The root problem of public universities is not that they keep losing public funds, although this is a destructive symptom. The root problem is that voters don’t know why public universities need public money. Legislators, business executives, and most public-university officials, too, either don’t know or aren’t saying. Why are public universities resting on public funds? Because only this combination supports the mass creativity on which a successful “innovation economy” depends. Although nearly all policy makers say they want an innovation economy, they are trying to get it in the wrong way… We should support a version of the innovation economy that is egalitarian and democratic—that develops craft and skill widely in the population, then puts it to use via mass employment. We need to side with the broad majority that has been damaged by economic concentration, and help solve, rather than perpetuate, the problems of our current plutocratic version of the innovation economy. Finally, we must explain clearly and constantly why only broad public financial support can create such broad public educational benefits.

Read full article [here].
by Christopher Newfield, The Chronicle of Higher Education.

Posted: August 28th, 2011, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.