Two higher education leaders present perspectives on the meaning of the baccalaureate degree. The first argues that institutions can satisfy the need for public accountability for the degree without sacrificing autonomy. The second stresses that a clear statement of institutional objectives and desired outcomes is important and is consistent with…

Examines whether federal courts and the application of free-speech standards in academia are the proper ways to deal with the difficult issues faced by higher education. The author argues that they are not, and uses the Levin and Jeffries free-speech cases to illustrate this. (GR)

The founder of the Whitehead Institute (Massachusetts) describes the issues and challenges encountered in establishing a private research institute, focusing on the evolution of the institute's affiliation with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Autonomy, taxes, the differences between academic and industrial organizations, and defining…

The 1983 University Reform Act in Spain is examined, and its proposals for autonomy are analyzed in terms of the effect of the internationalization of Spanish universities. The reorganization of university teaching is seen as a possible impediment to internationalization of the teaching corps. (Author/MLW)

Four works are reviewed that contrast cases of constructive state government/university partnerships with examples of inappropriate involvement, and profile the primary political and governing bodies influencing higher education. The quest for quality without undue intrusion emerges as a recurrent theme. (Author/MSE)

W. Bowen and D. Bok analyze new data from the Mellon Foundation on the question of racial preferences in college admissions. Bowen and Bok assert that the institutions should decide admissions policy, that the autonomy of the college is one of the virtues of U.S. higher education. (SLD)

Since 1997 there has been a series of far-reaching constitutional changes in the UK through the devolution of power from Westminster to new legislatures and executives in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. In addition, an elected assembly in London and the English regional development agencies have been established. This paper examines policy…

Peter Blake reports on new legislations and reforms in Virginia that provide colleges and universities more operational and administrative autonomy in return for their commitment to public goals for higher education. He traces the history and context of privatization in Virgina from 1988. During this time, the legislatively mandated Virginia…

This paper uses extensive student-level micro databases of three international student achievement tests to estimate heterogeneity in the effect of external exit examinations on student performance along three dimensions. First, quantile regressions show that the effect tends to increase with student ability--but it does not differ substantially…

By tracing back the historical context of educational changes, this article explores in detail the impacts of globalisation on China's higher education reform. A trend of decentralisation in both rights and responsibilities is revealed in terms of structural adjustment, human resource exploitation and retention, curriculum development, and…

There are several reasons why the issues of academic freedom and university autonomy have re-emerged on the agenda in the last few years. First of all, there is the spiralling increase in the number of students since the end of the Second World War with, as its corollary, the explosion in most countries--whatever their political or social…

Until recently, charter schools have served a small percentage of public school students in any given community, but that is changing. Recent data indicate that the market share of public school students enrolled in charter schools is climbing. The growth of the charter school movement behooves us to consider how such a change in the educational…

The transformation of higher education systems under the pressure of new needs required by the "society of knowledge" in France and Italy has had a deep effect on the relationship between state and university, and therefore a direct impact on university governance. This article sums up the main results of a research carried out on…

This article is a retrospective analysis of a commentary we published in "The Journal of Negro Education" 25 years ago in which we discussed the interrelationships between and among the interpersonal, institutional, community, and African American achievement variables before and after the historic 1954 "Brown" decision. We discuss in this piece…

This booklet presents findings of a study that gathered information about charter schools. Representatives of more than 170 public charter schools were surveyed by mail, telephone or at national and regional meetings. Approximately 120 surveys were returned by representatives of 110 charter public schools in seven states--California, Colorado,…