Higher Education Policy

Biden’s victory means a reboot of US higher education policy

John Aubrey Douglass
Richard Edelstein
2020

Blue versus red states: Higher education policy-making in the US

John Aubrey Douglass
2023

New ideas in the face of rankings and ‘world class’ fatigue

John Aubrey Douglass
2023

Universities can expect a frontal attack if Trump returns

John Aubrey Douglass
2024

Earning My Degree: Memoirs of an American University President

David P. Gardner
2005

Dynamics of the Contemporary University

Neil Smelser
2013

This book is an expanded version of the Clark Kerr Lectures of 2012, delivered by Neil Smelser at the University of California at Berkeley in January and February of that year. The initial exposition is of a theory of change—labeled structural accretion—that has characterized the history of American higher education, mainly (but not exclusively) of universities. The essence of the theory is that institutions of higher education progressively add functions, structures, and constituencies as they grow, but seldom shed them, yielding increasingly complex structures. The...

Dynamics of the Contemporary University: Growth, Accretion, and Conflict by Neil J. Smelser (2013)

Neil J. Smelser
2013
This book is an expanded version of the Clark Kerr Lectures of 2012, delivered by Neil Smelser at the University of California at Berkeley in January and February of that year. The initial exposition is of a theory of change—labeled structural accretion—that has characterized the history of American higher education, mainly (but not exclusively) of universities. The essence of the theory is that institutions of higher education...

Openness and Globalization in Higher Education: The Age of the Internet, Terrorism, and Opportunity

Charles M. Vest
2006

Charles Vest gave the second of three Clark Kerr Lectures on the Role of Higher Education in Society on April 21, 2005 on the Santa Barbara campus. The Age of the Internet presents remarkable opportunities for higher education and research in the United States and throughout the world. The rise of a meta-university of globally shared teaching materials and scholarly archives, undergirding campuses everywhere, both rich and poor, could well be a dominant, democratizing aspect of the next few decades. Even as we develop the meta-university and other forms of digitally empowered...

Federal, State, and Local Governments: University Patrons, Partners, or Protagonists?

Charles M. Vest
2006

Charles Vest gave the first of three Clark Kerr Lectures on the Role of Higher Education in Society on April 19, 2005 on the Berkeley campus. This essay argues that research-intensive public and private universities increasingly have far more similarities than differences in missions, structures, and even financial support. For both, the federal government, despite numerous tensions, remains our indispensable partner. At the same time, the role of state governments toward their public universities has evolved from that of patron to that of partner — sometimes a minor partner...

The Effects of a Changing Financial Context on the University of California

Gerald R. Kissler
Ellen Switkes
2005

California’s loss of capital gains and stock options revenue during the recent economic downturn was one of the worst in the nation, and the resulting fiscal crisis led to reductions in State appropriations to the University of 15% over the past four years, while enrollments grew by 19%. This article examines the effects of this reduction in State funding and outlines the actions taken by the University of California to minimize the impact of these reductions in State funding. Despite sharp increases, student tuition and fee increases offset less than one-third of the total cut....