The inspiration for this timely book is the pressing need for fresh ideas and innovations in U.S. higher education. At the heart of the volume is the realization that higher education must evolve in fundamental ways if it is to respond to changing professional, economic, and technological circumstances, and if it is to successfully reach and prepare a vast population of students—traditional and nontraditional alike—for success in the coming decades. This collection of provocative articles by leading scholars, writers, innovators, and university administrators examines the current higher education environment and its chronic resistance to change; the rise of for-profit universities; the potential future role of community colleges in a significantly revised higher education realm; and the emergence of online learning as a means to reshape teaching and learning and to reach new consumers of higher education. Combining trenchant critiques of current conditions with thought-provoking analyses of possible reforms and new directions, Reinventing Higher Education is an ambitious exploration of possible future directions for revitalized American colleges and universities.

In this provocative volume, higher education experts explore innovative ways that colleges and universities can unbundle the various elements of the college experience while assessing costs and benefits and realizing savings. Stretching the Higher Education Dollar traces the reform continuum from incremental to more ambitious efforts. Topics include effective strategies for reallocating resources to capture efficiencies, opportunities with massive open online courses (MOOCs), and ideas for building low-cost degree pathways from the ground up. Though the pace of change in higher education is fast and furious, Stretching the Higher Education Dollar offers promising ideas for navigating the new fiscal, political, and technological environment.

Rising costs, increasing global competition, intensifying calls for accountability--all these pressures are bearing down upon the status quo of higher education today. Governments, funders, students, and parents are demanding strategic improvements in all aspects of postsecondary education. Reform cannot happen slowly--colleges and universities must take a rapid and dynamic approach to change. The answer lies in innovation, as this book shows, to promote fresh ideas and bring higher education professionals together to effect real and dramatic change.

Rising costs and increasing global competition press institutions to do more with less. At the same time, deep budget cuts and a general social and political impatience have revived calls for reform in educational affordability, curriculum, and outcome measurement. Yet within this environment, a myriad of success stories are being forged among educational institutions, supporting industries, and educational consortia that are embracing innovative approaches to all aspects of the higher education system. This book spotlights those fresh approaches and aims to bring higher education professionals together, as part of a broad, national movement to motivate reflection and encourage similar dynamic efforts. The editors and expert contributors focus in particular on areas such as measures of academic quality, benchmarking, faculty development, retention, curriculum development, technology, and facilities. In each case, this book illustrates successful pilot programs and documents tools that have proven to maximize efficiencies crucial to the continued success of the entire higher learning community.

Ultimately, the authors make a compelling case not only for this turn to learning but for creating new pathways for nonfaculty learning careers, understanding the limits of professional organizations and social media, and the need to establish this new interdisciplinary field of learning innovation.

Exploring how we can ensure that America's colleges remain places for intellectual inquiry and reflection, Neem does not just provide answers to the big questions surrounding higher education—he offers readers a guide for how to think about them.