Re:Learning | Workers in the Spotlight, Higher Ed on the Sidelines

[THE CHRONICLE OF HIGHER EDUCATION] #subscribelink [Subscribe Today]( --------------------------------------------------------------- [Subscribe to The Chronicle today to get access to premium content and more.]( Re:Learning Tuesday, July 24, 2018 --------------------------------------------------------------- [Sign up for this newsletter]( I’m Goldie Blumenstyk, a senior writer at The Chronicle of Higher Education covering innovation in and around academe. Here’s what’s on my mind this week: Workers in the spotlight, higher ed on the sidelines. Did you notice what — and who — was missing from all the hullabaloo last week around the White House’s national work-force strategy? The [executive order creating a National Council for the American Worker]( aims “to ensure that America’s students and workers have access to affordable, relevant, and innovative education and job training.” Even though education is a central pillar of the plan, no college leaders were present at its unveiling. Nor, from what I can tell, were higher-ed leaders asked to provide any input. This was one of the few times President Trump has invoked higher education without insulting or threatening it. Some of the ideas covered in the order — and a related [report from the White House Council of Economic Advisers]( — touch on concepts I hear all the time at conferences on reinventing higher ed: giving greater weight to industry credentials, for example, and allowing Pell Grants to be used for short-term training programs. Those two actions alone — especially if the Pell Grant expansion came without an increase in overall funding — could seriously reshape the market for higher education. I’m not exactly surprised that this White House considered college officials irrelevant to its efforts. The administration’s view of higher education seems predominantly focused on its role as a force for training and re-skilling. The need for STEM education gets a single mention in the executive order. (Humanities and social sciences get none at all, but considering the focus on “workers,” that’s more understandable.) The administration’s decision to bypass college leaders may be a sign of how little influence the major education associations carry with this White House. I had hoped to talk to the heads of the American Council on Education and the Association of American Universities about what this says about the administration’s view of higher ed, but neither Ted Mitchell nor Mary Sue Coleman was available. The groups learned of the efforts only when they were announced, their spokesmen told me. J. Noah Brown, president of the Association of Community College Trustees, noted that federal support for job retraining has been cut over the past decade, and called the order an encouraging sign. But Brown clearly wasn’t in on it either. “We look forward to further details,” his statement said. Sidelining higher ed seems like a missed opportunity to engage the sector on issues concerning lifelong learning and the role of education in a changing economy. Then again, if this effort proves as a consequential as the administration’s Infrastructure Week and other stalled initiatives, maybe it won’t matter. As you decide for yourselves about the new council’s prospects, consider this: The order names 12 people to the council and says one of them should be the director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy. But 18 months into this administration, the president [has yet to nominate]( anyone to that post. Book Corner: Living longer, but what will it take to prosper? As a society, we’re living longer. A lot of what we read and hear on that issue asks whether we’re saving enough to cover the costs of our old age. But longevity has broader implications — for the nature of work, for our family structures, and of course, for the shape of education. That idea was driven home to me recently in a conversation with Rovy Branon, vice provost at the University of Washington’s Continuum College, who told me he’s begun almost religiously recommending a book called [The 100-Year Life: Living and Working in an Age of Longevity]( to colleagues. So I ordered it. Now I get why he recommends it. The book, written by two professors at the London Business School, deals only glancingly with education. And frankly, even those brief mentions are pretty obvious: Institutions will need to adapt to technology, break down boundaries between age groups, find better ways to teach creativity and empathy, and so on. But like Branon, I’m far more intrigued by the broader trends and implications the authors describe. For one, they argue that longevity could be as powerful a societal force as globalization and technology. It could also mean our lives will be made up of even more stages. And the flexibility more time might afford could easily upend the way we’ve traditionally sequenced our lives: education first, followed by work, followed by retirement. Given all that, Branon says a college leader would be shortsighted “if you think a four-year education at 17 is going to last you 70 years.” He’s already taking that lesson to heart at his institution. As part of its “future of the faculty” study, he’s recommending that the entire university consider what it would take to create a 60-year curriculum. I haven’t finished the book yet, but it got me wondering: What other books — not specifically about higher ed! — would be useful as we think about the directions in which colleges are going? What have you read that’s inspiring, thought-provoking, or perhaps even disturbing? Please send me your suggestions (and why you chose them), and I’ll share them in a future newsletter. Got a tip you’d like to share or a question you’d like me to answer? Let me know at [goldie@chronicle.com.](mailto:goldie@chronicle.com) If you have been forwarded this newsletter and would like to see past issues or sign up to receive your own copy, you can do so [here.]( Goldie’s Weekly Picks From The Chronicle --------------------------------------------------------------- [What Happens in the Classroom No Longer Stays in the Classroom. What Does That Mean for Teaching?]( [premium] By Beckie Supiano In an era of secret video recordings and online evaluations, the possibility of public judgment hovers over every instructor. That’s making the messy art of teaching even messier. [Who Lives in Education Deserts? More People Than You Might Think]( By Ben Myers For most college students, place matters. Here’s what we know about the places where there’s no viable college option nearby. [Some Colleges Cautiously Embrace Wikipedia]( By Megan Zahneis The online encyclopedia, once scorned by academics, now pairs them with editors of its crowdsourced content. 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