Of Tuchman's "Wan U," you observe: &...

2009-10-06T07:53:40.345-06:00

Of Tuchman's "Wan U," you observe: "...in the final chapter she seems to throw up her hands and bleakly accept the inevitable: at “Wan U.” and other publics...the good life is not coming back."

Is that so bad? What makes anyone think that the path the academy has been on for centuries has been a straight and ascending climb toward excellence? The search for a way forward and a fresh view of academe's responsibilities for the public good demands a periodic (daily, would be good) reckoning. The need to "de-church" the academy makes me wonder how and why the "churching" was necessary in the first place.

I grew up where the land-grant, state university, operated the county agricultural extension services statewide. My mother worked in one such office in one of the more urban counties for more than 25-years. We were not farmers, but through the Extension's programs I got to see the work of the office (everything from helping people identify and deal with household plants and pests, to improving the quality and health of poultry farms). The academics that led the offices, the scientists and researchers on the University campuses, significantly improved the well-being of the people and the economic sectors they served.

Direct, measurable impact, what is wrong with that? Is sustainable, social performance anathema to the credo of academe? Is the work done at university hospitals an impediment to scholarship? Is society (its taxpayers and tuition payers) wrong to demand measurable performance from institutions (public or private) that supp at the public table? Isn't it rather more self-indulgent for state and private institutions to be so completely narcissistic that they only "reference" their performance to their relative standing in some kind of "celebrity group photo" in a magazine layout, elbowing their way to the front row -for prestige and recognition. Are faculty salaries about “prestige" for the brand or measurable impact on the well-being of students and communities?

With all the brainpower in higher education, it's shocking that the academy has not come up with its own measures for sustainable performance.

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Of Tuchman's "Wan U," you observe: &...