American Higher Education in the Twenty-first Century : Social, Political and Economic Challenges

America's colleges and universities are social institutions - embedded in the wider society and subject in various ways to its forces.

In this text, researcher explore the realities of higher education and consider its challenges for the 21st century.

Subject to increasing scrutiny by the media and the public, colleges and universities must wrestle with a wide range of issues generated by their various external constituencies.

Academic leaders rearrange their curricula to meet demands for multiculturalism.

They seek an appropriate response as race-based admissions come under attack.

They assess student learning and monitor faculty productivity - while simultaneously responding to calls for the end of tenure and for explanations of why the cost of attending college has risen so dramatically.

Whether discussing finance or technology, academic freedom or the canon, the authors find that relations between academic institutions and their surrounding societies have generally been ambivalent: both involved and withdrawn, servicing and criticizing, needing and being needed.