John Summers: Elite Institutions Exercise a Stranglehold on Power in the U.S.
[John Summers is visiting scholar in history at Boston College.]
Our institutions tremble and sway, but it's a rare week that passes without opinion leaders reminding us of the stability, excellence - nay, glory - of the US higher education system. Here is the last American piety, a liturgy incanted in newspaper columns by Thomas Friedman (Brandeis University, 1975) and Nicholas Kristof (Harvard University, 1981) in The New York Times and in think-pieces by the likes of James Fallows (Harvard, 1970) in The Atlantic magazine.
Dispatched in January-February 2010 to discover "How America can rise again", as the publication described his mission, Fallows listened to "experts around the country" whistle Alma Mater among the ruins.
"US higher education has essentially been our innovation engine," Shirley Tilghman, Princeton University's president, told him. "I still do not see the overall model for higher education anywhere else that is better than the model we have."
Laura Tyson, who has served as dean of the business schools at the University of California, Berkeley, and the University of London, chimed in: "There is not another country's system that does as well - although others are trying aggressively to catch up."
In higher education, Fallows reports, lies "America's advantage".
Certainly, a degree from a leading school is an "advantage" in national politics. Like his presidential predecessor George W. Bush (Yale University, 1968), Barack Obama (Columbia University, 1983) has surrounded himself with graduates of elite private universities. The members of his Cabinet, his chief of staff and three senior advisers are together a tribute to ethnic and racial diversity. But only Vice-President Joe Biden and Labor Secretary Hilda Solis received undergraduate degrees from public colleges....
Read entire article at Times Higher Education (UK)
Our institutions tremble and sway, but it's a rare week that passes without opinion leaders reminding us of the stability, excellence - nay, glory - of the US higher education system. Here is the last American piety, a liturgy incanted in newspaper columns by Thomas Friedman (Brandeis University, 1975) and Nicholas Kristof (Harvard University, 1981) in The New York Times and in think-pieces by the likes of James Fallows (Harvard, 1970) in The Atlantic magazine.
Dispatched in January-February 2010 to discover "How America can rise again", as the publication described his mission, Fallows listened to "experts around the country" whistle Alma Mater among the ruins.
"US higher education has essentially been our innovation engine," Shirley Tilghman, Princeton University's president, told him. "I still do not see the overall model for higher education anywhere else that is better than the model we have."
Laura Tyson, who has served as dean of the business schools at the University of California, Berkeley, and the University of London, chimed in: "There is not another country's system that does as well - although others are trying aggressively to catch up."
In higher education, Fallows reports, lies "America's advantage".
Certainly, a degree from a leading school is an "advantage" in national politics. Like his presidential predecessor George W. Bush (Yale University, 1968), Barack Obama (Columbia University, 1983) has surrounded himself with graduates of elite private universities. The members of his Cabinet, his chief of staff and three senior advisers are together a tribute to ethnic and racial diversity. But only Vice-President Joe Biden and Labor Secretary Hilda Solis received undergraduate degrees from public colleges....