Higher Ed Musings 11.

A Moonshot for Private Universities in the Public Interest

Everyone in higher ed these days wants to talk about the erosion of public confidence in higher ed, how the sector is broken, from elite private universities to struggling small liberal arts colleges to public systems — everyone is under new and intense state and federal scrutiny. Nobody has solutions except at the edges. Excuse me while I go look at the new rankings.

Everyone agrees elites should take the lead in making change. Well, many agree. Given the role of elites in widening inequality and political polarization there are questions of trust and direction involved. Change for whom? Will elites do anything that will risk a fall in the rankings?

Still, why not try. A commitment to improving our image, to rethinking the social contract between universities and the public, brought together four former college presidents, leaders of top higher ed associations and funders, national writers on higher ed, distinguished scholars of higher ed, trustees, and a handful of deans and former deans to a two-day convening earlier this month, Private Universities in the Public Interest, hosted at the Stanford Law School.

The goal was a call to action: how should the top 50-100 private colleges and universities respond to diminished trust in institutions that are, by measures such as as global rankings, research productivity, and their reach into the upper echelon of every sector of finance, government, business, and culture industries, in a golden age?  What is to be done about the “growing skepticism, resentment, and outright derision from the public and politicians alike,” as a pre-circulated framing essay written by the conveners stated bluntly.

Every idea was on the table. No observation about was too dangerous to make. I raised the English major-to-plumber pipeline I’ve written about here. There was general agreement a call to action had to be bold. The phrase “lipstick on a pig” was uttered at least once.

The decision to focus top private schools was a matter of recognition that well-resourced schools have more capacity to act unilaterally and proactively, and that their sheer wealth “enables and obliges these schools to pursue novel forms of civic action,” stated the conveners.

Some consensus views emerged: there is no fundamental reason private universities should be in rankings-driven competition when there are so few real differences between top institutions. (The fanatical branding practiced by some schools may be a consequence of having little else to distinguish themselves.)  Some of the most successful private colleges succeed because of their distinctive culture (Reed, Swarthmore, Berea). Elite schools should be better at the hard sell of studying the liberal arts to make educated citizens. Elite schools should ask whether degrees ideally take four successive years and 120 credits. Private institutions should admit more transfers from community colleges and more veterans. More service should be baked into attending an elite private. Leaders of elite privates should spend more time in the real world and with legislatures, at the state and local level. Endowment growth at the elite privates cannot to remain on its current trajectory toward stratospheric accumulation without political blowback at some point. More transparency about costs is becoming increasingly urgent. Why, exactly, do these places spend so much money on so few students, and is there an upper limit to this excess? How will unionization matter? Elite schools need to reckon with the fact that their well-heeled alumni base, curated carefully over decades, may inhibit their beloved institutions from making any real changes.

That last point – that elite private university alumni have an outsized influence on institutional conservatism – suggests that a literal moonshot may be in order. What would it take for an entire elite campus community, including alumni, to get behind an endeavor that would open its doors wider than ever without loss of prestige? A thought experiment emerged to think through the possibility of bold action that could just possibly yield change here on earth.

So here goes:

Imagine it’s 2050, there’s a 4,000-person colony living on the moon, most highly educated scientists and engineers: astronomers, astrophysicists, geologists, materials scientists, nuclear physicists, biologists studying effects of low gravity and radiation, robotics specialists, life support engineers, doctors, nurses, physiotherapists, nutritionists, hydroponic/aeroponic specialists. As the colony grows, less educated labor is needed: HVAC technicians, 3D printing machinists, heavy equipment operators, drilling rig operators, farm workers, physical therapists, water reclamation and compost technicians, satellite dish operators, maintenance workers of all kinds. Psychiatrists and counselors have determined that transporting families to the moon is the best way to ensure the settlement’s success. There are now 200 teenagers living up there.

A wealthy, visionary donor believes Stanford should be the first university on the moon and approaches the board of trustees with the following proposition: she will fund a satellite campus to educate the growing college-age population on two conditions: 1) Stanford is able to retain its prestige and distinctiveness and 2) it will accept all students into its program. Does Stanford take the deal?

The boldness of being the first university with a campus on the moon, partnering with visionaries, scientists, engineers, and explorers on a new frontier, might be the only possible thing to balance the resistance to opening doors to more students, one of the conference participants suggested, when I raised the thought experiment at dinner.  (During the conference, nobody knew that the idea of Stanford on the Moon had been talked about by alumni for years.)

The point of our thought experiment was this: what would be necessary for Stanford-on-the-Moon to still be Stanford, on the moon, letting in everyone who wished to attend? What is the essence of an elite private that could be transported off California soil? (Unlike many other elite schools, Stanford has no satellite international campuses.) Here the answers ranged more widely.

Given assumptions about limited space, limited communication, and limited transportation back and forth to Earth, the essence of Stanford would be its faculty, its knowledge base, and its networks, most agreed. Some wanted dedicated space for reflection (perhaps possible on the moon), some wanted a Redwood tree, some jokingly wanted a football team. Some wanted a library of old books; some thought a combination of digital texts and proprietary AI would be sufficient. But everyone agreed that the essence of an elite private includes its faculty, knowledge base, and networks. If enough top faculty agreed to go, facing cramped quarters, limited physical resources, digitally mediated access to knowledge and networks, that would be enough to maintain prestige

Which curricula would be taught? Primarily, Stanford-on-the-Moon would focus on what moon colonists needed to train the next generation of engineers and scientists (a “workforce development” curriculum, to use the standard label) as well as a liberal arts component. Poetry, drama, film, art, music, and dance are as important on the moon as on earth. Ethics, civics, psychology, and sociology would be taught too, including Gil Scott-Heron’s great commentary.

Stanford’s founding grant would be the guide for the new campus:

a university with such seminaries of learning as shall make it of the highest grade, including mechanical institutes, museums, galleries of art, laboratories, and conservatories, together with all things necessary for the study of agriculture in all its branches, and for mechanical training, and the studies and exercises directed to the cultivation and enlargement of the mind:

Its object, to qualify its students for personal success, and direct usefulness in life;

And its purposes, to promote the public welfare by exercising an influence in behalf of humanity and civilization, teaching the blessings of liberty regulated by law, and inculcating love and reverence for the great principles of government as derived from the inalienable rights of man to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Although the museums, galleries, and conservatories might be largely digital, the goal of “promot[ing] the public welfare by exercising an influence in behalf of humanity and civilization” would remain embodied by the faculty and the fact of teaching every moon citizen who desired to learn.

Most participants agreed that, given the context, opening Stanford-on-the-Moon to all comers would not be such a radical idea. One noted that given that Moon denizens would already be more tech savvy, responsible, and community-minded than their counterparts on Earth – living every day, as they would, cognizant of multiple existential risks to their thriving – concerns about status pollution would be much less salient.

But let us return. What is keeping Stanford, or any elite private, from radically increasing access but loss of the prestige of exclusivity? In part it’s the fact of ferocious competition for prestige among a handful of extraordinarily wealthy schools. In the last two decades of the twentieth century, “third-party ranking schemes transformed how institutions calibrated their prestige in relation to one another and changed how they made fundamental strategy and budgeting decisions. Because prospective students, donors, and alumni increasingly kept an eye on rankings, university leaders did as well,” noted the conveners.  

Given the historically unprecedented disapproval of higher ed institutions, the reasons for elite private schools to compete with each other are quickly disappearing. Working in tandem toward a bold moonshot future may be the only way to save the higher ed sector. If we can imagine Stanford-on-the-Moon taking a risk and opening its doors more widely, why not Stanford, or Harvard, or Princeton, or Yale on earth?

It's a real question.

And it won’t be answered. Still, I came away more energized than disillusioned. I expect to be in endless meetings about access, graduation rates, AI tutoring bots, learning outcomes, and innovation grants. None of it will matter. But the fact that we’re trying and will keep trying until there’s a moon colony of sufficient size to launch a campus there, will keep me optimistic.