R SPECIAL ISSUE THE BIG PICTURE Assessing the Future of Higher Education Winter 2014 CARNEGIE CORPORATION OF NEW YORK vol. 7/no. 3 American Higher Education: to the An Obligation Future by VARTAN G RE G ORIA N, President, Carnegie Corporation of New York In recent years, there The specifics are indeed eye-opening. They reveal that has been a debate raging over the long-term, humanities graduates actually fare better among policymakers, than their peers who are focused on particular professional students, educators, con- fields. Upon graduating from college, those who majored in cerned parents, and many the humanities and social science made, on average, $26,271 others about the purpose in 2010 and 2011, slightly more than those in science and of higher education: is mathematics but less than those in engineering and in profes- it meant to help develop sional and pre-professional fields. However, by their peak an inquiring mind and a earning age of 56 to 60, these individuals earned $66,185, deep appreciation for the putting them about $2,000 ahead of professional and pre- value of how knowledge professional majors in the same age bracket.2 Further, em- enriches one’s lifelong ployers want to hire men and women who have the ability to personal and professional think and act based on deep, wide-ranging knowledge. For achievements or should example, the report finds that 93 percent of employers agree it be simply focused on that candidates’ demonstrated capacity to think critically, gaining the skills to pur- communicate clearly, and solve complex problems is more sue a well-paying career? important than their undergraduate major, and 55 percent PHOTO BY MICHAEL FALCO In other words, we seem said that what they wanted from potential employees was to have divided higher education into a black-and-white sce- both field-specific knowledge and skills and a broad range nario 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 Students do not have to make else he or she graduates from college and immediately plunges artificial choices between into the world of technologically complex, high-stakes, high- financial-reward work and becomes a “great success.” what they want to know Perhaps the time has come to reconsider that either-or proposition about higher education. The issue is too complex about the world and the skills to be addressed in such a simplified manner. For example, as a new study1 from the Association of American Colleges and they need to succeed in it. Universities (AACU) reports, “Students, parents, and poli- cymakers interested in the ‘return on investment’ of college of knowledge and skills. Even more evidence of hiring man- education [often assume] that a major in a liberal arts field agers’ interest in richly educated individuals is the finding has a negative effect on employment prospects and earnings that four out of five employers agree that all students should potential.” But the AACU study makes clear there is com- acquire broad knowledge in the liberal arts and sciences.3 pelling evidence that a liberal arts degree continues to be All this is heartening news in that it reminds us that the a sound investment, especially in these difficult economic current generation of students—and those who follow after times. The facts show that compared to students who major them—do not have to make artificial choices between what in professional, preprofessional, or STEM fields, liberal arts they want to know about the world and the skills they need to majors fare very well in terms of both earnings and long- succeed in it. But there are some who are still not persuaded term career success. (Continued on page 83) 1 How Liberal Arts and Sciences Majors Fare in Employment: A Report on Earnings and Long-Term Career Paths, by Debra Humphries and Patrick Kelly, published by the Association of American Colleges and Universities. 2 “Humanities Majors Don’t Fare As Badly As Portrayed, New Earnings Report Says,” HuffPost College, January 23, 2014. 3 Op. cit. How Liberal Arts and Sciences Majors Fare in Employment. Winter 2014 CARNEGIE CORPORATION OF NEW YORK vol. 7/no. 3 R S P ECIAL ISSUE 2 The Soul of the University, by Nicholas Lemann THE BIG PICTURE The Big Picture 7 Paying for Higher Education and Research, by Don M. Randel Assessing the Future of Higher Education Assessing the Future of Higher Education 12 A New Strategy to Maintain America’s Position of Global Preeminence, Winter 2014 CARNEGIE CORPORATION OF NEW YORK vol. 7/no. 3 by Robert Birgeneau 14 Never Eat Your Seed Corn, by Clifton R. Wharton, Jr. 16 For What It’s Worth, by Amy Gutmann 22 Better, More Affordable Colleges Start Online, by L. Rafael Reif 24 Recognizing the Real and the Potential: Fields Medal for Mathematical Efforts 25 American Academia’s Nobel History 33 The Real Crisis in Higher Education, by John L. Hennessy 35 The Liberal Arts and Presidential Leadership, by Nannerl O. Keohane 40 Can We Meet the Challenge? by Mary Sue Coleman 42 Are Our Colleges and Universities Failing Us? by John Etchemendy 57 Research Universities: American Exceptionalism? by Henry Rosovsky 62 A 21st Century Education: What Do Students Need to Know? by Richard Ekman 65 Research Universities Power U.S. Innovation and Prosperity, by Phyllis Wise 68 Higher Education in a Global, Digital Information Economy, by Arthur Levine 73 Fault Lines in the Compact: Higher Education and the Public Interest in the U.S., by Ronald J. Daniels, Phillip M. Spector, and Rebecca Goetz Note: The online version of this magazine can be found at higheredreporter.carnegie.org/ About This Issue For the past two years, Carnegie Corpora- challenges and opportunities of the 21st cen- of the Carnegie Reporter, which is devoted tion and TIME Magazine have co-hosted a tury. Leaders from higher education, state to articles, speeches and essays by some of summit on higher education. In the fall of and federal government, philanthropy, and America’s top educators whose opinions and 2013, the focus of the gathering was on the business discussed and debated the future points of view address aspects of higher edu- American university as a driver of research of America’s great research universities and cation that continue to concern us all. and education for the nation, threats to the related issues affecting higher education. To university’s continued excellence, and ideas continue and expand those discussions, the E LEANOR L ERMAN , Director, Public for innovation and reinvention to meet the Corporation is presenting this special issue Affairs and Publications Cover photo © Peathegee Inc/Blend Images/Corbis by NICHOLAS LEMANN, Professor of Journalism and Dean Emeritus, Columbia Journalism School The Soul of the UNIVERSITY R The two most important develop- states the importance of the research- rest of the world has to operate. Some ments in American higher education in university model, because the core of of their work is subsidized directly, by the twentieth century were, arguably, the faculty and senior administration at the federal government and by private contradictory. First, building on the hundreds more higher education insti- donors, but they also live under the foundation laid by the Morrill Act of tutions hold doctoral degrees and oper- economic protection that very large and 1862, which gave federal land to states ate within the academic tenure system successful institutions can provide to to create colleges that taught “agricul- that lies at the heart of the way research some of their component parts. ture and the mechanic arts,” we created universities are run. I have an immigrant’s perspective the world’s first mass higher education For many people who have spent on higher education, having spent most system. When the Carnegie Corporation their lives working in higher education, of my adult life working for news or- was founded, fewer than 3 percent of mass higher education and research uni- ganizations and then, through a series Americans between the ages of 18 versities make for a perfect fit: together of happy accidents, having become a and 24 were students in institutions of they express both the public service and dean at a major research university in higher education. About 350,000 young the intellectual ambitions of educators. middle age. No matter how much you Americans were enrolled in fewer than And during most of the twentieth cen- think you understand how central re- 1,000 institutions of higher education. tury, especially the years between 1950 search is to the university, you can’t A hundred years later, more than 35 and 1975, the two big ideas grew and truly feel its centrality until you have percent of 18-to-24-year-olds are en- flourished in tandem. But they aren’t experienced university life from the in- rolled, and about two-thirds of high the same idea. Mass higher education, side, at a fairly high level. Of the many school graduates immediately go on to conceptually, is practical, low-cost, stakeholder groups in higher education, get more education. The United States skills-oriented, and mainly concerned the most powerful, at least at research has 20 million students in 4,500 institu- with teaching. It caught on because universities, is the tenured faculty, and tions of higher education. state legislatures and businesses saw it the ticket for admission to that group is Second, building on the founda- as a means of economic development first-rate research. Very-high-achieving tion laid by the establishment of Johns and a supplier of personnel, and be- people who have devoted the main en- Hopkins University in 1876, American cause families saw it as a way of en- ergies of their careers to research, and higher education has embraced the suring a place in the middle class for who use evaluations of research qual- idea of the research university as its their children.