Higher Education: Open for Business - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 073911848X ISBN 13: 9780739118481

Publisher: Lexington Books, 2007

Synopsis

Higher Education: Open for Business addresses a problem in higher learning, which is newly recognized in the academic spotlight: the overcommercialization of higher education. The book asks that you, the reader, think about the following: Did you go to a Coke or Pepsi school? Do your children attend a Nike or Adidas school? Is the college in your town a Dell or Gateway campus? These questions should not be a primary concern for students, parents or faculty in an environment that has to allow students to freely focus on learning. But in a time of fiscal uncertainty, can higher education ignore the benefits of commercial ventures? It may seem foolish to do so. However, commercialism has gotten too close to certain aspects of academia such as the campus environment, classroom activities, academic research, and college sports. This disturbing encroachment of academic ground is addressed in Higher Education: Open for Business by a diverse host of authors who are closely involved in higher learning.

About this title

About the Author

Christian Gilde is an instructor and research associate at the University of Bath.

Review

In the 1960s, two significant events occurred. In 1963, Clark Kerr, president of the University of California, invented the concept of the multiversity in his book The Uses of the University. By that concept, Kerr meant an institution that was becoming increasingly indistinguishable from any other business enterprise in our industrial society, 'a mechanism held together by administrative rules and powered by money.' Second, in 1966, Ronald Reagan ran for governor on a platform that included 'cleaning up the mess in Berkeley.' When Reagan became president of the United States in the 1980s, a movement began to privatize and corporatize functions and institutions previously thought of as public, fueled by the questionable belief that the for-profit sector could do it less expensively and more efficiently. The chapters found in Higher Education explore the negative consequences of these trends upon colleges and universities and highlight important issues that have largely been ignored. (Ritchie P. Lowry, professor of sociology, Boston College, and author of Good Money: A Guide to Profitable Social Investing in the '90s)

The ever-growing power of the market ethic as a touchstone for university decision-making is transforming higher education. This provocative book casts a critical eye at how market values increasingly predominate across the campus landscape: in the science labs and on the athletic fields, in admissions offices and presidents' offices. For anyone who's troubled by the idea that higher education is losing sight of its true calling―the cultivation of knowledge―Higher Education delivers a confirmation and a call to arms. (David L. Kirp, professor of public policy, University of California-Berkeley, and author of Shakespeare, Einstein, and the Bottom Line: The Mar)

The book will be useful, particularly in graduate-level courses in higher education. Summing Up: Recommended. (R.O. Ulin, emeritus, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill CHOICE)

The general issues raised by the authors are important ones. (Journal of Higher Education, January / February 2009)

A penetrating look at how and why our higher education system is becoming increasingly commercialzed, coupled with some wise advice concerning what we might do about it. (Alexander W. Astin, Allan M. Cartter Professor Emeritus at the University of California, Los Angeles and Founding Director of the Higher Education R)

Edition details

• Publisher: Lexington Books
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 073911848X
• ISBN 13: 9780739118481
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 196
• Editor: Gilde Christian