Policy Vinegar or Honey?

I was a participant in the Summit on Higher Education yesterday, which was convened by the Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings (the photo is from a reception in the White House after the event). I must admit that I came to the meeting with mixed feelings. I am not a fan of the Secretary. Indeed, one could argue that I am not a fan of any Secretary of Education. I am not convinced that the Department of Education was a necessary creation.

But the discussion yesterday created two impressions. The first was that we rushed through a lot of issues. For example, one group on adult learners (or as some would call them non-tradtional learners) - argued that we had to treat those people in college the same way we treat traditional undergraduates. I wonder why. The dramatic expansion of college age eligible students (or at least potentially eligible students) is large enough in many areas to suggest that if we concentrated resources on 18 year olds we would do pretty well in solving some of the problems facing the country in terms of need for college educated people. As we were reminded yesterday - a high percentage of the returning students have a job and thus a high potential to complete their educations without assistance. That set of questions needs a lot more thought and care. I have several concerns about the way some of the issues were formed.

My second impression was that they got a good group of people together to discuss important issues and for the most part the groups (the 250 participants were divided into 5 working groups) covered the right (or at least the most important issues). Although there was a certain amount of surrealism in the discussions. For example, the Secretary and her Undersecretary reiterated the Administration's commitment to increasing need based aid. (Neither mentioned that the Administration has proposed to eliminate a couple of major need based financial aid programs for students.)

The most interesting part of the day was at the reception where I got to speak with a White House Fellow that I have met before. This guy is at the start of a career - he has finished his Ph.D. and wants to move back home (in a Southern state) when he completes his fellowship. His is committed to getting more students in his home state to go to college. He has worked in student affairs but he also worked for one of the best governors in the South.

We discussed whether the Secretary's rhetoric over the last year was appropriate or not. Spellings has made some outrageous claims about higher education and at the same time she has made some proposals which I believe would be fundamentally injurious to the enterprise of higher education. But the substance of our discussion was whether such inflated rhetoric was necessary to get a group as diverse as higher education (and complex and often resistent to change) to move. Obviously, there are some areas where higher education could improve.

One is in transparency - of telling clearly what we do to those who are interested. Spellings' initial solution was to propose creation of a massive data base of individual student records. That idea was silly and ultimately troubling - the Department has shown little ability to handle things like that. She has also yammered that it is hard to find information about colleges for families and students - silly again - there is lots. One of her problems is that she looks at higher education as an extension of K-12 - where she has some experience. In the end, the structure of higher education is different. (More complex, more diverse, more alternatives than K-12). She would also like to screw up the voluntary system of accreditation - which I think has been on the whole pretty good at moving in the right direction over the last decade or so.

I got back to the discussion with this Fellow - whether the extreme rhetoric was necessary. In the end, I think not. Yesterday, the substance of the discussion suggested that higher education has heard some of her comments and has begun to think creatively about some necessary changes. Moving 3000+ institutions, that range in size from a few hundred to several thousand and encompass a huge variety of educational backgrounds and abilities is never easy. After yesterday, while I still reject the rhetoric, I am also willing to withhold judgment about the next set of steps.

A good deal of trouble which higher education has lived through during my career has been caused by the following phrase "I'm from the government and I am here to help." Spellings' rhetoric is close to that - she would like to help higher education by regulating it more - that has never shown to be a good solution. The "helpers" are not just in the Department, nor the Congress but also in state legislatures. On the other hand, if higher education does not take some initiative on some of the key issues discussed yesterday, then regulation is probable. So let's see what happens next.