States face the challenge of working harder—and faster—to educate enough college graduates for the country to sustain the vitality of its local communities and the economy. To meet workforce demands alone, research shows the United States will need 1 million more graduates a year than it’s on track to turn out during the next 16 years.
Without a major overhaul, the nation's higher-education system is simply too costly to meet this challenge. Meanwhile, global competition is roiling the U.S. economy. Failing to meet the need for a better-educated workforce will have dire consequences for citizens' ability to earn living wages.
A generation ago, the United States had the best-educated population in the world. Today, the country ranks 10th among industrialized countries in the percentage of its citizens aged 25 to 34 with college degrees. The good news is educating a greater share of the U.S. population does not have to cost a lot more. The country already spends at least twice as much as the average industrialized nation per student. Better investment, with a focus on productivity, should generate better results.
Achieving big gains will require policymakers and leaders of public two- and four-year colleges and universities to embrace a new agenda. Among the objectives:
- Increase and Reward Completion. States should begin setting aside significant portions of their higher education budgets to reward institutions for students who complete courses and graduate in greater numbers at lower per-unit expense. States also should pay colleges and universities more for serving students who will comprise a growing share of the American labor force, including students of color, first-generation students, students from low-income families and working or unemployed adults.
- Generate and Reinvest Savings. Spread widely, efficient and cost-effective academic and administrative approaches can free resources for serving many more undergraduates. Fewer wasted credits, better use of tuition policy, campus space, fewer building projects, and outsourcing operations - all of this and more is needed to make the best use of available dollars.
- Educate and Train in Affordable Ways. Higher education is a prime candidate for innovation, such as entirely new ways of cost-effectively delivering degree programs. High-quality education could be delivered through in a variety of ways using a variety of channels that would free resources to offer non-traditional students new opportunities. Whether public or private, nonprofit or for-profit, two-or four-year, higher education institutions must become more nimble, efficient and responsive to the needs of students and American society.
**Source: Lumina Foundation for Education