Why Flagship Public Universities Should Stay Public

[marmar]

from the Chronicle of Higher Education:



Why Flagship Public Universities Should Stay Public
By Kevin Carey


Two years ago, I traveled to the University of Wisconsin at Madison to give a lecture on the obligations of flagship universities. I had recently returned from a vacation in Turkey and was thinking of the library in Topkapi Palace, where the best and brightest Christian students from throughout the Ottoman Empire were brought to study in comfort and splendor behind high walls that overlooked the Sea of Marmara and Constantinople below. As one historian said, "Theirs was pride of the most splendid and forgivable sort; for they were fitted to rule."

Madison, I knew, had plenty of cause for pride, too. Walk the campus and you'll see everything a Midwestern flagship should have and be: crew teams slicing across Lake Mendota; the iconic, castellated Red Gym; a sign commemorating the invention of vitamin D milk. But the best public universities, I argued, had responsibilities beyond their high walls. Great societies could no longer educate only the chosen few. Flagships were blessed with the most of everything: money, talent, and acclaim. They needed to do more to help the regional public universities and community colleges that most students attend.

Somehow, my short talk delivered to perhaps 50 people did not fundamentally change the mind-set of Madison's administration. Earlier this year, as the nation watched tens of thousands of citizens rally to protest Gov. Scott Walker's assault on collective bargaining, another drama was playing out a few blocks from the Wisconsin Capitol. Biddy Martin, then chancellor, was trying to broker a deal with Walker to cut Madison loose from the University of Wisconsin system.

She wasn't alone. Across the country, flagship public universities are trying to disentangle themselves from their obligations to the states that created them. In New York, the research campuses want more flexibility to set (that is, raise) tuition. In Michigan, lawmakers have floated the idea of privatizing the Ann Arbor campus. University of California campuses, and particularly Berkeley, are enrolling more students from out of state. The University of Virginia went semiprivate years ago. ...............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://chronicle.com/article/Why-Flagship-Public/128542/?sid=cr&utm_source=cr&utm_medium=en