Meeting the Challenge: - The Council of Independent Colleges

John R. Thelin
provide affordable, high-quality undergraduate education to new generations.
educational reasons, preferring a more personalized
pedagogical approach.
The statistical skeleton gains a fuller shape when one
considers that the major factor in the growth of American
undergraduate education has been investments by state
and local governments in the creation of new institutions,
especially the community colleges. In 1950, junior and
community colleges enrolled fewer than 5 percent of firstyear
college students; by 1980 the comparable figure was
50 percent. The new community colleges were commuter
institutions, without residence halls, and populated by parttime
students who did not seek to complete a bachelor’s
degree. Community colleges dramatically expanded the
range of options within American postsecondary education,
but their approach to undergraduate education contrasted
sharply with that of the private liberal arts colleges.
Charting the Collegiate Course
The preoccupation with expanding undergraduate
enrollments has been a dominant theme in American higher
education since World War II. This big story, however,
is not the whole story. The enduring—and endearing—
characteristic of American higher education since the 17 th
century has been its diversity. While the large universities
gained resources and publicity, the small private liberal arts
colleges not only survived but thrived on their ability to
provide affordable, high-quality undergraduate education to
new generations of American students.
The aim here is not to dismiss the appeal of bigness
in American higher education, but rather to probe this
preoccupation by considering alternative educational values
and models of institutional effectiveness. Private colleges have
responded to changing demographics in a distinctive manner,
and they have been especially effective as part of the spectrum
of American postsecondary education. Between 1981 and
2001, for example, independent colleges and universities
enrolled only 21 percent of first-year students, but they
conferred a much larger percentage of the nation’s bachelor’s
degrees—37 percent. While the large public institutions were
enrolling more students, the smaller colleges were seeing
more of their students graduate (see chart on following page).
As we have already seen, the liberal arts colleges
also grew with the times. The first sign that private colleges
could help absorb a new generation of students came with
the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1945, popularly
known as the GI Bill. One strength of this legislation was
that it gave qualified veterans choices about their education.
Scholarships and living expense stipends could be used
at any accredited institution. Within the marketplace of
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