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This timely book examines issues pertaining to equal opportunity--affirmative action, challenges to it, and alternatives for improving opportunities for underrepresented groups--in higher education today. Its starting point is California's Proposition 209, which ended race-based affirmative action in public education and the workplace in 1996. The book carefully considers how Proposition 209 reflects national trends that have changed higher education policy and practice, from administrators to student diversity to standards. With a roster of leading scholars and administrators--including Chancellor Robert Birgeneau of the University of California, Berkeley, and President Mary Sue Coleman of the University of Michigan--Equal Opportunity in Higher Education is a crucial assessment of one of the most important issues facing higher education. "With over a decade of data on which to draw, this volume brings together analysts from academic institutions, researchers in the University of California and community college systems, and policy makers to reflect on what we have learned about the impacts of removing affirmative action and of new policy directions for the future. In a time of great economic uncertainty, it is easy to lose sight of the complex questions of equal access with which many state postsecondary systems struggle." --from the introductory chapter by Christopher Edley Jr., dean, University of California, Berkeley, School of Law "A comprehensive examination of the consequences and implications of challenges to affirmative action for racial equity and diversity in public higher education. Although focused on California's Proposition 209, the volume offers useful insights for public and institutional policy makers in other states, as well as for education researchers." -- Laura W. Perna, professor, Graduate School of Education, University of Pennsylvania "A thorough and masterful treatment of an important and complex subject. What it chronicles is the first step in the gradual asphyxiation of race-based affirmative action. The book represents an extraordinary blending of social science, legal, and policy perspectives. It illustrates a skillful use of administrative data by an impressive array of scholars and day-to-day practitioners. There are important lessons here, not only for higher education but for the broader American public." -- Thomas J. Espenshade, professor of sociology, Princeton University "The book does a nice job juxtaposing research with important perspectives on policy to give a rich, insightful examination of what happens when universities are not allowed to use race in their deliberations. Of course, the answer is complicated given the complex nature of race in America and the admissions process. This type of nuanced analysis is needed in what are sure to be future debates about affirmative action." -- Bridget Terry Long, professor of education and economics, Harvard Graduate School of Education Eric Grodsky is associate professor of sociology at the University of Minnesota. Michal Kurlaender is associate professor of education at the University of California, Davis.
Why so many of America's public university students are not graduating—and what to do about it The United States has long been a model for accessible, affordable education, as exemplified by the country's public universities. And yet less than 60 percent of the students entering American universities today are graduating. Why is this happening, and what can be done? Crossing the Finish Line provides the most detailed exploration ever of college completion at America's public universities. This groundbreaking book sheds light on such serious issues as dropout rates linked to race, gender, and socioeconomic status. Probing graduation rates at twenty-one flagship public universities and four statewide systems of public higher education, the authors focus on the progress of students in the entering class of 1999—from entry to graduation, transfer, or withdrawal. They examine the effects of parental education, family income, race and gender, high school grades, test scores, financial aid, and characteristics of universities attended (especially their selectivity). The conclusions are compelling: minority students and students from poor families have markedly lower graduation rates—and take longer to earn degrees—even when other variables are taken into account. Noting the strong performance of transfer students and the effects of financial constraints on student retention, the authors call for improved transfer and financial aid policies, and suggest ways of improving the sorting processes that match students to institutions. An outstanding combination of evidence and analysis, Crossing the Finish Line should be read by everyone who cares about the nation's higher education system.
The movement to broaden access to public universities, the dominant strategy during the 1970s and 1980s, has largely shifted to enable the marketplace, rather than the government, to shape the contours of higher education. Government funding is being reduced, affirmative action and other programs designed to insure broader access are in decline and personal fulfillment is replacing a public good designed to insure greater equality of opportunities. This book explores the impact of diminishing government resources and expanding market forces in developing and developed countries to either foster or lessen equality of opportunities in higher education for different racial, ethnic, religious and gender groupings. What are the consequences of a market-driven higher education for student access, teaching and scholarship? Through case studies, this book explores issues such as access of minority groups within the larger societies, the place of foreign students in a national system, and access for students with mental health difficulties, and evaluates the success of funding schemes designed to expand opportunities and access. The research provides an interesting contrast of the diversity and uniqueness of higher education in the United States, France, Australia, India, Israel, South Korea, The Netherlands, Ghana and several other countries, while at the same time revealing surprising commonalities. These studies reveal world-wide trends in higher education including a cutback in government financing, a decline in access, and a receding of affirmative action. This book is an important addition to the literature on higher education during the age of globalization and the decline of government funding of higher education. The studies provide important data about the current situation in higher education in countries around the world.
A fresh and bold argument for revamping our standards of “merit” and a clear blueprint for creating collaborative education models that strengthen our democracy rather than privileging individual elites Standing on the foundations of America’s promise of equal opportunity, our universities purport to serve as engines of social mobility and practitioners of democracy. But as acclaimed scholar and pioneering civil rights advocate Lani Guinier argues, the merit systems that dictate the admissions practices of these institutions are functioning to select and privilege elite individuals rather than create learning communities geared to advance democratic societies. Having studied and taught at schools such as Harvard University, Yale Law School, and the University of Pennsylvania Law School, Guinier has spent years examining the experiences of ethnic minorities and of women at the nation’s top institutions of higher education, and here she lays bare the practices that impede the stated missions of these schools. Goaded on by a contemporary culture that establishes value through ranking and sorting, universities assess applicants using the vocabulary of private, highly individualized merit. As a result of private merit standards and ever-increasing tuitions, our colleges and universities increasingly are failing in their mission to provide educational opportunity and to prepare students for productive and engaged citizenship. To reclaim higher education as a cornerstone of democracy, Guinier argues that institutions of higher learning must focus on admitting and educating a class of students who will be critical thinkers, active citizens, and publicly spirited leaders. Guinier presents a plan for considering “democratic merit,” a system that measures the success of higher education not by the personal qualities of the students who enter but by the work and service performed by the graduates who leave. Guinier goes on to offer vivid examples of communities that have developed effective learning strategies based not on an individual’s “merit” but on the collaborative strength of a group, learning and working together, supporting members, and evolving into powerful collectives. Examples are taken from across the country and include a wide range of approaches, each innovative and effective. Guinier argues for reformation, not only of the very premises of admissions practices but of the shape of higher education itself.