Tuesday, April 13, 2010

we have dozens of institutions trying to be identical miniature, for instance, McGills.

A very interesting and challenging article on tuition, incentives, and teaching. It includes this crucial bit of wisdom that echoes something that's come up in this space before:

Now, if you think of universities not as revenue-maximizing institutions but as prestige-maximizing institutions, it all starts to fall into place.

Now, I don't share Usher's attitude to the pursuit of star researchers as a university-building strategy. But the point about tuition, incentives, and institutional convergence is clearly right.