Presents a brief history of the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE), launched during a period of growth and turmoil in U.S. higher education. Discusses FIPSE's successes as it celebrates 30 years of helping colleges and universities assess and improve the quality of their services. (EV)

Causes and effects are examined for recent cuts in the budgets of the Office of Education's Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE) and the National Institute of Education (NIE). Through interviews with agency executives the author finds new priority placed on selling themselves and their products to Congress. (JT)

Describes the program at Northwestern University where the university became a lender in the Federally Insured Student Loan Program in cooperation with a large bank. (Author/PG)

Authors take a critical look at the HEW Task Force on Higher Education and the recent article by its chairman, Frank Newman. (Ed.)

Excerpts of the 1980 Democratic Party platform dealing with education are presented, along with the complete text of the education section of the Republican Party platform. (LB)

Four opinions are presented concerning the controversy over state/federal government responsibility for higher education. (Editor/PG)

A congressional staff member explains why Congress has difficulty controlling the federal role in higher education and suggests ways the higher education community can help make the federal government a more effective and responsive partner, e.g. assessment of the impact of federal programs by a coalition of nongovernment organizations. (JT)

Describes how the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE) has played a central role in sponsoring innovations in the medical and health sciences, including landmark medical projects to integrate women's health issues into the medical curriculum and to use lay people in the teaching and evaluating of medical students. (EV)

Describes how the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE) has helped institutions reach out to groups they have historically neglected, including funding a project to formulate a global strategy for making computers accessible to disabled students. Includes a list of other projects. (EV)

The federal cost-of-education program would provide millions of dollars a year in direct institutional aid to public and private colleges. Funds would be granted largely on the number of students receiving federal student aid funds at each college. The history of this program is traced. (Author/PG)

Discusses how the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE) has considered international programs an essential element of its mandate and created projects that led to partnerships that advance core international initiatives in higher education. (EV)

Reviews activity in Congress, federal agencies, and higher education associations as legislation to extend and improve the 1972 Higher Education Amendments is being fashioned. Issues include a public vs. private debate regarding use of the Basic Opportunity Grant program (BOG) to foster access as opposed to choice among institutions. (JT)

To liberate individuals and free colleges to do what they do best the author proposes that each person receive a fixed sum of $10,000 on his eighteenth birthday or upon graduation from high school to be drawn through increased take-home pay, or used for further education, or for financial investment. (JT)

Criticising human capital analysis as it has been applied to public policy (e.g. seeing educational institutions as means to greater personal and national income and substituting capital for labor, which causes competition for students' borrowed money), the author argues for a negative income tax and an endowment funding for institutions of higher…

New trend of the National Science Foundation is for more support of science education for all students, and for individual research projects, especially those dealing with national problems. (IR)