Speeches

A Legacy at Risk: Public Research Universities at the Crossroads

Good morning and welcome to Penn State and to this timely symposium on the Future of the American Public Research University.  This conference promises to offer insight about how public research universities can help shape their own destinies.

I’m reminded of an advertisement in a London newspaper in the early 1900s. It stated:  “Men wanted for hazardous journey. Low wages, bitter cold, long hours of complete darkness. Safe return doubtful. Honor and recognition in event of success.”

    Despite its less-than-attractive description, 5,000 men and women actually responded to this call from Antarctic explorer Ernest Shackleton, who wished to attempt the first crossing of the Antarctic continent on foot.

    However after setting sail, their ship, The Endurance, became trapped in ice for 10 months and was slowly crushed. They were forced to abandon ship. For more than a year they were stranded on drifting ice, in near total darkness and subzero temperatures.

    To reach civilization, Shackleton and a few of his crew members crossed 800 miles of open ocean in a small boat. Then he led a rescue to save the men he had left behind. Every member of the crew returned home safely. This historic account is certainly an example of perseverance and overcoming adversity.

Can you imagine how an honest ad for public higher education administration might read:

“Men and women wanted for hazardous journey. Must be willing to educate 16 million people at any given time. Willingness to endure legislative attacks. Must raise $1 million in gifts every two days. Must be adept at thwarting budget crises. No glory, no honor. Must be comfortable with public ridicule.”

This conference is part of Penn State’s yearlong Sesquicentennial celebration. For 150 years, Penn State – like other research universities – has been a source of tremendous innovation and has helped boost our nation’s economic condition.

Public research universities have laid the foundation for industries such as biotechnology, computing, telecommunications, and manufacturing, producing discoveries that have benefited every American. We have produced millions of leaders and professionals, and have advanced society in ways unimagined at our founding.

Since the time of Thomas Jefferson, education has been looked upon as a public good, established to benefit all of society.

That has been our legacy. But that legacy is at risk, and our role as public research universities is changing on many fronts. While the challenges vary by degree from institution to institution and from state to state, they are still challenges that must be faced. Our universities have repeatedly transformed themselves to accommodate a changing society.

Today, major shifts in the landscape of American higher education are again making it imperative that we adapt and change to meet society’s needs, while still preserving the broad public purposes on which we were founded.

One such shift is occurring in the demographics of our nation. One example is the proportion of senior citizens in the United States, which is on the rise largely due to the aging of the Baby Boomers. In just six years, the first Baby Boomers will turn 65, and within 17 years, 70 million will follow suit.

Across the country, senior citizens will become a dominant force. This gerontological drift could have a great effect on the public support – or more precisely the lack of it --we receive in the future. Will older individuals, who vote at much higher rates and have strong lobbies, support the education of the state’s youth?

Higher education will likely continue to find itself on the short end of the stick when it comes to state funding priorities, especially when the competition is health care and other important needs of the elderly.

National demographic projections also suggest that about 65 percent of the growth in population through the year 2020 will be in ethnic minority groups, particularly Hispanics and Asian populations.  But as with age, this population change will not be uniformly distributed across the country. In fact, three-fifths of the projected increase in minority populations will take place in just three states: Florida, California, and Texas. A portion of this population growth will be fueled by immigration.

As for what was once considered the traditional college-age student, that too is changing. It is estimated that by 2010, more than 50 percent of college students will be working adults over age 25.

The reason? Education is often seen as the great fault line that determines who can be part of the American dream. In 1950, 80 percent of jobs were classified as “unskilled.”  Now, an estimated 85 percent of jobs are classified as “skilled,” requiring education beyond high school.

It has been shown that gains in educational achievement spurred an estimated 11 percent to 20 percent growth in worker productivity in the U.S. in recent decades.   Public universities play an essential role in sustaining and improving our labor pool, and nations that have been successful in developing human talent through postsecondary education have had enormous competitive advantages.

In addition, those enrolling in college are lured by the promise of a better life. The highest average salaries in the United States are earned by those who have college degrees. Earning a professional or doctoral degree could be worth up to $2.5 million in added income over 40 years. A master’s degree is worth an additional $1.3 million and a bachelor's degree can gain an extra million over a lifetime.

The re-entry of women into the workplace has also fueled participation in postsecondary education. In fact, the majority of college students today are women, who now make up 56 percent of the undergraduate population on U.S. campuses.

While the percent of high school graduates who choose to go on to college has climbed over the last few decades, the rate is expected to level off. Currently, nearly 64 percent of high school graduates nationally apply to college.

In some states, such as Pennsylvania, however, demographic trends will take hold and the pipeline of high school graduates will decline or remain stagnant. In these states, competition among universities for 18-year-olds will be more acute than ever, and again, non-traditional students will be the focus of dramatic marketing campaigns.

All of the demographic shifts I have mentioned, and many more, have serious implications for higher education. How will our institutions serve a more diverse population? Will our faculty ranks mirror this new population with more minority and women in the professoriate? Will state support continue to erode as our population ages and other priorities take hold? Will we continue to address the needs of society as well as we have in the past?

Over the last 40 years, public institutions have been educating the majority of American college students. Public institutions, including community and junior colleges, collectively educate 77 percent of the nearly 16 million students currently enrolled. 

It is clear that with so many students attending our public institutions, we play a pivotal role in our nation’s well being.

However, many people -- including too many elected officials – now see postsecondary education as a private benefit rather than a public good. We have entered an era of major shifts in funding, growing consumerism, budget cuts, increased competition, and rising expectations for higher education. 

These issues have brought with them other challenges related to quality, costs, rising tuition, accessibility, and the burden we may be placing on families.

While state appropriations in 1974 were generous enough to cover 78 percent of the cost of schooling for a student, in 2000 this support had fallen to just 43 percent.

As states continue to back away from providing sufficient educational funding to their public universities, those same institutions continue to turn to other sources of funds – most notably tuition – to absorb the burden. We are shifting costs for higher education from the taxpayer to students and their families. Public institutions are in fact replicating a pattern of high tuition/high aid, which started in the private sector some years ago.

This trend troubles those of us who believe higher education is a public good, not just a private benefit.

Other indications of public higher education’s slow slide toward privatization include the heavier emphasis on fund raising, the increased loan burden on our students, and the growing trend toward partnerships with the private sector. We also have pushed for more commercialization of our research, asked faculty to generate more resources, and moved toward more practical and professional programs to meet public demand.

Some institutions are of the opinion that if the state is unwilling or unable to pay the bills, a move toward privatization would make sense. In exchange for less state funding, the institution could gain more autonomy.  However, state appropriations are still the largest single source of funding for current operating expenses at many public universities, making a move to full privatization a risky scenario.

While those of us in this room may anguish over our public responsibilities in the face of these critical challenges, it is my hope that continued discussions such as those that will occur at this conference over the next two days will stimulate thought about the future of public research universities.

Some of the best minds in higher education have come together for this symposium and I know that the information that will be exchanged here will be valuable.

    I, for one, feel fortunate to be part of an enterprise that continues to contribute so much to our society.

    I hope you all have an enjoyable and productive meeting.

 U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, press release, “Education Department Reports Positive Link Between Education and Increased Productivity,” April 24, 1997,  HYPERLINK "http://www.ed.gov/PressReleases/o4-1997/econmc1.html" http://www.ed.gov/PressReleases/o4-1997/econmc1.html

 Employment Policy Foundation analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics Current Population Survey as reported in USA Today, March 12, 2002. Also, Higher Education and National Affairs, American Council on Education, Vol. 51, No.14, July 29, 2002.

 Michael Rizzo, “A Less Than Zero Sum Game? State Funding for Public Education: How Public Higher Education Institutions Have Lost,” August 2004, Cornell University.

 “A Less Than Zero Sum Game? State Funding for Public Higher Education: How Public Higher Education Institutions Have Lost,” Michael J. Rizzo, Cornell University, 2004.