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About the Author
Bob Zemsky describes himself as being old and round enough to be mistaken for a pooh-bah. He was a member of the Spellings Commission and, as an author and researcher, has focused on making colleges and universities mission-centered and market-smart. He has focused on what globalism might really mean for higher education, on what technology has not accomplished, and how to make learning important to the higher education market. Bob currently serves as professor and chair of The Learning Alliance at the University of Pennsylvania.
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Recent Posts
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Imagine a Spellings Process Rather Than a Commission
Last Tuesday I suggested it would be an interesting parlor game to speculate whether a Bologna-like template might have resulted in more reform of U.S. higher education than resulted from the work of the Spellings Commission.
In any event, here is my imaginary scenario which substitutes a “Spellings Process” for a “Spellings Commission.”
Phase 1: April 2005 – March 2006. Newly confirmed U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings launches a multi-year process focusing on the future of American higher education. The two primary goals she wants the process to focus on are expanding access to higher education and insuring that an American college education remains affordable. During this initial year she quietly meets with a wide variety of college and university leaders, the leaders of higher education’s national associations, and a goodly number of policy wonks. By mid year she begins to convene a limited number of working groups charged with suggesting the key initiatives on which a national higher education policy ought to focus.
By the February 2006 these discussions begin coalescing around two key proposals: 1) A total redesign of the federal system of student financial aid; and 2) a plan to make a three-year baccalaureate degree the nation’s standard undergraduate degree. The first proposal derives from a growing consensus that the current system of federal aid is too cumbersome, too dysfunctional, and too much a collection of special interests to really achieve the broad access the Secretary seeks. The three-year baccalaureate degree has as its principal attraction an immediate 25-percent reduction in the price of an undergraduate education. As those working on this idea quickly discover, however, the proposal also offers the prospect of breaking the institutional gridlock that now derails nearly every attempt to broadly change undergraduate education in the United States. To move to a three-year baccalaureate degree will require a truly national discussion focusing on the purposes of an undergraduate education — precisely the kind of discussion that Derek Bok’s new book, Our Underachieving Colleges, has just called for.
Phase 2: April 2006 – March 2007. This phase is kicked off with a higher education summit presided over by President Bush and attended by all 50 state governors. In carefully prepared sessions the president, his secretary of education, and her staff, supported by the key participants of Phase 1, succeed in winning a bipartisan political commitment to the principal of redesigning federal student aid and moving the United States to a three-year baccalaureate degree. At the conclusion of the summit, the 50 governors pledge to designate their state’s chief educational officers as the public officials charged with making sure every state is fully engaged in the planning necessary to implement the principles the governors have just endorsed. This planning to plan and then planning to implement activity consumes the balance of the year with the chief educational officers meeting all together three times over the next 11 months.
Phase 3. April 2007 – March 2008. With the outlines of a plan of action — though perhaps a better term would be, a pathway to change — in hand, Secretary Spellings turns back to the key actors she worked with in this process’s first year — institutional leaders, association leaders, and policy wonks — to develop specific plans of action for simultaneous consideration by the U.S. Congress and the 50 state legislators. Meetings — both large and small public, as well as quasi-private — continue to be held with the explicit purpose of sustaining the consensus to move forward even in the face of a growing opposition from a number of special interest groups who have known all along their power resides in business as usual.
At this point there is a pause in the process to await the results of the 2008 national elections. But regardless of which party wins, there will have been sufficient bipartisan involvement to make it difficult to derail the effort. No doubt another four-year cycle of meetings, consultations, presidential convenings, and public discussion will follow. Patience will become an important strategy in itself. The pay-off will be a recast federal system of student financial aid and a reinvigorated undergraduate curriculum that is less costly to deliver and more open to continuous change.
Could it happen this way? Could the process be truly bipartisan? Could the 50 states actually work together and work with the U.S. Congress in implementing a process of purposeful change. Given the enormous sums of money involved in federal student aid, could the standpatters ever be won over? Probably not, but at least it is worth thinking about.
Posted at 03:05:03 PM on April 4, 2008 | All postings by Bob ZemskyComments
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When reading the posts of Brainstorm’s three friends-in-high-places bloggers (one of whom, if I recall correctly, actually referred to himself as a “beloved” former college president), I try to grin ‘n’ bear it. After all, I tell myself, they’re not bad people; they just live in a world—one of fancy titles and prominent buddies and committees and commissions and conferences blue-ribbon panels and reports institutes and freebie junkets, etc.—wildly different from the in-the-trenches worlds of Brainstorm’s other bloggers. True, every once is a while, one of the FIHP bloggers manages to say something that’s not mere throat-clearing or thinly guised declarations of self-importance. But reading Bob Zemsky’s “Imagine a Spellings Process Rather Than a Commission” (truly a distinction without a difference) is like being beaten over the head with a hardbound copy of “The Dictionary of Pomposity.” To alleviate the pain, it’s either three extra-strength Tylenol or the following response:
“my imaginary scenario which substitutes a ‘Spellings Process’ for a ‘Spellings Commission.’”
Great idea. Years from now, educators will look back and say, “You remember the Spellings Process, don’t you?”
“launches a multi-year process focusing on the future of American higher education.”
Wow. My car’s engine is “multi-cylinder” and my cell-phone pad is “multi-numerical.” Wow again.
“a three-year baccalaureate degree will require a truly national discussion focusing on the purposes of an undergraduate education — precisely the kind of discussion that Derek Bok’s new book, Our Underachieving Colleges, has just called for.”
Shouldn’t a “national discussion” be well under way, before all the “Spellings Process” gets going, especially since Bok’s book is new? Focusing on “the purposes of an undergraduate education” ain’t much of a “focus,” either. It’s kind of like a theological discussion “focusing” on the nature of God. Which makes one wonder why “precisely” belongs in here.
“attended by all 50 state governors.”
Right. Every governor in the country will lend his/her imprimatur to a Commission….sorry, “Process,” headed by George W. Bush and the notoriously underqualified Ms. Spellings.
“Phase 2: April 2006 – March 2007…succeed in winning a bipartisan political commitment to the principal of….moving the United States to a three-year baccalaureate degree.”
Right again. In a mere year, the Spellings Comm…, damn! I mean Process, gets bipartisan support that would require all American high schools—as if they don’t already have enough problems—to include much if not all of a collegiate freshman year’s curriculum in their offerings, and would require practically every college in the country—already under Bushite market-philosophy pressure to increase their non-government revenue streams—to lop off one whole tuition-payment undergraduate year. (What is Zemsky smoking?)
“the 50 governors pledge to designate their state’s chief educational officers as the public officials charged with making sure every state is fully engaged in the planning necessary to implement the principles the governors have just endorsed.”
Right again. If I close my eyes, I can see all 50 governors standing in front of a bank of American flags, right hands raised, making the pledge. (I want some of what Zemsky’s smoking. Maybe it’d make this headache go away.)
“a plan of action — though perhaps a better term would be, a pathway to change”
Why stop there with the enflowering (I give Zemsky permission to use that word in future posts) of language? Why not “highway to heaven” or “road to revitalization” or “freeway to freedom” or some other perfumy phrase that belongs on the wrapper of a self-help DVD?
“develop specific plans of action”
Shouldn’t that be “develop specific pathways to change”?
“Meetings — both large and small public, as well as quasi-private — continue to be held with the explicit purpose of sustaining the consensus to move forward even in the face of a growing opposition from a number of special interest groups who have known all along their power resides in business as usual.”
Herein lies the real agenda of Zemsky’s “imaginary scenario.” “Special interest groups” equals “faculty,” no? Notice how the words “faculty” and “professor” occur nowhere in Zemsky’s post. In other words, this fundamental change in American higher education will occur via “leaders” and “wonks” and “governors” and “legislators” and Ms. Spellings and good ol’ George W. Bush himself, with no input whatsoever from the people who actually teach. And student input? Don’t be silly.
“there is a pause in the process to await the results of the 2008 national elections.”
Since this is an “imaginary scenario” (which implies the immediate future, as opposed to “alternative history,” which re-jiggers the past), why not just wait until the 2008 national elections are over to begin the “Spellings Process”? After the elections, Ms. Spellings will certainly be gone, and her top-down “reform” will most likely be gone, too.
“regardless of which party wins, there will have been sufficient bipartisan involvement to make it difficult to derail the effort. No doubt another four-year cycle of meetings, consultations, presidential convenings, and public discussion will follow.”
No, there won’t have been “sufficient bipartisan involvement.” And a subsequent “no doubt” “four-year cycle of meetings, consultations, presidential convenings, and public discussion” (i.e., a de facto filibuster) sure sounds like a derailment to me.
“Could it happen this way?”
Too late! It’s now 2008 and Zemsky’s “imaginary scenario” begins in 2005.
— LuckyJim · Apr 5, 09:04 AM · #
Why not start with the states? After all, following the Bologna model would mean seeing the states as the individual countries that must make a commitment.
The National Governors’ Association has often tackled the pre-K-12 continuum at its meetings, brain-storming and setting up committees to assist the governors to inspire dialogue and action within and among their states.
An American Bologna process is hampered, of course, by the almost complete lack of state “ministries” of education with any higher education oversight responsibilities/powers.
The New York State Education Department is perhaps the best and only exception to that generalization. Modeled after the French Ministry of Education, the Commissioner of NYSED is actually the President of all of the universities within the state, and the Board of Regents has legal oversight over all education in the state, including higher education. (Remember the removal of the Adelphi University President and the majority of its trustees?)
NYSED history perhaps holds lessons for this project. When the NYSED Deputy Commissioner for Higher Education tried to simply establish some mechanisms for transparency concerning quality in New York’s post-secondary institutions (using data that is primarily already collected via IPEDS, etc.), he assembled a cross-sector working group of faculty and administrators to recommend and flesh out a process.
The then SUNY Chancellor bucked and challenged the Commissioner and the Regents, pointing to the specific legislation which regulates SUNY and attempting thereby to claim exemption from any NYSED initiatives.
The Deputy Commissioner resigned in disgust and the Office of Higher Education was melded with the Office for the Professions — and, of course, the transparency project was abandoned.
The irony is that it was the public education sector rather than the private education sector that objected to public accountability using public information.
So, it’s a long row to hoe. Perhaps the lesson to be learned is this: American higher education administration actually doesn’t want a Bologna process — faculty involvement or no. In fact, it fears a Bologna process.
For all the wrong reasons….
— Anti-hypocrisy advocate · Apr 5, 09:19 AM · #
IF higher education were a disease, a war, or a major long term looming fiscal deficit or the like, the pompous proposed process would accomplish something other than inflating the ego that wrote it. I tend to agree with earlier critics above.
However, such a process is MORE likely, given that higher education is not presently a disease, to open the doors to bigotry, political slants, and bureaucratic perrogative encroachment—all to the great harm of higher education. Nothing like inviting a host of ignorant bigotted dunderheads to revise and improve higher education to get done the opposite. The giant-er the process the dumb-er the proposer. Only a buffoon could have faith in such glorious processing. The soviet union did not die and dissipate, it moved to higher education bloggs on the Chronicle!!!!
— Richard Tabor Greene · Apr 7, 04:35 AM · #
No one ever discusses the real issue for most undergraduates.
They are not students. They are working people trying to
be students. Many are working 20 to 30 hours or more, at
minimum wage jobs and attending classes, never having the
time to focus on their studies. This is one of the main reasons that it takes more than six years, on average to
complete an undergraduate degree. Cost is the real
issue. A three year degree would work, if students did not
have to work.
— Mary Lou Isaacson · Apr 7, 07:20 AM · #
The downside of blogging is anyone can spout off however they please. I appreciate the first two bloggers serving as examplars of this rule. As for Mr. Greene, it’s always a pleasure to see that he opened his email this morning and wished to inform the nation – yet again.
I took Zemsky’s point as rather straightforward and reasonable: Spellings had an opportunity to build a national consensus on two critical issues of higher education: affordablilty and matriculation. Instead, she used the Bush method of policymaking (i.e., foregone conclusions in content; heavy-handedness in procedures) and as a result she experienced the brunt of DuPont Circle.
As Zemsky points out, that’s too bad for her and the nation. Perhaps the next Secretary will understand better.
— Reasonable Center · Apr 7, 07:25 AM · #
It took a very long time for the nation to have and accept the very concept of a Department of Education as coordinator of national educational standards, K-12 (in fact, that is still contested).
The battle, so to speak, is now being extended to the post-secondary. I daresay the resistance will be there for the next several Secretaries as well.
— Anti-hypocrisy advocate · Apr 7, 08:05 AM · #
I agree with Zemsky that a “process” would be more likely to effect change than the heavy-handed Commission. He fails to mention the linchpin problem, however. All the discussion about affordability and accountability hinges on our ability to measure whether students are actually learning or not. Without valid and reliable measures of student learning outcomes, all the other arguments shift like sands.
The Spellings Commission insisted on standardized tests to measure learning, a demand rightly rejected by academics as simplistic and inappropriate for higher-level cognitive skills. But without meaningful measures, efforts at reform will be impossible to judge: does the three-year baccalaureate provide as much education as today’s four-year degree? How will we know? It seems to me that this question is the sticking point where forward progress stops. If we can’t solve this problem, the rest of the discussion has no foundation.
— Lee Griffin · Apr 7, 08:51 AM · #