Thinking Anew About Institutional Taxonomies

Author/s: 
Brian Prescott
Year of publication: 
2011
Session topic: 
Conceptualizing the broad-access sector in the context of US higher education

One of the great strengths of American higher education, a quality that has helped make it the envy of the rest of the world, is the diversity of its institutions. . Americans expect our colleges and universities to fill a variety of critical societal roles, from equipping the next (or even the current) generation with the skills and abilities necessary for work and citizenship to pushing the limits of human understanding. What’s more, our highly decentralized system allows many different kinds of institutions to flourish. In such an environment, institutions settle into roles based on the curriculum they offer, the characteristics of the students they serve, the degree to which they focus on research or teaching, their sources of funding, and so on. The thinking goes that this variation has made for a fertile ground that has brought out the best in institutions, allowed for specialization among them, and ultimately has society effectively.

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