Actionline NEA

Global Challenges To Higher Ed

Massive increases in the number and diversity of students, cutbacks in public funding, and threats and opportunities from technology impact all nations.

The issues facing higher education internationally are the same as those facing NEA members here in the United States, notes a report from the NEA delegation to the Education International global conference "Higher Education Stakes and Challenges," held in Paris in December.

The challenges facing higher education globally include rising rates of participation—there's been a 50 percent growth in enrollment worldwide in the last seven years; increasing diversity of the student population—adults now make up 20 percent of the students; and the need to find alternate sources of funding as the role of public funding is reduced.

Among other crucial questions facing higher education: how to respond to the growing for-profit sector, especially in distance education, and maintain quality as higher education is traded across international borders.

Unions must play a critical role in ensuring quality, the report notes.

Higher education leaders of the National Education Association, American Association of University Professors, and American Federation of Teachers met recently at NEA headquarters in Washington to tackle issues surrounding the traditional faculty role in academic governance and to come up with some joint activities to strengthen the faculty role.

"There are too many misconceptions about what shared governance is and about the role of academic unions in relation to shared governance," said NEA's Barry Stearns, a counselor at Lansing Community College and president of the NEA National Council for Higher Education.

"All three higher education unions strongly support full faculty participation in shared governance because such participation is essential to ensure quality instruction," Stearns noted. "The union's role in the process is simple: to strengthen and protect this faculty role in governance."

The three unions will issue a joint statement based on the deliberations.

NEA joined more than 40 other faculty unions and higher ed professional associations as a co-sponsor of COCAL IV, a national conference on contingent academic labor held in San Jose, California, January 12-14.

The conference drew more than 150 activists, who made initial plans for a Canada-United States "equity week of action" projected for fall 2001.

An "equity week" committee will develop a broad plan, seek support from sponsoring organizations, and report back to COCAL participants before April.