|
AAU SUMMARY OF COLLEGE COSTS COMMISSION REPORT January 21, 1998
The National Commission on the Cost of Higher Education met in Washington, D.C., January 21 and approved its final report. The Commission's report did not include an executive summary, and the Commission did not issue any kind of freestanding summary. A letter of transmittal at the beginning of the report says the report's "conclusions" are as follows:
The body of the report states that the Commission has arrived at "five key convictions about the college cost and price crisis:" "Conviction 1: The concern about rising college prices is real. . . . People consider a college degree as essential to their children's future . . . . And, they also worry that access and opportunity are slipping away. These are genuine public fears to which academic institutions must respond." "Conviction 2: The public and its leaders are concerned about where higher education places its priorities. . . . Academic institutions need much better definitions and measures of how faculty members, administrators, and students use their time. . . . College finances are far too opaque. Higher education has a major responsibility to make its cost and price structures much more 'transparent,' i.e., easily understandable to the public and its representatives." "Conviction 3: Confusion about cost and price abounds and the distinction between the two must be recognized and respected. Issues of cost, price, subsidy, and net price have been difficult for the members of this Commission to master. They are equally, if not more confusing to members of the public. These are complex topics, and higher education must strive continuously to clarify and communicate them clearly and candidly." "Conviction 4: Rising costs are just as troubling a policy issue as rising prices. . . . "Unless [institutional] cost increases are reduced, prices in the long run cannot be contained without undermining quality or limiting access. Some of the factors behind these cost increases can be understood and explained. [A paragraph follows that briefly refers to declines in public subsidies, increases in administrative costs, facilities costs, institutional aid, and regulatory costs.] Some policymakers worry that Federal financial aid might have encouraged tuition increases. This Commission is confident that Federal grants have not had such an effect, at either public or private institutions. The Commission believes no conclusive evidence exists with respect to Federal loans and believes this issue deserves serious and in-depth additional study. Aside from such general observations, the Commission does not have solid information to help identify specific factors driving cost and price increases. The simple truth is that no single factor can be identified to explain how and why college costs rise. The Commission suspects that part of the underlying dynamic is the search for academic prestige and the academic reward systems governing higher education. This institutional emphasis on academic status is reinforced by a system of regional and specialized accreditation that often encourages increased expenditures by practically every institutions. The complexity of the interrelationships among these and other factors convinces the Commission that policymakers should avoid simple, one-size-fits-all solutions to the challenge of controlling or reducing college costs." "Conviction 5: The United States has a world-class system of higher education. . . . It is little wonder that the world has beaten a path to the door of the American university. Nonetheless, Academic leaders cannot take the continued pre-eminence of their institutions for granted. . . . such a system can deteriorate very rapidly. In the Commission's judgment, one of the few things capable of precipitating such a decline in the United States would be an erosion of public trust so serious that it undermined ongoing financial support for the nation's academic enterprise. Continued inattention to the imperative to make academic institutions more financially transparent threatens just such an erosion." The report includes a variety of recommendations grouped under five general policy goals. The introduction to this section of the report emphasizes that "many different stakeholders have contributed to the college cost and price crisis [and] all of them will have to contribute to the solutions. . . . Government needs to invest in higher education as a public good; foundations should continue to support policy research and the search for innovation; parents should be prepared to pay their fare share of college expenses; and students should arrive at college prepared for college-level work. But without doubt, the greatest benefits depend on academic institutions shouldering their responsibility to contain costs and ultimately prices. Although the responsibility for controlling costs and prices is widely shared, the major onus rests with the higher education community itself." The report's policy goals and recommendations are as follows: Policy Goal I: "Strengthen Institutional Cost Control-The Commission recommends that academic institutions intensify their efforts to control costs and increase institutional productivity." Specific recommendations called for under this heading include:
Policy Goal II: "Improve Market Information and Public Accountability-The Commission recommends that the academic community provide the leadership required to develop better consumer information about costs and prices and to improve accountability to the general public." Specific recommendations called for under this heading include:
Policy Goal III: "Deregulate Higher Education-The Commission recommends that governments develop new approaches to academic regulation, approaches that emphasize performance instead of compliance, and differentiation in place of standardization." Specific recommendations called for under this heading include:
Policy Goal IV: "Rethink Accreditation-The Commission recommends that the academic community develop well-coordinated, efficient accrediting processes that relate institutional productivity to effectiveness in improving student learning." Specific recommendations called for under this heading include:
Policy Goal V: "Enhance and Simplify Federal Student Aid-The Commission recommends that Congress continue the existing student aid programs and simplify and improve the financial aid delivery system." Specific recommendations under this heading include:
Finally, the report includes an appendix, entitled "The Unfinished Agenda," that identifies 13 issues the Commission says it did not have time to review thoroughly. These issues include the following:
|