HE5

LEAS 833 Higher Education in America

Weeks 5 & 6

Types of Higher Education Institutions Part II

• Liberal Arts Colleges

• Research Institutions

• Tribal Institutions

• Single-Sex Institutions

• Religious-Affiliated Institutions

• Community Colleges

Source: Stateuniversity.com

• Liberal arts colleges endeavor to educate the whole student and emphasize education for its own sake rather than for job preparation.

• Liberal arts colleges tend to be small and private. ▪ Many have total enrollments of less than 2,000 students with low student-to-

teacher ratios. ▪ They are also usually residential and value the idea of community. ▪ The liberal arts college is invested in teaching, and students and professors often

collaborate with one another in the learning process.

• Liberal arts colleges aim to expose students to a wide breadth of courses in the humanities and both physical and social sciences. ▪ History, philosophy, religion, literature, physical sciences, social sciences, the arts,

languages, and mathematics.

• Most liberal arts colleges in the United States were founded by various religious dominations.

• Over time the American liberal arts college has become a small part of the American higher education system.

Liberal Arts Colleges

Source: Stateuniversity.com

• Liberal arts colleges flourished at the beginning of the twenty-first century.

• Liberal arts colleges are often innovative in their programs.

• Some liberal arts colleges focus on serving particular populations. ▪ All-women's colleges - Smith College and Mills. ▪ Historically Black colleges and universities - Morehouse College,

Spelman College. ▪ Few all-men's colleges - Walbash College.

Liberal Arts Colleges

Source: Stateuniversity.com

• The liberal arts college strives to produce thoughtful, well-rounded citizens of the world.

• An education in which students learn how to learn, an education that emphasizes the forming rather than filling of minds, an education that renders our graduates adaptive to any marketplace, curious about whatever world is around them, and resourceful enough to change with the times.

Liberal Arts Colleges

Source: Stateuniversity.com

• In the mid-nineteenth century, Americans began traveling to Germany to obtain their Ph.D.s. The influx of German-educated scholars back to the United States bought a new model for the American college, and created what is now the research university.

• Research universities are postsecondary institutions that devote a large portion of their mission, resources, and focus to graduate education and research. ▪ Currently, there are more than 250 of these institutions in the United

States.

Research Institutions

Source: Stateuniversity.com

• Range in size from very large universities with 60,000 students to small universities with fewer than 4,500 students.

• Students attending research universities generally pursue a specialized curriculum with a very large number of requirements for the major and a smaller number of electives and general education requirements.

Research Institutions

Source: Stateuniversity.com

• Students who have large lower-division classes taught by graduate students who serve as teaching assistants.

• Faculty members at research universities are expected to devote a larger amount of their time to research.

• Faculty members are researchers first and teachers second. ▪ Expected to publish articles and books and secure research

grants from external sources.

• Research universities enrolled more than one out of every five students attending a college or university in the United States.

Research Institutions

Source: Stateuniversity.com

• A research university is a far-flung and complex organization with multiple campuses, extension centers, research centers and institutes, multiple campuses, student services and programming for diverse student groups, and often high-profile athletics teams.

• Not unusual for research universities to establish their own research parks where private companies and the university engage in technology transfer and spin off new businesses.

Research Institutions

Tribal Colleges & Universities

Source: insidehighered.com

• Tribal colleges and universities offer opportunities for Native Americans to pursue higher education within their own cultural and regional contexts. ▪ Generally located on or near Indian reservations.

• Aim to preserve and communicate traditional native culture, provide higher education and career or technical opportunities to tribal members, enhance economic opportunities within the reservation community, and promote tribal self-determination.

Tribal Colleges & Universities

Source: insidehighered.com

• 1968 the first Tribal College was created by Navajo Tribe on their Indian Reservation ▪ As of 2001, thirty-two tribal colleges have been created by

American Indians tribes for American Indians. ▪ These colleges are located in areas with large concentrations of

Native Americans, principally in the upper Midwest, the Pacific Northwest, and the Southwest.

▪ Among these tribal colleges and universities, twenty-four are community colleges and offer the associate's degree and technical and vocational certificates, six offer the bachelor's degree, and two offer the master's degree.

Tribal Colleges & Universities

Source: insidehighered.com

• Tribal colleges seek to prepare their students to succeed both inside and outside the reservation.

• Tribal colleges and universities receive little or no state funds. ▪ They are primarily dependent on federal assistance for their core

operating expenses through oversight by the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

• Most of them have small enrollments, often less than 1,000 students.

• The average age of tribal college students has become younger in recent years, from thirty years of age down to twenty-seven.

Tribal Colleges & Universities

Source: insidehighered.com

• The modal profile of the typical tribal college student: ▪ Is a single mother with young children. ▪ Living below the poverty level and often dependent on welfare or

her extended family for support. ▪ Attends part-time, and is academically underprepared and in need

of some remedial courses. ▪ Child care and family services are common needs for these students

that tribal colleges try to meet on their campuses. ▪ Lack of dependable transportation and available telephone services

in isolated reservation areas impact students' ability to attend regularly or to communicate with college officials when problems arise.

Tribal Colleges & Universities

Source: insidehighered.com

• 30 % of the faculty are Native American and Alaska Natives as compared to less than one percent of all faculty at all other public institutions.

• Students have native role models and mentors, some of whom are tribal elders, who bring cultural awareness, sensitivity, and specific curricular expertise to the classroom.

• Tribal colleges and universities are able to achieve higher retention and graduation rates for Native American students than mainstream institutions can. ▪ Colleges awarded 69 percent of their associate's degrees, 81 percent of the

bachelor's degrees, and 67 percent of the master's degrees to Native American students.

▪ By comparison, only 0.9 percent of the associate's degrees, 0.5 of the bachelor's degrees, and 0.4 of the master's degrees awarded by all other institutions were earned by Native American students.

Tribal Colleges & Universities

Source: insidehighered.com

• All tribal colleges have full accreditation status from national accreditation boards.

• Even with massive federal monies, tribal colleges and universities remain seriously underfunded compared to the varied support received by mainstream higher education institution.

Single-Sex Institutions

Source: insidehighered.com

• The original colleges in the United States, including Harvard (1636), William and Mary (1693), Yale College (1716), and the College of New Jersey at Princeton (1746), were founded to educate men only.

• By 1870 there were 582 colleges in the United States, of which 343 were for men only, 70 were for women only, and 169 were coeducational.

• By 1890 the number of men's colleges reached 400 institutions, 465 coeducational colleges, and 217 women's colleges.

• The bulk of the single-sex institutions for both men and women were founded in the South and Northeast.

Single-Sex Institutions

Source: insidehighered.com

• Between 1890 and 1910 enrollment at women's colleges increased by 348 percent, while the gain of female students at coeducational colleges was 438 percent.

• In the 1950s there were 228 men's colleges, 267 women's colleges, and 1,313 coeducational institutions.

• The curriculum at these women's colleges focused on liberal education rather than on pre-professional programs.

Single-Sex Institutions

Source: insidehighered.com

• The 1960s and 1970s saw a more pronounced shift away from single- sex institutions toward coeducation. ▪ To many, the replacement of single-sex education with

coeducation was seen as part of women's attainment of parity with men.

• At the beginning of the twenty-first century there are only two men's colleges in the United States–Wabash College in Indiana and Deep Springs in California, although there are approximately eighty women's colleges.

• Women's colleges educate fewer than 1% of all women attending postsecondary institutions and award 1 % of all degrees conferred or 28,000 degrees in 2012.

Single-Sex Institutions

Source: insidehighered.com

• Women's colleges tend to be small, ranging in size from 94 full-time students to 5,000 full-time students.

• All women's colleges are private institutions, more than half of the existing women's colleges have a religious affiliation, most often with the Roman Catholic Church (33%).

• Almost half of the women's colleges are located in the northeastern United States, while 33 percent are located in the South.

Single-Sex Institutions

Source: insidehighered.com

• There are two historically Black four-year women's colleges, and six two-year women's colleges.

• Seventeen women's colleges grant master's degrees, while forty-seven grant bachelor's degrees.

• Woman’s colleges serve women of color and nontraditional-aged women in higher proportions than comparable coeducational institutions.

• Women's colleges are also more likely to grant undergraduate degrees to women in the more male-dominated fields as compared to similar coeducational institutions.

• Female students at women's colleges are more satisfied with their overall college experience, are more likely to major in nontraditional fields, and express higher levels of self-esteem and leadership skills.

• Female students who have attended women's colleges are more likely than their coeducational counterparts to graduate, to have high expectations of themselves, to attend graduate school, and to be successful in their adult lives.

Religious Affiliated Colleges & Universities

Source: Stateuniversity.com

• Religiously affiliated colleges often combined the mission of education with the desire to train individuals in religious practice and to evangelize others.

• Often church-related colleges began as academies or seminaries and then grew to college or university status.

• Some colleges severed their relationship with the religious communities and continue in the twenty-first century as quality independent institutions. ▪ Among these are Vanderbilt University, Auburn University, University of Southern

California, Oberlin College, and Princeton University.

• In 1881, 80 percent of the colleges in the United States were church related and private.

• In 2001, 20 % of the colleges (980 institutions had connection to a religious tradition). ▪ Sixty-six religious groups in the United States currently sponsor colleges or

universities. ▪ These institutions enroll more than 1.75 million students.

Religious Affiliated Colleges & Universities

Source: Stateuniversity.com

• Religiously affiliated colleges and universities are legally independent institutions. Sponsoring bodies usually have representatives on the institution's board of trustees.

• The nature and expression of the educational institution's relationship with religious bodies vary greatly. ▪ A few institutions are controlled by the denomination. ▪ Others share only a nominal relationship. ▪ Some colleges are to acknowledge an "historical" relationship.

• The colleges invest significant financial and personnel resources to foster personal worth and dignity within a diverse and just community, leading to an emphasis on lifelong learning, social responsibility, and service.

• Community service is an integral part of the colleges' philosophies.

• The curricular focus on the liberal arts and a solid commitment to general education challenges students to integrate learning from a variety of disciplines.

• Co-curricular religious activities are present on all campuses. These include worship, fellowship, study of the sacred texts of the religious tradition, service, and religious support.

Religious Affiliated Colleges & Universities

Source: Stateuniversity.com

• The typical religiously affiliated college is residential, although some colleges have developed satellite learning and evening programs to meet the needs of nontraditional students.

• While related to and supported by specific religious traditions, most colleges welcome students from a variety of faith traditions–or no faith tradition.

• The student bodies include representation from ethnic and international communities.

• The institutions' student-centered focus generally assures most students will graduate in four years.

Religious Affiliated Colleges & Universities

Source: Stateuniversity.com

• Religiously affiliated colleges and universities are as diverse as their religious traditions and the higher education scene in the United States. ▪ Although most are liberal arts colleges with enrollments between

800 and 2,000 students, ▪ Church-related higher education also includes large research

universities (Boston University, Notre Dame), medical colleges, professional schools, two-year colleges, theological seminaries, and Bible colleges.

▪ Many religiously affiliated colleges regularly are highly ranked in various "best colleges" ratings in the United States.

Community Colleges

Source: Stateuniversity.com

• The community college is largely a phenomenon of twentieth-century American higher education.

• Community Colleges offer six-month vocational diplomas; one- and two-year vocational, technical, and pre-professional certificates; and two-year programs of general and liberal education leading to an associate degree.

• Two-year college refers to all institutions where the highest degree awarded is a two-year degree (i.e., associate of arts, associate of science, associate of general studies, associate of applied arts, associate of applied science).

• As a distinctively American invention, the comprehensive community college stands between secondary and higher education, between adult and higher education, and between industrial training and formal technical education.

Community Colleges

Source: Stateuniversity.com

• Community colleges have provided educational programs and services to people who otherwise would not have enrolled in a college or university.

• For the most part community colleges offer admission to all who possess a high school education; in addition, many provide assistance to adults in completing their secondary education.

• They attract students who live in geographic proximity and who seek low-cost postsecondary education.

Community Colleges

Source: Stateuniversity.com

• Community colleges hold the collegiate function central to their mission. ▪ Transfer allows the traditional-age student seeking the first years of

a baccalaureate degree, collegiate courses enroll. ▪ Career preparation students, such as nursing students seeking

knowledge in the basic life sciences;. ▪ Reverse transfer students (who begin at a university and later

choose to continue at a community college). ▪ Part-time casual students (who enroll for personal rather than

degree-completion reasons). ▪ Continuing Education ( Working professionals needing additional

training)

Community Colleges

Source: Stateuniversity.com

• Community colleges play a significant role in meeting immediate and short-cycle needs of the immigrant, the disabled, and the unemployed with a wide range of courses and programs.

• The federal government has encouraged this expansion through incentives to colleges that serve such groups as displaced homemakers, students with disabilities, those needing adult basic education, and the unemployed seeking job retraining.

Community Colleges Community colleges serve more students than any other single sector of higher education.

• In 2016, community colleges served 46 percent) of all undergraduates enrolled in higher education. That’s over 8.5 million students.

• Public four-year colleges and universities enrolled 31 percent, followed by private nonprofit four-year institutions at 15 percent, and for-profit institutions at 8 percent.

Community colleges provide excellent educational opportunities at a lower price.

• Community colleges provide opportunities for students to learn and acquire the skills necessary to be competitive in today’s workforce.

• According to the College Board, the average tuition and fees charged by community colleges in 2017–18 was $3,560.

• Public four-year institutions charged $9,980, private nonprofit four-year institutions charged $34,700.

By Jonathan Turk