American higher ed falling behind other nations, study says
American higher education still may be considered the best in the world, but it is slipping in terms of international competitiveness. The accessibility and expense of a degree, meanwhile, pose massive challenges here at home, according to a new report released today.
"Other countries are creeping up on us, and the worst thing we can do is sit on our lards and do nothing," says James Hunt Jr., the former governor of North Carolina and chairman of the nonpartisan National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, which released the report.
The biennial "Measuring Up 2006: The National Report Card on Higher Education" found that the average American ninth grader has a less than 40 percent likelihood of enrolling in any college, that it costs the average family one quarter of annual income just to afford a year of community college, and that the country now ranks 16th among developed nations for the rate of college completion.
The findings lend support to the conclusions of a commission appointed by the secretary of education (including some affiliated with today's report) that has been investigating the state of higher education for the past few months. A recent draft of the commission's report proposes that colleges find ways to measure what their students actually are learning so that state and federal governments can maintain greater oversight over how education dollars are spent. A final report from the commission is expected in the coming weeks.
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