Written by
Michael and Shelly Robinson
The American infrastructure is moving away from its post-modern tenets of brut strength as a means of bullying markets, to one where the emerging concept of human capital is taking hold. This shift is shaped by an emerging new world that is flat and where value is found in the intellectual abilities of a nation's workforce (Pusser, et al 2007; Friedman, 2005; Duderstadt, 2000). Friedman (2005) in his book, The World is Flat suggested America’s place in the global economy is not secured. He proclaimed if America hopes to be a competitive nation, it must aspire to send every citizen to college. A sizable task when upon review, one finds no more than 30 percent of the adult population has a bachelor’s degree (Gallagher, 2005).
Intellectual prowess will be the new currency throughout the globe, as it is expected over the next twenty years more than 12 million jobs in America will require postsecondary education (Pusser, et. al, 2005). Increase job creation will therefore drive a need for postsecondary education. The expectation that of the 12 million jobs to developed over the next twenty years as much as 60 percent will require some form of postsecondary training or experience (Gallagher, 2005).
To meet these demands, business and industry are looking to colleges and universities to prepare and equip today’s workforce for tomorrow’s jobs (Carruthers, 2006 as cited in Hunt & Tierney, 2006). To remain competitive on a global scale, nations are building their infrastructure around their human knowledge economy and a competent workforce with transferable skills (Hanna, 2003). For Americans this represents a major challenge in an effort to maintain and continue their economic prosperity, as employers can now locate talented and skilled personnel from anywhere in the world thanks to technology (Herzog, 2006).
Today, America’s workforce is unable to meet the demands and expectations of local or global corporations and in 1985 according to Gallagher (2005) only 25 percent of the population had a college degree, now two decades later that number has only risen to 27 percent. Given these figures there is room for growth and development of educational opportunities for American citizens. A highly trained and educated workforce has been directly linked by economists to a nation’s economic health and stability (Dickens, Sawhill & Tebbs, 2006). Dickens, et al. (2006) further suggested business leaders are embracing the concept of human capital and believe ongoing investment in this area will become more important than investments in their physical capital.
What does this mean for postsecondary education? It may require colleges and universities, particularly community colleges to re-examine how they engage the nation of learners. Public institutions of higher education must be willing to become fully engaged participants in the ongoing shaping of this new postsecondary world (Hanna, 2003).
Hanna supposes if postsecondary education is to be successful in addressing the rapidly materializing challenges and demands of the 21st Century learner, there must be a willingness to modify institutional missions, goals, programs, operations and as an outcome create a flexible and responsive institution. Failure to do so could have dire consequences for the less elite public institutions (Dickens et al 2006). Drucker (1997) said it best when he declared, "Universities won't survive. The future is outside the traditional campus, outside the traditional classroom. Distance learning is coming on fast” (p.45).
