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N.C.S.L. REPORT: STATES FAILING HIGHER EDUCATION The U.S. higher education system is in crisis and is no longer the best in the world because the federal and state governments have failed to ensure that all eligible students obtain college education, a report released this week by the National Conference of State Legislatures said. Failing to invest more and improve the higher education system has grave consequences for the overall U.S. economy, the report said. No Michigan legislators were a part of the blue ribbon panel of the NCSL report, which said that because other nations are more rapidly changing higher education by both making it a greater national priority and including the product of higher education as part of their overall economic planning, the American higher education system is no longer the best in the world. "Although the United States has some of the best institutions in the world, we do a poor job overall in our mass education production," the report said. This is a major challenge for state legislatures because they fund the bulk of public spending on higher education, some $70 billion, and because the largest universities in the United States are public, the report said. "But states are not maximizing that investment," the report said. "It is imperative to do better." There has become a giant complacency about America's higher education system, which affects the universities themselves, the report said. Legislators are loath to criticize the system and encourage innovations in education and on the campuses themselves the faculty appears unchallenged to find new ways to teach. One problem, the report said, is that legislators draw more political visibility by championing issues like K-12 education, crime and economic development than they do higher education. In addition, the public rarely makes an issue of the overall quality of higher education, the report said. In Michigan, the higher education commission led by Lt. Governor John Cherry several years ago already outlined a series of steps designed to double the number of college graduates in Michigan over time. The state has also had to struggle with funding for universities because of the continuing economic problems. By and large, universities are still focusing their attention on the traditional student just out of high school, but the demand for higher education has changed with larger numbers of older students who had to delay their education or are seeking new skills, the report said. Universities must adapt to this changing student body. States and universities are also not doing enough to recognize the increasing diversity of the American population. African Americans and Hispanic students are the most underrepresented populations in higher education today, the report said. Across the nation, the report said, not enough is being done to ensure that low- income students have access to college. And overall, more and more students feel the doors to colleges are being closed to them. Efforts to keep students in school are not going far enough, the report said. Of every 100 students who now enter high school, only 18 finish college in a six-year time span, the report said. The report called on the states to set clear goals, understand its demographic trends going 30 years ahead, find ways to reduce borrowing and debt by students and their families, rethink overall funding for universities as well as student aid and hold schools accountable for their overall performance. http://www.ncsl.org/programs/press/2006/pr061127.htm