2. Universities are powered by a mix of faculty ego and institutional status seeking, not intrinsic motivation or love of learning. Universities are set up as specialized bureaucracies to support and celebrate faculty stars who are paid largely to build their research reputations and increase the university’s status. In this environment, students oftentimes receive scant attention and short shrift, even though increasingly, students pay for the privilege of the faculty-university, ego-status trip.
3. Universities rule through hierarchy, judgment, and fear, not democracy, respect, and love. The main organizational examples at the founding of the university were (a) the military and (b) the Church. Key aspects of these models were embedded in the organization of university, which continues to rule by demanding conformity and obedience, largely through the shame brought on by harsh judgment, and fear of punishment.
4. Universities charge and waste large amounts of money, yet find it impossible to cut programs or slash costs. Universities charge students large tuition amounts (that grow considerably faster than the rate of inflation) to attend universities with little cost accounting and almost no cost control. The dirty little secret of university finance is that undergraduate tuition fees subsidize faculty research. This is hidden by significant flows of Federal research funds to universities (mainly in the sciences and engineering), but these monies almost never pay for faculty salaries during the academic school year, and teaching represents only a small fraction of faculty members full-time work commitment.
5. Universities are stuck in the dark ages, underestimate the need to change, and misunderstand both what and how to change. The 11th century design of universities, with upgrades in the 19th century to further emphasize research activity and after World War II to feed at governmental troughs, leaves the university in a precarious state. The business model is ready for a fall. Worse, university leaders believe that leisurely and modest reforms of content, curriculum, and pedagogy, promulgated through the existing bureaucracy will save the day.
These five problems are not sustainable. Harvard innovation expert Clay Christensen suggests universities are already undergoing significant disruptive innovation by for-profit universities, massive open online courses (MOOCs), and other eLearning innovators and innovations. Continuing on this course risks relegating a once-great institution to the dustbin of history.
(Next page: 5 recommendations for change)
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