Survival Is Not Enough

For more than five years, blue-and-white-jacketed reports written or sponsored by the Carnegie Commission on Higher Education have been emerging from its Berkeley, Calif., offices with the seeming regularity of Vegas coming off the line at Lordstown. Originally set up by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching to examine the financing of higher education, the commission's task quickly broadened. Its 104 reports, running in size from a 978-page statistical survey to slim booklets of less than 40 pages, have probed such diverse facets as student dissent and dental education. Last week, with the publication of its final report, Priorities for Action, the project came to an end.

In tone and philosophy, the commission's output reflects the optimistic views of its chairman, Clark Kerr, longtime president of the University of California. Kerr had already agreed to act as the commission's part-time chairman when in January 1967, he was abruptly fired for his opposition to Governor Ronald Reagan's budget-cutting plans for U.C. Working virtually full time for the commission, Kerr led its support for the basic structure of the present U.S. higher educational system. Though the system is now undergoing "its greatest trauma of self-doubt," notes the final report, the commission has "faith in its potential for continued vitality."

Necessary Changes. Nevertheless, the 18-member commission urges reform and innovation to strengthen the system. "Survival, with memories of past glories, is not enough of a program for higher education as it approaches the year 2000," says the report. The commission believes that higher education will inevitably become available to all who want it, but that the shift will necessitate changes in the practices of learning institutions, governments and even parents. Specific recommendations range from urging the Federal Government to "take basic responsibility for providing equality of opportunity through financial aid" to telling parents not to press reluctant children too hard to attend college.

Inevitably, Kerr and his colleagues have their critics. Says Donald McDonald, executive editor of The Center Magazine, "The Carnegie Commission study ... is not going to persuade professors or administrators to ask themselves any hard, self-critical questions about what they are doing or the way they are doing it." In reply, Kerr cites a variety of innovations that he believes the commission helped achieve, including increased federal financial aid to needy students, better techniques for educating doctors and nurses, and growth in the state community college movement.

The gravest criticism of the commission is that it has focused upon the structure rather than the content of higher education. Kerr answers that the commission deliberately avoided such controversial areas as teaching and curriculum, and "tried to hold out for things that could be done." Even Alan Pifer, president of the Carnegie Corporation, which paid the commission's bills, has admitted to feeling "somewhat wistful" that the commission did not tackle the thorny problem of undergraduate liberal education. But he stresses that the commission's function was to provoke discussion and thought, not to provide a blueprint. Says he: "The Carnegie Corporation has gotten its money's worth." Total price tag: $6.3 million.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.