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Game Changers: Education and IT
the delivery of higher education at significantly less expense with its
creative infrastructure. At its core, this innovative university hopes to
create positive change in worldwide higher education through its disruptive
effect.
Rationale for the Approach Taken by University of the
People
Bringing together students from all walks of life, across cultures
and nationalities—that is the ultimate learning experience.
—Shai Reshef, UoPeople founder and president
The need for education in general, and tertiary education specifically, is a
growing global concern, especially for countries in the developing world where
the education index is very low. (The education index is one component of the
United Nations’ annual Human Development Index and is measured by combining
literacy rates with the gross enrollment ratio for primary, secondary, and
tertiary participation.) Africa—most notably, perhaps—has a long history of low
participation rates in postsecondary education. In Sub-Saharan Africa, despite
rapid growth in tertiary education, recent estimates are that only 6 percent of
eligible students have access to higher education. 1
Socioeconomic conditions lead to significant inequality in access to higher
education in both developed and developing countries. In regions that have
been devastated by natural disasters, political conflicts, or social upheaval, colleges
and universities are often severely affected, leaving few or no options
for students who want to further their education. Haiti provides a striking example:
the 2010 earthquake that ravaged that country destroyed twenty-eight
of the thirty-two major universities in Port-au-Prince and the surrounding area,
and the other four were severely damaged. 2
The primary reason that millions of people are unable to attain higher education
is that most people on the globe today can’t afford the cost of going
to college. This is an issue even in wealthy countries: in the United States, the
cost of higher education has been steadily on the rise over the last three decades—growing
four times faster than the rate of inflation—causing many students
to find that a college degree is simply out of reach. 3
In addition to the expense, in many regions of the world there simply
aren’t enough colleges to accommodate the number of students who would
want to attend. Neither the private sector nor governments have the resources
to build enough bricks-and-mortar colleges or universities to accommodate the
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