In an increasingly competitive higher education environment, Americas public universities are seeking ways to differentiate themselves. This book suggests that a hopeful vision of what a university should be lies in a reexamination of the land-grant mission, the common system of values originally set forth in the Morrill Land Grant Acts of 1862 and 1890, which established a new system of practically oriented higher learning across the United States. While hard to define, these values are often expressed by the one hundred or so institutions that currently define themselves as land grants under the three pillars of research, teaching, and engagement/extension. In order to understand the unique character of a modern land-grant institution, this book focuses especially but not exclusively on the multiple components of a single organization, Oklahoma State University, founded in 1890 and currently enrolling 35,000 students across five campuses. Contributors from across the university focus on what the land-grant mission means to them in their daily endeavors, whether that be crafting the undergraduate academic experience, stimulating research, or engaging with the community through extension activities. The twenty contributions are divided into four parts, exploring in turn the core mission of the modern land-grant university, the university environment, the universitys public value, and its accountability. The volume ends with an epilogue by the editor, which summarizes the values underlying the activities of land-grant institutions. In a time of uncertainty in higher education, this volume provides a helpful overview of the many different types of value public universities bring to American society. It also offers a powerful vision of a future founded on land-grant ideas that will be inspiring to university administrators and trustees, other educational policymakers, and faculty and staff, especially those fortunate enough to be part of land-grant institutions.

The idea of a better society as associated with the communal idea is investigated from both theoretical perspectives and through contemporary experiences around the world. This idea leaves nobody indifferent. Whatever the hardship that its concretization implies, however, once it does materialize, it cannot, as such avoid new challenges, tensions and unexpected claims. This means, at varying degrees, negations of, and removals from, the “utopian inspiration”. Humans are able to create unprecedented conditions of life under most ambitious inspirations, but are unable to safeguard their achievements from change, alterations and contradictions. In this, however, another aspect of the utopian realizations is that they ultimately leave room for new utopist thinking and enrolment. As far, indeed, the utopian inspiration draws its vitality from potent civilizational codes, its renewal from ashes is as unavoidable as its self-betrayal through materialization. Contributors included: Eliezer Ben-Rafael, Rami Degany, Amitai Etzioni, Maria Fölling-Albers, Yiftah Goldman, Ruth Kark, Yossi Katz, John Lehr, Graham Meltzer, Bill Metcalf, Timothy Miller, Yaacov Oved, Michal Palgi, Donald E. Pitzer, Shulamit Reinharz, Lyman Tower Sargent, György Széll, Menachem Topel, Katherine Trebeck, and Chris Warhurst.

Annotation Engineering in a Land-Grant Context considers the US government's first foray into higher education by examining engineering education at the nation's land-grant universities over the past 140 years. The authors demonstrate how that history has framed the present and suggest how it is likely to influence the fashioning of the future.

This book should be of great interest to faculty members and students, as well as those parents, legislators, policymakers, and other area stakeholders who have a vested interest in the well-being of America’s original public universities.

"There are the years that come along once in a generation," writes President Barack Obama in his introductory message to his 2009 budget for the United States of America, "when we look at where the country has been and recognize that we need a break from a troubled past, that the problems we face demand that we begin charting a new path." This governmental report is Obama's comprehensive plan for moving past the "legacy of misplaced priorities" he inherited from the Bush administration in order to jumpstart the U.S. economy and invest for the nation's future. From the Department of Agriculture to the Department of Veteran Affairs, from the literally down-to-earth business of the EPA to the spacebound mission of NASA, here Obama lays out his concrete, pragmatic strategy to move American schools into the 21st century, improve health care while reducing it costs, repair crumbling infrastructure, and rebuild the American economy. Any American who wants to be informed about the most fundamental operations of the nation will want to study this important report. The United States OFFICE OF MANAGEMENT AND BUDGET is a Cabinet-level office established in 1921 for the White House oversight of federal agencies. The OMB is currently headed by American economist PETER RICHARD ORSZAG (b. 1968).