Estados Unidos se ocupa de su Educación Superior

Noviembre 22, 2012

Una propuesta como ésta a que se refiere el siguiente artículo está también a la orden del día para Chile, en el año 2013. De lo contrario volverá el clima hostil que enfrente a los estudiantes con el gobierno, a los rectores del CRUCH con el resto, a las instituciones estatales y las privadas con subisidio del Estado, a las comunidades científicas con las autoridades públicas del financiamiento de las ciencias, etc.

Carnegie Leader Calls for Presidential Commission to Guide Higher Education's Future

By Goldie Blumenstyk, The Chronicle of Higher Education, November 21, 2012

The influential president of the Carnegie Corporation is working to build support for a new national commission of educators, business people, and civic leaders to be convened by President Obama "to work on the challenges facing higher education."

Carnegie's Vartan Gregorian says a presidential-level commission in 2013 could have the same kind of impact on the next few decades that the Truman Commission had after 1947. That commission led to the growth of community colleges, an expansion of adult-education programs, and the creation of other efforts that broadened educational access for post-World War II America.

Then, says Mr. Gregorian, "the nation was ready for direction." Today, he argues, such direction is needed again, even as state and national policy makers face daunting financial challenges. The Civil War didn't keep the nation from enacting the Morrill Act to create land-grant colleges, notes Mr. Gregorian, a former head of the New York Public Library and of Brown University, and the nation's current budgetary and debt issues shouldn't discourage leaders from acting today.

Higher education today faces no shortage of commissions, conferences, and convenings. Carnegie, in fact, co-sponsored one just last month in New York with Time magazine, Time Warner Inc., and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, a "summit" on college costs, access, technology, and internationalization where the idea for a new presidential commission first was raised publicly.

The daylong summit (at which this reporter participated as a moderator) drew about 100 high-level attendees from colleges, associations, and business. Mr. Gregorian said on Tuesday that he was now in the process of contacting all of them, first among them Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, to assess their support for a presidential commission.

"It was obvious" from that summit, he said, that "the time has come for us to give coherence" to the diverse pieces of the American education system. "Otherwise, we have people competing against each other" for scarce resources.
A 'Perfect Moment'

Mindful of the kind of intramural infighting among sectors of higher education that has marred past campaigns for college initiatives, Mr. Gregorian said he envisioned a commission with the role of showing the nation how all kinds of colleges can serve society, and vice versa, "not to pit privates versus publics versus community colleges."

It should be a chance, he said, for "a dialogue not with each other but with the nation."

Arthur Levine, president of the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation, in Washington, and a summit participant, said on Tuesday that this "watershed" period was a "perfect moment for a presidential commission."

More than a forum for debate over what to spend on higher education and where, Mr. Levine said a commission could help policy makers understand how higher education needs to change in light of "profound changes" now occurring in society.

"The demographics are different, the technology is different, the economy is different," and the global context has changed, Mr. Levine said. But the nation's higher-education system was "built for a national, analog, and industrial economy."

Donald E. Heller, a higher-education expert who has studied the impact of the Truman Commission, said a panel "having that kind of visibility" today with presidential appointees could be useful. For one, said Mr. Heller, dean of the college of education at Michigan State University, it could help focus attention on ways to curtail the competition for students through student aid, a practice that many cite as an unhealthy driver of rising college costs.

The federal role in higher education was minimal under President Truman and is much more extensive now, Mr. Heller noted, so the focus of a national commission today would probably be "on how that involvement needs to change." What's also different: the existence of so many associations and organizations representing various higher-education interests.

"That means the process will be a lot messier than it was in 1947, when there was bare ground," said Mr. Heller.

College leaders are still debating the impact of the national commission convened by Education Secretary Margaret Spellings during the administration of President George W. Bush, which concluded its work in 2006 with a call for greater access, affordability, and accountability.
'A Big Idea'

In interviews, Mr. Gregorian said only a national commission established by the president would generate the kind of attention and urgency that the circumstances demanded for the nation to keep its competitive edge. Already, said Mr. Gregorian, high-tech companies that need employees with scientific know-how are filling their gaps with employees on green cards. "We have to cultivate our own," he said.

Yet he said he hoped the commission would look more broadly at the role of higher education as well. "All the attention on jobs is not enough. The Soviet Union had full employment," he said. "We need to strengthen not just our training and education but also our citizenship." The former Supreme Court justice Sandra Day O'Connor introduced the summit with a plea for more education around civic engagement.

The Carnegie Corporation and the other powerful philanthropy involved in the summit, the Gates foundation, have made no secret of their interest in a grand follow-up. In a special issue of Time published the week of the summit, the two organizations placed a series of full-page advertisements celebrating "milestones" in higher-education history linked to presidents: the 1862 signing of the Morrill Act by Abraham Lincoln; Franklin D. Roosevelt's signing of the GI Bill, in 1944; Harry S. Truman's establishment of the Commission on Higher Education, in 1946, and the National Science Foundation, in 1950; and Lyndon B. Johnson's signing of the Higher Education Act of 1965.

The issue of Time also has a page for 2013, urging "the next president" to mobilize all segments of society, including colleges and universities, to help preserve America's strength as a democracy, resilience as a nation, and competitiveness in a global economy.

Thanks to his decades in public life, Mr. Gregorian has one of the most enviable Rolodexes in the country. In a letter to summit participants dated a week after the presidential election, Mr. Gregorian said he would be "exploring with colleagues and with various government officials about the desirability and the feasibility of establishing a President Truman-style" commission.

And if the reaction of one key attendee is any indication, he may have some work ahead of him. Molly Corbett Broad, president of the American Council on Education, said on Tuesday that she appreciated that "this is a big idea," but wanted to hear more about what Mr. Gregorian had in mind before she would say what she thought of its merits.

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