WSJ: Colleges Face Veritable SAT Of Challenges

Colleges Face Veritable SAT Of Challenges

Federal Funding Renewal, 2004 Election Spur Critiques on Tuition, Texts and
Accountability
By JUNE KRONHOLZ
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL


WASHINGTON -- It seems as though everyone in this town has a gripe with
America's colleges and universities.

Tuition is too high. The number of students who graduate is too low.
Professors are too liberal, and someone or other has an admissions
advantage, a leg up on federal loans, or both.

What is happening is that both the presidential election and Congress's
reauthorization of the law that defines the federal role in higher education
are scheduled for next year. At the same time, Americans have never been
more convinced that their kids need a college education -- or more uncertain
that they can afford it -- potentially giving Democrats an emotionally
charged economic issue they can use in the campaign as tuition continues to
rise. If that isn't the perfect storm for colleges that are eager for more
government aid, but don't want any strings attached, it is nevertheless
raining very hard.

The Senate won't take up the Higher Education Act until next year, and the
House also is months away from tackling the most important parts of the law,
which deal with student aid and tax credits. But the White House,
presidential candidates and both parties have been floating higher-education
ideas for almost a year.

The best known is a measure by California Rep. Howard McKeon that would
withhold federal aid from students attending colleges that raise their
tuition by more than double the inflation rate. The colleges accuse Mr.
McKeon, a conservative Republican, of advocating price controls, and insist
that cash-strapped legislatures and state boards, not the colleges
themselves, set tuition on most public campuses. But Mr. McKeon hits a
popular chord when he charges that universities boost their tuition every
time Congress boosts its student aid.


Massachusetts Democratic Sen. Edward Kennedy, meanwhile, has proposed
raising the value of the federal Pell Grant, which provided $11.7 billion in
student aid last year and is the government's biggest commitment to higher
education. Under his plan -- the Democrats' opening offer in what could be a
long debate -- the maximum grant would rise $450 to $4,500 per student.

But under Sen. Kennedy's approach, colleges also would have to disclose
information they now make it hard to find: How much they discount their
tuition off the published price to lure certain students, how much their
costs rise compared with their tuition, how many students are "legacies,"
the children of graduates.

Things don't stop there. Also last week, New Hampshire Republican Judd
Gregg, chairman of the Senate's education committee, held hearings into
whether liberal college professors are discouraging "intellectual diversity"
on campus. Mr. Gregg said he next will call hearings on textbook content.

The House, meanwhile, has passed a law requiring teacher colleges to tell
the Education Department how many of their students pass state
teacher-licensing tests -- an effort to raise standards for new school
teachers. Three major Democratic presidential candidates have unveiled
higher-education plans, although college generally isn't an issue in
national campaigns. Sen. Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut would require
colleges to issue "report cards" that disclose how many poor and minority
students they enroll and graduate.

The White House isn't talking about its plans for higher education, but last
year it suggested the president would like to extend to the colleges some of
the accountability measures that are in his "No Child Left Behind"
public-school program. Talk of a national test has quieted, but college
lobbyists worry that the administration is still interested in somehow
holding the colleges accountable for how well they educate their students.

Finally, obscure issues such as college accreditation and how hard or easy
it is to transfer credits between colleges are being written into bills or
scheduled for hearings. For-profit colleges, which are growing fast and find
support among business-friendly Republicans, contend the traditional
colleges are trying to make them less attractive to attend. The traditional
colleges, eager to protect their market share, don't disagree.

Low Expectations

While there isn't any shortage of proposals, David Longanecker, who headed
the Education Department's higher-education office under President Clinton,
predicts that "not much will happen" when Congress finally passes a bill.
The Bush administration and Congress are focused on making No Child Left
Behind work, says Mr. Longanecker, who is director of the Western Interstate
Commission for Higher Education, a 15-state association. There's isn't any
money for a new college program, he adds, and it is hard to imagine an
accountability system that could measure quality at community colleges and
the Ivy League alike.

Meanwhile, Mr. Gregg says he is "very hesitant" about getting the government
involved in what is taught on campuses. The air went out of the move to ban
legacy preferences, which tend to benefit white students, when the Supreme
Court upheld affirmative action. And Mr. McKeon's tuition sanctions would
hurt students who need federal aid to attend college. "I'm not saying it's
going to pass," Mr. McKeon said, but "you have to get people's attention."

College advocates dismiss most of the proposals and criticisms as part of
the posturing that accompanies debate over any big piece of legislation. But
Travis Reindl of the American Association of State Colleges and Universities
speculates that the focus is on higher ed because so many voters either are
in college, or have kids who soon will be. About 17.3 million people are
attending college now, twice as many as 30 years ago, and that is expected
to rise by an additional two million. "The constituency is larger and more
attentive," Mr. Reindl said, and perhaps more worried, too.

'Ideological Struggle'

College cost and access are lightning-rod issues. But state budget cuts to
public colleges caused an average 10% tuition increase this fall, and states
including California, Florida and Texas are talking about capping their
enrollments, leaving some students without a seat. Those are state issues,
but they find a ready ear in Congress and are already creating a stir on the
campaign trail.

In an increasingly partisan town, Rich Harple of the National Association of
State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges says he also sees an "ideological
struggle" going on. "There has always been a rolling of the eyes" about
colleges because they tend to be liberal and Democratic, he says. But with
Republicans in control of Congress and the White House, he sees colleges as
a target of "the conservative political agenda. 'Let's change these
institutions back to what they should be,' " he imagines conservatives
saying.

That could be, but 12 years ago, a Democratic-controlled Congress also
fussed about accountability and accreditation, and required the colleges to
report some of the performance statistics that are on the table now. Those
rules were dropped two years later when Republicans took control of
Congress.

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