The news sure looks bad: rapidly shifting
student demographics, the ever-increasing
speed of technological innovation, and extreme
legislative and public pressure are squeezing
colleges and universities into a lose-lose
race toward irrelevancy. Detailed in countless
articles and books, the challenges faced by
institutions of higher learning in the U.S. are
varied and weighty.
But higher education is far from doomed. It
is at this inflection point in which independent
colleges and universities have the opportunity
to revolutionize higher education. It is time to
pivot towards a new university, one that radically
refocuses structure and pedagogy on students
and their learning; reimagines the foundational
institutional structures of leadership, tenure,
and the higher education business model; and
produces national examples for access and
inclusion. In an industry notoriously slow to adapt
and evolve, leaders of colleges and universities
must act quickly and decisively, committing to a
monumental shift to educate students for a world
that we cannot yet see: a leap-frog into relevancy
that higher education has never experienced.
Authors Joanne Soliday and Dr. Mark Lombardi,
with their combined decades in higher education
leadership and consulting, explicate a picture of
possibility for the future of independent colleges
and universities, one rooted in the essential value
of a liberal arts education that brings students to
their highest potential. It is the critical
reimagining of how that education is shaped that
guides a vision for the new university.
