Saturday, December 12, 2009

LACK OF FUNDING ALTERING MISSIONS OF POSTSECONDARY INSTITUTIONS

Written by
Michael A. Robinson

Budget shortfalls have forced many public institutions to develop business behaviors in an effort to keep pace with rising cost of operations and dwindling governmental resources (Dolan, 2005). Behaviors such as hiking student fees to cover additional cost or entering into “questionable” partnerships with those entities who award millions of dollars in federal student aid have become more commonplace in recent years (Dolan, 2005).

Emulating the behaviors of commercially based organizations may or may not be the best direction for community colleges to travel. For some institutions seeking to dwell in the free-market is not an option, but is directly tied to the lost of their governmental funding (Eckel & King, 2004). According to the authors “many believe that the marketplace has overtaken state government as the dominant external force shaping (and reshaping) higher education” (p.19). If this is truly the case, is there any wonder why many community colleges as are other public institutions becoming more entrepreneurial “ in style and substance” (Breneman, 2005, p.3).

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