William G. Tierney 
Get Real 
49 Challenges Confronting Higher Education

Higher education always seems to be in crisis. Governments, foundations, professional associations, and the occasional scornful professor all tend to lament one or another problem plaguing America’s colleges and universities. The more apocalyptic claims state that the United States is a ‘nation at risk, ‘ that our students’ minds have been closed, or that radical faculty have run amok and are brainwashing our youth.



In
Get Real, William G. Tierney, a leading scholar of higher education, cuts through this noise, drawing on his experience and expertise to provide a thought-provoking overview of the many challenges confronting higher education and how to deal with them. In forty-nine short, engaging essays, he aims not to stoke the flames of controversy or promote a particular stance but to provoke creative, forward-looking public discussion about what higher education could and should look like in the twenty-first century. Tierney clearly distills and offers his take on critical issues—from diversity and free speech to the rise of for-profit colleges and student debt—but the goal is always to give readers the background and tools to form their own opinions. Written in a conversational tone and laced with personal anecdotes,
Get Real is informed by scholarly literature without being weighed down by it and includes suggestions for further reading.

Inhoudsopgave

Acknowledgments

Preface



1. A Crisis Is a Terrible Thing to Waste

The Benefits of a Postsecondary Education

The Worth of Universities to Society

The Challenges That Exist

Getting Higher Education’s Groove Back



2. Canaries in the Academic Coal Mine

The Twenty-First Century Idea of a University

Is Higher Education an Aging Industry or a Hot Commodity? Or Both?

Why For-Profit Higher Education Grew

‘It’s None of Your Business.’ ‘Yes, It Is!’

‘Good’ Public Goods



3. The Kids Are Alright—No, They’re Not

John Dewey, Meet Mark Zuckerberg

That Pesky Problem of the First College Year

Let’s Get Real about the (Lack of) Importance of Attending Class

What’s Going on Outside of Class



4. Safe Spaces, Trigger Warnings, and the Contours of Diversity

America’s Love Affair with ‘Merit’

Safe Spaces for ‘Snowflakes’

The Imprint of Microaggressions and Trigger Warnings

Demands versus Conversations



5. Students as Customers

Universities as Amazon (or Whole Foods)

The Lords of the Manor: Faculty

The Parameters of a Good Idea: For-Profit Higher Education

The Flimflam Man Reexamined: For-Profit Higher Education



6. Tear Down That Wall: From High School to College

College for All?

College for Some?

Preparing for College

College Knowledge



7. Jobs, Jobs, Not Jobs

The Good Old Days: Before Anyone Was ‘Academically

Adrift’

Reading and Writing and Arithmetic

Ahead at the Starting Line

Kicking the Learning Can Down the Road



8. The Cost of Free Speech

Understanding Academic Freedom

The Psychic Cost of Free Speech

Fake News and Academic Freedom

The Monetary Cost of Free Speech

On Censoring Others and Oneself



9. Goodbye, Mr. Chips

Why Tenure Came into Existence

Why Tenure Is Going Away

The Color of the Academy



10. Paying for College

Understanding Costs

How Much Is a Degree Really Worth?

How to Avoid (or at Least Minimize) Debt

The Pluses and Minuses of Working in College



11. Noses In, Fingers Out: Rethinking Shared Governance

Shared Governance No More

Presidents at the Trough: Perks and More Perks

Boards Asleep at the Wheel

Monkey See, Monkey Don’t

Leadership for the Twenty-First Century



12. Lessons Learned

Inconvenient Truths

Building a Community of Difference

The Way Forward



Notes

Further Reading

About the Author

Index

Over de auteur

William G. Tierney is University Professor Emeritus and Founding Director of the Pullias Center for Higher Education at the University of Southern California. His many books include
Relational Sociology and Research on Schools, Colleges, and Universities (coedited with Suneal Kolluri) and
The Problem of College Readiness (coedited with Julia C. Duncheon), both also published by SUNY Press;
Diversifying Digital Learning: Online Literacy and Educational Opportunity (coedited with Zoë B. Corwin and Amanda Ochsner); and
Rethinking Education and Poverty.