A Conversation: Historiographic Issues in American Higher Education

1999 ◽  
Vol 39 (3) ◽  
pp. 291-294
Author(s):  
Linda Eisenmann ◽  
Philo A. Hutcheson ◽  
Jana Nidiffer
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
History Of Higher Education ◽  
College And University ◽  
American Higher Education ◽  
History Of

Many of us who teach the history of American higher education likely experience an uncomfortable moment at the beginning of each collegiate term when we order for our classes a book first published in 1962: Frederick Rudolph's classic The American College and University: A History. Of course, we are somewhat heartened by choosing the 1990 republished version with its fine new introduction by John Thelin, as well as by requiring Lester Goodchild and Harold Wechsler's recently revised compendium of articles, The History of Higher Education. Nonetheless, choosing a textbook as old as Rudolph's for a basic overview of the field feels awkward to historians who are witnessing a surge of work in the history of American higher education.

“To Qualify its Students for Personal Success”

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles Dorn
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Political Economy ◽  
Stanford University ◽  
History Of Higher Education ◽  
Commercial Society ◽  
American Higher Education ◽  
Technological Advances ◽  
Industrial Age ◽  
History Of ◽  
Personal Success

This chapter examines the rise of commercialism in American higher education. Popularly known as Stanford University, Leland Stanford Junior University was exceptional both because of the Stanfords' thirty-million-dollar endowment—the largest gift in the history of higher education up to that time—and because it represented the commercial fortune one couple could amass as a result of changes to the nation's political economy during the second half of the nineteenth century. Thus, when Stanford University opened to students in 1891, it served as a conspicuous manifestation of commercialism's rise in American higher education. Indeed, Stanford University's founding grant reflected the rise of a social ethos of commercialism in higher education when it stated that the institution's central “object” was “to qualify its students for personal success.” While scientific and technological advances increased the number of professions from which students could choose, the industrial age accelerated the growth of a commercial society.

The Gendered Roots of American Higher Education

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Deondra Rose
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
United States ◽  
The United States ◽  
Educational Institutions ◽  
History Of Higher Education ◽  
Government Programs ◽  
American Higher Education ◽  
Women's Participation ◽  
History Of ◽  
Historical Role

This chapter analyzes the history of women’s participation in American higher education and the federal government’s historical role in shaping who has access to it. Higher educational institutions in the United States were established with men in mind, and for approximately three hundred years after the establishment of the nation’s first college, women were excluded from equal access to postsecondary institutions. On campus, women were often greeted with hostility and found themselves treated as second-class students. The history of higher education in the United States yields important lessons for thinking about the effect that government programs have had on the gender dynamics of American citizenship since the mid-twentieth century.

Book Review: The Shaping of American Higher Education

NASPA Journal ◽  
2000 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Gary H. Knock
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
United States ◽  
The United States ◽  
Early History ◽  
Quarter Century ◽  
American Higher Education ◽  
History Of ◽  
Broad Understanding

In the introduction of this book, Arthur Cohen states that The Shaping of American Higher Education is less a history than a synthesis. While accurate, this depiction in no way detracts from the value of the book. This work synthesizes the first three centuries of development of high-er education in the United States. A number of books detail the early history of the American collegiate system; however, this book also pro-vides an up-to-date account of developments and context for under-standing the transformation of American higher education in the last quarter century. A broad understanding of the book’s subtitle, Emergence and Growth of the Contemporary System, is truly realized by the reader.

History of Universities

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Reference Material ◽  
Review Essay ◽  
Original Research ◽  
University Reform ◽  
History Of Higher Education ◽  
History Of ◽  
Queens College ◽  
History Of Universities

This issue of the history of universities contains, as usual, an interesting mix of learned articles and book reviews covering topics related to the history of higher education. The volume combines original research and reference material. This issue includes articles on the topics of Alard Palenc; Joseph Belcher and Latin at Harvard; Queens College in Massachusetts; and university reform in Europe. The text includes a review essay as well as the usual book reviews.

scholarly journals What Happened to Your College Town: The Changing Relationship of Higher Education and College Towns, 1940–2000

2021 ◽  
Vol 61 (3) ◽  
pp. 320-340
Author(s):  
Kate Rousmaniere
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Higher Education Institutions ◽  
History Of Higher Education ◽  
Campus Housing ◽  
College Towns ◽  
Education Enrollment ◽  
History Of ◽  
To Come ◽  
And Function ◽  
Relationship Of

AbstractThis essay examines the history of what is commonly called the town-gown relationship in American college towns in the six decades after the Second World War. A time of considerable expansion of higher education enrollment and function, the period also marks an increasing detachment of higher education institutions from their local communities. Once closely tied by university offices that advised the bulk of their students in off-campus housing, those bonds between town and gown began to come apart in the 1970s, due primarily to legal and economic factors that restricted higher education institutions’ outreach. Given the importance of off-campus life to college students, over half of whom have historically lived off campus, the essay argues for increased research on college towns in the history of higher education.

scholarly journals History of Higher Education in Pennsylvania

1964 ◽  
Vol 51 (3) ◽  
pp. 543
Author(s):  
F. Garvin Davenport ◽  
Saul Sack
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
History Of Higher Education ◽  
History Of

Widening Access to Higher Education – An Australian Case Study

2003 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 195-212
Author(s):  
Glen Postle ◽  
Andrew Sturman
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Access To Higher Education ◽  
History Of Higher Education ◽  
Student Groups ◽  
Diverse Student ◽  
History Of ◽  
Australian Case ◽  
Open And Distance Learning

In this paper the authors trace the development of equity within the Australian higher education context over the latter part of the last century. In particular they focus on the ways different perspectives (liberalist-individualist and social democratic) have shaped what has been a dramatic increase in the number and diversity of students accessing higher education in Australia. The adoption of a specific perspective has influenced the formation of policies concerning equity and consequently the way universities have responded to the pressures to accept more and different students. These responses are captured under two main headings – ‘restructuring the entry into higher education’ and ‘changing the curriculum within higher education’. Several examples of current programs and procedures based upon these are explained. The paper concludes with the identification of three ‘dilemmas' which have emerged as a result of the development and implementation of equity processes and procedures in higher education in Australia. These are: (a) While there has been an increase in the number and range of students accessing higher education, this has been accompanied by a financial cost to the more disadvantaged students, a cost which has the potential to exacerbate equity principles. (b) For one of the first times in the history of higher education, a focus is being placed on its teaching and learning functions, as opposed to its research functions. The problem is that those universities that have been obliged to broaden their base radically have also been obliged to review their teaching and learning practices without any budgetary compensation. (c) A third consequence of these changes relates to the life of a traditional academic. Universities that have been at the forefront of ‘changing their curriculum’ to cope with more diverse student groups (open and distance learning) have seen the loss of ‘lecturer autonomy’ as they work more as members of teams and less as individuals.

Service Learning: The Peace Corps, American Higher Education, and the Limits of Modernist Ideas of Development and Citizenship

2018 ◽  
Vol 58 (4) ◽  
pp. 475-505
Author(s):  
David S. Busch
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Service Learning ◽  
Citizenship Education ◽  
Peace Corps ◽  
Pedagogical Practices ◽  
American Higher Education ◽  
History Of ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Work Abroad ◽  
The University

In the early 1960s, Peace Corps staff turned to American colleges and universities to prepare young Americans for volunteer service abroad. In doing so, the agency applied the university's modernist conceptions of citizenship education to volunteer training. The training staff and volunteers quickly discovered, however, that prevailing methods of education in the university were ineffective for community-development work abroad. As a result, the agency evolved its own pedagogical practices and helped shape early ideas of service learning in American higher education. The Peace Corps staff and supporters nonetheless maintained the assumptions of development and modernist citizenship, setting limits on the broader visions of education emerging out of international volunteerism in the 1960s. The history of the Peace Corps training in the 1960s and the agency's efforts to rethink training approaches offer a window onto the underlying tensions of citizenship education in the modern university.

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