This is a post that's been a long time coming. Here is part of its history.
During the Mayoral primary campaign, YPP hosted a post by a young woman named Renata Neal. Renata grew up in Germantown, and attends West Chester University through the Core Philly Scholarship program. Her mother worked as a volunteer for Chaka Fattah's mayoral campaign, and Renata likewise voiced her support since Fattah had helped create the program.
But one of the questions that came out of that post was why a talented young Philadelphian had to leave the city of Philadelphia to get an affordable education at a public university. Philadelphia has many prestigious and wonderful colleges and universities -- but most of them are private, which makes their tuition steep, especially for first-generation college students who are unwilling to take on debt or who can't easily navigate the scholarship system. Temple, which like Penn State is a public/private commonwealth university, has undergraduate tuition twice that of West Chester. If Renata, who as a young, full-time student had been offered scholarships, had to look elsewhere -- what opportunities were there for nontraditional students, finishing their degrees part-time, or trying to return to school after a long absence?
Mark Cohen noted then that he was working with the state university system to try to bring a new four-year state university to the city of Philadelphia. I've had this in my mind ever since then. And I think it's a wonderful idea -- for college students like Renata, for students nothing like Renata, for our schools, for our neighborhoods, and for our city. What's more, it's a project that in principle all of our elected officials, from city office to Congress, can work to make happen. If you want to know more, read after the jump.
Today the AP reported that enrollment in the Penn State system is at an all-time high. The satellite campuses are expanding, and the freshmen classes are being reduced to keep enrollment within what the system can handle. Enrollment in and applications to Philadelphia's universities, too, are booming. These seem like two trends that naturally fit together.
When Ray asked us all to envision a plan for Philadelphia's economic future, I could only think about the best parts of Philadelphia's economic present, including above all our colleges and universities. More people than ever want to study in Philadelphia. Not only do our universities bring talented young (and not-so-young) people into our city, they're also economic engines for our city and state, generating employment, business opportunities, and billions of dollars in new wealth beyond the campus borders. Universities bring their own town-and-gown problems as well, but ultimately, we want our universities as partners in what we're trying to do to help our city, and for the most part, they've been exactly that.
And when Dan asked us to imagine a legacy for the city's progressive politicians, again, a new university seemed like a perfect place to begin. For the hundreds of thousands of people in our city to have a chance to move beyond generational poverty, and the hopelessness, violence, and social decay that such poverty brings, they're going to need more education. And it behooves us to make that education both as accessible and as good as we possibly can. Our universities are our best showcase for what the government can do to have a positive impact on our nation, our communities, our businesses, and on individual lives. A new urban university, as committed to excellence and innovation as it is to affordability and access. That's a legacy that could make any progressive proud.
At the same time, as our universities shine, our public K-12 schools sputter. If colleges are a spur to our economy and our neighborhoods, the public schools are a drag. But a new public university in Philadelphia could also be a model of how universities can work with a troubled public school system -- through research, teacher education, professional development, assistance in restructuring troubled schools, and in training the next generation of teachers, administrators, counselors, and social workers. This is why I've suggested that the centerpiece of any new university in Philadelphia should be an innovative 21st-century teachers' college. We can partner with our existing institutions, public and private, and our leading businesses, including the city's telecommunications giant, to create the university of the future -- a university that can use the ideas and technology of the 21st century to help the men, women, and children left behind by the vicissitudes of the 20th-century economy and in many cases the failures of 20th-century education.
Our politicians, including Michael Nutter, Mark Cohen, Chaka Fattah, Dwight Evans, Bob Brady, Ed Rendell, and others, have shown that they care about our city and its students. I think this is the time, with a Democratic governor and state house, and a Congressional majority, to try to make this happen.
There are plenty of things to discuss. What can we do to support our existing institutions? If there is a new institution, what should it look like? What would be the benefits and potential pitfalls for the city? And what we can do to make this happen?
Benefits to City Will Be Jobs and Employer Attractiveness
I deeply appreciate Short Schrift's unequivocal endorsement of my goal of having a state university for Philadeophia. The State System of Higher Education leadership is working to come up with a realistic proposal or series of proposals to be released soon, and demonstrations of public support will be extremely helpful towards advancing this idea.
The advantages to Philadelphia of a state university are that a state institution will bring--without expenditures of city funds-- state-paid jobs in teaching, administration, and service to the city, encourage students to believe that pursuing college graduation as a goal is reasonable, and, with a greater amount of college educated workers here in sight (Philadelphia now is 92nd in % of college graduates among the largest 100 American cities), encourage more information-oriented and technology-oriented employers to locate here. There is no question that a state university will lead to higher city tax revenues here.
Short Schrift's belief in having a focus on teacher education so that this new institution will be the best in the region at it has to be fleshed out some more. I would welcome having information about any gaps in teacher education in the offerings of other Philadelphia area colleges. But certainly, preparing students for teaching careers has traditionally been a key function of state universities ever since their inception, and will remain so. If the perennial shortage of teachers in the Philadelphia schools can be remedied, it will be a tremendous boon to our children's future.
Similarly having more college graduates in Philadelphia and from Philadelphia should lead to deeper roots here among the city's professions and businesses, and should create a positive attraction for out of town businesses, non-profits, and professionals. Finding qualified and competent employees is vital to the lifeblood of any business; only if a business can be run successfully is the question of taxes relevant.
A decade or so ago, a legislator from Montgomery County made a disparaging remark about state university students. She found herself pilloried on the House floor and in the media, and from constitutents, and she soon apologized. There are a number of State University alumni success stories--in my world, labor leader Tom Cronin, blogger extraordinaire Duncan Black, physician and Latino activist Miguel Cortes come immediately to mind--and there will be many more if attending a state university can be made conventient for financially hard-pressed Philadephians.
While I believe that there
While I believe that there should be a State School for Philadelphia. Temple is not expensive, CCP is right here, Penn State has the Abington Campus which is a hop, skip and a jump away, Drexel has a Blue and Gold deal with CCP, and Penn makes life easier for some students. Besides we have trade schools, nursing schools, restaurant school etc.
My question would be when Michael Nutter spoke of 18% of the residents in Philadelphia have a college degree something is wrong when we have such schools already here. It is either no one wants to stay here, or the schools are not trying hard enough to get our young people. Possibly the school district here is educating our young people enough to be able to attend secondary education schools.
Maybe if the PPA did contribute even 10 million extra a year when they promised 45 million, something might be different, if families were able to wanted to suport their children's educational goals, and if it were easier for parents to achieve their own education, this would not even be a discussion.
We can have a school on every corner, but if we don't support the children and families before they become college age it doesn't matter what the schools cost.
"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about the things that matter".
Dr Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
Schools Want HIgh Test Score Students Who Can Pay High Tuition
Dave, I deeply appreciate your expression of support as well. It is another hopeful sign for the future. Plus I like your digs at the Parking Authority, an agency long in need of urgent reform.
What colleges are looking for in students is no mystery: they want students with high test scores (which gives them prestige and selling points for future years for both recruitment and fundraising purposes) and the ability to pay tuition (which obviously gives them the revenue stream they need to run their operations successfully).
Yes colleges give out scholarships--academese for discounts--to students they deem worthy. Some students even get full scholarships; my father at Penn Law School was one of them and my sister at St. Thomas Law School was another one of them. But no amount of financial aid to top students makes up for the high costs for average students. And there are obvious financial constraints in the amount of merit that can be discovered or rewarded.
A college degree is becoming a de facto requirement for a higher and higher percent of the workforce as time goes on. The average student is, by definition, average. Some students are below average. While we gain inspiration from students who overcome great hardships to achieve excellence, we have to also provide for ladders of opportunity for those hard-pressed financially people who have not achieved excellence but can lead useful lives that will support themselves and benefit people around them.
America, Woodrow Wilson liked to say, is not a country of people who get their names in the newspapers. Nor is Philadelphia such a city. The search for and the rewarding of excellence must continue, but it must not serve as a substitute for creating opportunities for folks who need them.
A College Is Not Like A Sports Team; You Can Have More Than One
The student straight out of high school with a good grade point average and strong test scores, even with little means, is fairly well served by the existing collegiate system in general, including Philadelphia's universities. More schools are moving to a financial aid package that meets the full needs of lower-income students, without loans, which is how most middle-class students finance the bulk of their education. And if you become a doctor, lawyer, engineer, or enter another well-paying profession, you have few problems repaying those loans.
I don't know whether Temple meets the full needs of lower-income students with grants, but in general, this is a more progressive approach to enlarging the ranks of lower-income students at elite universities than a global tuition decrease. Essentially, the more fortunate students' tuition helps finance the education of the less fortunate. Colleges have effectively become a perfectly priced system -- every student pays what he/she or his/her family can afford.
This system works much less well for nontraditional students -- students taking classes only part-time, which often renders them ineligible for financial assistance, especially if they have income from working a full-time job. Higher tuition also pinches the middle class -- especially those burdened with other debts, other financial obligations, a sudden change in income status, or anything else where the demonstrated need doesn't meet the actual need. These are the people for whom affordable university education means the most.
But even if a new university didn't enlarge the market for college education in this way, it would still be attractive to plenty of students. One thing I alluded to above is that there is a great deal of demand for university education that is going unmet, or that the existing universities are struggling to meet with the resources and capacity they have. It is not at all a zero-sum game.
Even if a new university were to draw on the same pool of students as Temple, Penn State-Abington, CCP, or any of the other institutions, that would not at all be a bad thing. A little free-market competition can be a good thing! Nobody thinks that because Boston has Harvard, they don't need MIT, UMass, Boston College, or Boston University; City College doesn't make the SUNY schools in NYC irrelevant; and Penn doesn't hurt Drexel or the University of the Sciences or St. Joe's or Temple in the slightest. In fact, all of the universities gain from mutual access to resources, an educated talent pool, and forged partnerships.
I want a new state university to poach students from Abington, or West Chester, or Arcadia, State College, Erie, Penn, Rutgers, Michigan, Berkeley. We want the university to attract students from all over the state, and all over the country, in addition to benefiting people already in Philadelphia. The more people will come, the more they will contribute to Philadelphia while they are here, and the likelier they are to find opportunities to stay when their education is done.
--Tim
I Agree: A College Is Not A Sports Team
I agree with Tim: a college is not a major league sports team. But even major league sports teams can have other competitors: for instance, there are now minor league baseball teams in Camden (the Camden Riversharks) and Trenton (the Trenton Thunder).
Here and there one is likely to find someone who would have gone to a Phillies game instead if the minor league team was not available, but the net effect is undoubtedly to increase access to professional baseball by offering low cost tickets to people who want to spend an evening relaxing at a baseball game and are not particular about the quality and fame of the players they watch. I am also sure that there are people inspired by seeing the Riversharks and/or the the Thunder who subsequently go to see the Phillies who otherwise would not have gone.
I appreciate Tim's enthusiasm about how this new state university will be attracting people from all over the country. I am sure some of that will come true, aided by the fact that state universities get to charge much higher tuitions to out of state students.
But, in my mind, the fundamental mission of a new state university in Philadelphia is to offer opportunities for Pennsylvanians, especially Philadelphians, who currently do not have them. Tim is absolutely right that "It is not at all a zero-sum game." Tim is right that "There is a great deal of demand for university education that is going unmet" and that there are many people with financial difficulties for whom "affordable education means the most."
A better analogy than I knew
Minor league baseball is fantastic. But so are major league rivalries. If Penn is the Yankees and Temple the old New York Giants, we could use our own collegiate version of the Brooklyn Dodgers -- the "Frankford Avenue Faithful," if you will. :-)
More seriously, I am enthusiastic about both what a new university can do for native-born Philadelphians and for already-transplanted and future-transplanted newcomers. Again, going back to old debates about nativism, this also isn't a zero-sum game where one group wins and the other loses. At any rate, it doesn't have to be.
--Tim
My wife's suggestion
Ja, there are a bunch of universities already in Philly. So, why doesn't the State University System (I keep wanting to call it the 'State Teachers' College' system) simple affiliate itself w/one of those. And, take the land and/or buildings which would go towards a new collge + make it into a new comprehensive high school.
My wife's suggestion,
-Z
Better than a new
Better than a new comprehensive high school, to my mind, would be a new partnership between the university and the city high schools, including a new neighborhood catchment and a new lab magnet school, on the model of the University of Chicago laboratory school and Penn's Sadie Alexander elementary school.
--Tim
What I'd like to see
I'd love to see a new comprehensive HS for Chestnut Hill + Mount Airy. Let's face it- comparatively few middle-class + above residents in Chestnut Hill + Mount Airy send their kids to their neighborhood HS, which is Germantown. Another comprehensive HS could go a long way to help keep kids in the public schools, as opposed to motivating their parents either to pay for private/parochial schools or, worse yet, move to the suburbs for the perceived better public schools.
-Z
Schools in the NW
Lankenau, in Roxborough, is supposed to be turned into a Masterman-type magnet high school, with families in the NW getting first crack. Also, Parkway Northwest in Mt. Airy is supposed to become a "peace academy" -- at least under the plan that was introduced a few years ago. And of course, Germantown HS needs to do a better job with safety, academic standards, everything.
Two sites that could be good candidates for a new college campus and laboratory school are the Budd and MCP sites along Henry Ave (just south of Philadelphia University) in East Falls/Nicetown -- one of the failed casino sites -- or in the old town hall in downtown Germantown. The other sites that would make a lot of sense to me are Fishtown/Port Richmond, or somewhere in South Philadelphia. Obviously, any site not currently along the BSL, MFL, or trolley lines would have to be better connected to transit than it is now.
--Tim
Preserving the mission of Temple
Temple was the road to upward mobility for the last two generations of Philadelphians. Why can't it be so for the current generation?
Temple means a lot in Philadelphia. And it has something of a reputation beyond it. Why shouldn't the current generation of Philadelphians get the advantage of that name when they are starting their careers?
Temple has an enormous physical plant into which the state has put a ton of money. Why shouldn't the current generation of Philadelphians get the advantage of that physical plant?
Temple has a large alumni body that, if asked the right way, will support continuing improvements in the school. A new school won't have the same resources.
I've been telling people for four years that Temple was moving away from its historic mission. Anyone who saw what was happening to tuition rates would know it.
I'll say more at some point about the disturbing trends in academia that are leading institutions like Temple away from what I take to be their true mission: providing a really good liberal arts education to the sons and daughters of the working class.
All I want to say here is that I don't see why people are hot on creating another institution that is bound to be second class for many years instead of fighting to preserve the historic mission of Temple.
One reason I came to Temple ten years ago was that I wanted to teach first generation, African American kids from Philadelphia. They were the majority of my students for many years. And, while they came into Temple behind the suburban kids in many ways, their hunger to learn and their appreciation for the opportunity offered them at Temple helped them catch up pretty quickly. Grading their papers was hard work. But there were great rewards in seeing them improve.
And they were a pleasure to teach--many of them they were feisty and aggressisve.
The precentage AND ABSOLUTE NUMBERS of Philadephia blacks attending Temple has been declining for a few years now. And that is a lot of what is driving this effort to create a new institution.
Is there some reason that blacks don't deserve to attend the same institution that helped the Jews, Italians, and Irish enter the middle class?
PS I taught at UNC Charlotte starting about 20 years after it was founded. It became a prett decent university in the first five years I was there (then it headed downhill when it became ambitious to be come a major research institutio...the same path Temple is heading down.) It will take 20 years for a new university in Philly to become what it should be. That's too long for the current generation of Philadelphians to wait. And, while we are waiting, we will be losing the efficiencies of scale that come with a large university. The best way to serve the current generation is to keep expanding Temple--which the university wants to do anyway--while providing more support for working class and poor kids to attend.
Zero-sum, short-term reasoning
First, your experiences at UNC-Charlotte notwithstanding, I deny the premise that a new university will necessarily be "second-class for five or ten or twenty years." I see that as a potential pitfall, but not a reason to withhold support from creating a new institution. That's why getting the support of the state and federal governments and other institutions, in addition to popular support and good PR, is crucial. What's more, even if it takes the new institution some time to begin to rival Temple in name recognition or prestige, I refuse to see that as wasted time, especially when it takes away nothing from what Temple is currently doing or could potentially do. Seeking transformation through education is always about digging in for the long-haul. Meanwhile, in the short term, you get an explosion of jobs and an expansion of the talent pool in the city, which thousands more Philadelphians can take advantage of immediately.
As you point out, the current trends at Temple are headed in the opposite direction, and it will be hard to turn that ship completely around. Tuition is rising, the mission is changing, and while the North Philadelphia campus is expanding, the satellite campuses are contracting. I suggested above that Temple could increase its access to more Philadelphians by offering (and publicizing) grant packages in lieu of loans for lower-income students, as other prestigious universities are beginning to do. You can do that with an infusion of state or federal funds, without expanding the campus or changing the tuition rates for middle-income students one bit.
Temple cannot add thousands of students and greatly expand its staff and faculty with the resources it currently has. If Temple or Penn State could open and staff a new satellite campus, I would welcome it, with all of the good things that that can bring. But until then, blacks and Jews and Irish and Italians and Arabs and Indians and Koreans and Chinese and Latinos and Hispanics deserve as many routes to the middle class as they possibly can get. Temple's success/disfunction, whichever way you want to see it, can help that process along or it can get in the way, but we can't let it stop more avenues from opening up.
--Tim
I couldn't agree more. I
I couldn't agree more. I have no problem with creating a new University in Philly, but believe that it is a pipe dream. I also believe that what is happening at Temple is a little disconcerting.
Understand that friends come and go, but with a precious few you should hold on. Work hard to bridge the gaps in geography and lifestyle, because the older you get, the more you need the people who knew you when you were young. ~ Mary Schmich
We Need Allies At Temple To Change The Mission Of Temple
We need allies at Temple to change the mission of Temple, or, in Marc Stier's terminology, to restore it to its orginal mission. We have none at the moment to the best of my knowledge. It is a tough thing to argue against raising the admission standards and national reputation of any university.
I am working with officials of the State System of Higher Education to bring a state university to Philadelphia because at least some of them are interested in doing that.
But I know of no one at Temple interested in changing Temple's move towards excellence and away from being the ladder of opportunity for ordinary students from low-income backrounds.
If Marc Stier or anyone else knows of anyone at Temple (obviously, the higher the rank the better) interested in working to add a large number of low income students with generous scholarship aid to Temple, please post their names here or get in touch with me privately.
The Power of Discussion and of the Purse
When it comes to budgeting, it is a almost always a zero-sum game. We have to figure out the most cost-effective way to creat quality educational opportunities for low-income students.
I don't know the answer. But I think I am asking the right questions.
As for changing the direction of Temple goes, note three things.
First, improving the quality of the university is not incompatible with bringing low income students to the university unless we are going to use an absurd definition of quality, that is the SAT scores of incoming students. As I pointed out, Temple can take students with less qualifications, as far as this "objective" measure is concerned and turn out good graduates.
Second, any university except for a small college would like to expand. Does anyone really think that Temple would turn down a substantial increase in state funding that would allow it to expand its student body, with all the new revenues that would bring in?
Third, Temple has for some time encouraged students who are not as well prepared it would like to start at CCP and then transfer to Temple. More funding for this path would help low income students go to college, and support two of our existing city institutions. (And doing it in this way will help get support from Dwight Evans who is a big proponent of CCP and, as we all know, someone who holds the purse string in Harrisburg.)
Frankly, it strikes me that the politics of this issue is a a lot simpler problem than most of the ones we face.
Has anyone in the legislature who is concerned about this issue talked with the Temple administration and CCP administration and the faculty unions about these ideas?
Those of us who have been paying attention to infrastructure issues know that we have a history in this country of politicians starting new projects to get credit for doing so, while not paying to sustain and maintain them. Before we rush off and start a new college or university, wouldn't it be a good idea to think through the alternative of improving the ones we have now? Let's analyze this in some depth before spending the limited resources available for helping low income students in Philadelphia go to college.
Has anyone in the legislature talked to Temple officials, faculty, members and students about ideas along these line?
SAT Scores May An Absurd Measurement, But They Are Dominant
SAT scores may be an absurd measurement as Marc Stier says, but they are the dominant measurement. The higher Temple's SAT scores, the better it looks nationally and locally to many prospective students, faculty, alumni, and potential contributors.
I don't have substantial amounts of money to hand Temple. Nor do I have people on staff to monitor how they spend the money they get. Nor I have the power or the interest in micromanaging Temple's admissions process. If they have statistics, hypothetically, showing that 75% of those with SAT scores of 750 drop out of Temple in a year or less, I have no way of rebutting that. The interests of low-income Philadelphians are just one set of interests influencing a university which inherently has many conflicting interests.
I do have experience with Temple on other issues that does not make me sanguine on this issue. Thirty-one years ago, I participated in hearings about Temple's firing of a distinguished black professor; Temple officials were adamant that they were doing enough for the black community at that time and they had no need to return the professor they fired or hire more black professors or recruit more black students.
Twenty one years ago, I explored with Temple the possibility of opening a law school campus in Harrisburg; they thought having a law school campus serving Harrisburg was a good idea, but not for them. Widener ultimately opened a very successful campus, which quickly attracted minority and other low prestige people who could not get into old guard Republican-dominated Dickinson Law School in Carlisle.
Less than a decade ago, Temple got tired of waiting for city approval of what is now the Liacouras Center; they did want to deal with neighborhood concerns seeking more affordable housing among other goals and railroaded the bill through the legislature over the objections of myself and other Philadelphia legislators supporting community concerns.
Earlier this year, State Rep. Joshua Shapiro got frustrated with working out an articulation agreement with community colleges and Temple and tried to get a state law passed, which I fully supported over the strong objections of Temple's lobbying team, requiring them to accept all community college courses as being credit-worthy; Temple aggressively fought that legislation. Finally, they comprised on a somewhat diluted version of Shapiro's very worthwile legislation.
Any agreement with Temple is going to be dependent on the good faith of the people who implement it. Philadelphia will likely lose legislative seats--we will at least lower the percentage of Philadelphians in Philadelphia-based districts--in the 2010 redistricting, and the chances of us ever having another governor from Philadelphia in the forseeable future is low. Any deal based on our current political power will not last the inevitable erosion of that political power.
A new state university will have an administration of people committed to its mission, and will have a vested interest in fighting for its continued existence and growth. Without clear and very visible public commitments from Temple officials, I seriously doubt that Temple has any particular interest in lowering its SAT sccores and making itself less appealing to upper middle class and wealthy people by adding low income students in exchange for more state money.
There are many thousands now who could go to an affordable state university in Philadelphia if there was one here; there will be hundreds of thousands of such people in the long run.
Philadelphia teachers in large numbers get masters degrees and principal certifications from state colleges who give courses in Philadelphia public schools now in order to save money, and this money saving alternative should be available to people with considerably less annual income than that of teachers.
It is not a matter of creating a new institution for the sake of creating a new institution or creating a new institution for the purpose of looking good. It is a matter of creating a new institution for the sake of helping people who otherwise could not go to college.
No new institution can possibly fill the vast need that now exists for additional affordable college slots in Pennsylvania in general and in Philadelphia in particular. I stand ready to meet with any Temple officials who are willing to publicly commit to admitting thousands more low-income Philadelphia students than are now admitted, but I will not under any circumstances back off from the vitally important goal of creating a new state university in Philadelphia.
Temple serves an important purpose, just as the Convention Center, the new stadiums, and the Philadelphia airport expansion does. All of them, here and there, help this or that low income person escape from poverty. But I think we need to have greater goals than lowering Philadelphia's poverty rate from 25.1% or so to 24.87% or so. To make a real dent requires the focus and prestige of a new institution with leaders empowered to represent the constituency of that institution and actively engaged on a day to day basis with the challenges of doing so.
This is a ridiculous discussion
Mark, you are telling us you made up your mind, that you don't have the capacity to do the analysis that would be sensible before starting a new state university, and that you have power to create a new campus of the state university but not the power to influence the direction of Temple.
I find none of this terribly plausible except that you have already made up your mind. You are the third ranking member of the majority party in the House of Reprsentatives. The Chair of the Appropriations Committee, upon which Temple is highly dependent, is from Philadelphia. I find it strange that the two of you working together can't do the staff work needed to think this through, don't have the ability to exercise some oversight over Temple (and haven't over the last ten years, when Temple was changing). And, despite all this, and despite your expectation that Philadelphia will lose power after 2010, you still think you can somehow conjure a university out of nothing and keep it growing
I have no particular reason to pursue one strategy or another. All I really care about is insuring more Philadelphia kids--the kids I loved to teach when I first came here--can go to college. So I hope you are right about this being the best path forward and, if so, I hope you are successful.
But why are you here? Last week, on another thread, you basically said that you hope all of us who can't support your plan should just keep quiet. And now you just said that your mind is made up and you are moving ahead. So what is the point of coming here and inviting a discussion about the issue and then bascially saying that you are not interested in critical analysis of your ideas?
Send out a press release and go do it, if you can.
Not everyone wants to go to Temple
Let's suppose you're a high school freshman right now, and a potential member of the first entrance class into either an expanded Temple or a new Philadelphia state university.
Would you want to go to a 45,000 student university on a huge campus in North Philadelphia, or a 10,000 student university in a Penn-sized campus in another of Philly's neighborhoods?
--Tim
How much would the Temple name be worth?
My guess is that it would give a graduate a leg up in getting a first job and would be worth something in salary?
Weren't you the one who made the point last week that there is growing inequality within demographic / class / educational categories. One source of that inequality is growing returns of going to a high vs low status college.
I've been teaching a long time in lots of different kinds of institutions. My experience is that after a university gets to have 5,000 students, there isn't an enormous difference between it and a 45,000 student university.
Temple's Upward Mobility Is Also About Salaries
Temple's trajectory of upward mobility is also about salaries for faculty and administrators. While Community College of Philadelphia professors earn slightly less than Philadelphia school teachers according to some measurements, Temple full professors have a base salary of over $100,000 a year, and plenty of opportunities set forth in their contract to earn extra money for doing extra work.
While the President of Community College earns more than the average Temple full professor, many, many administrators at Temple earn far more than the $150,000 a year or so that he makes. As far as I know, the top-paid Temple official, Hospital President Joseph Marshall, makes about $800,000 a year, and he is far from the only Temple administrator earning over $500,000 a year.
Just as it is true with law firms, medical practices and virtually all other forms of endeavor, the wealthier the people one serves, the higher one's income is. Whatever their ideology, Temple officials and faculty have a strong common interest in having a high income student body so that they are not dependent on political winds for the income levels they have become accustomed to and would like to improve even more in the future.
1997
I was a first generation, lower income student who started at Temple. And, I think those opportunities remain open for Philadelphia students. Though, I'll agree--not as many as in 1997, or heck, 1987.
But, Temple IS a major research institution and wants to continue to develop into such BECAUSE it can only rely on the Commonwealth for about 18% of its money! With research comes money. With a different student body comes money in terms of alumni and parent giving. Temple for years has been terrible at alumni giving. Temple wants to change that because the Commonwealth's funding is unreliable.
As an alumnus, I love the fact that Temple is increasing its standards to some extent. I think it can pursue its original mission and be more competitive at the same time. But, with the Commonwealth accounting of a paltry 18% of it and Penn State and Pitts' budget, should we really look to Temple for change. Or should we look at Harrisburg? (No, this is not directed exactly at you Mr. Cohen, so please, let's not get started again).
I am working to elect Larry Farnese to the General Assembly. Unless otherwise expressly stated, this and every comment or blog I post on YPP and any action I take hereon is solely attributable to me and not Farnese or Friends of Farnese
Mark and Gaetano agree!
I'd like to point out that Gaetano and Mark pretty much made the same point about Temple's reliance on state funding and why that is a problem in some respects.
---
Check out my website!
Higher Ed is a funny thing
I support the building of any new colleges. Though it might seem that Philadelphia, PA and the USA have a lot of schools, we clearly still don't have enough. Tuition is still spiking all the time and I don't think there are many schools out there that don't manage to fill their whole enrollment.
That said, schools' cachet is complicated. Temple has managed to start having a bit of a "name." that takes a while to build, and they aren't going to be pumped about taking in a bunch of a less qualified students. That would hurt their standing.
It's also not realistic to say that a new school won't be second tier. Actually, a new school would be lucky to make the third tier. A large part of the value of a school is its age and reputation. You don't get a reputation in higher ed right away.
So I agree and disagree with stuff on here. It would be nice if somehow we could have a new school that could somehow take advantage of the existing higher ed infrastructure (the accounting and HR services and all that junk, rather than start from scratch) of an existing school... but, realistically, in terms of the student market this post is about, it's gotta be its own school. Which is fine, because it also needs to be geared to students that are less college-ready than Temple/Penn/Chestnut Hill students. You can't just throw students who didn't do that hot in high school or came from not-so-great high schools in with the best graduates in the city. It's not fair to either group of students.
All that said, talk about a great way to convert a lot of the buildings in North Philadelphia. If a bunch of the old factories were converted to classrooms and labs rather than eventual condos, it would definitely diversify the economy their and have tons of positive effects for the workers, students and the community. There is plenty of real estate in this city for developing a new state system college.
Maybe Philadelphia could become a sort of Working Class Boston in terms of Higher Ed? You know, lots of schools that serve first generation college students and lower income students?
Even if we don't develop an industry locally for the students to go into and they kept leaving, higher ed could eventually become big enough that our city could largely function on it as our industry. If we had lots and lots of schools and more and more students were coming here and it was the key factor in our economy, well... I can think of worse things to export than educated workers.
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