In the last blog post I passed over a few foundations that have helped liberal education by focusing on certain well defined areas.  One such example is the Henry Luce Foundation, run by a talented and deeply committed president, Michael Gilligan.

Carols Schneider of the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) reminded me that the Luce  Foundation has supported their LEAP initiative, a crucial part in the effort to strengthen liberal education.   Moreover, two-thirds of Luce’s  grants in the past decade have gone directly to American colleges and universities or to organizations like AAC&U that support them.   Michael Gilligan assures me  that the Luce Foundation “remains very committed to higher education in this country, with a particular focus on scholarship and leadership development in the humanities and social sciences, reflected primarily in our program areas (American art, Asian studies, religion and international affairs, theology, and women in STEM disciplines … We’re proud of our continued focus [in these areas].”

And rightly so!   It’s a strong record and deserves recognition.  I wish there were more foundations that had an equally strong record. 

 

Not so many years ago if you had a good idea for strengthening liberal education you could turn to  the Carnegie Corporation, the Ford Foundation, Knight, MacArthur, Pew, Rockefeller and maybe a few other big national foundations.  To judge from recent grant making patterns, don’t waste your time with them now.  They’ve gone off in other directions – or just bogged down in their bureaucracies.  Maybe they do other wonderful things, but not helping  liberal education when it really needs help.  

I find two more recent entries into  higher education grant making  equally discouraging – Gates and Lumina. Both seem to be op-down organizations. They know best.  If you want to do what they have in mind, maybe they will let you do it, on their terms.  But  don’t expect them to spend much time listening.

That leaves The Andrew W. Mellon as the one big national foundation with a convincing track record in liberal education.

At a smaller level but, I believe, with a remarkable ability to “do a lot with a little” is the New York based  Teagle Foundation.  I had great fun there as president  and my successor, Rich Morrill,  kept the focus on using evidence to improve student learning in the liberal arts and sciences. Teagle has always wanted to listen to the ideas from smart people at less affluent colleges and universities.  That’s why it is such good news that the Teagle Foundation has named Judith Shapiro, the former president of Barnard College as its new president.

For more information on Judith and the Teagle Foundation  see:

http://www.teaglefoundation.org/About/News/Press-Release?id=1032

The interesting thing about today’s  report in the New York Times (“Harvard Asks Graduates to Donate  Their Time to Free Online Humanities Class”) (  http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/26/education/harvard-asks-alumni-to-donate-time-to-free-online-course.html?ref=education&_r=0 ) is not that Greg Nagy has 27,000 students enrolled in his course Concepts of the Ancient Greek Hero. It’s been a popular course at Harvard for decades.  Enrolling that number of students in a Massive Open Online Course is no surprise.

But Harvard is asking alumni not just to enroll but to “donate their time and intellects” as mentor and discussion group leaders.   They can add a personal, (though not quite face-to-face) dimension to the experience of reading  Homer and other classical texts under Greg Nagy’s guidance.  

Why should it stop there? Are we asking enough of our students and alumni in the humanities?  Only about one college or university in ten offers any program, even a rudimentary one, in Classics. As a result most college students in the US today have at best minimal access to the literature and cultural experience of the ancient Greek and Roman world --  few courses, even fewer teachers with real expertise in that area, and little encouragement from advisers.   How are they to gain an opportuno9tuy that the curricular structure now denies them?

Are MOOCs the answer? Too early to say.  But if not, let’s come up with ideas for something better.  In the meantime, hats off to Harvard for asking more of its alumni than just money.

Rachel Louise Ensign in the Wall Street Journal on March 24, 2013 shows how debt for college education is hitting many families. It’s not just that the kids have big student loans; mommy and daddy have their burden, too, often at a 7.9% interest rates.  Here is her article “Parent Trap: What to Know before Taking a College Loan“ http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324532004578362290396501134.html

For about a sixth of the parents of college students that may mean paying off a loan averaging almost $34,000, while their son or daughter is paying off  almost $29,000 at graduation.) Blithe economists will say, “Don’t worry; it’s a great investment.” (Scroll down to see blog entries  on  “investment” language and its implications.)  

No wonder then if parents are putting a lot of pressure on their kids to major in fields that (they think) will guarantee a job immediately after graduation.  

All this say to me that if we are serious about keeping liberal education strong, we have to be serious about keeping college costs down.  That’s not easy to do while maintaining quality, but we have to find ways  to do9 iut., 

 
SCROLL DOWN (AND CHECK  ARCHIVES) FOR AMMUNITION I -- III

For reasons I plan to explain in subsequent posting – if I ever get my act together! – the accreditation of colleges and universities is likely to be at the center of highly contentious changes in higher education.   So a recent job announcement from the Council of Higher Education Accreditors may be of interest – but not the faint hearted!

Here is an excerpt from the job announcewment:

A new survey by IHE probes parents’ attitudes to higher education.  As we have all suspected, parents (more than students) are the big problem.   For example, more parents believe that not going to college at all will  lead to better jobs than  getting a liberal arts degree does. Here’s part of the story (Butr don't miss the graph which my blog won't reproduce.



"For many education leaders who promote the idea of liberal education (and who don't see that as inconsistent with preparing for careers), some of the responses are frustrating.

"Carol Geary Schneider, president of the Association of American Colleges and Universities, said that she viewed "all of the above" as the "correct answer" on the purpose of college. But she said that the results reflected the reality that many people believe in a dichotomy between education that prepares one for a job and education that encourages critical thinking and other valuable qualities.

"In particular, she said that there is a problem for liberal arts colleges and disciplines in that there is a "very confused and ill informed understanding of what one means by the liberal arts" in the public at large. The AAC&U has conducted a series of surveys of employers on what they look for in college graduates, and has a new survey coming out next month.”



Read more: http://www.insidehighered.com/news/survey/jobs-value-and-affirmative-action-survey-parents-about-college#ixzz2O5Xi0pZk 



The parents are right, I think, in worrying that in this economy (still) college graduates often find it hard to get a decent job.  But they are making a big mistake if they urge their kids to aim low. The challenge is to get them (and their kids) to aim high – both in  the type of job they seek and in the long-run  career satisfaction.  We have to get the word “satisfaction” into their vocabulary. What will convince them? 

One college president told me that he was finding the key was a successful internship program,  available to all students.  That way they see, and can convince their parents, that studying material they truly enjoy has spill-over effects in a tough job market.   Parents need to hear that and as well stories of liberal arts majors  who have aimed high,  and are experiencing  high levels of satisfaction in their work.  More important, students (both high school and college) need to meet people like themselves who know what a difference a liberal education can make.

So one starting place is to make sure that your college has such an internship program, well-designed for all students, not just vocational majors.

If you care about liberal education, should you worry about the fact that many bright students from lower income families are not applying to highly ranked institutions?  The situation as analyzed in study soon to be published in  the Brookings Papers on Economic Activity is summarized by David Leonhardt of the New York Times, “Better Colleges Failing to Lure the Poor” http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/17/education/scholarly-poor-often-overlook-better-colleges.html?hp&_r=0.

“Only 34 percent of high-achieving high school seniors in the bottom fourth of income distribution attended any one of the country’s 238 most selective colleges, according to the analysis, conducted by Caroline M. Hoxby of Stanford and Christopher Avery of Harvard, two longtime education researchers. Among top students in the highest income quartile, that figure was 78 percent.

…many top low-income students instead attend community colleges or four-year institutions closer to their homes, the study found. The students often are unaware of the amount of financial aid available or simply do not consider a top college… “

That means in most cases that they have relatively low access to courses in the liberal arts and sciences, especially the humanities, and to  the perspective that comes from the study of pre-modern and non-Western societies – and , of course, to other opportunities that relatively affluent institutions can provide

What causes this distribution of enrollment?  Leonhardt focuses on the reluctance of some students to go to a college far away from home, and on the failure of some highly selective institutions vigorously  to recruit such students.  Those may be two sides of the same coin.  In a recent conversation with the woman who runs a well-designed outreach program at a North Carolina  university, I asked when the students she works with first  heard the word “college,” and when they first set foot on a college campus.  Don’t try to guess her answers; try the question out on your own campus.  What’s clear is that time spent on a campus during the high school years, provided it has a true educational component, can make a huge difference to students, to their choice of colleges and majors, and, it appears, to long-term growth and achievement.  

If liberal education is to fulfill its promise in this country, it has to reach beyond an established elite.  We all know that, but how best to reach fist generation, under-prepared or minority students remains a problem.  Your idea might now find  funding. Check out:

http://www.impatientoptimists.org/Posts/2013/03/Jumpstarting-Adaptive-Learning

Could this initiative from the Gates Foundation actually help serious learning in the liberal arts? Let's see; a $100,000 grant  for "adaptive learning"  sure could make a difference. 
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Thanks to Zaneeta Daver for pointing out this opportunity.  I hope others will send me  leads about developments affecting liberal education so I can share them on this blog.






 students, 

The California legislature did what was predicted in the last blog entry.  Here's the story: http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/03/13/california-bill-encourage-mooc-credit-public-colleges