`In an era of sound bites, Smart Leadership for Higher Education in Difficult Times provides an outstanding analysis of the context in which today's colleges and universities operate. The essays are thought provoking, insightful and valuable for preparing our institutions for an uncertain future. Through case studies and personal experience, contributors challenge readers to reflect on our own institutions and re-imagine higher education.' - Graham B. Spanier, The Pennsylvania State University, US `Smart Leadership for Higher Education in Difficult Times makes the case that bridging the time from recession to recovery with typical belt-tightening tactics, without a strategy for fundamental change in the higher education business model, is a formula for failure. Globalization, changing demographics, evolving technology and jobs of the future are only beginning to impact the business of higher education. These trends, combined with the lingering effects of constrained revenue, are the building blocks of a new business environment. Reading this book will jump-start your thinking about how innovation, reorganization, prioritization and strategic investing are necessary for institutional success.' - John Walda, National Association of College and University Business Officers, US `In response to falling state support, limited returns from endowments and increasing costs, colleges and universities have turned to examinations of the mission of higher education and new ways in which its missions can be achieved. Two of the many provocative insights described in this series of papers concern the permanent nature of change in the economic, demographic and competitive environment, and the need for more creativity and innovation.' - Risa Palm, Georgia State University, US `Smart Leadership for Higher Education in Difficult Times offers positive ideas and encouragement from some of the leading thinkers and doers in higher education about how to lead proactively in response to the sobering challenges now facing colleges and universities - economic stagnation; the completion imperative; rapid demographic changes; global competition; the stunning pace of technological change; and the tensions among affordability and the stubborn growth in college unit costs.' - William Zumeta, University of Washington and Association for the Study of Higher Education, US As the US economy emerges from the severest recession in a generation, large questions regarding its long-term ramifications for higher education remain unanswered. In fact, the harshest effects of the economic downturn are likely ahead as campus leadership focuses on enrollment, affordability and fundraising. This volume of essays examines the challenges and opportunities for advancing higher education's core missions of education, research and service in a resource-constrained environment. Many parties will wish to return to the old normal, but fulfilling the mission of higher education will require implementing change in the face of opposition, gaining support from key stakeholders, and maintaining morale in the process. The new normal entails innovating to meet the needs for higher education among a growing population of potential students from disadvantaged socioeconomic backgrounds, many of whom are ill-prepared for a college education and unaware of how to access it, and a population of mid-career students seeking to retool or reinvent themselves for the labor market. The economic success of both individuals and the US economy are directly dependent upon increasing the share of the population receiving a higher education. Chapter authors include college and university presidents and chancellors, and other senior administrators and thought leaders from the higher education community. They provide new and actionable information to enhance decision-making and inform strategic planning as well as a contemporary examination of the business of higher education and areas of potential new research. This book is an excellent resource for academic administrators, as well as for researchers and students in business, management, economics, education and public sector economics.

Private liberal arts colleges provide high-quality undergraduate education, but their survival is in doubt. Some see the liberal arts as increasingly irrelevant in a world marked by growing demand for technical training. Others wonder how private colleges, many with few students and high tuitions, can compete successfully against heavily subsidized public colleges and universities.David Breneman, an economist and former college president, explores these and many other educational and economic issues in this book, a detailed analysis of more than 200 liberal arts colleges. Breneman describes the recent financial and curricular history of liberal arts colleges. He explains how they have survived and how many have prospered despite severe competitive pressures. He shows how both outsiders and college administrators themselves misunderstand the role and effects of unfunded student aid (tuition discounting) and how this misunderstanding leads to questionable policies. He shows why the universe of liberal arts colleges which includes such diverse members as women's colleges, black colleges, religiously affiliated colleges, and highly selective colleges have had diverse experiences and confront different futures. Breneman includes sketches of twelve colleges that provide insight into both the shared and distinctive concerns of a varied but representative set of liberal arts colleges. He weaves these specific cases into a concluding chapter on the prospects for liberal arts colleges. This book is designed to appeal to college administrators, trustees, faculty, students, alumni, policymakers, and anyone who cares about quality higher education.

This ambitious book grows out of the realisation that a convergence of economic, demographic, and political forces in the early twenty-first century requires a fundamental re-examination of the financing of American higher education. The authors identify and address basic issues and trends that cut across the sectors of higher education, focusing on such questions as how much higher education the country needs for individual opportunity and for economic viability in the future; how responsibility for paying for it is currently allocated; and how financing higher education should be addressed in the future.