Good afternoon. There are lots of seats in the front and im told one of the seats as tickets underneath it so you need to sit in the front to get the tickets. [laughter] [inaudible conversations] for those that are faculty, give everybody a couple more minutes to just grab a seat. Im the executive dean for administration and finance at the school of engineering and Applied Sciences. In my six years on the institutes of Higher Education is my pleasure to welcome you to this afternoons session and its my honor to introduce the presenter and speaker. Already i started off bad. Associate dean for Academic Affairs and professor ofca education. After receiving his bachelor of arts, he spent the first ten years of his career as a High School Social studies teacher in maryland, california and casablanca morocco. His phd from the university of california berkeley in 2012 and 2013 he received a u. S. State Department Fulbright award to the university of cape town south africa and shes published in the american journal of education diplomatic history, Teachers College record and history of education quarterly is the authoand is the author on education, democracy and the secondnd world war. The most recent book, the common good a new history of Higher Education in america was published this year by Cornell University press and his next book which will be published in the spring is coauthored with university of rochester philosopher and is entitled Patriotic Education in a global age. Please join me in welcoming. Nk[applause] thank you for being here today is my pleasure tit is my pleasun opportunity to address you this afternoon. Earlier this morning i was told the only thingin standing betwen you and the holiday cookies and cocoa is me, 3 00 in the foyer to be precise. So not a good place for the speaker to be so that might be worthwhile to dispense with the pleasantries and get down to business so there isnt a rush out the door. I will do that just by jumping in and beginning to discuss with you today what we all think we know about american Higher Education in the 21st century which is that it is in crisis. There is as you know a financial crisis that is comprised of ever escalating tuition cost and a panic overt. Student at. Theres a crisis of intellectual andom academic freedom. Theres a crisis involving the curriculum itself. It includes issues such as the decline of the humanities and the dominance of Applied Science and Mathematics Technology and engineering. Its being taught and certainly the political orientation of thm Academic Program more broadly. Theres a crisis attributed to the disruption and the possibility that Information Technology has progressed to the point of college has existed for hundreds of years is that an unprecedented moment of profound transformation. Theres a fair amount of reporting and it seems at least in some sectors less concerned. That is the proportional decline of th the enrollmentss in colls and universities with the National Center for Education Statistics predicting that men will comprise trust 40 of Higher Education enrollees by the ear 2020 which may already be the case on some of the campuses. All of this has led some observers to predict the college as we know it and have known it for centuries is coming to an end. Collectively these issues might comprise some kind of crisis but concerning the end of college, those have at their core a fundamental assumption which is these challenges are truly unprecedented, that weve never anything like them before and we simply dont know how to respond. It is my claim today such arguments are truly flawed, so i would like to share an alternative interpretation and historical interpretation of the socalled contemporary crisis in american Higher Education today and how we might think ofnk the issues that the colleges and universities confront not as signs of decline but as historically predictive indicators of growth and transformation. I published a new history of h Higher Education entitled for the common good and i would like to use the research and findings in a the book as a starting poit to take you on a journey back through time through a country called the United States of america. Having just recovered from a severenr recession with the significant and political unrest its armed forces are mired in urban combat zones as a result of the war that was quickly one but never actually ended. Years of dramatic increases have triggered the backlash technological innovation is having a profound influence on the labor market and is disrupting business in important ways. Corporations and commercialism have come to dominate society and as you can imagine, all of this is having an impact on colleges and universities in america. Becoming a bastion of privilege in the delete declining ratings and institutions to take the radical step of imposing the cap on the womens enrollment. It is eating widely reported on demand press leading business figures have voice concerned that students are not learning a whole lot or at the very least what they are learning is irrelevant to the job market especially in such rapidly changing and unsettled times. Whether the University Diploma is still worth the cost and in fact. It lands on the cover of one of the most highly subscribed magazines. It is penned by the former president of the United States. What is the magazinefor it is the saturday evening post. This College Access, effectiveness, relevance, and especially affordability. The obvious question for us today is what can we learn from the ways that americans have responded historically. The answer is in the past when americans became disillusioned with the college as a failed to them which they are barred due to race or gender, religion or they establish an entirely new kinds of institutions beginning with small allmale mostly denominational colleges the college eventually expanded to include Agricultural Colleges, Teacher Education schools, historically black colleges and universities, when in colleges, research universities, military academies and a host of others. Theres institutional types and kinds that have developed over the centuries. All of these institutions grew out of shortcomings that were proof real and perceived in the kind of colleges and universities that came before them and it is important to note central to that appraisal are thetu opportunities that these institutions provided for students personal success. Students have enrolled in colleges for the private, often preprofessional advantages that Higher Education provided. So it was hardly surprising when i conducted the research for my book and i conducted a treasure trove of documents from the early 19th century to early president ial reports that reflectt concerns over Higher Education capacity to foster students personal advancement. What was a bit surprising to learn is that private advantage was mobbed the dominant theme emanating from those archives. Spanning all institutional types and chronological errors it is this fundamental attributes that we need to understand if we want to appreciate what Higher Education in america is today as well as the challenges that it currently confronts so biskupic to the Early National period the opening of the century. The year is 1802, and in a northern non continuous part of the commonwealth of massachusetts called the districtct of maine, people from miles around come to the town of brunswick to witness a very rare occurrence in america, the official opening of the college. It is named in honor of the donors father that we have in the history of giving this into the highlight is the inauguration of the colleges first president ial riverbend and what he has to say on this bright september morning is not specific in fact scholars have interpreted the inaugural address as emblematic of Higher Education at this moment in history. And in referring to the colleges Central Mission he says the inhabitants of the district may have their own sons to fillmo the liberal professios among them and particularly to instruct them in the principles and practice of the religion is topless the object of this institution. So what does he mean by that . The colleges mission is to prepare its male students at the ministry for law, for medicine, teaching and statesmanship for public service. In the present day we would most likely characterize it as preprofessional. But then he says this. It ought to always be remembered that literary institutions are founded and endowed for the common good and not for the private advantage of those that resort to them education, those needed by the public and addition to acquire an education are under peculiar obligations to exert their talents for the public good. 215 years ago he articulated what we understand to be the crux of the challenge that it grapples with today to provide an educatio education that direy relates to the students features including future occupations advancing the common good. You can call the attention thata paradox, contradiction. They used the adjective peculiar to describe it but that is the education in america so what did that look like in practice when they tried to do with . Established during the period with a National Commitment to advance the common good in the et no one a year befor year befe delivered his inaugural address, the governor ofli South Carolina proposed the presentday university of South Carolina in order to foster the good order and the harmony of the whole community. It maintains the purpose of Georgetown University was to promote the grand interest of society. So how do they plan to educate students to advance the common good . s by fostering mental discipline, virtue and integrity. And how do they expect to combat . It was the ancient greeks and romans, the pedagogy was primarily the kind of model and memorization as a way to exercise it or make it stronger. Student life and behavior was highly regulated. All three colleges have lists of rules governing student life where they could be in doubt what kinds, what they could and couldnt wear, the lists are remarkably extensive. The results were mixed at best and i have to say its a bit of a digression but theres never been a golden age in the highers education when austin showed up for class on time, took the studies seriously and did the reading that has never existed. And in fact one could study the history of Higher Education through the tension between the students and faculty. Nevertheless returning to my central claim i would like to note for as many similarities as there were across these institutions and to find the comment that there were regionaa differences. The crucialal example is the approach the outbreak of the civil war South Carolina college adopts in its curriculum a defense of states rights qualifications, slavery and eventually secession, which is certainly never the case and of course many of you have probably been reading about georgetowns investigation into the sale of enslaved people held on marylands Eastern Shore in order to support the college financiallyro which differs from South Carolina and actually had to leave to people on campus and thats contrasted significantly with the college which in 1886 graduate of john brown and the third africanamerican in the United States to receive a college degree. So very important regional differences. But also significant similarities such as overtime and certainly by the 1840s these early cultures are becoming increasingly exclusive. Admissions requirements continue to include proficiency in latin and greek and so continue to frequentlynt benefit privileged applicants who have received private tutoring in the classics, tuition is on the rise so theres increasing concerns in the United States over College Access and affordabili affordability. Simultaneously, theresmu a growing movement questioning the efficacy and effectiveness and relevance of thess classical education especially in the rapidly changing society along with a growing skepticism of the sort of mind and muffled philosophy. The skepticism in particular is part of the movement that changes the political economy including the rise of populism and expanding industrial commercial sectors. Inadvertently, and to the point, credit call into question the capacity to continue to contribute to thehe common good. One result is that a more accessible and affordable Higher Education with a more practical orientation gains a foothold in the United States along with a course of study that can demonstrate some Practical Applications and that new model of Higher Education becomes institutionalized here in america through thetu establishment of colleges and universities devoted to the study of agriculture, mechanics, mining and the military that will either be abbreviated as texas amm as well as Teacher Education which is an element of practical o reform that is often sort of left out of the conversation historically. A way to understand the development is asking for the colleges, berlin, georgetown, South Carolina they begin to change they dont simply give in to the reformers demand and replace the traditional programs with a new educational model. Instead, they slowly adopt the elements of practicality into the program over time. For the reformers however, the process is too slow so the institutional types arrived in america and become a part of american higher. Education. In the book for two examples i provide for the shift towards practicality as th the college f the state of michigan so presentday Michigan University and San Jose State University but of course there are many more and you can probably name some that are established in the antebellum period in the United States with the sort of practical orientations in the u. S. Naval academy would be another one. Im not going to go into a detailed history but let me say this, michigans Agricultural College is the first four year college ifouryearcollege in amt was scientific agriculture in america and becomes the prototype for the nations land grant institutions so when the u. S. Representatives seek the model on which the base of the land grant acts keep books to michigan. This is an institution that is intentionally more accessible to students and eliminates latinna and greek in this form or attentive to theo socioeconomic class than any of the institutions that come before it and it encourages the sons of farmers to apply for instance and provides employment on the colleges experimental forms so that students can pay and work their way through college and it poses a challenge to the traditional Academic Program by offering a practical curriculum things like animal and vegetable physiology, etymology and horticulture. The california state on the other hand is designed to prepare students to become classroom teachers. The named Normal School comes from the french Training Institution into these institutions offer a combination of secondary coursework including practice teaching comprised of grammar schoolage students like michigans Agricultural College they eliminatete in our in this case providing free tuition to students who commit to teaching in a state for a prescribed number of years. Most importantly and unlike michigan in its early years they are open to women providing the first instance of Higher Education being made available on the larg a large scale in th. Now one could imagine that this mix of institutional types, called collegial institutions and could have served the needs for quite some time, but the civil war will provide a turning point in many areas of American Life into th and the political d social changes that result leads to the rise of the commercial ethos in the United States with the historian many years ago labeled in america. Thee effects it will have on Higher Education are quite complex and some of these who yu are already familiar withgh all the people tend to associate them with the post world war ii era. He gives you an example from the economist is sociologist who published a book during this period Higher Learning in america with the conduct of universities by b businessmen to give you an idea of the pieces in the book. You mi