Written by
Mike Robinson
The environment around higher education is changing and as a result so has the needs of students. The demand for college is increasing, while the ability to finance education is shrinking. Without affordable and assessable pathways to higher education the economic well being of America and its citizens cannot be assured. These changes, demands, and expectations are impacting the virtual landscape of higher education in American. They represent several of the primary assertions included in both the 2004 ACCT Environmental Scanning Initiative and the ABG’s 10 Public Policy Issues report.
Changing Demographics
Emerging demographics will continue to place imposing demands on the state and public and private colleges and universities (ABG, 2005). A reality that both the ACCT Environmental Scanning Initiative and the ABG report have identified as a top trend that has major policy implications. ACCT’s (2004) scanning report based on its survey of 212 members indicated that the changing demographics of learners will require an ability of institutions of higher learning to be flexible and capable of responding quickly to their needs. In addition the Scanning report implies that due of the changes in demographics are taking place faster and more often the need to create and understand the diverse learning styles will be essential to an institution’s capability to impact learning.
This sentiment is echoed by the 2005 ABG report, but the ABG report goes slightly further into this area by discussing the need to ensure access is widening for the changing population. According to the ABG’s (2005) report 80 percent of the new students expected to enter higher education starting from 1995 to 2013 will be minorities. While enrollment projections all indicate massive increases in students attending college, the reality of less financial assistance to pay for school is a real threat to access. Lack or limited access to higher education due to shortfalls in state and federal aid is clearly viewed as a major issue impacting the compass of higher education in the view of ABG, which has it a major portion of its top ten trends, and the ACCT Environmental Scanning Initiative.
Governmental Capacity to Assist
Dwindling federal and state support for higher education has been the trend for the past decade and a half. Yet for many the ongoing reduction of fiscal support continues to make the capability of colleges and universities to educate the masses a complex proposition. In the 2004 ACCT Scanning report over 65 percent of the survey respondents indicated governments at all levels struggle to address increasing demands with limited resources, and thereby makes higher education an option for funding not a priority. This issue represented the number one trend to impact higher education, according to ACCT’s 2004 Environment Initiative. Again, the trend while phrase slightly different in the 2005 ABG report ranked high among its major public policy issues.
The ABG report examined the issue of a state’s capacity to establish policy that impact higher education. According to the ABG (2005) report, fiscal uncertainty combined with the lack of clear expectations from state policy makers have impacted the leadership and direction of higher education on a state level. The primary question presented by the ABG report regarding the issue of governmental support is a simple one, “does the public believe that higher education is a public good worth supporting with fiscal mean or do they see it as private good that provides no economic benefit to the state as a whole.”
Extensive and heated debates have occurred in state legislative session regarding this issue, but as indicated in both the 2004 ACCT Scanning and the 2005 ABG reports, higher education expectations from government officials, leaders of business and industry and citizens change often and inasmuch higher education is sometimes left to adjust on its own without guidance or support.
No comments:
Post a Comment