Demanding accountability from universities is good, but what about the students?
For decades, universities were in the money. They expanded their administrative staffs, splurged on new buildings, tolerated money-losing sports and indulged professors too busy with their research to be bothered with teaching.
This produced bloated institutions that, while still outstanding in many ways, are dreadfully inefficient and keep raising tuition despite (or perhaps because of) the billions of dollars in federal and state money flowing in each year.
But now the good times appear to be ending, which stands to be good news for anyone in search of high-quality education at a lower cost.
Governments are growing decidedly less generous. And technology is beginning to disrupt education as it has other industries. "Massive open online courses," or MOOCs as they are called, could displace significant numbers of teaching jobs.
