Southern Exposure A Look at Mississippi’s Public Colleges and Universities AMERICAN COUNCIL OF TRUSTEES AND ALUMNI and MISSISSIPPI CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY Photo: Lyceum Building, University of Mississippi, Oxford, Mississippi Image courtesy of Historic American Buildings Survey—HABS © American Council of Trustees and Alumni 2020. All rights reserved. Southern Exposure A Look at Mississippi’s Public Colleges and Universities a report by the American Council of Trustees and Alumni and Mississippi Center for Public Policy February 2020 Acknowledgments This report on the eight public four-year undergraduate institutions in the state of Mississippi was prepared by the staff of the American Council of Trustees and Alumni, primarily Dr. Michael Poliakoff, Armand Alacbay, Esq., Dr. Jonathan Pidluzny, and Ian Cook, with the assistance of the Mississippi Center for Public Policy. The American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) is an independent nonprofit dedicated to academic freedom, academic excellence, and accountability at America’s colleges and universities. Since its founding in 1995, ACTA has counseled boards, educated the public, and published reports about such issues as good governance, historical literacy, core curricula, the free exchange of ideas, and accreditation. ACTA has previously published Best Laid Plans: The Unfulfilled Promise of Public Higher Education in California; The Diffusion of Light and Education: Meeting the Challenges of Higher Education in Virginia; Prepared in Mind and Resources? A Report on Public Higher Education in South Carolina; Made in Maine: A State Report Card on Public Higher Education; Here We Have Idaho: A State Report Card on Public Higher Education; At a Crossroads: A Report Card on Public Higher Education in Minnesota; For the People: A Report Card on Public Higher Education in Illinois; Show Me: A Report Card on Public Higher Education in Missouri; Shining the Light: A Report Card on Georgia’s System of Public Higher Education; and Governance in the Public Interest: A Case Study of the University of North Carolina System, among other state-focused reports. The mission of the Mississippi Center for Public Policy is to advance the constitutional ideals of liberty and justice for all Mississippians by employing an evidenced-based approach to public policy whereby the Center advocates for and advances true conservative ideas with policymakers, members of the media, business leaders, the academic community, and private citizens. For further information, please contact: American Council of Trustees and Alumni Mississippi Center for Public Policy 1730 M Street NW, Suite 600 520 George Street Washington, DC 20036 Jackson, MS 39202 Phone: 202.467.6787 • Fax: 202.467.6784 Phone: 601.969.1300 GoACTA.org • [email protected] mspolicy.org • [email protected] CONTENTS Executive Summary 1 Academic Strength 1. What are students learning? 4 Intellectual Diversity 2. Do schools promote a free exchange of ideas? 10 Cost & Effectiveness . 3 How much are students paying? 19 4. Where is the money going? 24 5. Are students completing their programs? 38 Governance 6. Is Mississippi’s higher education governance structure effective? 41 Recommendations 46 Appendices Appendix A: Evaluation Criteria for Core Courses 49 Appendix B: School Evaluation Notes for Core Courses 51 End Notes 52 Our society is growing ever more complex, requiring greater skill and knowledge from its public servants, its professionals, its executives, and its citizens. In such an environment, the moment has surely come for “America’s colleges to take a more candid look at their weaknesses and think more boldly about setting higher educational standards for themselves. —Derek Bok, President Emeritus, Harvard University, in Our Underachieving Colleges (Princeton: Princeton” University Press, 2006) EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Executive Summary he Board of Trustees of the Mississippi • Graduation rates among several IHL universities TState Institutions of Higher Learning (IHL) are unacceptably low. governs the state’s eight public universities. The • Athletic expenditures at the University of board is ultimately accountable to the people of Mississippi (Ole Miss) and Mississippi State Mississippi and bears the responsibility for effectively University have skyrocketed, outpacing many communicating the accomplishments, value, needs, schools throughout the nation. Some of and challenges of Mississippi’s public universities. Mississippi’s smaller schools have tried to keep This state report, one of many produced by the pace, passing on these costs to their students. American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA), • No school in Mississippi currently requires all examines the performance of the Board of Trustees of its students to complete a course in American the Mississippi State Institutions of Higher Learning government or history. This deficit inevitably and the schools under its authority. We will use four diminishes graduates’ ability to participate general metrics—Academic Strength, Intellectual effectively in our democratic republic. Diversity, Cost & Effectiveness, and Governance—to assess the overall quality of higher education in the • Although free speech policies at most Mississippi state of Mississippi, and we make recommendations universities are appropriate, this is not the case for ways that the IHL can strengthen the institutions at the state flagship. Ole Miss has a Bias Incident it governs. Response Team with highly disturbing implications for freedom of expression and the due process Key findings and recommendations in this report are: rights of students. • The rising cost of college is a problem nationwide. • None of the IHL schools have yet adopted Although, currently, IHL schools have tuition the Chicago Principles, a commitment to the costs below the national average, the IHL has importance of the unfettered and unobstructed important choices to make if it is to continue to pursuit of truth and knowledge as the defining provide an affordable education to its students. value of a college or university. The Chicago • Faculty salaries have stagnated, making it more Principles are widely seen as the gold standard difficult to retain top talent, while the salaries of for protecting free inquiry and free expression on administrators such as the chancellor or president college campuses, and Mississippi needs to join have grown consistently. other eminent universities and university systems that have made this important public commitment. A REPORT BY THE AMERICAN COUNCIL OF TRUSTEES AND ALUMNI and MISSISSIPPI CENTER FOR PUBLIC POLICY 1 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY • The voting record of the IHL Board of the possibility that there is insufficient Trustees shows little evidence of disagreement transparency, debate, and analysis in decision on the important business of the IHL, raising making. • 2 SOUTHERN EXPOSURE A LOOK AT MISSISSIPPI’S PUBLIC COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES Academic Strength WHAT ARE STUDENTS LEARNING? What are students 1. learning? ccording to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 36% found college graduates to be well-prepared to A between the ages of 18 and 52, Americans can address this need.3 By providing students with a solid anticipate changing jobs an average of 12 times.1 grounding in a broad range of liberal arts subjects, In these dynamic economic circumstances, a well- in addition to their specialized area of study, colleges constructed and well-taught core curriculum offers and universities can ensure that their graduates have significant advantages. Students who have been a leg-up in the job market.4 Alumni retrospectively exposed to a broad array of liberal arts subjects, from report high levels of appreciation for challenging and literature to economics to foreign language, will be rigorous curricula. According to a survey of 5,100 better-prepared for an evolving workplace where they recent graduates, those who “strongly agree” that will need multiple skill sets, strong critical thinking “they were challenged academically” were 2.4 times abilities, and wide-ranging knowledge. In particular, more likely to answer that “their education was worth employers are interested in hiring “expert learners,” the cost” and 3.6 times more likely to respond that the kind of graduates who have the inclination and “they were prepared for life outside of college.”5 ability to learn new skills that help their business or While far too many schools fail to require even organization effectively adapt to a rapidly-changing elementary-level foreign language courses, a study by economy. A rigorous and coherent general education the Hamilton Project and the Brookings Institution has been shown to help develop these abilities and found that graduates who majored in foreign cultivate “lifelong learning orientations.”2 languages other than French, German, and Latin frequently went into law and made almost double that A 2018 study by Hart Research Associates on of a graduate with a pre-law degree.6 behalf of the Association of American Colleges and Universities found that, when considering potential The analysis in this section follows that of ACTA’s hires, 90% of executives and hiring managers value What Will They Learn?® annual survey of collegiate effective oral communication, 84% value ethical general education requirements. Instead of evaluating judgment and decision making, 76% value written America’s colleges and universities on the basis of communication skills, and 73% value the ability their prestige or their reputation for research, we have