Meeting the Challenge: - The Council of Independent Colleges

Preface
Richard Ekman
The Council of Independent Colleges marks its 50 th anniversary in 2006. In the past
half-century CIC has grown in size—from 63 founding members to more than 550
members today—and greatly expanded the array of services and programs it offers to
member institutions. Yet the primary commitments at CIC are the same as they were in 1956: to
help campus leaders strengthen their own colleges and universities; to provide practical services
to member institutions; to encourage private philanthropy for independent higher education; to
promote liberal arts education; and to enhance and advocate for the distinctive effectiveness of
small and mid-sized private colleges and universities. We are proud of this record—proud of both
the changes at CIC and what has remained the same.
We wanted this milestone anniversary to be more than a celebration—which explains the
book in front of you now. We sought to use this occasion to shine the spotlight on the colleges and
universities that constitute CIC as well as to reflect on our own development as an organization.
We asked three distinguished writers to help us. The first essay, by historian John R. Thelin of the
University of Kentucky, examines the many post-World War II challenges that small colleges faced
(for the most part, successfully): budgetary crises, demographic booms and busts, philanthropists
and policymakers who did not always understand the distinctive virtues of independent colleges,
and above all the challenge of “bigness.” The second essay, by former U.S. News & World Report
editor Alvin P. Sanoff, turns to the more recent years and current prospects of small and mid-sized
private institutions—diverse institutions, he argues, but collectively dynamic, adaptive, effective,
teaching-centered, and purposeful about their values and community service. The third essay, by
former Chronicle of Higher Education writer Welch Suggs, focuses on CIC’s own development as
the only national organization devoted to the collaborative improvement of private liberal arts
institutions.
Together the three essays make a powerful case for the value of independent colleges and
universities and their unique contributions to American higher education. Overall, there is much
good news in this volume, which we hope our members and friends will share widely. The many
challenges of the past have given us useful lessons as we look to the future.
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