree. As he suggests, though more and more students are going to college with “the narrow aim of obtaining a preprofessional credential” (a phenomenon he attributes to the accelerating commercialization of American higher education), guiding young men and women down this path is a mistake. In fact, he argues, it means that they are losing the chance to experience the traditional—and wonderful—attributes of the undergraduate years, “an exploratory time for students to discover their passions and test ideas and values with the help of teachers and peers…” He also worries that this kind of multi-faceted, aspirational education is in danger of becoming available only to the wealthy and privileged, which would would pose a great danger to the progress of American society. While science, technology, engineering, and math play an increasingly prominent role in our globalized economy, innovation still requires original and imaginative thinking. The new discoveries that will improve the living conditions, health, and welfare of men, women, and children around the world will not be found without those who have the education to work toward those discoveries. And if we do not nurture the talent among us, who will provide literature and art and music for ages yet to come?

These are some of the purposes for which we, as a society, created, supported, and continue to value a liberal arts-oriented college education. As W.E.B. DuBois said, “The true college will ever have one goal—not to earn meat, but to know the end and aim of that life which meat nourishes.” 7

For myself, I believe that the immeasurable value of American higher education and the potential it has to open doors to a future of one’s own making is the proverbial pearl beyond price that we must all cherish. That is one of the reasons I am so gratified that some of our nation’s most eminent university leaders, along with prominent scientists, engineers, and others are sharing their thoughts and ideas about higher education in this special edition of the Carnegie Reporter . I am pleased to be able to contribute to their work by including an address I gave to the President’s Council of the University of Tokyo (below), of which I am a member.

In many ways—and I can attest to this from personal experience—education is the bridge that allows us to travel from where we are to that further place where we can become who we want to be and do all the wonderful things we might otherwise only dream of. Whatever we can do as educators and citizens to strengthen that bridge is an obligation to the future that we all share.

Presentation by Vartan Gregorian to The Seventh President’s Council of the University of Tokyo

June 8, 2010.

©Erika Mitchell/iStock/Thinkstock

U.S. colleges and universities enroll more than 19 million students and annually grant nearly 3 million degrees. Higher education employs more than 3.6 million people, including 2.6 million faculty, in what amounts to a more than $380 billion business.

The diversity of our education system gives it strength, great strength. Individual institutions have traditionally emphasized different functions that have complemented each other by addressing different local, regional, national, and international needs. They also provide educational oppotunities to diverse populations by expanding scientific and technical knowledge, and providing opportunities for continuing education, and also opening their doors to the world. Until several years ago, two-thirds of all students from foreign countries studying abroad were in the United States; two-thirds of the entire international student body that went abroad studied in the United States.

In the last century, enrollment in American higher education grew from 4 percent of the college-age population in 1900 to almost 70 percent by the year 2000. Our student body, moreover, is incredibly diverse. Following a long period of little or no growth in total enrollment, the nation’s institutions of higher education are now seeing the biggest growth spurt since the baby boom generation arrived on campus in 1960.

Between 1995 and 2015, enrollments are expected to increase 16 percent, and one-third of the increase will be members of minority groups. By 2015, minority enrollment is anticipated to rise by almost 30 percent to 2 million in absolute numbers, representing almost 38 percent of undergraduate education.

Clearly there is a strong case to be made for the fact that American higher education is a vital and successful endeavor. But let me take a few moments here to review its history and highlight several aspects of higher education in the United States in order to understand the underpinnings of its success.

The first major opportunity for the expansion of American higher education came in 1862. Even in the middle of the Civil War, and despite the fact that 500,000 people died in the greatest tragedy of American history, President Abraham Lincoln enacted the Morrill Act, which established land-grant universities throughout the United States. The Morrill Act coincided with the Industrial Revolution, and it helped to establish universities just about everywhere the people of the United States were, and where they needed institutions of higher education that addressed their particular needs. Some of our current universities grew from these roots such as the University of California, Irvine, which deals with agriculture; in Wisconsin, the state university includes a focus on the fact that the dairy industry is important; in Minnesota, the mining industry, and on and on. Because of the needs of the state, the resources of states were tapped at the time and folded into the educational curriculum.

The second most important revolution that happened, in addition to land-grant universities—which, by the way, have produced, since their inception, some 20 million degrees— was the establishment of the National Academy of Sciences. Again, it is remarkable to note that Lincoln had such faith in the strength and continuity of the U.S. that in 1863, while the Civil War raged on, President Lincoln signed another piece of landmark legislation—a law that created the National Academy of Sciences. The Academy, which was established to advise Congress on “any subject of science or art,” has done that job well and expanded to include the National Research Council, the National Academy of Engineering, and the Institute of Medicine.

It was not until World War II, though, that the federal government began supporting university research in a significant way. Prior to that, research was done in Europe and in corporate laboratories. To strengthen U.S. growth in science, President Franklin Roosevelt established a commission headed by Vannevar Bush, a former professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His landmark report was published in 1945 and adopted by President Truman. In this piece, a beautiful report entitled Science: The Endless Frontier , Bush noted that the business of industry naturally took the lead in applied research but was deterred by marketplace considerations from conducting pure research. Bush argued that it was the federal government’s responsibility to provide adequate funds for basic research, which pioneers the frontiers of human knowledge for the benefit of society. He also wrote that the nation’s universities were, by their very nature, best suited to take the lead in conducting basic research. Public funding, he said, would promote competition among researchers and projects could be selected on the merits through a peer review process. Bush suggested a federal agency should oversee the program, and Congress created the National Science Foundation to do the job in 1950.

The agency got off to a slow start, but after October 1957, when Sputnik was launched, support for science, science education, and basic research rose rapidly. From 1960 to 1966, federal spending on research not associated with defense leapt from $6 billion a year to almost $35-$40 billion. Until recent years, federal investment in research rarely fell below $20 billion a year, and much of this money went to universities. Giving the universities—that’s the difference— giving the universities the lead in basic research turned out to be a brilliant policy. Instead of being centralized in government laboratories as science tended to be in other parts of the world, scientific research became decentralized in American universities. This policy spurred a tremendous diversity of investment. It also gave graduate students significant research opportunities and helped spread scientific discoveries far and wide for the benefit of industry, medicine, and society as a whole.

Another revolutionary phase in American higher education came about in 1944 and was known as the GI Bill of Rights. This legislation ranks up there in importance with the Morrill Act because the law, enacted at the height of World War II, opened the doors of America’s best colleges and universities to tens of thousands of veterans returning from the battlefields, ordinary Americans who had never dreamt of going to college, and who were now actually being encouraged to do so by their government. The G.I. Bill made an already democratic system of higher education even more democratic in ways that were simply inconceivable in Europe and other parts of the world. In the following decades, the GI Bill—and its legislative offspring enacted during the wars in Korea and Vietnam, and now Iraq and Afghanistan—have resulted in the public investment of more than $60 billion in education and training for about 18 million veterans, including 8.5 million in higher education. Currently, the United States offers an education benefit as an incentive for people to join its all-voluntary military forces.

Shortly after World War II, in 1946, Congress also created the prestigious Fulbright scholarships, which all of you are familiar with, and which have been enormously successful. All in all, there have been some 235,000 American and foreign Fulbright scholars—146,000 alone from countries other than the U.S. The program was created, by the way, as one of the best ways of investing in international education.

The noted sociologist David Riesman said that the greatest contribution to the American economy in the post-war period was the liberation of women.

In 1947, the democratization of higher education was advanced when the President’s Commission on Higher Education recommended that public education be made available up to the 14th grade, thus opening the door to the development of community colleges, or two-year colleges, which are now playing a major role in American higher education, but also point to some of the problems I will discuss later.

In a more recent effort to promote international cooperation and security, Congress enacted the National Security Act of 1991, which provides scholarships for undergraduates and graduate students to study many of the less well-known languages and cultures in key regions of the world, including East Asia, Central Asia, and the Middle East, not to mention Eastern Europe, the former Soviet Union, and Africa.

Another major landmark was the creation of federal loan grant guarantees and subsidy programs as well as outright grants for college students. In the decades since its founding in 1965, the Federal Family Education Loan Program has funded more than 74 million student loans worth more than $180 billion. And in the years since the 1973 Pell Grant program—named after Senator Claiborne Pell— was created, more than $100 billion in grants have been awarded to an estimated 30 million postsecondary students.

Last but not least, let me add something important about Pell grants: when they were proposed, there was a big debate about whether to give the money to university presidents or to give it directly to students so the funds would be portable. It was decided—in fact, Clark Kerr of University of California who led the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education recommended—that the money be designated as portable by students because this would create competition among universities. Many of Clark Kerr’s friends stopped talking to him after that recommendation, including his president. Thus, we can see that land-grant universities, the National Academy of Sciences, the GI Bill, Pell grants, and a host of other innovative strategies for advancing American higher education and increasing access to colleges and universities played a major role in enriching and expanding American education at the college and university level.

Naturally, the civil rights movement in the United States and the end of formal, legal discrimination also contributed to advancing higher education and educational access. In this connection, I should mention that my late friend, the noted sociologist David Riesman, said that the greatest contribution to the American economy in the post-war period was the liberation of women. He was right, because today, almost 54-58 percent of students enrolled in American higher education are women and that, along with the advancement of minorities—especially Asians and African Americans—is truly revolutionary.

Now, let me turn to the problems facing American higher education. There are many things I can talk about. Problem number one is that when there was no competition, America could afford duplication in its higher education. The nation could afford to have thousands of colleges and universities because they provided educated leaders and skilled labor, but at the same time, unskilled workers—those who could not afford higher education or even dropped out of school, could still find jobs in manufacturing and so on, but today, that’s not the case. So duplication in education is no longer affordable, and quality has become very important and a key to competition among educational institutions.

Perhaps the second most important problem is the state of public universities which, as I indicated earlier, were created to be funded by public sources. Private institutions had to rely on private sources, on philanthropy. And parenthetically, ladies and gentlemen, as you know, philanthropy is a big deal in the United States. Annually some $350 billion dollars in philanthropic giving is disbursed by Americans, and not only the rich; 70 percent of those sums come from families with incomes of less than $100,000 dollars a year. Giving has become an American phenomenon. Even during presidential campaigns and debates, candidates now have to reveal the amounts of their philanthropic giving because otherwise they will be known as being stingy, being cheapskates.

But now, the barriers between public and private funding of universities have all but disappeared. Both private and public universities seek support from private sources as well as from the public, with one major difference: when I came as a freshman to Stanford University in 1956, tuition and fees were $750 dollars at Stanford, $50 dollars at the University of California, Berkeley—yes, 50, five-oh. Now, all the costs have gone astronomically high. Colleges and universities have to keep up with inflation and support the costs of laboratories; technology; of stocking their libraries; building and maintaining dormitories and other facilities; paying for athletics; paying for health and other types of insurance; providing health, food, counseling and other services; legal and government affairs departments, public affairs departments, etc. In short, universities, nowadays, are like city states. But what has changed over the years is that individual states can no longer afford by themselves to pay for public higher education. For example, I’m told that today, only 8 or 9 percent of the funding needed for the University of Michigan comes from the state of Michigan; in Missouri, it’s 9-10 percent; Maryland, 9-10 percent; etc. The rest has to come from tuition, fees, federal research grants, federal loans and grants as well as philanthropy, which was not how the system of supporting public higher education was supposed to work.

In addition, when Pell grants were inaugurated, there were two components: loans and outright grants. As time has passed, the proportion of loans and grants has changed so that today, more loans are given than grants. Hence, students often have to borrow money to pay back the loans, and if they are unable to pay their debts or go into bankruptcy as a result of their debt burden, this will adversely affect their future, including their ability to find jobs and advance in their careers. If, on the other hand, they take jobs with low pay and because of their low salaries remain unable to pay their loans, it discourages some people from embarking on careers where the financial rewards are not great but the mission is important to society and the nation. As a former teacher myself, I have first-hand experience of that type of situation. If you become a teacher with a $30,000-a-year salary and you have to pay six-to-ten thousand a year for your college debt, especially if you get a higher degree, that’s a very serious challenge.

©Robert Ford/iStock/Thinkstock

So these are some of the problems. But there is still another that is among the most important of all, and that is the following: we all agree that what makes universities great is the quality of their faculties. I have always believed that the faculty is the bone marrow of the university. Students come and go, administrators come and go—even visionary leaders, though they be few and far between, come and go—but a university’s faculty provides continuity. In that connection, the challenge is that many universities cannot afford to maintain or recruit high-quality faculty nor can they have the same number of top-level faculty that they did in the past. As a result, they resort to replenishing their ranks with adjunct and part-time faculty. Part-time faculty size has increased from 22 to almost 40 percent in many universities, making the overall quality of their faculty questionable. I’m not referring to the Harvards, Princetons, Yales and others of that rank; I’m talking about those small colleges and public universities that cannot afford to maintain an excellent faculty roster and so must rely on part-timers in order to preserve themselves during difficult financial times. Remember, when you have part-time faculty, you save money because you don’t have to give them offices, or provide benefits or sabbaticals or other types of resources. It’s almost like piece-work is being introduced into higher education.

One of the greatest challenges facing our society is how to distinguish between information, which may be true, false or some tangled combination of both, and real knowledge.

In addition, naturally, during times of financial crisis such as we find ourselves in now, another challenge that arises is that there is a growing impulse to do what is expedient, such as reducing the number of academic units required to graduate. Hence, I am not surprised that once again there are also voices raised, asking why can’t the time required for BA and other degrees be reduced to three years? After all, some say, Oxford started with four years and then reduced it to three. Harvard copied the four-year system and it has been with us since the beginning of the higher education system in the U.S., but why does it have to remain that way? Let’s reduce it. Quality, depth and richness of education don’t seem to factor into these suggestions.

This brings me to what may be the core crisis facing higher education today, and that is the onslaught of information that now accosts almost every human being in our borderless, always tuned in, always connected and interconnected globalized world. Perhaps nowhere is this flood of information more apparent than in the university—particularly in the United States. Never mind that much of the information is irrelevant to us and unusable. No matter, it still just keeps arriving in the form of books, monographs, periodicals, web sites, instant messages, social networking sites, films, DVDs, blogs, podcasts, e-mails, satellite and cable television shows and news programs, and the constant chirping of our Blackberries and smart phones—which, by the way, I hope you have turned off, if just for now!

While it is true that attention to detail is the hallmark of professional excellence, it is equally true that an overload of undigested facts is a sure recipe for mental gridlock. Not only do undigested facts not constitute structured knowledge but, unfortunately, the current explosion of information is also accompanied by its corollary pitfalls, such as obsolescence and counterfeit knowledge.

And, if you will indulge me for sacrificing the English language for a moment, another phenomenon we are confronting is the “Wikipediazation” of knowledge and education. At least in part, this is a result of the fact that we are all both givers and takers when it comes to running the machinery of the Information Age, particularly the virtual machinery. I am talking, of course, about the Internet. Let me tell you about a notorious event involving Wikipedia that has come to represent how easily false information can virally infect factual knowledge. What has come to be known as the Seigenthaler Incident began in 2005 when a false biography of the noted journalist Robert Seigenthaler, Sr., who was also an assistant to Robert Kennedy when he was Attorney General in the 1960s, was posted on Wikipedia. Among the scurrilous “facts” in the biography were that “For a short time, [Seigenthaler] was thought to have been directly involved in the Kennedy assassinations of both John, and his brother, Bobby. Nothing was ever proven.”

This horrendous misinformation—represented as truth— existed on Wikipedia for 132 days before Seigenthaler’s son, also a journalist, happened upon it and called his father. Seigenthaler, Sr. then had Wikipedia remove the hoax biography, but not before the same false facts had migrated to many other sites. Probably, somewhere in the estimated 30 billion online pages, it still exists. Wikipedia has taken steps to address this problem, but estimates are that there may be somewhere around two million distinct sites on the Internet, with more being created all the time, and there is no central authority, no group, individual or organization to oversee the accuracy of the information they purvey.

Clearly, therefore, one of the greatest challenges facing our society and contemporary civilization is how to distinguish between information—which may be true, false, or some tangled combination of both—and real knowledge. And further, how to transform knowledge into the indispensable nourishment of the human mind: genuine wisdom. As T. S. Eliot said, “Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?”

Today’s universities—along with our colleges, libraries, learned societies and our scholars—have a great responsibility to help provide an answer to Eliot’s questions. More than ever, these institutions and individuals have a fundamental historical and social role to play in ensuring that as a society, we provide not just training but education , and not just education but culture as well. And that we teach students how to distill the bottomless cornucopia of information that is ceaselessly spilled out before them twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, into knowledge that is relevant, useful, and reliable and that will enrich both their personal and professional lives.

This is not an easy task, especially in a nation where, as Susan Jacoby writes in her recent book, The Age of American Unreason , “the scales of American history have shifted heavily against the vibrant and varied intellectual life so essential to functional democracy. During the past four decades, America’s endemic anti-intellectual tendencies have been grievously exacerbated by a new species of semiconscious anti-rationalism, feeding on and fed by an ignorant popular culture of video images and unremitting noise that leaves no room for contemplation or logic. This new form of anti-rationalism, at odds not only with the nation’s heritage of eighteenth-century Enlightenment reason but with modern scientific knowledge, has propelled a surge of anti-intellectualism capable of inflicting vastly greater damage than its historical predecessors inflicted on American culture and politics.”

What Jacoby so forcefully points out is that ignorance is absolutely not bliss when both the strength of our democracy and the future of our society is at stake. And it may well be, for not only are we distracted and overwhelmed by the explosion of images, news, rumor, gossip, data, information and knowledge that bombard us every day, we also face dangerous levels of fragmentation of knowledge, dictated by the advances of science, learning, and the accumulation of several millennia of scholarship. Writing about the fragmentation of knowledge and the advent of specialization, it was not so long ago that Max Weber criticized the desiccated narrowness and the absence of spirit of the modern specialist. It was also this phenomenon that prompted Dostoevsky to lament in The Brothers Karamazov about the scholars who “…have only analyzed the parts and overlooked the whole and, indeed, their blindness is marvelous!” In the same vein, José Ortega y Gasset, in his Revolt of the Masses , as early as the 1930s, decried the “barbarism of specialization.” Today, he wrote, we have more scientists, scholars and professional men and women than ever before, but fewer cultivated ones. To put the dilemma in 21st century terms, I might describe this as everybody doing their own thing, but nobody really understanding what anybody else’s thing really is.

Unfortunately, the university, which was conceived of as embodying the unity of knowledge, has become an intellectual multiversity. The process of both growth and fragmentation of knowledge underway since the seventeenth century has accelerated in our time and only continues to intensify. The modern university consists of a tangle of specialties and sub-specialties, disciplines and sub-disciplines, within which specialization continues apace. The unity of knowledge has collapsed. The scope and the intensity of specialization are such that scholars and scientists have great difficulty in keeping up with the important yet overwhelming amount of scholarly literature of their own sub-specialties, not to mention their general disciplines. Even the traditional historical humanistic disciplines have become less and less viable as communities of discourse. As the late professor Wayne C. Booth put it wistfully in a Ryerson lecture he gave more than twenty years ago that still, sadly, sounds like breaking news from the education front: Centuries have passed since the fateful moment…when the last of the Leonardo da Vincis could hope to cover the cognitive map. [Now], everyone has been reduced to knowing only one or two countries on the intellectual globe…[In our universities] we continue to discover just what a pitifully small corner of the cognitive world we live in.

In that regard, I would add that this fragmentation of knowledge into more and more rigid, isolated areas is contributing to a kind of lopsidedness in the way education is organized and a growing disconnect between value-centered education and the kind of training that is aimed specifically at career preparation. What is hopeful is that there is a growing realization among the leaders of the nation’s higher education sector that this lopsided system of education is both deficient and dangerous, that we need a proper balance between preparation for careers and the cultivation of values, that general and liberal education is the thread that ought to weave a pattern of meaning into the total learning experience, that unless such a balance is restored, career training will be ephemeral in applicability and delusive in worth; and value education will be casual, shifting and relativistic. I strongly believe that one of the great strengths of American higher education is that it is home for liberal arts education, which is a sound foundation for all the professions and professional schools.

Ignorance is absolutely not bliss when both the strength of our democracy and the future of our society is at stake.

In the words of Albert Einstein, “It is essential that the student acquire an understanding of a lively feeling for values. He or she must acquire a vivid sense of the beautiful and the morally good. Otherwise he or she—with his or her specialized knowledge—more closely resembles a well-trained dog than a harmoniously developed person.” That is why I believe, and every year, whether I was a Dean, President or Provost of a University, I always reminded incoming freshmen to remember the famous line in Sheridan’s Critic (1799), that the number of those who undergo the fatigue of judging for themselves is precious few. It is the task of higher education to increase the number of those who do undergo that fatigue.

To sum up, it seems to me that by trying to reduce the requirements for a degree and at the same time, expecting to be able to break down education into specialized parts— each part swollen to overflowing with endlessly and exponentially increasing amounts of data and information—we are going in absolutely the wrong direction. Why? Because all this pushing and pulling and compartmentalizing presupposes that somehow, one’s education will eventually be finished, that it will come to an end where an individual can say, now I’ve graduated and I don’t have to learn anymore . But of course, you never graduate from your life and hence, you never really graduate from learning. One’s “formal” education is really just an introduction to learning where the skills to go on educating oneself are acquired and inculcated into everyday life—because learning is a lifelong endeavor. In that connection, when I was president of Brown, one day I decided, as a joke or as an ironic act, to propose awarding two kinds of degrees, one certifying that you know the following subjects, the other one certifying the subjects that you know, but most thought it was a crazy idea because parents would say, we paid you to educate our sons and daughters and instead, you’re giving us an uneducated person. So I decided that we’d just say the BA degree was, as I’ve described above, an introduction to learning, an undertaking that must be carried on throughout all the years of one’s life.

One of the greatest strengths of American higher education is that it is home for liberal arts education, which is a sound foundation for all the professions and professional schools.

In order to further make my point about lifelong learning, let me share this one last story with you. Some years ago, when asked to give a major speech to an illustrious gathering at Southern Methodist University, instead of a speech, I gave an exam. I said, imagine that you are the last person on earth. Nothing is left, no monuments, no other human beings, no libraries, no archives and hence, you are the best-educated person on the planet. Suddenly, the Martians land and they want to debrief you, the last human being standing, so they can preserve the history of humanity and the civilizations of the planet Earth. They begin by asking you questions such as: We heard that you had some objects that could fly, but that’s such an antiquated mode of transportation, so can you explain to us the principles by which these objects were made to fly? After all, your society awarded PhDs and MDs and all kinds of other degrees to people like yourself, so can you just prepare a schematic for us about these flying things? And we also heard that you had some kind of ships that could travel under water, but how was that possible? We also heard that you were able to phone each other, and despite mountains and oceans and so forth, you could talk to each other across thousands of miles; how did that work? And, oh yes, we’d also like to have the maps of all the continents, so can you draw them for us? Please include all the nations along with rivers, counties, capitals, and so forth. After all, we understand that you are an educated person, so these things should be easy for you.

Then I said to the gathering—still speaking on behalf of the head Martian—there’s another subject we Martians want to know about. We have a long list of the names of the religions that people on Earth followed, and they were well-represented in the United States. We don’t quite understand the differences between these religions and why you argued about them century after century. Here is just part of the list we have: Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Jainism, Sikhism, Shintoism, Confucianism, the Baha’i faith, and then the different forms of Christianity: Catholics, Protestants, Baptists, Southern Baptists, Lutherans, Pentecostals, Evangelicals, Amish, Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Seventh Day Adventists, Greek Orthodox, Eastern Orthodox, and Russian Orthodox. Could you please pick five of these and tell us where they agree and where they disagree? Of course, there was dead silence in the audience. So I concluded my “exam” by saying, I thank you for not being the last man or woman on Earth, because education is a life-long experience and endeavor, and I believe you might have some catching up to do…! In a way, perhaps we all have constant “catching up” to do when it comes to finding ways to address the many challenges facing our colleges and universities. But we will find them, I am sure, because in the words of Henry Rosovsky8, the economist and educator, in higher education, “‘made in America’ is still the finest label.” We all should have a hand in ensuring that continues to be true.

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• Published: 13 October 2017

Rethinking higher education and its relationship with social inequalities: past knowledge, present state and future potential

• Theocharis Kromydas 1  

Palgrave Communications volume  3 , Article number:  1 ( 2017 ) Cite this article

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The purposes and impact of higher education on the economy and the broader society have been transformed through time in various ways. Higher education institutional and policy dynamics differ across time, but also between countries and political regimes and therefore context cannot be neglected. This article reviews the purpose of higher education and its institutional characteristics juxtaposing two, allegedly rival, conceptual frameworks; the instrumental and the intrinsic one. Various pedagogical traditions are critically reviewed and used as examples, which can potentially inform today’s policy making. Since, higher education cannot be seen as detached from all other lower levels of education appropriate conceptual links are offered throughout this article. Its significance lies on the organic synthesis of literature across social science, suggesting ways of going forward based on the traditions that already exist but seem underutilized so far because of overdependence in market-driven practices. This offers a new insight on how theories can inform policy making, through conceptual “bridging” and reconciliation. The debate on the purpose of higher education is placed under the context of the most recent developments of increasing social inequalities in the western world and its relation to the mass model of higher education and the relevant policy decisions for a continuous increase in participation. This article suggests that the current policy focus on labor market driven policies in higher education have led to an ever growing competition transforming this social institution to an ordinary market-place, where attainment and degrees are seen as a currency that can be converted to a labour market value. Education has become an instrument for economic progress moving away from its original role to provide context for human development. As a result, higher education becomes very expensive and even if policies are directed towards openness, in practice, just a few have the money to afford it. A shift toward a hybrid model, where the intrinsic purpose of higher education is equally acknowledged along with its instrumental purpose should be seen by policy makers as the way forward to create educational systems that are more inclusive and societies that are more knowledgeable and just.

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Introduction.

The mainstream view in the western world, as informed by the human capital theory sees education, as an ordinary investment and the main reason why someone consumes time and money to undertake higher levels of education, is the high returns expected from the corresponding wage premium, when enters the labour market (Becker, 1964 , 1993 ). Nevertheless, things in practice are more complicated and this sequence of events is unlikely to be sustained, especially in recession periods like the one we currently live in. On the contrary, one notion of education, related somewhat to the American liberal arts tradition, is the intrinsic notion, which interprets that the purpose of education is to ‘equip people to make their own free, autonomous choices about the life they will lead’ (Bridges, 1992 : 92). There might be an economic basis underpinning this individual choice, but the intrinsic notion permits more subjective motivations, which are not necessarily affected by economic circumstances.

Robinson and Aronica ( 2009 ) argue that education, have become an impersonal linear process, a type of assembly line, similar to a factory production. They challenge this view and call for a less standardised pedagogy; more personalised to students needs as well as talents. Education is not similar to a manufacturing production-line, since students are highly concerned about the quality of education they receive as opposed to motor cars, which are indifferent to the process by which they are manufactured. Along these lines, Waters ( 2012 ), following Weber’s ( 1947 , 1968 ) rationale on the role of bureaucracy in modern societies, adds that this manufacturing process is achieved through rigid, rationalised and productively efficient but totally impersonal bureaucracy, operated in a way that sees children as raw materials for the creation of adults, which is the final product properly equipped to reproduce “itself” by being a parent to a new born “raw material” and so forth. Durkheim ( 1956 , 2006 ) sees this as a mechanism where adults exercise their influence over the younger in order to maintain the status quo they desire. However, since education entails ontological as well as epistemological implications, primary focus should be given to learning in such a way that educative and social functions could be amalgamated, rather than solely focusing on the delivery of existing knowledge per se, which becomes a reiterated process and an unchallenged absolute truth (Freire, 1970 ; Heidegger, 1988 ; Dall’ Alba and Barnacle, 2007 ).

This article focus on higher education; since it is the last stage before somebody enters the labour market and thus the instrumental view becomes more dominant over the intrinsic view, compared to the lower levels of education. Higher education, is being traditionally offered by universities. The first established university in Europe is the University of Bologna, where the term “academic freedom” was introduced as the kernel of its culture (Newman, 1996 ). Graham ( 2013 ) distinguishes between three different models of higher education. These are: the university college, the research and the technical university. He provides a historical review of the origins of these three models. The university college is the oldest one, where Christian values were the core values. Later on, when scientific knowledge questioned the universal theological truth, another type of university has been established, where research was the ultimate goal of the scholarship. This type of university has subsequently transformed by the introduction of the liberal arts tradition, flourished in the US. The research university model, originated circa 16 th century in Cambridge and established in Berlin by the introduction of the Humboldian University, shared a common aim: the pursuit of knowledge and its dissemination to the greater society. The third model of university is the technical one. It has been established in an industrial revolution context in Scotland and particularly in Glasgow in the premises of what is currently known as the University of Strathclyde. While the introduction of capitalism changed radically the structure and the format of labour relations, the technical model was based on the idea that industrial skills had to be acquired by formal education and somehow verified institutionally in order to be applied to the broader society. This is the first time where the up to then distinct fields of education and industry, started to be conceived as inextricably tight in a rather linear way.

These different models of higher education cultures and traditions still exist, but in reality, Universities worldwide follow a hybrid approach, where all traditions collaborate with each other. However, there are some universities that still carry the reputation and tradition of a specific model and to some extent this tradition differentiates them from all others. It is not the scope of this research to analyse this in detail, as the main aim is to offer an institutional and policy narrative, exploring the purpose of higher education and its relationship with social inequalities, focusing primarily on the western world.

Nowadays, in a rapidly changing word, the major debate is placed under the forms of institutional transformation of higher education. Brennan ( 2004 ), based on Trow ( 1979 , 2000 ), allocates three forms of higher education. The first one is the elite form, which main aim is to prepare and shape the mind-set of students originated from the most dominant class. The second is the mass form of higher education, which transmits the knowledge and skills acquired in higher education into the technical and economic roles students subsequently perform in the labour market. Lastly, the third is the universal form, which main purpose is to adapt students and the general population to the rapid social and technological changes.

This article reviews the contemporary trends in higher education and its widespread diffusion as interacted with the evolutions in western economies and societies, where social inequalities persist and even become wider (Dorling and Dorling, 2015 ). The narrative used in this article is more suitable to conceptualise higher education in a western world context, though we acknowledge that via globalisation, the way education and particularly higher education is delivered in the rest of the world seems to follow similar to the Western worlds paths, despite the apparent differences in culture, social and economic systems as well as writing systems. Footnote 1

An interdisciplinary and critical synthesis of the relevant literature is conducted, presenting two stances that are largely considered as rival: The instrumental one that treats higher education as an ordinary investment with particular financial yields in the labour market and the more intrinsic one which sees higher education as mainly detached from the logic of economic costs and benefits. The theoretical rivalry is apparent since in the former approach higher education is an inevitable property of labour market and thus an indispensable part of the mainstream economic neoliberal regime, whereas the latter sees no logical link between higher education and labour market purposes and therefore the content and substance of learning and knowledge acquisition in education and specifically in higher education should not be market-driven or aligned to the functions of specific economic regimes. However, this article argues that educational systems, and particularly their higher levels, are amalgamated parts of contemporary societies and therefore theories and practices need to move away from rather futile binary rationales.

The remainder of this paper explains why both the intrinsic and instrumental approaches are doomed to fail in practice when used in isolation. In a rapidly diverging and polarised world, where social inequalities rise within as well as between countries, common sense dictates social theories and practices to move towards reconciliation rather than stubborn rivalry. In that spirit, this paper argues that the intrinsic and instrumental approach are in fact complementary to each other. Such view can inform policy making towards building more inclusive educational systems; organically tight with the broader society. The narrative this article uses departs and expands on the rationale of eminent critical pedagogists such as Freire, Bronfenbrenner, Bourdieu and Kozol in order to challenge the current instrumental world-view of education, at least as this is apparent in the western world. Then the article moves into offering a reasoning for an organic synthesis of existing knowledge in order the two rival theories to be actualised in practice as a unified and reconciled pedagogical strategy. This reasoning builds on the research conducted by Durst’s ( 1999 ), Payne ( 1999 ) and Lu and Horner ( 2009 ). Durst ( 1999 ) suggests a “reflective instrumentalism”, where student’s pragmatic view that education is just a way of finding a well-paid job, operated in tandem with critical pedagogical canons, is indeed possible. Payne ( 1999 ) proposes a similar approach, where students are equipped with the necessary tools to find a job in the labour market; however educators should engage students with this knowledge in a critical way in order to be able to produce something new. Likewise Lu and Horner ( 2009 ) note that educators and students need to work together in such a way that perceptions of both are amenable to change and career choices are critically discussed in a constantly changing social context.

The purpose of higher education in western societies

Mokyr ( 2002 ) suggests that education should be integrated by both inculcation and emancipation in order to serve individual intellectual development as well as social progression. Shapiro ( 2005 ) emphasizes the need for the higher education institutions to serve a public purpose moving beyond narrow self-serving concerns, as well as to enforce social change in order to reflect the nature of a society that its members desire. More recently, in philosophical terms Barnett ( 2017 , p 10) calls for a wider conceptual landscape in higher education where “The task of an adequate philosophy of higher education…is not merely to understand the university or even to defend it but to change it”. )

The purpose of education and its meaning in the contemporary western societies has been also criticised by Bo ( 2009 ), suggesting that education has become a contradictory notion that leaves no space for emancipation since it gives no opportunity for improvisation to students. Thus, the students feel encaged within the system instead of being liberated. Bo agrees with Mokyr, who highlighted the need for recalling the basic notions of education from ancient philosophies: that education should be integrated by both inculcation and emancipation in order to serve individual intellectual development as well as social progression (Mokyr, 2002 ; Bo, 2009 ).

Not all individuals and societies agree on the purposes and roles of higher education in the modern world. However, in any case, it is a place where teaching and research can be accommodated in an organised fashion for the promotion of various types of knowledge, applied and non-applied. It is a place where money and moral values compete and collaborate simultaneously, where the development of labour market skills and competences coexist with the identification and utilisations of people’s skills and talents as well as the pursuit of employment, morality and citizenship.

The post-WWII era has been characterised by the mass model of higher education. Before this, higher education was for those belonging to higher social classes (Brennan, 2004 ). This model became the kernel of educational policies in Europe and generally, in the western world (Shapiro, 2005 ). Such policies have been boosted by the advent of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), which enhance commercial and non-commercial bonds between countries and higher education institutions, transforming the role of higher education even further, making it rather universal (Jongbloed et al., 2008 ). Higher education’s boundaries have become vague and the predefined “social contract” between its institutions and those participated in them, is more complicated to be defined in absolute terms. Higher education institutions are now characterised by economic competition in a strict global market environment, where governments are not the key players anymore (Brennan, 2004 ).

Moreover, student demographics in higher education are constantly changing. Higher education is now an industry operating in a global market. Competition to attract talents from around the world is growing rapidly as an increasing number of countries offer additional graduate and post graduate positions to non-nationals, usually at a higher cost compared to nationals (Barber et al., 2013 ). Countries such as China or Singapore that are growing economically very rapidly are investing huge amounts of money to develop their higher education system and make it more friendly to talented people from around the world. The advent of new technologies have changed the traditional model of higher education, where physical presence is not a necessary requirement anymore (Yuan et al., 2013 ). Studying while working is much easier and therefore more mature students have now the opportunity to study towards a graduate or post-graduate degree. All these developments have increased the potential for profit; however it also requires huge amount of money to be invested in new technologies and all kinds of infrastructures and resources. The need for diversification in funding sources is simply essential and therefore all other industries become inevitably more engaged (Kaiser et al., 2014 ). On top of all these, climate change, the rise of terrorism, the prolonged economic uncertainty and the automazation of labour will likely increase cross-national and intraoccupational mobility and therefore the demand for higher education, especially in the recipient countries of the economically developed western world will inevitably rise. Summing up, higher education institutions operate under a very fluid and unpredictable environment and therefore approaches that are informed by adaptability and flexibility are absolutely crucial. The hybrid approach we propose where instrumental and intrinsic values are reconciled is along these lines.

Modern views of higher education place its function under a digital knowledge-based society, where economy dominates. Labour markets demand for skills such as technological competence and complex problem-solving by critical thinking and multitasking, which increases competition and in turn, accelerates the pace of the working day (Westerheijden et al., 2007 ). Haigh and Clifford ( 2011 ) argue that high competency, in both hard and soft skills, is not enough, as higher education needs to go deeper into changing attitudes and behaviours becoming the core of a globalised knowledge-based-economy. However, the trends of transferring knowledge and skills by universities, which “increasingly instrumentalize, professionalize, vocationalize, corporatize, and ultimately technologize education” (Thomson, 2001 : 244), have been extensively criticised in epistemological as well as in ontological terms (Bourdieu, 1998 ; Dall’ Alba and Barnacle, 2007 ). Livingstone ( 2009 ) argues that education and labour market have different philosophical departures and institutional principles to fulfill and therefore conceptualising them as concomitant economic events, with strong causal conjunctions, leads to logical fallacies. Livingstone sees the intrinsic purposes of education and contemporary labour market as rather contradictory than complimentary and any attempt to see them as the latter, leads to arbitrary and ambiguous outcomes, which in turn mislead rather than inform policy making. The current article, building on the arguments of Durst’s ( 1999 ), Payne ( 1999 ) and Lu and Horner ( 2009 ) challenges this view introducing a “bridging” rationale between the two theories, which can be also actualized in practice and inform policy making.

When education, and especially higher education, is considered as a public social right that everyone should have access to, human capital, as solely informed by the investment approach, cannot be seen as the most appropriate tool to explain the benefits an individual and society can gain from education. Citizenship can be regarded as one of these tools and perhaps concepts, such as the social and c ultural capital or habitus , which contrary to human capital acknowledge that students are not engaged with education just to succeed high returns in the labour market but apart from the economic capital, should be of equal importance when we try to offer a better explanation of the individuals’ drivers to undertake higher education. (Bourdieu, 1986 ; Coleman, 1988 ). Footnote 2 For example, Bourdieu ( 1984 ) thinks that certificates and diplomas are neither indications of academic or applied to the labour market knowledge, nor signals of competences but rather take the form of tacit criteria set by the ruling class to identify people from a particular social origin. Yet, Bourdieu does not disregard the human capital theory as invalid; however he remains very sceptical on its narrow social meaning as it becomes a property of ruling class and used as a mechanism to maintain their power and tacitly reproduce social inequalities.

Higher education attainment cannot be examined irrespectively of someone’s capabilities, as its conceptual framework presupposes a social construction of interacting and competing individuals, fulfilling a certain and, sometimes common to all, task each time. Capabilities, certainly, exist in and out of this context, as it includes both innate traits and acquired skills in a dynamic social environment. Sen ( 1993 : 30) defines capability as “a person’s ability to do valuable acts or reach valuable states of being; [it] represents the alternative combinations of things a person is able to do or be”. Moreover, Sen argues that capabilities should not be seen only as a means for succeeding a certain goal, but rather as an end itself (Sen, 1985 ; Saito, 2003 ; Walker and Unterhalter, 2007 ).

Capabilities are a prerequisite of well-being and therefore, social institutions should direct people into fulfilling this aim in order to feel satisfied with their lives. However, since satisfaction is commonly understood as a subjective concept, it cannot be implied that equal levels of life satisfaction, as these perceived by people of different demographic and socio-economic characteristics, mean social and economic equality. Usually, the sense of life satisfaction is relative to future expectations, aspirations and past empirical experiences, informed by the socio-economic circumstances people live in (Saito, 2003 ).

According to the capability approach, assessing the educational attainment of individuals or the quality of teachers and curriculum are not such useful tasks, if not complemented by the capacity of a learner to convert resources into capabilities. Sen’s ( 1985 , 1993 ) capability approach, challenges the human capital theory, which sees education as an ordinary investment undertaken by individuals. It also remains sceptical towards structuralist and post-structruralist approaches, which support the dominance of institutional settings and power over the individual acts. According to Sen ( 1985 , 1993 ), educational outcomes, as these are measured by student enrolments, their performance on tests or their expected future income, are very poor indicators for evaluating the overall purpose of education, related to human well-being. Moreover, the capability approach does not imply that education can only enhance peoples’ capabilities. It also implies that education, can be detrimental, imposing severe life-long disadvantages to individuals and societies, if delivered poorly (Unterhalter, 2003 , 2005 ).

From Sen’s writings, it is not clear whether the capability approach imply a distinction between instrumental and intrinsic values. Even if someone attempts an interpretation of the capability approach by arguing that it is only means that have an instrumental value, whereas ends only an intrinsic one, it is still unclear how can we draw a line between means and ends in a rather objective way. Escaping from this rather dualistic interpretation, a common-sense argument seems apparent: Capabilities have both intrinsic and instrumental value. Material resources can be obtained through people’s innate talents and acquired skills; however through the same resources transformed into capabilities a person who does not see this as an end but rather as a means, can also become a trusted member of the community and a good citizen, given that some kind of freedom of choice exists. Thus, resources apart from their instrumental value can also have an intrinsic one, with the caveat that the person chooses to conceive them as means towards a socially responsible end.

The American tradition in student development goes back to the liberal arts tradition, which main aim is to build a free person as an active member of a civic society. The essence of this tradition can be found in Nussbaum ( 1998 : 8)

“When we ask about the relationship of a liberal education to citizenship, we are asking a question with a long history in the Western philosophical tradition. We are drawing on Socrates’ concept of ‘the examined life,’ on Aristotle’s notions of reflective citizenship, and above all on Greek and Roman Stoic notions of an education that is ‘liberal’ in that it liberates the mind from bondage of habit and custom, producing people who can function with sensitivity and alertness as citizens of the whole world.”

Nowadays, liberal arts tradition is regarded as the delivery of interdisciplinary education across the social sciences but also beyond that, aiming to prepare students for the challenges they are facing both as professionals and as members of civic society. However, as Kozol notes in reality things are quite different (Kozol, 2005 , 2012 ). Kozol devoted much of his work examining the social context of schools in the US by focusing on the interrelationships that exist, maintained or transformed between students, teachers and parents. He points out that segregation and local disparities in the US schools are continuously increasing. The US schools and especially urban schools are seen as distinctive examples of institutions where social discrimination propagates while the US educational system currently functions as a mechanism of reproducing social inequality. Kozol is very critical on the instrumental purpose of market-driven education as this places businesses and commerce as the “key players”, since they shape the purpose, content and curriculum of education. At the same time, students, their parents as well as teachers, whose roles should have been essential, are displaced into some kind of token participants.

Hess ( 2004 ) might agree that US schools have become vehicles of increasing social inequalities but he suggest a very different to Kozol’s approach. Since schools are social institutions that operate and constantly interact with the rest of economy they have to become accountable in the way that ordinary business are, at least when it comes to basic knowledge delivery. Hess insists that all schools across the US should be able to deliver high quality basic knowledge and literacy. Such knowledge can be easily standardised and a national curriculum, equal and identical to all US school can be designed. By this, all schools are able to deliver high quality basic knowledge and all pupils, irrespective of their social background, would be able to receive it. Then, each school, teacher and pupil are held accountable for their performance and failure to meet the national standards should result in schools closed down, teachers laid off and pupils change school environment or even lose their chance to graduate. Hess distinguishes between two types of reformers; the status quo reformers who do not challenge the state control education and the common-sense reformers who are in favour of a non-bureaucratic educational system, governed by market competition, subjected to accountability measures similar to those used in the ordinary business world.

While Hess presents evidence that the problem in higher education is not underfunding but efficiency in spending, the argument he makes that schools can only reformed and flourish through the laws of market competition is not adequately backed up as there are plenty of examples in many industrial sectors, where the actual implementation of market competition instead of opening up opportunities for the more disadvantaged, has finally generated huge multinationals corporations, which operate in a rather monopolistic or at best oligopolistic environment, satisfying their own interests on the expense of the most deprived and disadvantaged members of the society. The ever growing increasing competition in the financial, pharmaceutical or IT software and hardware (Apple Microsoft, IOS and Android software etc.) sectors have not really helped the disadvantaged or the sector itself but rather created powerful “too big to fail” corporations that dominate the market if not own it.

Hess indeed believes that the US educational system apart from preparing students for the labour market has a social role to fulfil. When the purpose of higher education is solely labour market-oriented teaching and learning become inadequate to respond to the social needs of a well-functioned civic democracy, which requires active learners and critical thinkers who, apart from having a job and a profession, are able “ to frame and express their thoughts and participate in their local and national communities”(p. 4) . Creating rigorous standards for basic knowledge in all US schools is a goal that is sound and rather achievable. However, when such goals are based on a Darwinian like competition and coercion where only the fittest can survive they become rather inapplicable for satisfying the needs of human development, equity and sustainable social progress.

Bronfenbrenner’s ecological systems theory ( 1979 , 2005 , 2009 ) (subsequently named from Bronfenbrenner himself as bioecological systems theory) is also an example of schools as organic ingredients of a single concentric system that includes four sub systems; the micro, the meso, the exo and the macro as well as the chronosystem that refers to the change of the other four through time. The Micro system involves activities and roles that are experienced through interpersonal relationships such as the family, schools, religious or social institutions or any interactions with peers. The meso system includes the relationships developed between the various microsystem components, such as the relationship between school and workplace or family and schools. The exosystem comprises various interactions between systems that the person who is in the process of development does not directly participates but influence the way microsystems function and impact on the person. Some examples of exosystems are the relationships between family and peers of the developing person, family and schools, etc. The macrosystem incorporates all these things that can be considered as cultural environment and social context in which the developing person lives. Finally, the chronosystem introduces a time dimension, which encompasses all other sub-systems, subjecting them to the changes occurred through time. All these systems constantly interact, shaping a dynamic, complex but also natural ecological environment, in which a person develops its understanding of the world. In practical terms, this theory has found application in Finland, gradually transforming the Finish educational system to such a degree that is now considered the best all over the world (Määttä and Uusiautti, 2014 ; Takala et al., 2015 ). Finally, Bronfenbrenner is also an advocate that poverty and social inequalities are developed not because of differences in individual characteristics and capabilities but because of institutional constraints that are insurmountable to those from a lower socio-economic background.

Freire ( 1970 , 2009 ) criticizes the way schooling is delivered in contemporary societies. The term he uses to describe the current state of education is “banking education”, where teachers and students have very discrete roles with the former to be perceived as depositors of knowledge and the latter as depositories. This approach sees the knowledge acquired within the institutional premises of formal education as an absolute truth, where reality is perceived as something static aiming to preserve the status quo in education and in turn in society and satisfy the interests of the elite. This actual power play means that those who hold knowledge and accept its acquiring procedure as static, become the oppressors whereas those who either lack knowledge or even hold it but challenge it in order to transform it, the oppressed. From the one side the oppressors achieve to maintain their dominance over the oppressed and on the other side the oppressed accept their inferior role as an unchallenged normality where their destiny is predetermined and can never be transformed. Therefore, through this distinction of social roles, social inequalities are maintained and even intensified through time. Freire sees the “banking education” approach as a historical hubris since social reality is a process of constant transformation and hence, it is by definition dynamic and non-static. What we actually know today cannot determine our future social roles, neither can prohibit individuals from challenging and transforming it into something new (Freire, 1970 ; Giroux, 1983 ; Darder, 2003 ).

The banking education approach resembles very much the ethos of the human capital theory, where individuals utilise educational attainment as an investment instrument for succeeding higher wages in the future and also climb the levels of social hierarchy. The assumption of linearity between past individual actions and future economic and social outcomes is at the core of banking education and thus human capital theory. However, this assumption introduces a serious logical fallacy that surprisingly policy makers seem to value very little nowadays, at least in the Western societies. Freire ( 2009 ) apart from criticizing the current state of education argues that a pedagogical approach that “demythologize” and unveils reality by promoting dialogue between teachers and students create critical thinkers, who are engaged in inquiry in order to create social reality by constantly transforming it. This is the process of problem-posing education , which aligns its meaning with the intrinsic view of education that regards human development as mainly detached from the acquisition of material objects and accumulation of wealth through increased levels of educational attainment.

Originated in Germany, the term Bildung —at least as this was interpreted from 18 th century onwards, after Middle Ages era where everything was explained in the prism of a strict and theocratic society- shaped the philosophy by which the German educational system has been functioning even until nowadays (Waters, 2016 ). Bildung aims to provide the individual education with the appropriate context, through which can reach high levels of professional development as well as citizenship. It is a term strongly associated with the liberation of mind from superstition and social stereotypes. Education is assumed to have philosophical underpinnings but it needs, as philosophy itself as a whole does too, to be of some practical use and therefore some context needs to be provided Footnote 3 (Herder, 2002 ).

For Goethe ( 2006 ) Bildung , is a self-realisation process that the individual undertakes under a specific context, which aims to inculcate altruism where individual actions are consider benevolent only if they are able to serve the general society. Although Bildung tradition, from the one hand, assumes that educational process should be contextualised, it approach context as something fluid that is constantly changing. Therefore, it sees education as an interactive and dynamic process, where roles are predetermined; however at the same time they are also amenable to constant transformation (Hegel, 1977 ). Consequently, this means that Bildung tradition is more closely to what Freire calls problem-posing education and therefore to the intrinsic notion of education. Weber ( 1968 ), looked on the Bildung tradition as a means to educate scientists to be involved in policy making and overcome the problems of ineffective bureaucracy. Waters ( 2016 ) based on his experiences with teaching in German higher education argue that the Bildung tradition is still apparent today in the educational system in Germany.

However, higher education, as an institution, involves students, teachers, administrators, policy makers, workers, businessmen, marketers and generally, individuals with various social roles, different demographic characteristics and even different socio-economic backgrounds. It comes natural that their interests can be conflicting and thus, they perceive the purpose of higher education differently.

Higher education expansion and social inequalities: contemporary trends

Higher education enrolment rates have been continuously rising for the last 30 years. In Europe, and especially in the Anglo-Saxon world, policies are directed towards widening the access to higher education to a broader population (Bowl, 2012 ). However, it is very difficult for policy-makers to design a framework towards openness in higher education, mainly due to the heterogeneity of the population the policies are targeted upon. Such population includes individuals from various socio-economic, demographic, ethnic, innate ability, talent orientation or disability groups, as well as people with very different social commitments and therefore the vested interests of each group contradict each other, rendering policy-making an extremely complicated task (CFE and Edge Hill University, 2013 ).

A collection of essays, edited by Giroux and Myrsiades ( 2001 ), provided valuable insights to the humanities and social sciences literature regarding the notion of corporate university and its implications to society’s structure. As Williams ( 2001 : 18) notes in one of this essays:

“Universities are now being conscripted directly as training grounds for the corporate workforce…university work has been more directly construed to serve not only corporate-profit agendas via its grant-supplicant status, but universities have become franchises in their own right, reconfigured to corporate management, labor, and consumer models and delivering a name-brand product”.

Chang et al. ( 2013 ) argues that institutional purposes do not always coincide with the expectations students have from their studies. In most cases, students hold a more pragmatic and instrumental understanding towards the purpose of higher education, primarily aiming for a better-paid and high quality jobs.

Arum and Roksa ( 2011 ) claim that students during their studies in higher education make no real progress in critical thinking and complex problem-solving. Nonetheless, it is notable that those who state that they seek some “deeper meaning” in higher education, looking at a broader picture of things, tend to perform better than those who see university through instrumental lenses (Entwistle and Peterson, 2004 ). These findings question the validity of the instrumental view in higher education as it seems that those that are intrinsically motivated to attend higher education, end up performing much better in higher education and also later on in the labour market. Therefore, in practice, the theoretical rivalry between the intrinsic and instrumental approach operate in a rather dialectic manner, where interactions between social actors move towards a convergence, despite the focus given by policy makers on the instrumental view.

Bourdieu ( 1984 , 1986 , 1998 , 2000 ) based on his radical democratic politics, argued that education inequalities are just a transformation of social inequalities and a way of reproduction of social status quo. Aronowitz ( 2004 ) acknowledged that the main function of public education in the US is to prepare students to meet the changes, occurred in contemporary workplaces. Even if this instrumental model involves the broad expansion of educational attainment, it also fails to alleviate class-based inequalities. He is in line with Bourdieu’s argument that social class relations are reproduced through schooling, as schools reinforce, rather than reduce, class-based inequalities. More recently, similar findings from various countries are very common in the literature (Chapman et al., 2011 ; Stephens et al., 2015 )

Apple ( 2001 ) argues that despite neoliberalism’s claims that privatisation, marketization, harmonisation and generally the globalisation of educational systems increase the quality of education, there are considerable findings in numerous studies that show that the expansion of higher education happens in tandem with the increase of income inequality and the aggravation of racial, gender and class differences. Gouthro ( 2002 ) argues that there has been a misrepresentation of the basic notions that characterise the purpose of education, such as critical thinking, justice and equity. Ganding and Apple ( 2002 ) went one step further by suggesting an alternative solution, which lies on the decentralisation of educational systems, using the “Citizen School” as an example of an educational institution, which prioritises quality in education and its provision to impoverished people. Finally, they call for a radical structural reform on educational systems worldwide, where the relationship between various social communities and the state is based on social justice and not on power.

Brown and Lauder ( 2006 ) investigated the impact of the fundamental changes on education, as related to the influence that various socio-economic and cultural factors have on policy making. Remaining sceptical against the empirical validity of human capital theory, they conclude that it cannot be guaranteed that graduates will secure employment and higher wages. Contrary to Card and Lemieux’s ( 2001 ) findings, the authors argue that when the wage-premium is not measured by averages, but is split in deciles within graduates, it is only the high-earning graduates that have experienced an increasing wage-gap during this period. Increasing incidences of over-education, due to an ever-increasing supply of graduates compared to the relatively modest growth rates of high-skilled jobs, have also been observed. Any differences in pay, between graduates and non-graduates, can be ascribed more to the stagnation of non-graduates' pay, rather than to graduates’ additional pay, because of their higher educational attainment. More recently, Mettler ( 2014 ) argues that the focus on corporate interests in policy making in the US has transformed higher education into a caste system that reproduces and also intensifies social inequalities.

There are evidence, which illustrate that families play a distinctive role in encouraging children’s abilities and traits through a warm and friendly family environment. As higher education requires a significant amount of money to be invested, families with high-income have more chances and means to promote their children’s abilities and traits as well as their career prospects, when compared with the low-income ones. Certainly, there are other factors, which can affect children’s prospects, but the advantage in favour of high-income families is relatively apparent in the empirical literature (Solon, 1999 ).

Livingstone and Stowe ( 2007 ), based on the General Social Survey (GSS), conducted an empirical study on the school completion rates partitioning individuals into family and class origin, residential area as well as race and gender. They focused on the relatively low completion rates of low-class individuals, from the inner city and rural areas of the US. Their findings reveal that working-class children are being discriminated on their school completion rates, compared with the mid- and high-class children. Race and gender discrimination has been detected in rural areas but not in inner cities and suburb areas, where the completion rates are more balanced.

Stone ( 2013 ), finally sees things from a very different perspective, where inequalities exist mainly because of simply bad luck. He argues in favour of lots, when a university has to decide whether to accept an applicant or not. Even if, an argument like this seems highly controversial, it consists of something that has been implemented in many countries, several times in the past (Hyland, 2011 ). The argument that an individual deserves a place in university just because he/she scored higher marks in a standardised sorting examination test does not prove that he/she will perform better in his/her subsequent academic tasks. Likewise, if an individual, who failed to secure a place in university due to low marks, was given a chance to enter university through a different procedure, he/she might have performed exceptionally well. Yet, human society cannot solely depend on lotteries and computer random algorithms, but sometimes, up to a certain point and in the name of fairness and transparency, there is a strong case for also looking on the merits for using one (Stone, 2013 ).

Furthermore, Lowe ( 2000 ) argued that the widening of higher education participation can create a hyper-inflation of credentials, causing their serious devaluation in the labour market. This relates to the concept of diploma disease, where labour markets create a false impression that a higher degree is a prerequisite for a job and therefore, induce individuals to undertake them only for the sake of getting a job (Dore, 1976 ; Collins, 1979 ). This situation can create a highly competitive credential market, and even if there are indications of higher education expansion, individuals from lower social class do not have equal opportunities to get a degree, which can lead them to a more prestigious occupational category. This is, in turn, very similar to the Weberian theory of educational credentialism, where credentials determine social stratum (Brown, 2003 ; Karabel, 2006 ; Douthat, 2005 ; Waters, 2012 ).

The concept of credential inflation has been extensively debated from many scholars, who question the role of formal education and the usefulness of the acquisition of skills within universities (Dore 1997 ; Collins, 1979 ; Walters, 2004 ; Hayes and Wynard, 2006 ). Evans et al. ( 2004 ) focuses on the tacit skills, which cannot be acquired by formal learning, mainly obtained by work and life experience as well as informal learning. These skills are competences related to the way a complex situation could be best approached or resemble to personal traits, which can be used for handling unforeseen situations.

Policy implications

Higher educational attainment that leads to a specific academic degree is a dynamic procedure, but with a pre-defined end. This renders the knowledge acquired there, as obsolete. Policies, such as Bologna Declaration supports an agenda, where graduates should be further encouraged to engage with on-the-job training and life-long education programmes (Coffield, 1999 ). Other scholars argue that institutions should have a broader role, acknowledging the benefits that higher educational attainment bring to societies as a whole by the simultaneous promotion of productivity, innovation and democratisation as well as the mitigation of social inequalities (Harvey, 2000 ; Hayward and James, 2004 ). Boosting employability for graduates is crucial and many international organisations are working towards the establishment of a framework, which can ensure that higher education satisfies this aim (Diamond et al., 2011 ). Yet, this can have negative side-effects making the employability gap between high- and low-skilled even wider, since there is no any policy framework specifically designed for low-skilled non-graduates on a similar to Bologna Declaration, supranational context. Heinze and Knill ( 2008 ) argue that convergence in higher education policy-making, as a result of the Bologna Process, depends on a combination of cultural, institutional and socio-economic national characteristics. Even if, it can be assumed that more equal countries, in terms of these characteristics, can converge much easier, it is still questionable if and how much national policy developments have been affected by the Bologna Declaration.

However, the political narrative of equal opportunities in terms of higher education participation rates does not seem very convincing (Brown and Hesketh, 2004 ; The Milburn Commission, 2009 ). It appears that a consensus has been reached in the relevant literature that there is a bias towards graduates from the higher social classes, but it has been gradually decreasing since 1960 (Bekhradnia, 2003 ; Tight, 2012 ). Nonetheless, despite the fact that, during the last few decades, there has been an improvement in the participation rates for the most vulnerable groups, such as women and ethnic minorities, the inequality is still obvious in some occasions (Greenbank and Hepworth, 2008 ). Machin and Van Reenen ( 1998 ) trace the causes of the under-participation in an intergenerational context, arguing that the positive relationship between parental income and participation rates is apparent even from the secondary school. Likewise, Gorard ( 2008 ) identifies underrepresentation on the previous poor school performance, which leads to early drop-outs in the secondary education, or into poor grades, which do not allow for a place in higher education. Other researchers argue that paradoxically, educational inequality persists even nowadays, albeit the policy orientation worldwide towards the widening of higher education participation across all social classes (Burke, 2012 ; Bathmaker et al., 2013 ).

There are different aspects on the purpose of higher education, which particularly, under the context of the ongoing economic uncertainty, gain some recognition and greater respect from academics and policy-makers. Lorenz ( 2006 ) notes that the employability agenda, which is constantly promoted within higher education institutions lately, cannot stand as a sustainable rationale in a diverse global environment. This harmonisation and standardisation of higher education creates permanent winners and losers, centralising all the gains, monetary and non-monetary, towards the most dominant countries, particularly towards Anglo-phone countries and specific industries and therefore social inequalities increase between as well as within countries. Some scholars call this phenomenon as Englishization (Coleman, 2006 ; Phillipson, 2009 ).

Tomusk ( 2002 , 2004 ) positioned education within the general framework of the recent institutional changes and the rapid rise of the short-term profits of the financial global capital. Specifically, the author sees World Bank as a transnational organisation. Given this, any loan agreement planned from the World Bank regarding higher education reforms in developing countries, has the same ultimate, but tacit, goal, which is the continuous rise of the national debt and in turn, the vitiation of national fiscal and monetary policies, in order the human resources of the so called “recipient countries”, to be redistributed in favour of a transnational dominant class.

Hunter ( 2013 ) places the debate under a broader political framework, juxtaposing neo-liberalism with the trends formulated by the OECD. She concludes that OECD is a very complex and multi-vocal organisation and when it comes to higher education policy suggestions, there is not any clear trend, especially towards neo-liberalism. This does not mean that economic thinking is not dominant within the OECD. This is, in fact, OECD’s main concern and it is clear to all. Hunter ( 2013 : 15–16) accordingly states that:

“Some may feel offended by the vocational and economic foci in OECD discourse. Many would like to see HE held up for “higher” ideals. However, it is fair for OECD to be concerned with economics. They do not deny that they are primarily an organization concerned with economics. It is up to us, the readers, politicians, scholars, voters, teachers, administrators, and policy makers, to be aware that this is an economic organization and be careful of from whom we get our assumptions”.

Hyslop-Margison ( 2000 ) investigated how the market economy affects higher education in Canada, when international organisations and Canadian business interfere in higher education policy making, under the support of government agencies. He argues that such economy-oriented policies deteriorate curriculum theory and development.

Letizia ( 2013 ) criticises market-oriented reforms, enacted by The Virginia Higher Education Opportunity Act of 2011, placing them within the context of market-driven policies informed by neoliberalism, where social institutions, such as higher education, should be governed by the law of free market. According to Letizia, this will have very negative implications to the humanistic character of education, affecting people’s intellectual and critical thinking, while perpetuating social inequalities.

The term Mcdonaldisation has been also used recently to capture functional similarities and trends in common, between higher education and ordinary commercial businesses. Thus, efficiency, calculability, predictability and maximisation are high priorities in the American and British educational systems and because of their global influence, these characteristics are being expanding worldwide (Hayes and Wynard, 2006 ; Garland, 2008 ; Ritzer, 2010 ).

The notion of Mcdonaldisation is very well explained by Garland ( 2008 , no pagination):

“Mcdonaldisation can be seen as the tendency toward hyper-rationalisation of these same processes, in which each and every task is broken down into its most finite part, and over which the individual performing it has little or no control becoming all by interchangeable. It may be argued that the labour processes involved in advanced technological capitalism increasingly depend on either the handling and processing of information, or provision of services requiring instrumentalised forms of communication and interaction, just as the same “professional” roles frequently consist of largely mechanized, functional tasks requiring a minimum of individual input or initiative, let alone creative or critical thought, a process illustrated in blackly comic by the 1999 film Office Space”.

Realistically, higher education cannot be solely conceptualised by the human capital approach and similar quantitative interpretations, as it has cultural, psychological, idiosyncratic and social implications. Additionally, Hoxby ( 1996 ) argued that policy environment and systems of governance in higher education play a significant role to an individuals’ decision-making process to obtain further education and unfortunately, policy makers regard this aspect as static that can never be transformed.

Lepori and Bonaccorsi ( 2013 ), following Latour and Woolgar’s ( 1979 ) rationale of the high importance of vested interest in scientific endeavours, argue that higher education trends are too complex to be reduced and captured adequately, by the use of economic indicators as related to the labour market. However, the market and money value of higher education should not be neglected, especially in developing countries, as there is evidence that it can help people escape the vicious cycle of poverty and therefore it has a practical and more pragmatic purpose to fulfil (Psacharopoulos and Patrinos, 2004 ). According to World Bank ( 2013 ), education can contribute to a significant decrease of the number of poor people globally and increase social mobility when it manages to provides greater opportunities for children coming from poor families. There are also other studies that do not only focus to strict economic factors, but also to the contribution of educational attainment to fertility and mortality rates as well as to the level of health and the creation of more responsible and participative citizens, bolstering democracy and social justice (Council of Europe, 2004 ; Osler and Starkey, 2006 ; Cogan and Derricott, 2014 ).

Mountford-Zimdars and Sabbagh ( 2013 ), analysing the British Social Attitudes (BSA) survey, offer a plausible explanation on why the widening of participation in higher education is not that easy to be implemented politically, in the contemporary western democracies. The majority of the people, who have benefited from higher educational attainment in monetary and non-monetary terms, are reluctant to support the openness of higher education to a broader population. On the contrary, those that did not succeed or never tried to secure a place in a higher education institute, are very supportive of this idea. This clash of interests creates a political perplexity, making the process of policy-making rather dubious. Therefore, the apparent paradox of the increase in higher educational attainment, along with a stable rate in educational inequalities, does not seem that strange when vested interests of certain groups are taken into account.

Moreover, the decision for someone to undertake higher education is not solely influenced by its added value in the labour market. Since an individual is exposed to different experiences and influences, strategic decisions can easily change, especially when these are taken from adolescents or individuals in their early stages of their adulthood. Given this, perceptions and preferences do change with ageing and this is why there are some individuals who drop out from university, others who choose radical shifts in their career or others who return to education after having worked in the labour market for many years and in different types of jobs.

Higher education has expanded rapidly after WWII. The advent of new technologies dictates the enhancement of people’s talents and skills and the creation of a knowledge-based-economy, which in turn, demands for even more high-skilled workers. Policy aims for higher education in the western world is undoubtedly focusing on its diffusion to a broader population. This expansion is seen as a policy instrument to alleviate social and income inequalities. However, the implementation of such policies has been proved extremely difficult in practise, mainly because of existent conflicted interests between groups of people, but also because of its institutional incapacity to target the most vulnerable. Nonetheless, it has been observed a constant marketization process in higher education, making it less accessible to people from poor economic background. Concerns on the persistence of policy-makers to focus primarily on the economic values of higher education have been increasingly expressed, as strict economic reasoning in higher education contradicts with political claims for its continuing expansion.

On the other hand, there are studies arguing that the instrumental model can make the transition of graduates into the labour market smoother. Such studies are placed under the mainstream economics framework and are also informed by policy decisions implemented by the Bologna Process, where competitiveness, harmonisation and employability are the main policy axes. The Bologna Process and various other institutions (e.g., the EU, World Bank, OECD) have provided a framework under which higher education can be seen as inextricably linked with labour market dynamics; however, the intrinsic notion of higher education is treated more as a nuisance and less as a vital component on this framework. Nevertheless, this makes the job competition between graduates much more intense and also creates very negative implications for those that remain with low qualifications as they effectively become socially and economically marginalised.

The purpose of higher education and its role in modern societies remains a heated philosophical debate, with strong practical and policy implications. This article sheds more light to this debate by presenting a synthetic narrative of the relevant literature, which can be used as a basis for future theoretical and empirical research in understanding contemporary trends in higher education as interwoven with the evolutions in the broader socio-economic sphere. Specifically, two conflicting theoretical stances have been discussed. The mainstream view primarily aims to assist individuals to increase their income and their relative position in the labour market. On the other hand, the intrinsic notion focus on understanding its purpose under ontological and epistemological considerations. Under this conceptual framework, the enhancement of individual creativity and emancipation are in conflict with the contemporary institutional settings related to power, dominance and economic reasoning. This conflict can influence people’s perceptions on the purpose of higher education, which can in turn perpetuate or otherwise revolutionise social relations and roles.

However, even if the two theoretical stances presented are regarded as contradictory, this article argues that, in practical terms, they can be better seen as complementing each other. From one hand, using an instrumental perspective, an increase in higher education participation, focusing particularly on the most vulnerable and deprived members of society, can alleviate problems of income and social inequalities. The instrumental view of education has a very important role to play if focused on lower-income social classes, as it can become the mechanism towards the alleviation of income inequalities. On the other hand, apart from the pecuniary, there are also other non-pecuniary benefits associated with this, such as the improvement in the fertility and mortality and general health level rates or the boost of active democracy and citizenship even within workplaces and therefore a shift of higher education towards its intrinsic purposes is also needed. (Bowles and Gintis, 2002 ; Council of Europe, 2004 ; Brennan, 2004 ; Brown and Lauder, 2006 ; Wolff and Barsamian, 2012 ).

Summing up, education is not a simply just another market process. It is not just an institution that supply graduates as products that have some predetermined value in the labour market. Consequently, acquired knowledge in education verified by college degrees is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for the labour market to create appropriate jobs, where graduates utilise and expand this knowledge. In fact, the increasing costs of higher education, mostly due to its internationalisation, and the rising levels of job mismatch create a rather gloomy picture of the current economic environment, which seems to preserve the well-paid jobs mostly to those from a certain socio-economic class background. At the same time, poor students are vastly disadvantaged to more wealthy ones, considering the huge differences in terms of higher as well as their past education, their parent’s education and also certain elitist traditions that work towards perpetuating power relations in favour of the dominant class.

As Castoriadis ( 1997 ) notes, it is impossible to separate education from its social context. We, as human beings, acquire knowledge, in the sense of what Castoriadis calls paideia , from the day we born until the day we die. We are being constantly developed and transformed along with the social transformations that happen around us. The transformation on the individual is in constant interaction with social transformations, where no cause and effect exists. Formal schooling has become nowadays an apathetic task where no real engagement with learning happens, while its major components such as educators, families and students are largely disconnected with each other. Educators, cynically execute the teaching task that a curriculum dictates each time, families’ main concern is to attach a market value to their children educational attainment, “labelling” them with a credential that the labour market allegedly desires, while students pay attention to anything else apart from the knowledge they get per se and therefore they care too little for its quality and also its practical use.

To tackle the ever-growing social inequalities due to the narrow economic policy making in education, we need a radical shift towards policies that are informed from Freire’s problem-posing education and Sen’s capabilities approach, get insights in terms of structure from Bronfenbrenner’s bioecological systems theory, while giving context according to the Bildung tradition also acknowledging that education, apart from instrument, is a vehicle towards liberation, cultural realisation as well as social transformation. In practical terms, real-world examples from Finland or Germany can be used, which policy makers from around the world should start paying more attention to, moving away from narrow and sterile instrumentalism that has spectacularly failed to tackle social inequalities.

In the context of a modern world where monetary costs and benefits are the basis of policy arguments, a massification and broader diffusion of higher education to a much broader population implies marketisation and commercialisation of its purpose and in turn its inclusion on an economy-oriented model where knowledge, skills, curriculum and academic credentials inevitably presuppose a money-value and have a financial purpose to fulfil. The policy trends towards an economy-based-knowledge, through a strict instrumental reasoning, rather than the alleged knowledge-based-economy seems to persist and prevail, albeit its poor performance on alleviating income and social inequalities. Yet, in a global context of a prolonged economic stagnation and a continuous deterioration of society’s democratic reflexes, a shift towards a model, where knowledge is not subdued to economic reasoning, can inform a new societal paradigm of a genuine knowledge-based-economy, where economy would become a means rather than an ultimate goal for human development and social progress.

Data availability

Data sharing not applicable to this article as no datasets were generated or analysed during the current study.

For example, Confucian tradition is very rich, when it comes to education and human development. It is indeed very interesting to see how the basic principles of Confucian education, such as humanism, harmony and hierarchy, has been transformed through time and especially after the change in China’s economic model by Den Xiaoping’s reforms towards a more open economic system and along this a more business-oriented and globalised educational system. Perhaps the Chinese tradition in education, which mainly regards education as a route to social status and material success based on merit and constant examination can explain why the human capital theory is more applicable. On the other hand, additional notions in the Confucian tradition that education should be open to all, irrespective of the social class each person belongs to (apart perhaps from women and servants that were rather considered as human beings with limited social rights), its focus on ethics and its purpose to prepare efficient and loyal practitioners for the government introduces an apparent paradox with human capital theory but not necessarily with the instrumental view of education. This contradiction deserves to be appropriately and thoroughly examined in a separate analysis before it is contrasted to the Western tradition. For this reason the current research focuses only on the Western world leaving the comparison analysis with educational traditions found around the world, among them the Confucian tradition, as a task that will be conducted in the near future.

The use of capital in Bourdieu is criticised by a stream of social science scholars as rather promiscuous and unfortunate (Goldthorpe, 2007 ). They argue that a paradox here is apparent as in English linguistic etymological terms, the word capital implies, if not presupposes market activity. The same time Bourdieu criticises Becker’s human capital tradition as solely market-driven and a tacit way where the ruling class maintain their power through universities and other institutions. Waters ( 2012 ) argue that the use of the term “capital” in both Becker’s and Bourdieu’s writings is unfortunate, while both use the term to mean different things. Bourdieu’s understanding on the nature of “habitus” is a much more applicable term to explain the social role of education systems. Habitus is not capital, even if there is constant interaction between the two. Becker on the other hand, seem to neglect social and cultural capital as well as Bourdieu’s notion of habitus, which in turn is about the reproduction of society and power relations by universities and other institutions.

Some might have valid ontological objections on this, in terms of the purpose of philosophy as a whole; however the concept of Bildung has given education a role within society that moves away from individualism and the constant pursuit of material objects as ultimate means of well-being.

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This chapter represents a systematic effort to identify widely accepted goals of higher education. Education, or the teaching-learning function, is defined to embrace not only the formal academic curricula, classes, and laboratories but also all those influences upon students flowing from association with peers and faculty members and from the many and varied experiences of campus life. Distinctions among the cognitive, affective, and practical goals are blurred, and there is much overlap among them. The goals of education are usually expressed as characteristics, skills, abilities, competencies, dispositions, motivations, sensibilities, orientations, commitments and understandings. The goal of verbal skill, a subgoal under cognitive learning, implies effective verbal communication as a desired behavior of later life. The chapter refers the three primary goals of education as the personal development of students with respect to their cognitive abilities, their affective characteristics, and their practical competence.

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• Introduction

Systems of higher education in France and Germany

The system of higher education in great britain.

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higher education , any of various types of education given in postsecondary institutions of learning and usually affording, at the end of a course of study, a named degree , diploma, or certificate of higher studies . Higher-educational institutions include not only universities and colleges but also various professional schools that provide preparation in such fields as law , theology , medicine , business, music , and art . Higher education also includes teacher-training schools, junior colleges, and institutes of technology. The basic entrance requirement for most higher-educational institutions is the completion of secondary education , and the usual entrance age is about 18 years. ( See also college ; university .)

(Read Arne Duncan’s Britannica essay on “Education: The Great Equalizer.”)

The system of higher education had its origin in Europe in the Middle Ages, when the first universities were established. In modern times the nature of higher education around the world has been largely determined by the models established in influential countries such as France, Germany, Great Britain, and the United States .

Both France and Germany have systems of higher education that are basically administered by state agencies. Entrance requirements for students are also similar in both countries. In France an examination called the baccalauréat is given at the end of secondary education. Higher education in France is free and open to all students who have passed this examination. A passing mark admits students to a preparatory first year at a university, which terminates in another, more rigorous examination. Success in this examination allows students to attend universities for another three or four years until they have attained the first university degree, called a licence in France.

Basic differences, however, distinguish these two countries’ systems. French educational districts, called académies, are under the direction of a rector, an appointee of the national government who also is in charge of the university in each district. The uniformity in curriculum throughout the country leaves each university with little to distinguish itself. Hence, many students prefer to go to Paris, where there are better accommodations and more cultural amenities for students. Another difference is the existence in France of higher-educational institutions known as grandes écoles , which provide advanced professional and technical training. Most of these schools are not affiliated with the universities, although they too recruit their students by giving competitive examinations to candidates who possess a baccalauréat. The various grandes écoles provide a rigorous training in all branches of applied science and technology, and their diplomas have a somewhat higher standing than that of the ordinary licence .

In Germany, a country made up of what were once strong principalities, the regional universities have autonomy in determining their curriculum under the direction of rectors elected from within. Students in Germany change universities according to their interests and the strengths of each university. In fact, it is a custom for students to attend two, three, or even four different universities in the course of their undergraduate studies, and the majority of professors at a particular university may have taught in four or five others. This marked degree of mobility means that schemes of study and examination are marked by a freedom and individuality unknown in France.

Each of these countries has influenced higher education in other nations. The French, either through colonial influence or through the work of missionaries, introduced many aspects of their system in North and West Africa, the Caribbean, and the Far East. In the 1870s Japan’s growing university system was remodeled along French lines. France’s grandes écoles have been especially copied as models of technical schools. German influence has come about through philosophical concepts regarding the role of universities. The Germans were the first to stress the importance of universities as research facilities, and they also created a sense of them as emblems of a national mind. The doctoral degree, or Ph.D., invented in Germany, has gained popularity in systems around the world.

The autonomy of higher-educational institutions is strikingly pronounced in Great Britain. Its universities enjoy almost complete autonomy from national or local government in their administration and the determination of their curricula, despite the fact that the schools receive nearly all of their funding from the state. Entry requirements for British universities are rather complicated. A student must secure a General Certificate of Education (corresponding to the French baccalauréat ) by taking examinations in various subjects and receiving passing marks in them. The greater the number of “advanced level” passes, rather than General Certificate of Secondary Education (formerly “ordinary level”) passes, that a student acquires , the better his chances are of entering the university of his choice. (Britain has a centralized admissions bureau to which candidates for admission are able to give their choice of universities in an order of preference.) This selective admission to universities, combined with the close supervision of students through a tutorial system, makes it possible for most British undergraduates to complete a degree course in three years rather than the standard four years. Great Britain’s academic programs are more highly specialized than their European continental counterparts. Most undergraduates follow an “honours” course (leading to an honours degree) in one or, at the most, two subjects, while the remaining minority of students take “pass” courses that cover a variety of subjects. Great Britain’s model of higher education has been copied to varying degrees in Canada , Australia , India, South Africa , New Zealand , and other former British colonial territories in Africa, Southeast Asia , and the Pacific.

How to transform higher-education institutions for the long term

Higher-education institutions in the United States are facing unprecedented challenges. Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, higher-education operating models were under tremendous pressure. Many institutions, experiencing declining enrollment, watched expenses outpace revenues and tapped into their endowments to cover shortfalls.

The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated the pressures that higher-education institutions face . Even some of the most notable and stable institutions are experiencing significant declines in tuition and auxiliary revenues as well as increasing budget shortfalls. Our analysis suggests  that, before any government or philanthropic intervention, up to 57 percent of public four-year institutions and up to 77 percent of private not-for-profit four-year institutions could suffer budgetary shortfalls of more than 5 percent. The more than $35 billion provided by the federal government to higher education in relief acts to date has helped institutions and students address some of the near-term challenges, but the enrollment headwinds will likely affect university budgets for years to come. 1 Relief included about $14 billion in the March CARES Act and about $23 billion in the December Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2021. Indeed, according to the National Student Clearinghouse data, declines in first-time college enrollment in fall 2020 were stark, 2 For more on the fall 2020 admissions cycle, see Hamilton Boggs, Charag Krishnan, Samvitha Ram, and Jimmy Sarakatsannis, “ Best practices for an unusual US admissions cycle amid coronavirus ,” April 30, 2020. with greater than 10 percent declines in public four-year institutions and 8 percent declines in private not-for-profit four-year institutions, 3 “National Student Clearinghouse Research Center’s monthly update on higher education enrollment,” National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, November 12, 2020, nscresearchcenter.org. significantly affecting most universities’ top revenue source. While fundraising remained flat in academic year 2020, 4 “Charitable giving to US colleges and universities reached $49.50 billion, virtually unchanged from last fiscal year,” Council for Advancement and Support of Education, February 9, 2021, case.org. institutions are projecting steep fundraising declines in 2021, 5 “EAB survey points to dramatic decline in university fundraising,” GlobeNewswire, June 8, 2020, globenewswire.com. meaning fiscal challenges won’t be easing anytime soon.

A transformation approach that enables institutions to operate more flexibly and resiliently in the long term can help institutions emerge on a stronger footing from today’s challenges and brace for those of the future. A true transformation often improves operating surplus by 20 percent or more—money that can then be reinvested into an institution’s mission. But such a transformation requires an intense, operations-wide program focused on improving student outcomes and boosting organizational health and performance. In our experience, there are five common features of the most successful transformation efforts. While many leaders are aware of such efforts, implementation success has varied. We provide five inspiring case examples that prove a transformation approach is not only possible but also essential for the long-term success of institutions.

A transformation approach that enables institutions to operate more flexibly and resiliently in the long term can help institutions emerge on a stronger footing from today’s challenges.

Educational institution transformation best practices and case examples

While a reasonable degree of cost management is necessary to address fiscal challenges and make change, it’s perhaps more important for institutions to focus on improving student outcomes and identifying new ways to diversify and grow revenues. As core decision makers—including presidents, chancellors, provosts, and CFOs or COOs—embark on a transformation, they can reflect on their alignment with five factors to measure how prepared they are and determine where they need to focus their efforts.

Ensure leadership is engaged and empowered to support the organization to reach its full potential

The best predictor of the success of a transformation is leadership that is willing to embrace new and innovative approaches, recognizes the importance of institutional performance and health, and is prepared to take a self-confident leap instead of incremental steps. A few actions can help core decision makers ensure leadership is on board.

• Develop an aspirational, shared vision. Establish a vision for the future of the organization and frame all conversations with the leadership team around it.
• Establish a data-driven organizational baseline. Assess operational and cultural performance to discover opportunities to expand mission impact and set targets.
• Create a sense of urgency for bold action. Share stories about how other institutions are responding to the moment to inspire action.
• Get everyone involved. Activate all levels of the organization to brainstorm innovative changes and help achieve the vision by following a proven approach that gathers broad stakeholder inputs and enables ownership and accountability for improvement ideas.

The leadership team of a large network of higher-education institutions wanted to identify the full potential of the organization and build a shared vision for change. As they began their transformation journey in 2018, the system leadership met with each institution’s leadership team to form a shared vision of the future of their network. These conversations helped the leaders recognize when they weren’t performing at their best and, most importantly, the detrimental impact that had on students. Consequently, the collective leadership set an ambitious goal to improve organizational health, 6 Organizational health refers to an organization’s ability to align around and achieve its strategic goals. To learn more about measuring and improving organizational health, see McKinsey’s Organizational Health Index . increase student enrollment and retention, and reduce costs in the interest of better serving students. The system leadership then structured the transformation efforts to empower institution leaders to own and drive the transformation at their institutions. While the approach and leaders involved throughout the effort varied, each leader was committed to pursuing the shared aspiration of improved student experience and outcomes.

The transformation increased enrollment in both new and existing programs by about 5 percent over approximately 16 months since the start of the effort—through a combination of increased new enrollments and improved persistence of existing students. Further, the cost-improvement efforts have helped these institutions limit tuition increases and offer additional financing options so students can complete their education even in times of uncertainty, such as those brought on by the COVID-19 crisis.

Ensure the board prioritizes the transformation

Board support and commitment is integral to the success of a transformation. The COVID-19 pandemic and associated financial and societal pressures have created an even greater imperative for boards to actively define the strategic direction of their higher-education institutions and to push leaders to make substantive and sustainable operational changes to achieve financial stability and resilience. As such, core decision makers should consider involving the board in three ways.

• Leverage the board’s advisory role and fiduciary duties. Harness the board’s unique position to push university leadership for actionable plans to adjust the status quo.
• Build in accountability. Task a board subcommittee with supporting management with problem solving and track the change through regular progress updates that focus on measurable outcomes.
• Ensure the board is grounded in current higher-education trends. Most boards, rightfully, comprise members from a diverse set of business and philanthropic backgrounds. Many trustees won’t be as familiar with the pressures facing higher education. Educating the board on the trends in higher education by sharing literature improves transparency on the institution’s challenges and finances.

A midsize liberal arts university was facing a crisis of declining enrollments and net tuition, and its operating deficits forced the university to double what it typically drew from endowments for four subsequent years. Due to these financial concerns, the university’s accreditation organization alerted it of the need for immediate action to avoid the risk of probation and possible loss of accreditation. The university needed a strategy that would enable it to make rapid and significant changes without sacrificing the quality of the education.

The board took responsibility for shaping the transformation goals, unifying key stakeholders, and building momentum throughout the university. The board oversaw a short review of the school’s key metrics and plotted a course that placed as much emphasis on student success and enrollment-driven revenue growth as cost management. Next, it supported the university leadership to encourage faculty, staff, and students to play active roles in this transformation by creating a compelling change story and providing transparency that inspired people to think and behave differently. The board and leadership relayed this change story through carefully planned internal and external communications. To continually reinforce its crucial role in this process, a subcommittee of the board committed to meet biweekly to monitor progress over the entire transformation period.

The university’s first-year class increased by 30 percent the first year of the transformation, and it saw similar increases the following two years. In addition, retention from the first to second year of school improved from 77 to 85 percent, the university’s financial health significantly improved, and for the first time in nearly a decade, it had a balanced budget in 2019. Moreover, the new processes renewed a culture of continuous improvement and put the institution in a much better position to weather the COVID-19 crisis.

Translate financial outcomes to the institution’s mission when setting transformation targets

To maximize outcomes for students, faculty, staff, and the broader community, higher-education institutions need to be financially sustainable and efficient. Drawing the link between financial goals and an institution’s mission serves as a powerful rallying cry in support of transformative change. Two related actions can help.

• Emphasize mission impact over financial impact in messaging to the campus. Share impact and successes—for example, when additional financial aid has been allocated to Pell-eligible students to support their success, focus on the impact of improved persistence rates rather than the increased revenues from student retention.
• Communicate small but impactful vignettes. For instance, spotlight additional research funding secured due to strategic investment in grant writers. Such stories personalize the change for the community.

The CFO and provost of a large flagship public university both recognized the need for change. Their operating expenses were outgrowing their operating revenues, and state funding had precipitously declined amid budget pressures. Though the university was not yet in distress, the leaders wanted to act before circumstances became more dire. Leaders were aware, however, that the university had undertaken several large initiatives over the preceding three years, and the community was wary of another significant effort. To help tie together what had previously been more siloed efforts, the university linked the financial transformation to prior initiatives tied to the teaching and research mission. Leaders linked every opportunity area that was explored—such as research, student success, and marketing optimization—to how it was enabling a greater “return on mission” for the university. Ultimately, through the community rallying around their common goal of teaching, research, and the public good, the community developed initiatives to generate and implement innovative ideas to support the institution.

In the first year of the transformation, the university realized more than $30 million of revenue generation or cost savings, and it put itself on the path to almost $100 million in improvements the following year. More importantly, this net benefit to the university also enabled investments in critical mission activities to support research growth, student advising and wellness, and more flexibility for students through expanded summer offerings.

Take a comprehensive approach across both growth and efficiencies

Cost-reduction measures can often lead to decreased employee morale and can impact student outcomes. But targeting strategic growth can expand the impact of an institution’s mission and establish a more financially resilient university.

In response to the COVID-19 crisis, many universities turned to cost savings as immediate opportunities to improve their near-term financial outlook. While this was necessary, cost-reduction measures can often lead to decreased employee morale, and, in the worst case, they can impact student outcomes. Targeting strategic growth, in a few ways, can help provide inspiration for the community, expand the impact of an institution’s mission, and establish a more financially resilient university.

• Review student outcomes and revenue-generating and operating activities. Conduct a comprehensive review and analyze the findings to understand opportunities to grow. Key areas to explore include the program portfolio, endowment returns, and student support and service (exhibit).
• Ensure messaging to the community focuses on strategic growth ambitions as well as efficiency. University stakeholders require inspiration to help them overcome financial strain. Areas of growth can provide an optimistic outlook to help the community through the required change.

In recent years, a midsize not-for-profit religious university had faced a decreasing surplus with declining enrollment and retention paired with steady increases in costs, which was only exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Leaders wanted to solidify the university’s financial situation for future mission-based investments while diversifying its student base through targeted growth. But prior implementation of cost measures had been met with significant resistance from university faculty and staff.

University leaders realized they needed to implement a comprehensive approach focused on not only costs but also revenue; in addition to transparently framing the need to save costs to pursue future priorities, they highlighted detailed plans for strategic revenue generation. The president rallied the community for an all-hands-on-deck effort to solve the financial gap while maintaining student experience. They instituted a clear process to evaluate the ideas generated by the community and to allow for quick decisions. Ultimately, through reframing what it meant to “put the community first” and providing community members with inspirational initiatives in addition to the more challenging efforts, the president and school leaders were able to implement decisions with stakeholder support.

Indeed, within just four months, the administration was able to present a detailed outline to meet savings goals, and the university achieved 3 to 5 percent annual budget value improvement within four months of acting on this plan.

Build muscle for change

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, many institutions have relied on short-term efforts that may help them survive the crisis but will not change their long-term trajectory. An effective transformation builds the capacity for sustained change and continuous improvement rather than implementing short-term changes to survive a crisis.

• Establish a central transformation team. Use this team to provide support to overcome barriers and accountability to achieve objectives; run a regular cadence to ensure timely execution.
• Detail a transparent and objective decision-making process. Clearly detail what information is required to evaluate an idea and communicate how leadership will use this information to determine what moves forward. The clarity builds confidence within the community around a fair and objective process that all can participate in.
• Improve organizational capabilities. Invest in growing individual and collective capacity through dedicated training aimed at expanding the talent bench and ensuring the longevity of the transformation.

Leaders at a large Research I public university drove a transformation around the four best practices previously described to fundamentally alter their operating model. In the first 12 months, they succeeded in establishing new, objective ways to evaluate and execute on ideas. In the final six months of the transformation, the university focused on sustainability and established a team to help maintain the new habits and procedures. This central implementation team not only continues to drive the transformation forward but also is adapting the process for other parts of the organization—for example, evaluating new budget requests—thus broadening the impact and ingraining the change throughout the organization.

Higher-education institutions are under tremendous pressure and time constraints as they work to keep their students, faculty, and staff safe while they deliver on their missions to educate, conduct research, and contribute to their communities, society, and the public good. In a sector that is already feeling stretched, the prospects of a comprehensive transformation might sound overwhelming to leaders and the communities they lead. But the effort will be worth it.

Leaders can inspire their communities with a more resilient future state that allows them to see beyond the pandemic to focus on improving the well-being of individuals and society through inspired learning, growth, and change. By implementing an ambitious set of projects to inspire the entire team, foster new areas of growth, and change the university’s trajectory, these institutions can continue to influence and impact generations of learners and their communities.

Hamilton Boggs is an associate partner in McKinsey’s Denver office, Rachel Boroditsky is a consultant in the Chicago office, Charag Krishnan is a partner in the New Jersey office, and Jimmy Sarakatsannis is a partner in the Washington, DC, office.

The authors would like thank Claudio Brasca, Leah Farmer, Jack Guest, and Mark Hojnacki for their contributions to this article.

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The Goals of Higher Education

• Harold Taylor , Jacob Klein , Richard Sullivan , Gordon Allport , Brand Blanshard and Arthur Morgan
• Edited by: Willis D. Weatherford, Jr.
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• Language: English
• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Copyright year: 1960
• Edition: Reprint 2014
• Audience: Professional and scholarly;
• Main content: 122
• Keywords: Education, Higher.
• Published: October 1, 2013
• ISBN: 9780674593367
• Published: February 5, 1960
• ISBN: 9780674593350

Institute for Lifelong Learning

The Role of Higher Education Institutions for Lifelong Learning

Higher education institutions (HEIs) are essential actors in the promotion of lifelong learning (LLL). They have a unique capacity to develop skills and foster knowledge, and the potential to mobilize educational resources and provide learning opportunities for diverse populations. This implies a fundamental shift, from educating young students coming from secondary schools to encouraging learners from various backgrounds to enter higher education at different ages and stages of their personal and professional lives.

While the higher education sector constitutes a huge potential for promoting lifelong learning, its actual contribution is far from being realized.

Many universities continue to prioritize academic excellence and research, with less attention being paid to widening access and participation to learning opportunities. Achieving the vision expressed through the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and precisely articulated in SDG 4, requires a substantial transformation of HEIs into lifelong learning institutions. To further explore these issues and provide guidance to policy-makers and HEIs, the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong learning (UIL) and Shanghai Open University (SOU) are conducting a comprehensive research project on the contribution of universities and other HEIs to lifelong learning .

Moreover, a recent survey implemented together with the International Association of Universities (IAU) of almost 400 HEIs, revealed the following significant findings:

their lifelong learning policies aim to contribute to the Sustainable Development Goals.

that gender equality is one of the principal goals of their lifelong learning offerings.

& social responsibility as main drivers for their involvement in lifelong learning.

Reaching out to vulnerable groups, providing flexible learning pathways, promoting an open science approach, and offering learning opportunities for people of all ages constitute some of the fundamentals that should guide higher education institutions in a learning society.

Key findings

of the UIL policy brief 'The contribution of higher education institutions to lifelong learning'

National governments should define lifelong learning as a core mission of higher education institutions.  

Comprehensive national policies and frameworks show political will and support the institutionalization of LLL; however, while 68 per cent of participating HEIs confirm that this is the case for their countries, 18 per cent do not and almost 14 per cent answered, ‘I don’t know’.

Higher education institutions should develop institution-wide approaches to lifelong learning that adhere to all three missions of higher education . 1

Institutional policies/strategies provide the framework for the diversity of learning while defining sound institutional principles. Forty-four per cent of HEIs report that lifelong learning is referenced as a ‘high priority’ in their mission statements.

1 To many universities and other HEIs are attributed three major, interrelated missions: education, the generation of new knowledge, and engagement with society or ‘the community’.

Dedicated lifelong learning units are a useful structure to institutionalize lifelong learning in higher education institutions .

Units that take the operational lead of lifelong learning implementation establish a shared understanding, engage different stakeholders, and develop specific expertise. In the sample report, nearly 54 per cent of HEIs responded that they have a dedicated lifelong learning unit.

Funding schemes for higher education, both institutional and for learners, should extend to lifelong learning opportunities .

Funding and financing remain a major barrier to lifelong learning in HEIs, with almost 67 per cent of participating institutions identifying finance as a key challenge.

Quality assurance procedures are key to enhancing the effectiveness and level of professionalism of lifelong learning in higher education institutions . 

Since funding is often tied to measurable outputs, a mechanism to define and monitor these outputs, including for non-formal lifelong learning, is essential. Over 59 per cent of HEIs in the sample have quality assurance mechanisms in place.

To widen access to and increase participation in lifelong learning, higher education institutions need to make educational opportunities and content relevant for non-traditional students . 

The main target groups of lifelong learning in higher education in the participating HEIs are working people who require upskilling, public and private organizations, women and HEI staff.

Higher education institutions must address the diverse learning needs of lifelong learners by including different delivery modalities, degree- and non-degree-granting formats, as well as alternative forms of accreditation . 

Only 44 per cent of participating institutions offer non-credit certificates or diplomas, and only 11 per cent badges or other micro-credentials.

Flexible learning pathways (FLPs), including the recognition, validation and accreditation of prior learning (RVA), should be introduced and expanded across higher education institutions .

FLPs allow learners to enter and re-enter higher education at various points of their lives and enable individualized and learner-centred education. Just over 66 per cent of participating institutions report having policies to support flexible learning pathways in place, while 34 per cent do not.

Technology-enhanced learning elevates lifelong learning in higher education institutions in an inclusive way .

Online teaching and learning – recently accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic – along with more sophisticated methodologies provide enhanced opportunities for adaptive and self-led learning. While 80 per cent of participating institutions report offering online lectures and seminars, only 30 per cent have online learning degree-granting programmes.

Higher education institutions should engage with local communities through lifelong learning . 

HEIs are important players in regional and local development, fulfilling their social responsibility. Almost all participating institutions – 98 per cent – interact in at least one way with their communities, most often through the organization of public lectures and workshops.

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The educational purposes of higher education: changing discussions of the societal outcomes of educating students

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• Published: 03 October 2022
• Volume 84 , pages 1227–1244, ( 2022 )

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In this article, I examine the educational purposes of higher education in terms of the societal outcomes of educating students through higher education . Based on an analysis of the first 80 volume of Higher Education , published from 1972 to 2020, I argue that discussions of societal educational purposes were dominated by authors from the Anglophone, global North and these authors were more likely to write as if the educational purposes under discussion were relevant to all higher education systems regardless of national context. This tendency increased over time. The overall models of the educational purposes in each contribution differed in terms of whether they focused on single, multiple, or differentiated sets of educational purposes. I argue that as higher education has become increasingly stratified, there has been less discussion of whether there are differences in the societal outcomes served by different forms of higher education. This is problematic because it obscures the potential differences in the educational purposes of higher education in different societies and the extent to which inequalities are perpetuated by differences in the forms of higher education to which students gain access. In order to address this, I argue there is a need to move away from a focus on the educational purposes of the institutional form of ‘the University’ to focus on the educational purposes that are served by different configurations of higher education systems.

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Introduction

Commonly, discussions of the purposes of higher education are focused on the overall purposes of higher education and these are treated as synonymous with the purposes of ‘the University’ as an institutional form. This is true for both the seminal statements on the purposes of higher education (for example, Newman 1976 ; Nyerere, 1971 ; Kerr, 1963 ; Nussbaum, 2010 ) and discussions of the purposes of higher education within the field of higher education studies (for examples, see Perlmutter, 1958 ; Fawley, 1971 ; Kerr, 1990 ; Deem, 2008 ; Zgaga, 2009 ; Biesta, 2011 ; McArthur, 2011 ). Rather than discussing the purposes of higher education more generally, this article is focused on the educational purposes of higher education.

In focusing on the educational purposes of higher education, this article examines what the education that is offered to students through higher education is intended to achieve for societies. The focus is on the outcomes that these educational processes are expected to contribute to societies rather than on the educational process and how students are changed by this (as discussed, for example, by Ashwin, 2020 ). Whilst these societal outcomes will affect the form of education, this relationship is complex because a number of different purposes can be served by the same form of education and the same purpose can be served by different educational forms.

There are two reasons for focusing more specifically on the educational purposes of higher education rather than the more typical discussions of ‘the idea of the University’ (for example, see MacIntyre, 2009 ). First, as higher education has expanded globally, it has become increasingly true that not all institutions of higher education are universities and that not all universities offer higher education (Barnett, 2004 ). Second, in line with Kerr’s ( 1963 ) idea of the ‘multiversity’, individual institutions involve the bringing together of a great many purposes that are informed by a range of contradictory normative principles. They conduct primary research, offer education to a diverse range of students, and work with governments, businesses, professions, and local communities. It should be noted that the separation of the educational purposes from the wider purposes of higher education in this article is an analytical commitment rather than a practical commitment to ‘unbundling’ of the institutional form of the university (Robertson and Komljenovic, 2016 ; McCowan, 2017 ).

Whilst previous research has focused more on the purposes of the university than the educational purposes of higher education, the models generated still offer an insight into these educational purposes. In relation to European and American approaches to higher education, Zgaga ( 2009 ) and Sam and Van Der Sijde ( 2014 ) each identify four models. Three of these are common: the Humboldtian model that is focused on the advancement of knowledge, the vocationally oriented Napoleonic model, and the personality-oriented Anglo-Saxon model. The fourth model for Zgaga ( 2009 ) is focused on the development of critical citizens, whereas for Sam and Van Der Sijde ( 2014 ), the fourth model is a US hybrid that combines the elements of the other three models. In addition to these models, there has also been discussions of the African model of the University (for example, Nyerere, 1971 ) which emphasises the role that education must play in solving urgent societal problems and a Chinese model of the educational purposes of higher education that focuses on creating harmony between people and the world (Yang, 2022 ).

Examining whether and how the discussion of the societal educational purposes of higher education in the journal has changed is important given the changes to higher education over the fifty years that Higher Education has been published. One of the clearest changes has been the increases in access to higher education globally and with these increases in the size and complexity of national systems of higher education (Cantwell et al., 2018 ; Grubb et al., 2005 ). In 1972 when the first issue of the journal was published, the Gross Tertiary Enrollment was 26% in high-income countries, 6% in middle-income countries, and 2% in low-income countries. In 2015, the figures were 74% for high-income countries, 33% for middle-income countries, and 8% for low-income countries with the number of students worldwide increasing from 36 to 218 million (World Bank Ed Stats). This growth in higher education is over three times higher than population growth and over one half times higher than growth in GDP over the same period (Clancy & Marginson, 2018 ). It has also been associated with a greater diversity of students and higher education institutions, although the extent of these forms of diversity varies between systems of higher education (Antonowicz et al., 2018 ).

Another key change has been a shift to focus on higher education systems rather than higher education institutions (Marginson, 2018 ; Noonan, 2018 ; Williams, 2018 ). As higher education provision systems have expanded, there has been increased vertical stratification between institutions (Cantwell et al., 2018 ; Trow, 1973 ). Whilst the expansion of higher education systems offered new educational opportunities for a wider range of students, the increase in vertical stratification also contributed to the perpetuation and reinforcement of social and economic inequalities due to differences in the status of different types of institution and in who gains access to these institutions (Wheelahan et al., 2012 ; Wheelahan, 2016 ; Marginson, 2018 ; Bathmaker and Orr 2020 ). The tensions within different higher education systems and their potential to perpetuate inequalities raise important questions about whether students with different demographic characteristics are offered forms of higher education that are designed to meet different educational purposes.

In this article, I review how the societal outcomes from educating students through higher education have been written about over the first 50 years of Higher Education . I examine the locations of the authors who had their writing about these educational purposes published in the journal, the variety of societal educational purposes identified, and how these were to be realised. I then examine how these different elements combine into overall models of the societal outcomes of higher education and the way these have changed over the five decades of the journal. Based on this analysis, I argue that there is a need to analyse the educational purposes expressed across higher education systems rather than the purposes of ‘the University’ as an institution. This would support a conversation about the relations between the education offered by particular higher education systems and the societies in which they operate. This would allow an exploration of the extent to which the educational purposes of higher education vary between societies rather than assuming these purposes are always the same.

This article is based on an analysis on the first 80 volumes of Higher Education that were published from 1973 to 2020. In these 80 volumes, there were 393 separate issues (although five of these were joint issues containing more than one numbered issue).

Selection of articles for analysis

From the 80 volumes of Higher Education , I initially selected only articles and reports of research for the initial review because I was focused on how the purposes of higher education were positioned in contributions that were intended to make an original contribution to the field of higher education studies. This decision meant that announcements, book reviews, correspondence, editorials, forewords, and introductions to issues were excluded from the initial sorting of contributions to the journal. The abstracts of 2913 contributions to the journal were initially read to identify whether they were focused on an educational aspect of higher education or another aspect (for example, research) of higher education. As shown in Table 1 , this process identified 1488 (51%) contributions that were focused on education. The full text of these contributions was read in order to examine whether they explicitly discussed the educational purposes of higher education, with 105 contributions found to do this (7% of those contributions focused on an educational aspect of higher education). Table 1 sets out a summary of this for each 10 years of the journal.

In selecting the contributions, the initial decision on whether a contribution focused on education was based on whether it directly concerned the education of students by higher education. This meant that topics that were related to education but not directly related to the education of students were excluded, such as contributions on student politics and activism and contributions on the academic profession. Similarly, contributions that focused on the development of higher education systems but did not explicitly consider their educational role were also excluded.

In deciding whether a contribution explicitly discussed the educational purposes of higher education, the focus was on whether the contribution explicitly discussed the outcomes for societies that were expected from the educational process offered by higher education. It should not be assumed that the purposes identified were advocated by the authors. In the contributions analysed, around two-thirds (69) involved an argument for particular educational purposes, whereas one-third (36) involved the description of educational purposes, for example, the educational purposes set out in a particular government policy document. This meant that the contributions were primarily normative in the way that they approach the educational purposes of higher education and there were no articles that empirically investigated the educational purposes of higher education. In identifying these expected outcomes for the educational process, it is also important to be clear that there was no assumption that the outcomes discussed were the only educational outcomes that authors attributed to higher education. Rather the intention was to identify as many different educational purposes that were identified across the contributions and to examine how these shifted over time.

Approach to analysis

In analysing the contributions, I examined the following:

The dates and volume of each contribution.

The geographical location of the institution(s) of the author(s). These were initially done by the country and then aggregated to geographical region and the global North and South. Whilst the application of these terms is contentious, imprecise and potentially anachronistic given the timeframe of the analysis, it was considered important in order to map whether globally privileged views of the educational purposes of higher education were dominant in the same way that the global North has dominated in academic publishing more generally (Collyer, 2018 ).

All of the societal educational purposes that were identified within each contribution.

The way in which these educational purposes were achieved.

Whether the educational purposes identified seemed to refer to all higher education or whether educational purposes were differentiated across different forms of higher education.

The relationship between higher education and society that was implied in the discussions of the educational purposes of higher education.

Whether the contribution was an argument for particular educational purposes or a description of how another actor (for example, a government) positioned the educational purposes of higher education.

Whether the purposes appeared to be related to the whole of global higher education or a particular higher education system. If the latter, whether this system was the one in which the author was located or a different higher education system.

The different elements of the analysis were brought together to develop overall models of the societal educational purposes of higher education expressed in each contribution. Whereas the analysis of all of the societal educational purposes involved simply identifying which purposes were expressed in each contribution, the generation of the overall models involved considering the relations between these different purposes and how they were to be achieved. In some models, particular purposes were seen as incidental or supporting of a single overall societal educational purpose; in other models, multiple purposes were seen as important; and in a final model, the societal educational purposes were differentiated between different kinds of students.

The findings from the review were analysed using descriptive statistics to show the frequencies of the different elements examined in the study. Bivariate analysis was carried out using cross-tabulations to examine the relationships and patterns between these different elements.

The institutional location of authors published on the educational purposes of higher education

Table 2 shows the countries in which the institution of the first author was located, using the country designations that were in use at the time of the publication of each contribution. It shows that the most contributions came from the USA (17) and from England (14) and over half the contributions came from first authors located in Anglophone countries. This is unsurprising given that Higher Education is an English Language journal but it highlights the partial view it gives of higher education internationally.

Table 3 combines these into geographical regions and indicates that contributions from Europe were the most common (56) followed by North America (19) and Asia (15). Apart from the domination of the European and Anglo-American models of higher education, the most striking outcome was the lack of contributions from South America.

Aggregating the countries into those considered to be in the global North and South, 73% of the contributions that discussed the educational purposes of higher education were from authors located in institutions in the global North and 23% from authors in the global South. The remaining 4% were co-authored by teams of researchers from both the global North and global South. This suggests that the discussion of the societal educational purposes of higher education was largely from researchers located in the global North. Whilst this is not surprising given the overall contributors to the journal, what is more significant is how these authors presented their discussions of the purposes of higher education. Two-thirds of the contributions focused on the societal educational purposes of specific higher education systems. Of the third of contributions that appeared to focus on discussing the educational purposes of all higher education, 85% were located in the global North.

The question this raises is the extent to which these authors extrapolated from their own system of higher education to all of global higher education. Interestingly, this tendency to write as if referring to all systems of higher education appears to have increased over time with around one-fifth of the contributions taking this perspective in the 1970s and the 1980s and around a half from the 1990s onwards. This change fits with the rise of the discourse around the global university in the 1990s which preceded, and arguably made possible, the development of global university rankings in 2003–2004 (Marginson & Rhoades, 2002 ; Marginson in press). However, it also raises questions about whether there has been an associated loss of a sense of the particularities of the societal educational purposes of higher education within particular countries.

The societal educational purposes of higher education identified

In analysing the societal educational purposes of higher education identified in the contributions, it is important to be clear that higher education institutions have always served a range of purposes and the view of these purposes varies according to whether it is from a policy, student, or academic perspective (Swartz et al., 2019 ). However, in their analysis of the founding charters of universities from the thirteenth to the twenty-first century, Kivinen and Poikus ( 2006 ), whilst accepting there has been a shift in who can access higher education, argued that the range of purpose have remained relatively similar:

The local and national interest, strengthening the proper faith, and training public servants have remained the reasons for founding universities from the 13th century until now. Higher education has throughout history been regarded as the solution to the most diverse problems. Quenching the thirst for knowledge and promoting wisdom, truth, and justice have always been familiar reasons for academic establishments. It has been known from the beginning that studies pave the way to happiness for all mankind, both economic and spiritual. Even achieving peace has been regarded as one of the reasons for higher education. (Kivinen & Poikus, 2006 , p. 205)

Table 4 sets out all of the societal educational purposes identified across all of the contributions analysed and they were consistent with those identified by Kivinen and Poikus (2016).

The most frequent educational purpose identified was that the role of higher education was to produce a skilled workforce for society. For many authors, this role was seen as self-evident:

It may be a cliche´ to begin an article by arguing that a primary task of HE institutions is to prepare students to manage flexible jobs in changing markets. But the importance of this task cannot be ignored. (Nygaard et al., 2008 , p.33)

It is also seen as crucial in order to maintain the legitimacy of higher education.

In a context of limited resources for education and visible skill deficiencies, the credibility and legitimacy of the university depends upon its ability to gear its training in some measure to the provision of skills sought by the national community. All three East African universities have attempted to move towards more vocationally specific curricula and tighter manpower planning. (Court, 1977 , p.49)

The production of a skilled workforce was the most common educational purpose identified in contributions from the global North and South. However, there was some indication that the production of a skilled workforce was more common in contributions from the global South where 79% of contributions included this purpose compared to 68% of contributions from the global North. Closely related to the development of a skilled workforce was the less common focus on developing a society that was mobile.

The second most frequent educational purpose of higher education was the development of critically reflective individuals; half of the contributions highlighted this purpose. This was referred to by different terms including ‘knowledge capability’ (Bailee et al. 2013) and ‘reflective thinking’ (Steur et al., 2012 ) but the purpose was focused on the production of individuals who had a moral commitment to questioning knowledge and understanding different world views. Some traced this purpose back to Aristotle (Himanka, 2015 ) and the concept of Bildung was also sometimes drawn upon:

A posthuman Bildung is a lifelong task of realising one’s responsibility within an ecology of world relations, it occurs outside as well as inside formal education, in virtual as well as ‘real’ places. Furthermore, a posthuman Bildung interrogates what ‘citizenship’ as a political project might mean, it deepens and extends ethical accountably by reformulating who and what social justice is ‘for’ and includes, and complicates all such projects by positing that all our educative encounters are material, co-emergent and experimental becomings which cannot be planned or known in advance. (Taylor, 2017 , p.432)

This educational purpose was more common in contributions from the global North with 53% highlighting this purpose compared to 39% of contributions from the global South. It is important to distinguish this educational purpose from the less common purpose that focused on the development of individuals. In this case, there was not a sense that the individual developed had a critical moral purpose but rather about meeting the individual’s need for self-development:

While higher education is a profitable investment for both individual and society as a whole, this paper concludes that any future expansion needs to carefully identify the appropriate demands of the individual, and ensure these match societal needs. This is particularly so at a time when Taiwan’s economy is moving towards parity with developed countries, and where a workforce of highly qualified employees will be necessary to intensify its competitiveness in the international trade market. (Wang, 2003 , p.283)

Closely related to the purpose of developing critically reflective individuals was the educational purpose of developing a critical society which was highlighted in 41% of the submissions. This purpose went beyond the production of an individual to actively identify the contribution that this individual would make to society. Sometimes this educational purpose was seen to be in tension with the production of a skilled workforce, whereas in others, they were seen as complimentary:

The vocational purposes of higher education are incidental and secondary, and could often be provided for in other ways. The principal reason why we have universities and colleges is concerned with the extension of civilisation, with the rediscovery of man’s highest creative achievements, with the need in every generation to question and challenge what has been created, and with the excitement of new discovery. The benefit is, or should be, the enlargement of culture and the enlivening of minds. (Carter, 1973 , p.212) [O]ur human capacity to feel is one facet that distinguishes us from robots and computers. And it is this one human facet – if channeled properly in the educational process – that might just save our planet and us from the destruction of the environment and the destruction and degradation caused by war. Moreover, it would produce the kind of people that industry now requires. (Doyon, 2001 , p.468)

The remaining educational purposes of higher education related to the development of a cohesive society, although this appeared in different forms including ensuring social harmony, creating more equal society, and developing religious values in society. In some cases, it was about ensuring social harmony and preventing unrest:

The overriding goal of the universities is to assist in the promotion of national integration and unity. It is hoped that this will be achieved through their teaching as well as non-curricular programs, and through the use of the national language - Malay -- as the principal medium of instruction. In this manner the gradual moulding of moral discipline and the inculcation of national values will lead towards this fundamental aim. (Ahmat, 1980 , p.724)

This educational purpose was more common in contributions from the global South with 29% of contributions highlighting this purpose compared to 5% of contributions from the global North. Similarly, the development of more equal society was more common in contributions from the global South than the global North (18% compared to 6%) The relative scarcity of discussion of the development of a more equal society suggests that this tends to be decoupled from discussions of the educational purposes of higher education.

Today’s purpose is to bring within the reach of every member of the African society that touch of the romantic hitherto reserved for men of noble birth or gentle upbringing. This intrusion upon the privileges of the few need not spread desperation. Good university education should be capable of well planned and executed expansion. Above all, the more a nation’s population exhibit and accept the values of the “educated”, the more “civilized” the nation should become. The popularization of civilized values must surely be the goal of every civilization and the modern university can hardly afford to be left out of such a venture in Africa. (Wandira, 1981 , pp.269-270)

A final educational purpose was the development of religious values in society:

The philosophy of the educational system has essentially been based on co-relating religious morals and cultural traditions with modern economics, and both technological and scientific development. (Madany et al., 1988 p. 413)

The realisation of the societal educational purposes of higher education

In all cases, the societal educational purposes of higher education were positioned as being realised through the development of students, although this development took different forms and the role of selection and the signals sent by the qualifications students’ achieved were also recognised (for example, Jones, 1979 ; Smolentseva, 2017a ). There were two areas in which the realisation of educational purposes of higher education varied across the contributions. These were whether the same educational purposes applied to all students in higher education and the relationship to the world beyond higher education established within these educational purposes.

In over 90% of contributions, the educational purposes of higher education were written about as if they applied to all students whether in a single system or across global higher education. However, there was a small subset of contributions in the 1970s and 1980s in which it was argued that the education offered should be differentiated in terms of higher education that offered intellectual training and higher education that offered preparation of employment:

In short, for the production of high level manpower, there is at least some ground for querying whether the university is an appropriate institution either in its professional programmes or still more in its less job specific courses. Conversely, there is a case for exploring more full-heartedly what alternative institutions and processes could be created to form manpower for the so called high level functions, less expensively, more effectively and less injuriously to society at large. The foregoing discussion has concentrated exclusively on the university as a designated producer of manpower, which is to say on its function to teach those who intend not to be professional academics themselves, but to make their livelihood elsewhere. (Oxenam 1980, p.654)

The second area of difference was the relationship between the education offered by higher education and the society in which the education took place. In 80% of cases, there was no discussion of the relationship to society and it appeared to be assumed that the two were separate. In six contributions, this separation was made explicit:

Education could, instead, be allowed to develop on the basis of its own premisses, for instance, devocationalizing schools and shifting the acquisition of vocational skills to the workplace. The obstacles to loosening the bond between education and work are manifold but they are more a question of politics and vested interests than of identifying or meeting ‘genuine’ educational needs. (Kivinen & Ahola, 1999 , p.205)

In six contributions, there was an argument for the education offered to more integrated with society:

Colleges may boast numerous talents and opportunities within their own walls, but life itself certainly offers a pool much larger than any which a single social institution can provide. Communities must become an integral part of their educational scheme, and colleges must retain and develop their individual characters to take full advantage of the settings, tradition, facilities, and resources uniquely available to each one of them. (Yamamoto, 1975 , p.216)

Overall models of the societal educational purposes of higher education

Table 5 sets out the overall models of the societal educational purposes of higher education by the decade in which the contributions were published. Whereas Table 4 treats each educational purpose separately, Table 5 examines how these different purposes were brought together in each contribution to the journal and takes account of how these societal educational purposes were to be realised. There were seven overall models of the societal educational purposes of higher education that fall into three main categories of single purpose models, multiple purpose models, and a differentiated purposes model.

There were four different models within the single societal educational purpose category. Whilst these models sometimes combined different elements, these elements were integrated into a single educational purpose. The most common model, Critical Agency Changing Society, was one in which higher education led to the development of critical agency in students and thereby led to changes in society. This model was present across all of the decades of the journal and the changes in society could be in terms of a more critical and/or equal society and sometimes included the production of a skilled workforce:

Universities can disrupt hierarchies, opening out significant opportunities and achievements for marginalized or under-represented groups and individuals, and can instill altruistic values and outcomes as a contribution to more justice in society. While higher education has a reproductive role in reproducing existing social hierarchies of social class, gender, race and language, it also has this potentially transformative role. Moreover, research on social change suggests that if (professional) elites are sufficiently socially aware, they can play a significant role in transformative development, not only through quality public services, but also by broadening civic participation and consolidating democratic reforms. (Walker 2016, p.419)

The second model within the single educational purpose category was that the educational purpose of higher education was related to employment. This was again present in all of the decades of the journal and was often expressed in terms of developing graduates with the attributes to succeed in the labour market to the benefit of both students and society:

Academics have consistently maintained that a university education should go beyond acquiring a knowledge of a discipline or becoming competent to practice a profession… Economic forces have also strengthened the calls for generic capabilities. Developed economies are being forced to move out of basic manufacturing as they cannot compete with cheaper labour in less-developed countries. To make the transition to knowledge-based economies requires an intelligent labour force with additional capabilities such as creative thinking, flexibility, adaptability and information technology skills. (Kember, 2009 , pp.37-38)

The third model within the single purpose category focused on the individual development of the student. This was present in all of the decades apart from the 1980s. In some cases, this focused on the development of critically reflective individuals but it was made explicit that this was an end in itself:

The autopoietic identity of the university, as I hope to have shown in this paper, justifies academic professors being preoccupied with what their students know, understand, are able to question and explain, and not with what concepts and qualities are currently considered worthy a transaction within the system of the economy—be it even a transaction of employment at the job market. The ruts of academic work have been set long ago to travel from unknown to known, and from disciple to master. (Lenartowicz, 2015 ,p.959)

In other cases, the focus was not on developing critically reflective individuals but in meeting the demands of students for whatever form of self-development they identified as most important.

In today’s society, where knowledge is central to social and economic progress, and individuals are increasingly focussing on the self, the demand for new learning and renewal of competence can be characterised as unpredictable and heterogeneous. In this article, we have argued that the business concept that is most appropriate in this constellation should be one that enables and encourages a customer-oriented, tailor-made education, where learner needs are the driver of the system. (Jongbloed 2002, p.428)

The final model within the single educational purpose category focused on the educational role of higher education as being related to the development of a cohesive society. Cases of this model where it was not related to other purposes were only identified in three contributions and it was sometimes set in contrast to the Western model of the university:

In the Chinese tradition, higher learning has always unapologetically emphasised practical learning and a connected approach, as it views serving society and the nation as a primary goal. In the ancient Chinese mind, it is never enough to advance the learning of the individual. One must achieve self-cultivation through the learning of ethics and subsequently use that self-cultivation to serve the state. Education has always been oriented towards the affairs of the state—‘sustaining cultural and ancestral heritages, governing the nation, and harmonizing the people instead of a narrow individual purpose’ (Xu 2016). (Lu & Jover, 2019 , p.431)

The multiple societal educational purposes category included two models that focused on achieving two educational purposes. One of these, which first appeared in the journal in the 1980s, focused on both employment and societal cohesion:

By the early 1970s therefore it had become apparent that there needed to be a new approach to higher education if the pressures and frustrations from below were not to lead to violence. Such a situation was also obviously unsatisfactory for an economy that was growing very fast (during the 1960s GNP growth was between 6% and 8%) especially since there was growing concern in Thailand to plan social and economic development and to link both secondary and tertiary education with manpower requirements in various parts of the economy. (Watson, 1981 , p.303)

The second multiple purposes’ model focused on the development of critical society and a skilled workforce. It was only found in two discussions of Polish higher education in the 1970s (Kietlinska, 1972 ; Kluczyński et al., 1972 ) although it was also one of the models of purposes discussed in an exploration of policy documents from the USSR (Smolentseva, 2017b ). Whilst there was a sense that this model involved the development of individuals, the educational purpose of this development was not for the individuals but for the society in which they were operating:

Clearly, education was considered an instrument of political, social and economic development. However the dominance of the socializing function of education should be acknowledged: the major goal was a formation of “a harmoniously developed personality”, as well as certain ideological attitudes. Emphasizing supra-individual interests, the documents have not overlooked individual needs and agency, leaving to the individuals the right to choose the profession following their vocation and abilities. (Smolentseva, 2017b , pp.1095-6)

The third category was focused on differentiated educational purposes and included a single model. In this model, different outcomes were identified for different forms of higher education or for different students. For some, higher education was about developing critical agency, whereas for others higher education was about employment. This model was present in the 1970s and, to a much lesser extent in the 1980s, but was not present after this. This version of differentiated higher education was most fully developed by Clark Kerr ( 1978 ):

One of these (Model X) would center around what Parsons and Platt ( 1973 ) have called the “core sector” of graduate training and research, but I would add related pre-graduate training as in the selective liberal arts colleges in the United States. The second (Model Y) would be organized, formally or informally, around the occupational and vocational needs of society for undergraduate training and around the “general education” interests of students. The third (Model Z) would be responsive to social demand based on any reason, subject only to consumer choice. There are, of course, points of overlap. …The central theme of the first is scholarship; of the second, attention formally or informally to the labor market and the preparation of what economists call “human capital”; of the third, the satisfaction of individual desires for self-development. (Kerr, 1978 , p.270-271)

The analysis in this article has highlighted that higher education was positioned as focusing on a number of societal educational purposes. However, these individual societal educational purposes were often combined and integrated into an overall model with a single societal educational purpose. The result of this was that, whilst the development of a skilled workforce was the most frequent individual purpose, as an overall model the development of critical agency to change society was the most frequent. This tension between the higher education for employment and higher education for critical agency seems to parallel the tension between the reproductive and transformative power of higher education in society.

In relation to the overall models of the societal educational purposes of higher education, in most cases, they appeared to align with the models explored in the previous literature. The ‘employment’ and ‘self-development’ appeared to align with the vocationally-orientated models and personality-orientated models identified by Zgaga ( 2009 ) and Sam and Van Der Sijde ( 2014 ). Elements of the ‘critical agency changing society’ model appeared to align with the both Zgaga’s ( 2009 ) model focused on the development of critical citizens, Sam and Van Der Sijde ( 2014 )’s US hybrid model, and Nyere’s (1971) emphasis that education most solve urgent social problems. The social cohesion model appeared to align with the focus on education creating harmony between people and the world (Yang, 2022 ). The word ‘alignment’ is deliberately chosen to indicate a broad similarity between the models rather than an exact match. The exception was that the knowledge advancement model identified by Zgaga ( 2009 ) and Sam and Van Der Sijde ( 2014 ) did not appear to be present. It is possible that knowledge advancement was part of the ‘critical agency changing society’ model, with knowledge as the basis of the change in students and society rather than the societal outcome that is sought (for example see Ashwin, 2020 ). However, it is notable that the advancement of knowledge did not appear to be a discrete outcome for society of educating students through higher education.

There were three additional models not highlighted in the previous literature. The ‘employment and cohesion’ and the ‘employment and critical society’ models involved distinctive combinations of the elements of the other models and appeared to reflect the ways in which societal priorities shape the educational purposes of higher education within particular systems of higher education. This lies in tension with the increasing tendency in the contributions to write as if discussions of the educational purposes of higher education are relevant to all systems of higher education. This tension suggests the need to avoid the assumption that there are general societal educational purposes of higher education that exist independently of the conditions in particular societies. This is not to suggest that there are necessarily differences in what higher education attempts to achieve in bringing students in relationship to knowledge (Ashwin, 2020 ) but rather that there may be important differences in what this process is for.

The third additional model was the ‘differentiated purposes’ model, which emphasised the different societal outcomes of higher education for different students. This model was clearly articulated in the 1970s but has disappeared from discussions of the educational purposes of higher education from the 1990s onwards. What is notable about this is that higher education has become increasingly vertically stratified since the 1970s (Cantwell et al., 2018 ). Thus as differences in the status of different types of institution and differences in who gains access to these institutions have increased (Wheelahan et al., 2012 ; Wheelahan, 2016 ; Marginson, 2018 ; Bathmaker and Orr 2020 ), the field of higher education studies as reflected in this journal appears to have engaged in less discussion about whether this vertical stratification results in different parts of higher education systems serving different educational purposes.

One explanation of the lack of discussion of the differentiated educational purposes of higher education is the focus on the purposes of the university as an institution (for example in MacIntyre, 2009 ; Sam et al., 2014 ; Zgaga, 2009 ) rather than focusing on higher education systems (Marginson, 2018 ; Noonan, 2018 ; Williams, 2018 ). In focusing on the purposes of a particular societal institution, it is difficult to discern the way in which these purposes are differentiated. Instead this institution of ‘the University’ becomes loaded with many different and potentially contradictory purposes and becomes ‘an imagined abstraction’ (Marginson & Considine, 2000 , p.40).

In shifting to focusing on the educational purposes of higher education systems, it is possible to consider mapping these systems and understanding how different kinds of higher education institution might serve different educational purposes. This is not to argue for the unbundling of these educational purposes from the institution of the university (Robertson and Komljenovic 2016; McCowan, 2017 ) but it is rather to argue that we need to open up discussions about what societal outcomes are served by the different forms of higher education that different students have access to. Without this focus, the danger is that whilst vertical stratification and inequalities in access to, and outcomes from, higher education increase, discussions of the educational purposes of higher education focus very partially on the purposes served by a very particular and privileged institutional form: the University. Indeed whilst it is easy to dismiss Kerr ( 1978 ) argument for differentiated higher education as a way of protecting elite higher education, the question raised is how a system can be developed that offers fair access for students and is cost-effective for societies. Whilst from today’s perspective, Kerr’s ( 1978 ) solution would appear to reinforce educational inequalities, there is a need to be clear sighted about the current stratification that exists across higher education systems (Cantwell et al., 2018 ) and to be committed to understanding and addressing its role in perpetuating inequalities.

A shift to focusing on the educational purposes of higher education systems rather than ‘the University’ offers the possibility of analysing how the configurations of higher education systems relate to the societal educational purposes served by those systems. This could open up discussions of the educational purposes of higher education to a broader range of educational systems than those currently present in contributions to Higher Education . It also might help to shift the discussion from how the ‘African’ or ‘Chinese’ University is different from the ‘European’ or ‘Anglo-American’ University to a more fine-grained analysis of how these systems operate in their own terms. As part of this, there is a need to have more explicit conversations about the relationships between the education offered by higher education systems and the societies in which they operate. As participation in higher education has increased, it has become increasingly untenable to consider higher education as separate from society and there is a need to more fully understand higher education systems as an integral part of the societies in which they operate. At a basic level, this involves being much more explicit about the legitimacy of the educational purposes of higher education varying between societies but it also involves exploring how the purposes and outcomes are shaped different ‘national assemblages’ of the family, the state, education, and the economy (Marginson, 2018 ).

This article has examined how the societal educational purposes of higher education were discussed over the first 80 volumes of Higher Education. Whilst discussions of the educational aspects of higher education have accounted for around half of the contributions to the journal, discussions of the societal educational purposes have been much less common and have tended to focus on the purposes of the university as in institution. I have argued that, in the future, there should be a shift from focusing on the educational idea of ‘the University’ to the educational purposes of higher education systems. This is in order to gain a greater understanding of whether the increasing vertical stratification of higher education is leading to different educational purposes being served by different parts of those systems and thereby perpetuating educational inequalities.

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I gratefully acknowledge the insightful comments of Margaret Blackie, Jennifer Case, Brendan Cantwell, Simon Marginson, and Jan McArthur on an earlier version of this article, which were very helpful in sharpening its overall argument.

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Ashwin, P. The educational purposes of higher education: changing discussions of the societal outcomes of educating students. High Educ 84 , 1227–1244 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10734-022-00930-9

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For too many learners, working while in college is a barrier to career growth

Many on-campus jobs offer little career development, but these opportunities can be reimagined to align with students’ professional goals, one expert says.

Jane Swift is the former governor of Massachusetts and the head of the nonprofit Education at Work, which partners with companies and higher education institutions to connect college students to job opportunities.

Earlier this year, the Biden Administration urged colleges and universities to lend a hand to the nation’s K-12 schools. Specifically, it called on postsecondary institutions to use at least 15% of their annual allocation of roughly $1.2 billion in Federal Work-Study Program funds to employ more college students as tutors, mentors and student success coaches in public schools.

The White House included the call to action in its agenda for accelerating K-12 academic performance after pandemic-era school closures. But for higher education, this announcement should increase urgency around rethinking the connection between education and employment. 

Under the Federal Work-Study program, low- and middle-income college students are paid by their colleges for part-time work to help cover their educational costs. Using these dollars more effectively to enhance the early-career prospects of college students is critical to giving them quality work-based learning experiences. 

For college students considering careers in education, public policy, social work, or human services, working in our nation’s public schools is not only a win for the K-12 students they serve but also will provide them with needed experience — the definition of a high-quality learn and earn program. 

However, most undergraduates don’t get a high quality, career accelerating opportunity to combine work and learning while in college. Yet, nearly two-thirds of undergraduates work while they’re in school. One-quarter of students from low-income backgrounds have full-time jobs — which is concerning, as working long hours correlates with lower grades, fewer credits earned and a higher chance of dropping out.

Although it might seem counterintuitive, working merely to pay the bills while in college often does little to prepare students for the kinds of employment opportunities envisioned by policymakers and higher education leaders. 

The reason? Too many of today’s learners have jobs disconnected from their college majors and eventual careers. It’s time to reframe how higher education thinks about work-based learning and how federal dollars should be spent.

Consider which students work and why. Students from wealthier backgrounds might choose paid and unpaid opportunities during college to gain valuable skills, knowledge and connections. 

But financially disadvantaged students often must work to pay rent, buy groceries and cover college tuition. These students tend to work longer hours in jobs that provide little scheduling flexibility, which limits their ability to focus on their education or future careers.

Research from Strada shows that first-generation college students are more likely than their peers to work longer hours and less likely to secure career-boosting, work-based learning opportunities like internships.

Meanwhile, there’s a gap between expectation and reality. Seventy percent of first-year students expect to have work-based learning experiences — such as internships, co-ops, field experience, student teaching, or clinical placement — while in college. Yet fewer than half of students, 48%, report having had such experiences by the time they reach their senior year. 

Working learners — who are disproportionately Black, Latino/a or women — aren’t simply being shut out of career opportunities. Many do not even graduate. Just 22% of working learners from low-income backgrounds earn a bachelor’s degree within six years of starting college. 

Ironically, higher education has long had a mechanism for helping more students access work-based learning: the Federal Work-Study Program. 

In 2016, researchers from Teachers College, Columbia University, found that students who participated in Federal Work-Study were more likely to earn a bachelor’s degree and find employment after graduation. 

At the same time, these jobs rarely advance students' career goals. More than 90% of Federal Work-Study funds support on-campus jobs — roles that are often within college administrative offices and offer little career relevance or development. 

Policymakers in recent years have attempted to expand the scope of the Federal Work-Study program. 

In 2023, Sens. John Kennedy, a Republican from Louisiana, and Chris Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut, reintroduced bipartisan legislation to allow the Federal Work-Study Program to cover residencies for students who want to become teachers or school leaders.

In March, two Democratic representatives introduced a bill to modernize the program by, among other things, increasing access to work-based learning opportunities more closely aligned with students’ career goals.

Forward-thinking institutions also are reconsidering what these on-campus jobs can look like. 

Arizona State University employs 11,000 students annually through Federal Work-Study and its Hourly Employment Program. Many of these learners have jobs tightly aligned with their fields of study because Arizona State bakes skills development into its work experiences. This approach allows students to earn a paycheck, gain important career-ready skills and work for a flexible employer that recognizes the importance of education and work.

In 2023, the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia awarded grants to eight colleges and universities to align on-campus work-study jobs with course learning objectives and have them function more like internships.

The nonprofit Education At Work, where I work, helps college students find work as customer and back-office support at Fortune 500 companies. Students employed through us can develop career skills while earning a paycheck and receiving tuition assistance.  

Technological advances are helping students gain career experience in class or from their own homes. Remote internships and virtual project-based learning platforms are allowing institutions and companies to solve challenges around time and location. Meanwhile, virtual reality and other immersive learning technologies enable college and high school students to safely and easily explore new careers and develop in-demand technical skills.

Higher education’s approach to work-based learning has long been broken. It has created a two-tiered system in which some students work to gain experience and skills that set them up for career success while others work just to make ends meet. Bridging this gap will require reimagining work and learning, which will transform the college job from a basic necessity into a driver of economic mobility.

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Penn faculty say outside groups are threatening its academic freedom

Professors expressed concerns after a major donor asked the university's trustees about potential changes to its academic departments.

Black students who enroll at HBCUs have higher bachelor’s degree attainment, research finds

But those who initially attended a historically Black college also had higher debt loads than their similarly situated peers, a working paper found.

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Impact Rankings 2024: methodology

The  times higher education  impact rankings measure global universities’ success in delivering the united nations’ sustainable development goals. here, we explain how we arrived at the results.

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Browse the full results of the Impact Rankings 2024

Participate in next year’s impact rankings.

The  Times Higher Education  Impact Rankings are the only global performance tables that assess universities against the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals. We use carefully calibrated indicators to provide comprehensive and balanced comparisons across four broad areas:  research ,  stewardship ,  outreach  and  teaching .

Definitions of areas

Research:  the most obvious and traditional way that a university might help deliver the SDGs is by creating research in relevant topics.

Stewardship:  universities are custodians of significant resources; not just physical resources, but also their employees, faculty and students. How they act as stewards is one of the key factors in delivering the SDGs.

Outreach:  place is critical in higher education, and the work that universities do with their local, regional, national and international communities is another key way that they can have an impact on sustainability.

Teaching:  teaching plays a critical role, both in ensuring that there are enough skilled practitioners to deliver on the SDGs, and in making sure that all alumni take forward the key lessons of sustainability into their future careers.

Which SDGs are included?

There are 17 UN SDGs, and we are evaluating university performance on all of them.

• SDG 1 –  no poverty
• SDG 2 –  zero hunger
• SDG 3 –  good health and well-being
• SDG 4 –  quality education
• SDG 5 –  gender equality
• SDG 6 –  clean water and sanitation
• SDG 7 –  affordable and clean energy
• SDG 8 –  decent work and economic growth
• SDG 9 –  industry, innovation and infrastructure
• SDG 10 –  reduced inequalities
• SDG 11 –  sustainable cities and communities
• SDG 12 –  responsible consumption and production
• SDG 13 –  climate action
• SDG 14 –  life below water
• SDG 15 –  life on land
• SDG 16 –  peace, justice and strong institutions
• SDG 17 –  partnerships for the goals

Universities can submit data on as many of these SDGs as they are able. Each SDG has a series of metrics that are used to evaluate the performance of the university in that SDG.

Any university that provides data on SDG 17 and at least three other SDGs is included in the overall ranking.

As well as the overall ranking, we also publish the results of each individual SDG in 17 separate tables.

How is the ranking created?

A university’s total score in a given year is calculated by combining its score in SDG 17 with its best three results on the remaining 16 SDGs. SDG 17 accounts for 22 per cent of the total score, while the other SDGs each carry a weighting of 26 per cent. This means that different universities are scored based on a different set of SDGs, depending on their focus. The score for the overall ranking is an average of the last two years’ total scores.

The score from each SDG is scaled so that the highest score in each SDG in the overall calculation is 100 and the lowest score is 0. This is to adjust for minor differences in the scoring range in each SDG and to ensure that universities are treated equitably whichever SDGs they have provided data for. It is these scaled scores that we use to determine which SDGs a university has performed in most strongly; they may not be the SDGs in which the university is ranked highest or has scored highest based on unscaled scores.

The metrics for the 17 SDGs are included on their individual methodology pages.

Scoring within an SDG

There are three categories of metrics within each SDG:

Continuous metrics  measure contributions to impact that vary continually across a range – for example, the number of graduates with a health-related degree. These are usually normalised to the size of the institution.

When we ask about policies and initiatives – for example, the existence of mentoring programmes – our metrics require universities to provide the  evidence  to support their claims. In these cases, we give credit for the evidence, and for the evidence being public. These metrics are not usually size-normalised.

Evidence is evaluated against a set of criteria, and decisions are cross-validated where there is uncertainty. Evidence need not be exhaustive – we are looking for examples that demonstrate best practice at the institutions concerned.

In general, the data used refer to the closest academic year to January to December 2022. The date range for each metric is specified in the full methodology document.

The ranking is open to any university that teaches at undergraduate or postgraduate level. Although research activities form part of the method­ology, there is no minimum research requirement for participation.

THE  reserves the right to exclude universities that it believes have falsified data, or are no longer in good standing.

Data collection

Institutions provide and sign off their institutional data for use in the rankings. On the rare occasions when a particular data point is not provided, we enter a value of zero.

The methodology was developed in conjunction with our partners  Vertigo Ventures  and Elsevier, and after consultation and input from individual universities, academics and sector groups.

View the full methodology for the Impact Rankings 2024.

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Over 700 College And University Leaders Are ALL IN To Vote

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Senior leaders play a key role in a higher education institution’s ability to institutionalize nonpartisan democratic engagement (civic learning + political engagement + student voter participation) efforts. That said, there has consistently been minimal structure as to how these senior leaders can support and uplift nonpartisan engagement at their institution.

For years, there has been section 487(a)(23) of the Higher Education Act of 1965, as amended which states that eligible postsecondary institutions are required to “make a good faith effort to distribute a mail voter registration form, requested and received from the State, to each student enrolled in a degree or certificate program and physically in attendance at the institution, and to make 487(a)(23) of the Higher Education Act of 1965, such forms widely available to students at the institution.” The definition of a ‘good faith effort’ is interpretive at best. For instance, this box has been checked at institutions by including language in campus handbooks, distributing the National Mail Voter Registration Form through the campus registrar or like offices, and adding language to a campus webpage. Nonetheless, the direct role of the institution’s president or chancellor is not outlined.

That’s why in 2020, the ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge set out to change the narrative by raising the commitment level of senior leaders by asking them to dedicate resources for their institutions to actively work toward the goal of full student voter participation. Senior leaders who sign the ALL IN Higher Education Presidents’ Commitment to Full Student Voter Participation are asked to be mindful of three objectives: the responsibility of higher education institutions to prepare students to be informed and active citizens; the importance of the student voice in all elections (local, state, and presidential); and the need for both curricular and cocurricular experiences to shape and support the development of college students into becoming lifelong voters and engaged community members. While symbolic in nature, ALL IN asked campus leadership to sign the Commitment as a way to develop culture and accountability.

To build the network of senior leaders connecting with one another, ALL IN collaborated with a dozen individuals across multiple institution types to convene its first Presidents’ Council in 2020-2022 to guide the engagement of senior leaders across the nation. Today, the 2024-2025 Presidents’ Council is composed of 14 current and emeritus leaders that work collaboratively to reach all corners of the higher education network to uplift the mission of electoral participation as a pillar of the student collegiate experience. The Council is chaired by Brad Mortensen, Ph.D., president of Weber State University and a member of the 2022-2024 Presidents’ Council.

President of Weber State University, Brad Mortensen, Ph.D., with Weber State University students in Washington, D.C., on a tour of the U.S. Capitol Building.

“As chair of the ALL IN Presidents' Council, I'm thrilled with reaching the goal to have more than 700 of my colleagues across the country sign on to the President's Commitment. Our collective efforts to have our campuses engage in nonpartisan election- and voting-related opportunities is the most fundamental way to promote civic engagement among our students. It's not too late for other campus leaders to sign on and participate during this election cycle,” said Brad Mortensen, Ph.D.

Presidents’ Council members also uplift the mission of electoral engagement with their peers as they revere the objectives set forth in the ALL IN Presidents’ Commitment. “Universities serve as anchors of American democracy, and there is nothing more fundamental in a democracy than voting. At what feels like an inflection point in our country, it’s on us as leaders in higher education to underscore not just the symbolic value of this activity but its substantive significance,” said Jonathan Koppell, President of Montclair State University in New Jersey. “I’m proud to help lead ALL IN’s Presidents’ Council to ensure that students all over America are well-equipped to be productively engaged citizens.”

ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge Presidential Commitment Seal

To date, more than 700 senior leaders across 48 states have risen to the opportunity of prioritizing nonpartisan engagement since 2020. These individuals represent 174 community colleges, 103 Hispanic-Serving Institutions, 27 Historically Black Colleges & Universities, and 59 Asian American and Native American Pacific Islander-Serving Institutions.

By signing the ALL IN Presidents’ Commitment, these individuals have committed to providing their institution with the leadership and support to fully engage in all nonpartisan election- and voting-related learning opportunities, by:

• Becoming ALL IN — Joining the ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge.
• Striving toward Full Student Voter Participation — Designating staff (administration and faculty) to lead efforts to strive for full participation among the campus community.
• Making a Statement — Making visible and public their commitment to nonpartisan engagement to their campuses.

Signatories demonstrate their commitment to nonpartisan democratic engagement through public statements made during graduation and opening convocation ceremonies, all campus emails, alumni magazine updates, and through social media posts. The reason for these steps is to provide tangible ways in which senior leaders can share in the responsibility of their respective institutions having a thriving civic ethos for all of their stakeholders to take part. As said by Yves Salomon-Fernández, President of Urban College of Boston, “ Voting is the most basic level of participation in a democracy. Whether it is mail-in or in person, we need to ensure that our students vote. College prepares students for careers and citizenship. Community college students continue to live in the communities where they go to school well beyond graduation. They are directly impacted by outcomes of the democratic process and have both an opportunity and responsibility to partake in it. ”

President of Swarthmore College, Valerie Smith , Ph.D., with mascot, The Phoenix, pretending to cast a ballot.

While signing the Commitment can seem symbolic in nature, there is a correlation to civic culture on campus. For instance, ALL IN participating campuses that had a signatory to the Presidents’ Commitment in 2020 had a 2020 voter turnout rate that was on average 5.7 percentage point higher than those whose senior leader did not sign the Commitment. Additionally, ALL IN campuses whose president, provost, or chancellor signed ALL IN’s Presidents’ Commitment to Full Voter Participation were more likely to submit an action plan in 2020, 2022, and, so far, for 2024. There’s also a movement across higher education wherein senior leaders are organizing their institutions to proactively support civic engagement — as seen across the SUNY campuses .

With less than 75 days until the 2024 general election on November 5, now is the time for all institutional senior leaders to lean into the commitment of prioritizing nonpartisan engagement. Not only can college and university presidents and chancellors make this priority know by signing onto the Presidents’ Commitment , they can take other actionable steps to ensure their students are ready to vote this fall:

• Empower faculty, staff, and students to explore opportunities to advance nonpartisan college student voter registration, education, turnout, and access together.
• Participate in internship and Federal Work-Study programs to support student development and meet community election needs.
• Listen to campus concerns regarding election regulations (voter ID laws, polling locations, etc.).
• Celebrate the Civic Holidays : National Voter Registration Day on September 17, National Voter Education Week from October 7-11, Vote Early Day on October 29, Election Hero Day on November 4 and Election Day on November 5.
• Join the network of over 1050 institutions — if your campus isn’t already participating — that are in the ALL IN Campus Democracy Challenge working to institutionalize nonpartisan engagement efforts year round.

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Most community college students plan to get 4-year degrees. Few actually do

Dylan Peers McCoy

[WFYI] Community college transfer numbers 

Ever since he was a kid, Tyre’k Swanigan dreamed of going to Indiana University. But after he graduated from high school, he decided to start at community college. He figured he could keep his full-time job and transfer to IU later to earn his bachelor’s degree.

At first, Swanigan, now 23, did well. Then, he said he heard from an IU recruiter that some of his community college credits might not count toward his degree.

College is hard enough — try doing it while raising kids

“I was like, why am I wasting my time at a two-year community college when I know that I need at least a bachelor’s to do anything that I want to do?” said Swanigan, who wants to work in a leadership role at a school.

Swanigan eventually withdrew from the community college. And he’s not alone.

Community college is often touted as an affordable start for students who want to earn bachelor’s degrees. Yet only 13% of community college students actually go on to earn degrees from four-year institutions within eight years, according to data released by the U.S. Department of Education in 2023. Indiana has one of the lowest community college transfer success rates in the nation.

“It's ridiculous,” said Swanigan, who attended Ivy Tech Community College in Indianapolis. “It pisses me off honestly, because I was at Ivy Tech, right? And this is me. Like, this number — I’m a part of that.”

With their open enrollment policies and low tuition, community colleges offer crucial access to higher education. They educate 41% of all U.S. undergraduates, according to the Community College Research Center . And when those students enroll, 83% plan to transfer to four-year schools, according to the Center for Community College Student Engagement.

But that transfer process can be fraught with challenges, including structural barriers that force students to spend time and money taking extra classes.

“Most students leave empty-handed,” said Huriya Jabbar, a professor of education policy at the University of Southern California. “There are bureaucratic hurdles. There are really opaque transfer policies. There's not enough information about … which courses will transfer.”

How the deck is stacked against transfer students

Jabbar co-wrote a book, which will be published in September, about community college transfer students . Her research focused on Texas, where policies vary by institution and major.

“When a student enters community college, they need to know not just what major — area of study — but which university they plan to transfer to,” Jabbar said, “because what they do at the community college to transfer will vary.”

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College advisers are supposed to help students prepare to transfer, making sure they have the right credits for the degree they’re pursuing, and facilitating a smooth transition to a four-year school. But in Texas, Jabbar found that these advisers had large caseloads, which limited their ability to help students. Advisers also struggled to keep up with changes in degree requirements at different institutions, Jabbar said. Sometimes they gave students information that was outdated or wrong.

According to Jabbar, one common problem transfer students face is being forced to take extra classes. That happens when four-year schools don’t give students credit for all the classes they took in community college, or the courses are counted as electives instead of major requirements.

When students lose credits, it’s time-consuming and expensive, said Lorenzo Baber, director of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Office of Community College Research and Leadership.

“That's money,” he said. “That's a couple thousand dollars, which matters.”

Two-thirds of community college students take classes part time . And they often juggle jobs, caregiving and other obligations that can disrupt their education.

Because of that, Baber said, improving transfer success is not just up to higher education institutions. It requires investments in social supports ranging from child care to broadband access to health care. Someone might be forced to leave school, for example, to provide for a sick family member who has limited health care access.

“You could have the best designed programs,” Baber said, “but that gets rendered meaningless if somebody needs to stop out because they need to take a job to pay the bills of their household.”

A transfer policy that could help

Research suggests statewide policies to make transferring easier can help students earn bachelor's degrees and avoid taking unnecessary classes .

In Indiana, where Tyre’k Swanigan lives, community colleges and universities are trying to improve.

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About a decade ago, Indiana lawmakers required public colleges and universities to create transfer pathways for students who complete associate degrees. If an Indiana student earns an associate degree in nursing, for example, they can transfer to a public, four-year university without losing credits, said Mary Jane Michalak, a vice president at Ivy Tech Community College, where Swanigan started.

"Whenever possible we direct students into those pathways,” Michalak said, “because by state law then those credits are supposed to transfer seamlessly as long as it's within the same program."

Other states have created similar transfer policies. In 2010, California created a special associate degree that’s supposed to make it easier for students to transfer. In 2021-22, almost half of the community college students who transferred to four-year colleges in California had those diplomas .

Some Indiana universities and community colleges have partnered up to help make transferring easier for students, an approach that institutions in other states have used . This year, Ivy Tech announced a new dual admission agreement with Indiana University Indianapolis .

But Indiana doesn’t yet know if the state’s efforts to improve transfer success are working. That’s because the federal data published in 2023 — which found that only about 7% of Indiana community college students earn four-year degrees — follows students for eight years. The people it tracked started back in 2014, the year before the state's new transfer pathways kicked in.

Tyre’k Swanigan started college in 2019, and even with the state changes, it hasn’t been easy.

Swanigan almost went back to school this summer. But tuition was expensive. He started a new job. And he was pulling himself out of a difficult relationship.

“The longer I wait and life happens and issues come up,” Swanigan said, “the harder it is to get back into school.”

Five years after Swanigan started college, he’s still determined to earn his bachelor’s degree — eventually.

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What We Know About Kamala Harris’s $5 Trillion Tax Plan So Far

The vice president supports the tax increases proposed by the Biden White House, according to her campaign.

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By Andrew Duehren

Reporting from Washington

In a campaign otherwise light on policy specifics, Vice President Kamala Harris this week quietly rolled out her most detailed, far-ranging proposal yet: nearly $5 trillion in tax increases over a decade.

That’s how much more revenue the federal government would raise if it adopted a number of tax increases that President Biden proposed in the spring . Ms. Harris’s campaign said this week that she supported those tax hikes, which were thoroughly laid out in the most recent federal budget plan prepared by the Biden administration.

No one making less than $400,000 a year would see their taxes go up under the plan. Instead, Ms. Harris is seeking to significantly raise taxes on the wealthiest Americans and large corporations. Congress has previously rejected many of these tax ideas, even when Democrats controlled both chambers.

While tax policy is right now a subplot in a turbulent presidential campaign, it will be a primary policy issue in Washington next year. The next president will have to work with Congress to address the tax cuts Donald J. Trump signed into law in 2017. Many of those tax cuts expire after 2025, meaning millions of Americans will see their taxes go up if lawmakers don’t reach a deal next year.

Here’s an overview of what we now know — and still don’t know — about the Democratic nominee’s views on taxes.

Higher taxes on corporations

The most recent White House budget includes several proposals that would raise taxes on large corporations . Chief among them is raising the corporate tax rate to 28 percent from 21 percent, a step that the Treasury Department estimated could bring in $1.3 trillion in revenue over the next 10 years.

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