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23 décembre 2011

Radical reform of higher education is inevitable

http://www.chron.com/img/modules/siteheader/brand.pngBy RONALD L. TROWBRIDGE. Radical reform of higher education is coming whether we like it not. Clayton Christensen of the Harvard Business School argues that "disruptive innovation" will inevitably radically reform higher ed. Michael Horn, co-author with Christensen of several studies on higher ed, predicts: "I wouldn't be surprised if in 10 to 15 years, half of the institutions of higher education will have either merged or gone out of business." This change will not seriously affect upper elite colleges and universities because there will always be enough wealthy students to attend these prestigious schools - and image does matter.
What are the causes behind disruptive innovation? Consider the following:

It now costs more to send two kids to a university than to buy a nice home. Students entering, say, the University of Texas at Austin will pay about $160,000 over five years, less any government subsidies. Tuition and fees at the 10 largest universities in Texas have risen by 120 percent over the past decade. Data from the U.S. Department of Education indicate that the average full-time student in a public university in Texas takes more than five years to graduate. And data from the Project on Student Debt projects that students nationwide graduating in 2012 will on average have outstanding loans near $29,000, which with interest approaches $40,000. The Educational Credit Management Corp. reports that about 72,000 federal-loan borrowers filed for bankruptcy in 2008. What's more, a recent Pew Research Center study revealed that 57 percent of potential students said that the higher ed system fails to provide good value for the money, and 75 percent said college is unaffordable.
But there's another immense cause for disruptive innovation: Universities by de facto action are agents of class warfare. An October study by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) entitled "Cheap for Whom?" finds: "Average taxpayers provide more in subsidies to elite public and private schools than to the less competitive schools where their own children are likely being educated."
The disparity between rich and poor is shocking. Reports AEI, "Among not-for-profit institutions, the amount of taxpayer subsidies hovers between $1,000 and $2,000 per student per year until we turn to the most selective institutions ... Among these already well-endowed institutions, the taxpayer subsidy jumps substantially to more than $13,000 per student per year."
It has become a caste system. AEI asserts, "If the country is to retain its competitive edge, it must reverse the current policies that result in providing the lowest levels of taxpayer support to the institutions that enroll the highest percentage of low-income, nontraditional and minority students - the fastest growing segments of the population."
So if half of all institutions of higher ed either merge or go out of business in 10 to 15 years, having priced themselves out of the market, where will the majority of students be educated? They will be educated at community colleges or for-profit career schools. They will resort to online learning, or to "blended learning," or to "distance learning." These methods are not a second-class education. In a recently released, in-depth study of career schools in Texas, The Perryman Group found, "Private career colleges and schools play a key role in helping prepare Texans for the jobs of the future." It also found, about 70 percent of the most recent graduates from private career colleges and schools were immediately employed in a related field. Furthermore, the total cost of training a typical worker is approximately 20 percent lower in a private career college relative to a public community college.
This process of disruptive innovation is similar to what the economist Joseph Schumpeter called "creative destruction" - ultimately a wider benefit to society. The automobile industry destroyed the horse-and-buggy industry, enabling a vastly wider societal gain. Much of the higher ed establishment will be destroyed, but in its place will come forms of education that will benefit far more students. Trowbridge is a senior fellow at the Center for College Affordability and Productivity, an independent research center based in Washington, D.C. He lives in Conroe.
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