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Author(s): Douglass, John A.; Bleemer, Zachary | Abstract: This year marks the University of California’s (UC) 150th anniversary. In part to reflect on that history, and to provide a basis to peer into the future, the following report provides a history of the University of California’s revenue sources and expenditures. The purpose is to provide the University’s academic community, state policymakers, and Californians with a greater understanding of the University’s financial history, focusing in particular on the essential role of public funding.In its first four decades, UC depended largely on income generated by federal land grants and private philanthropy, and marginally on funding from the state. The year 1911 marked a major turning point: henceforth, state funding was linked to student enrollment workload. As a result, the University grew with California’s population in enrollment, academic programs, and new campuses. This historic commitment to systematically fund UC, the state’s sole land-grant university, helped create what is now considered the world’s premier public university system.However, beginning with cutbacks in the early 1990s UC’s state funding per student steadily declined. The pattern of state disinvestment increased markedly with the onset of the Great Recession. As chronicled in this report, the University diversified its sources of income and attempted to cut costs in response to this precipitous decline, while continuing to enroll more and more Californians. Even with the remarkable improvement in California’s economy, state funding per student remains significantly below what it was only a decade ago.Peering into the future, this study also provides a historically informed prospectus on the budget options available to UC. Individual campuses, such as Berkeley and UCLA, may be able to generate other income sources to maintain their quality and reputation. But there is no clear funding model or pathway for the system to grow with the needs of the people of California. UC may be approaching a tipping point in which it will need to decide whether to continue to grow in enrollment without adequate funding, or limit enrollment and program growth to focus on quality and productivity.Funding support was provided by the Center for Studies in Higher Education of the Goldman School of Public Policy, Speaker Emeritus John A. Perez, and UC Berkeley Deans Henry E. Brady and Bob Jacobsen. The views expressed are those of the authors.

The present study locates social justice in the higher education policies in Pakistan and the United States. It also determines the challenges that resist higher education institutions to promote human rights values. Through a robust systematic literature review, the researcher has traced elements of social justice in higher education policies. Whereas scholars’ experiences on human rights challenges are accumulated through a descriptive survey. Accessibility, harassment, and free speech are the core human rights challenges in higher educational settings. Although educational policies have infused ‘recognitive perspective of social justice’, there remains a gap between policy and its implementation due to ideological interferences (Nelson, Creagh & Clarke, 2009). Higher Education policies have the potential to stimulate social justice practices. In this regard, liaison between policy and its execution is of utmost importance. It necessitates coalition between various stakeholders and beliefs. In addition, policy evaluation, accountability mechanisms, and ethical leadership are at the forefront (OECD, 2015). What becomes more pivotal is to take ownership of governance, and practice social justice values across the academia for building institutional resilience.

Author(s): Douglass, John Aubrey; Lapid, Patrick A. | Abstract: In an environment of declining public funding and rising tuition rates, many public universities in the US are moving toward a “progressive tuition model” that attempts to invest approximately one-third of tuition income into institutional financial aid for lower-income and middle-class students. The objective is to mitigate the cost of rising tuition and keep college affordable. But is this model as currently formulated working? Utilizing data from the Student Experience in the Research University (SERU) Survey of undergraduates and other data sources, this study explores these issues by focusing on students at the University of California (UC) and 10 research-intensive public institutions that are members of the SERU Consortium. Focusing mostly on survey data from 2014, we find that increases in tuition, and costs related to housing and other living expenses, have not had a significant negative impact on the number of lower-income students attending UC or on their behaviors. Since the onset of the Great Recession, there has been an actual increase in their number—a counterintuitive finding to the general perception that higher tuition equals less access for the economically vulnerable. At the same time, there is evidence of a “middle-class” squeeze, with a marginal drop in the number of students from this economic class. With these and other nuances and caveats discussed in this study, the progressive tuition model appears to have worked in terms of affordability and with only moderate indicators of increased financial stress and changed student behaviors. This study indicates that tuition can and should be a part of the search for a viable funding model for many public universities, like UC, and that demanding lower or no tuition does not appear to be based on any substantial analysis of the correlation of tuition and affordability.

This article argues that California colleges and universities should make a concerted effort to work together to attract more foreign students by forming education hubs. The authors argue that such “EdHubs” can relieve the intense pressure on schools’ budgets by enrolling more higher-paying out-of-state students, while schools in the same geographic regions can share the burden of supporting such students, particularly with investment from local industry. The authors argue that schools that work together can increase their capacity to educate more students, particularly in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, thereby increasing opportunities not just for foreign students but Californians as well.

DOI 10.1515/cjpp-2012-0019 Calif. J. Politics Policy 2013; 5(1): 1–29 John Aubrey Douglass*, Richard Edelstein, and Cecile Haoreau Seeking Smart Growth: The Idea of a California Global Higher Education Hub Abstract: In 2010 international students generated more than $18.8 billion in net income into the US economy. California alone had nearly 100,000 international students with an economic impact of nearly $3.0 billion. In this paper, we outline a strategy for the San Francisco/Bay Area to double the number of international students enrolled in local colleges and universities in 10 years or less, gene­rating a total direct economic impact of an additional $1 billion a year into the regional economy. The US retains a huge market advantage for attracting foreign stu- dents. Within the US, the San Francisco/Bay Area is particularly attractive and could prevail as an extraordinary global talent magnet, if only policy-makers and higher education leaders better understood this and formulated strategies to tap the global demand for higher education. Ultimately, all globalism is local. We propose that one or all three of California’s major urban areas consider devel- oping the hub idea, and specifically outline how the San Francisco/Bay Area, a region with a group of stellar universities and colleges, could re-imagine itself as a Global Higher Education Hub. It could help meet national and regional economic needs, and assuage the thirst of a growing world population for high-quality ter- tiary education. Other parts of the world have already developed their version of the higher education hub idea. The major difference in our proposed Califor- nian version is that foreign competitors seek to attract foreign universities to help build enrollment and program capacity at home, and are funded almost solely by significant government subsidies. Our model builds capacity, but is focused on attracting the world’s talent and generating additional income to existing public and private colleges and universities. Doubling international enrollment from currently around 30,000 to 60,000 students in the Bay Area is an achievable goal, but would require expanding regional enrollment capacity as part of a strategy to ensure access to native students, and as part of a scheme to attract a new gen- eration of faculty and researchers to the Bay Area and Califo­r n ­ ia. International students would need to pay higher than the full cost of their education, helping to subsidize domestic students and college and university programs. The result would be a self-reinforcing knowledge ecosystem. At the same time, we recog- nize that California may not have the political will and interest to take on such a venture. But we sense that some regions in the US will eventually grasp the model and its advantages. Keywords: California; higher education system; international students; San Francisco/Bay Area.

What are the contemporary characteristics, values, and practices of a group of institutions we can identify as Flagship Universities? This chapter provides an initial profile of the model, framed by the tripartite mission of research-intensive universities: teaching and learning, research and knowledge production, and public service.1

A direct correlation exists between the emergence of international rankings of universities and the pervasive rhetoric and obsession with World Class University (WCU) status. Building on a model first ventured by commercial rankings of colleges and universities in the United States as consumer guides for prospective students—notably the US News and World Report ranking of American colleges and universities—international rankings based on similar formulas made their appearance around 2003.1 As government ministries focused increasingly on research-intensive universities as a path for national economic development, they quickly embraced rankings as a quantifiable source for assessing the place of their universities in the global marketplace.

The argument that cultural and other forms of diversity enhance the educational experience of all students is generally associated with post-1960 efforts to expand the presence of disadvantaged groups on the campuses of America’s universities and colleges. In the case of the University of California-Berkeley, arguments on the merits of cultural diversity have much earlier roots in the historical enrollment of international students. Debates in the late 1800s and early twentieth century revolved around the appropriateness of enrolling foreign students, particularly those from Asia. The result was an important intellectual discussion on the merits of diversity and the ideals of a cosmopolitan university that was eventually reframed to focus largely on underrepresented domestic students. In this essay, I discuss how the notion of diversity, and its educational benefits, first emerged as a value at Berkeley. I then briefly discuss the significant increase of international students at Berkeley and other public universities. Thus far, the primary impetus of this increase has been mostly financial—Berkeley has faced significant public disinvestment, seeks new revenue sources, and can charge international students tuition rates similar to elite private colleges and universities. By targeting 20 percent of all undergraduates as international or out-of-state (US-resident non-Californians)—the majority international—the Berkeley campus is essentially diversifying its student body. How does having a more globally inclusive enrollment fit into our contemporary ideas of diversity? I attempt a brief discussion of this question and the policy challenges generated by the dramatic increase in international students at the undergraduate level at Berkeley and other UC campuses.

In an often cited analogy, the university is imagined as a village—an insular and tightly knit community, focused on teaching and learning as a worthy endeavor of its own, but somewhat removed from the larger world. The modern comprehensive university is, however, more like a city. It has many subcultures and responsibilities that reflect its growing role in society. “Some get lost in the city,” Clark Kerr once explained in his assessment of major American universities in the early 1960s, “while others, both faculty and students, find communities within the larger institution.” The “city,” continued Kerr, “is more like the totality of civilization” (Kerr 1963).

The notion of the public Flagship University has its origins in the early development of America’s higher education system in the mid-1800s. It included a devotion to the English tradition of the residential college as well as the emerging Humboldtian model of independent research and graduate studies, in which academic research would, in turn, inform and shape teaching and build a stronger academic community. But just as important, the hybrid American public-university model sought utilitarian relevance. Teaching and research would purposefully advance socioeconomic mobility and economic development. As part of an emerging national investment in education, public universities also had a role in nurturing and guiding the development of other educational institutions. For these and other reasons, America’s leading state universities were to be more practical, more engaged in society than their counterparts in Europe and elsewhere, evolving and expanding their activities in reaction to societal needs.

What accounts for the rapid growth in the For-Profit (FP) higher education sector in the US? How will its growth influence educational opportunity and degree attainment rates in a country that first pioneered a mass higher education built largely on expanding public colleges and universities? The current US experience is a version of what I call the ‘Brazilian Effect’: when public higher education cannot keep pace with growing public demand for access and programmes, governments often allow FP's to rush in and help fill the gap, becoming a much larger and sometimes dominant provider. This is the pattern in many developing economies such as Brazil, Korea, Poland and other parts of the world. Despite new federal regulations intended to better regulate For-Profits, my prediction is that they will continue to grow over the long-term in the US not so much because they meet societal demands for diverse forms of higher education, but because of the inability of the public sector to return to the levels of public subsidies they had in the past. The result now, and in the future, is a kind of policy default: the future tertiary market will not be the result of a well thought out policy at the national or state levels, but a quasi-free market consequence that will foster lower quality providers and fail to meet national goals for increasing the educational attainment level of Americans. This article discusses how higher education policymaking is about broad issues of socioeconomic mobility and economic competitiveness, but it is also about money, big business, and political influence.

Throughout the world, measuring “learning outcomes” is viewed by many stakeholders as a relatively new method to judge the “value added” of colleges and universities. The potential to accurately measure learning gains is also a diagnostic tool for institutional self-improvement. This essay discussed the marketisation of learning outcomes tests, and the relative merits of student experience surveys in gauging learning outcomes by analyzing results from the University of California’s Undergraduate Experience Survey (Student Experience in the Research University Survey: SERU-S). The SERU-S includes responses by seniors who entered as freshmen on six educational outcomes self-reports: analytical and critical thinking skills, writing skills, reading and comprehension skills, oral presentation skills, quantitative skills, and skills in a particular field of study. Although self-reported gains are sometimes regarded as having dubious validity compared to so-called “direct measures” of student learning, the analysis of this study reveals the SERU survey design has many advantages, especially in large, complex institutional settings. Without excluding other forms of gauging learning outcomes, we conclude that, designed properly, student surveys offer a valuable and more nuanced alternative in understanding and identifying learning outcomes in the broad tapestry of higher education institutions. We discuss the politics of the learning outcomes race, the validity of standardized tests like the Collegiate Learning Assessment (CLA), and what we can learn from student surveys like SERU-S. We also suggest there is a tension between what meets the accountability desires of governments and the needs of individual universities focused on self-improvement.

One sees various efforts in developed as well as in developing economies to seek a greater participation of lower-income students in their nation's leading universities. Once lower-income students do enroll in a highly selective institution, what happens to them? How well do they do academically when compared to their more wealthy counterparts? How integrated are they into the academic community and in their satisfaction with their choice and sense of support by the institution and fellow students? These are crucial questions, if and when elite universities in various parts of the world become more representative of their general population; the stated desire of most of these institution, virtually all of which are nationally funded entities that must justify their public subsidies. This paper explores the divide between poor and rich students, first comparing a group of selective US institutions and their number and percentage of Pell Grant recipients and then, using institutional data and results from the University of California, Student Experience in the Research University Survey (SERU Survey), presenting an analysis of the high percentage of low-income undergraduate students within the University of California system; who they are, their academic performance and quality of their undergraduate experience.

THE CALIFORNIA Journal of Politics & Policy Volume 3, Issue 1 Revisionist Reflections on California’s Master Plan @50 John Aubrey Douglass University of California, Berkeley Abstract California’s “master plan” is arguably the most influential effort to plan the future of a system of higher education in American history. But there is confusion about how the Master Plan came about, what it said, and whether it is still relevant. The Master Plan’s historic accomplishment has been its ability to provide broad access to a system of high quality, mission differentiated, and affordable higher educa- tion institutions that have grown with the state’s population and successfully met a steadily rising demand for access to higher education. But the fiscal health and productivity of California’s higher education system has been seriously eroded in recent decades, and the Great Recession has accelerated this trajectory. In the past two years, public funding for higher education has been cut steeply, tuition and fees have climbed, budgets have been cut, and enrollment has been limited. This essay explains how California developed its pioneering higher education system, what the 1960 Master Plan accomplished, and the current problems facing this system in the midst of the Great Recession. Keywords: educational attainment, California Master Plan, socioeconomic mo- bility, economic competiveness, Great Recession www.bepress.com/cjpp

This essay discusses the major financial and organizational challenges facing California’s higher education system, and offers a possible pathway to reforms. Most critics and observers of California’s system remain focused on incremental and largely marginal improvements, transfixed by the state’s persistent financial problems and inability to engage in long-range planning for a population that is projected to grow from approximately 37 million to some 60 million by 2050. A number of studies indicate that California’s higher education system will not keep pace with labor needs in the state, let alone affording opportunities for socioeconomic mobility that once characterized California. California needs a “re-imagined” network of colleges and universities and a plan for “Smart Growth.”

One of the major characteristics of globalization is the large influx of immigrant groups moving largely from underdeveloped regions to developed economies. California offers one of the most robust examples of a large-scale, postmodern demographic transition that includes a great racial, ethnic, and cultural diversity of immigrant groups, many of which place a high value on education. As a window into a larger global phenomenon, this study looks at immigrant student participation in the University of California (UC) — one of the largest research universities systems in the world, chartered and subsidized by a state with the largest immigrant population in the US. We provide an initial exploration of the dynamics of race and ethnicity, major, and the differing socioeconomic backgrounds of immigrant students, and in comparison to ‘native’ students. Utilizing data from the Student Experience in the Research University Survey of the UC's students, we show that more than half the undergraduate students in the UC system have at least one parent that is an immigrant. The ratio is even higher at UC Berkeley. Among the major conclusions offered in this study: there are a complex set of differences between various ‘generations’ of immigrant students that fit earlier historical waves of immigrant groups to the United States; the startling number and range of students from different ethnic, racial, cultural, and economic backgrounds points to the need for an expanded notion of diversity beyond older racial and ethnic paradigms; and while there are growing numbers of immigrant students at Berkeley from different parts of the world, and often from lower-income families, there is a high correlation with their socioeconomic capital, described as a variety of factors, but most prominently the education level of their parents and family.

Le plan de relance de l’administration Obama a certes permis de limiter les coupes budgetaires dans les services publics en 2009-2010. Mais il n’est pas suffisant. Le financement du plan de relance sera epuise en 2011. En pratique, les budgets de l’enseignement superieur sont determines par les Etats federes. Or les Etats federes sont extremement contraints dans leur possibilite d’emprunts, ce qui fait de l’Etat federal, dont les possibilites d’emprunts sont theoriquement sans limites, le garant budgetaire en dernier ressort. Mais le Congres et la presidence semblent peu susceptibles de definir un nouveau plan. Dans ces conditions, il est inevitable que les universites publiques connaissent a nouveau de serieuses difficultes budgetaires.

In the United States, developing human capital for both economic and social benefits is an idea as old as the nation itself and led to the world's first mass higher education system. Now most other nations are racing to expand access to universities and colleges and to expand their role in society. Higher education will grow markedly in its importance for building a culture of aspiration and, in turn, the formation of human capital, the promotion of social economic mobility, and for determining national economic competitiveness. This essay briefly discusses the vital role of human capital for national economies, past and future. It also examines the public and private benefits of higher education, the effort of nation-states, and region, to build a culture of aspiration, and the convergence of approaches towards building a “Structured Opportunity Market” in higher education. Increasingly institutions and developed and developing nations, and, in some cases, supranational entities such as the European Union, will move to most if not all of the components of the Structure Opportunity Market; those that don’t will be compelled to offer in both domestic and international forums a rational reason why they are not adopting some aspects of the model. The paper concludes with a few observations on the emerging and growing higher education system in China. It is probably not too much of an exaggeration to say that the both the social and economic future of nations and regions will depend heavily on the educational attainment of their population, and, as a corollary, both the size and quality of their higher education institutions and systems. In postmodern economies, and increasingly in developing economies, there will be growing dependency on supported and expanding “knowledge accumulation” that will be vital for greater national productivity and global competitiveness. As the first nation to pioneer the idea of mass higher education, the United States has essentially provided the proving ground for the simple idea that the talent, training, and creativity of its citizens is as important a factor for generating economic prosperity as a nation's natural resources, or its strategic geographic location, or its military, political, or cultural influence. How do economists and historians explain long-term economic growth of nations, and their comparable competitive position? A consensus has emerged: one major factor is vibrancy and the maturity of their public and private higher education institutions. In the United States, and throughout the world, hard working people are not enough to produce prosperity and vibrant society. There is also the culture of aspiration-the sense that the individual has the freedom and the means to better themselves, to advance their knowledge, skills, and position in society. This essay discusses the vital role of human capital in national economies, and provides a brief look at the convergence of approaches by national and supranational governments towards a “structured opportunity market,” offering a comparative look at the US, the EU, and others parts of the world.

Dans le cadre d’un effort plus vaste visant a financer les universites publiques, l’instauration de droits de scolarite variables aux niveaux postlicence et prelicence fait debat aux Etats-Unis et, de plus en plus, dans toute l’Union europeenne. Le present article decrit la tendance relativement nouvelle qui consiste a faire payer aux etudiants une part importante du cout de leurs etudes, il presente egalement les nouvelles structures des droits de scolarite et analyse les repercussions eventuelles des mecanismes de droits variables du point de vue de l’action. Nous defendrons l’idee selon laquelle les nouvelles politiques elaborees aux Etats-Unis et au Royaume-Uni en matiere de partage des droits de scolarite sont mises en place progressivement, sans modele conceptuel adequat sur le financement a long terme des universites et sur leurs consequences possibles pour les etudiants et pour les programmes universitaires.

La convergence aux Etats-Unis de la politique federale en matiere economique et scientifique, qui s’est vraiment mise en œuvre sous l’administration Reagan, a constitue la premiere etape d’un processus nouveau pour la periode de l’apres-guerre froide, celui de l’innovation technologique. Aujourd’hui, la seconde etape se compose d’une plethore d’initiatives nouvelles soutenues par les Etats, ou les universites sont de plus en plus percues comme des outils indispensables a la competitivite economique. Le present document donne une vue d’ensemble de cette seconde etape. Les conclusions de l’auteur sont diverses : la place des hautes technologies dans l’economie est deja relativement importante dans les differents Etats ; les Etats occupant une place dominante dans le domaine des hautes technologies dependent pour beaucoup de leurs universites et d’une main-d’œuvre ayant suivi un enseignement superieur, mais ont de plus en plus tendance a importer des competences et a negliger les investissements dans l’enseignement et la formation de leur population autochtone ; il est difficile de determiner si les Etats vont s’engager sur le long terme a soutenir financierement le developpement frenetique des initiatives touchant aux hautes technologies ; enfin, les initiatives prises au niveau des Etats sont justifiees par les legislateurs comme satisfaisant un besoin qui n’est actuellement rempli ni par le secteur prive, ni par les universites, ainsi que, en partie, comme une reponse a la notion de concurrence entre les Etats, mais tres peu jusqu’alors comme une volonte d’etre competitifs au niveau mondial. Comme le montre le present document, la politique relative aux hautes technologies – y compris l’accent qui est mis sur la collaboration entre universites et industrie ou les controverses neo conservatrices d’ordre moral/religieux qui entourent la recherche sur les cellules souches – est un element important pour comprendre pourquoi et comment la plupart des Etats s’engagent dans cette seconde etape.

The convergence of United States federal science and economic policy that began in earnest under the Reagan administration formed the First Stage in an emerging post-Cold War drive toward technological innovation. A frenzy of new state-based initiatives now forms the Second Stage, further promoting universities as decisive tools for economic competitiveness. This paper outlines the characteristics of this Second Stage. Among the author’s conclusions are the following: high tech (HT) economic activity is already relatively widespread among the various states; leading HT states rely heavily on their university sectors and a highly educated workforce, yet are increasingly importing talent and neglecting investment in the education and skills of their native population; the long-term commitment of states to financially support the frenzy of HT initiatives is unclear; and state initiatives are rationalised by lawmakers as filling a need not currently met by the private sector or universities and, in part, by a sense of competition between states, with only a minor concern with global competition, thus far. As this paper explores, the politics of HT, including the focus on university-industry collaboration and neo-conservative religious/moral controversies over stem cell research, are a significant factor for understanding how and why most states are pursuing the Second Stage.

Though the United States is the number one destination for international students, a shift to other countries might occur because of an explosion of a demand for higher education worldwide as well as an emergence of new competitors. Some countries use higher education to accept educated immigrants for national workforce. Foreign students, who often used to choose to stay in the US after their graduation, are going back to their home countries. Therefore, the United States should set a national strategy on international higher education.

It’s a familiar if not fully explained paradigm. A “World Class University” is supposed to have highly ranked research output, a culture of excellence, great facilities, a brand name that transcends national borders. But perhaps most importantly, the particular institution needs to sit in the upper echelons of one or more world rankings generated each year by non-profit and for-profit entities.

After three decades of state disinvestment, the University of California (UC) faces significant challenges and misunderstandings regarding its operating costs, its mission, and its wide array of activities. Reduced funding from the state for public higher education, including UC, has essentially severed the historic link between state allocations and enrollment workload, altering the incentive and ability for UC to expand academic programs and enrollment in pace with California’s growing population and economic needs – what formed an important component of its historic social contract. “To grow or not to grow?” is the question that now confronts the University of California and, more generally, Californians. On the positive side, an improved economy offers a window for a renewed commitment to fund public high education. Yet the most recent budget deal with the state provides only a marginal reinvestment in the university and restricts its ability to move toward a new funding model. The historic commitment to grow with the needs of California that propelled much of the state’s economic activity and socioeconomic mobility is, for the first time, an unfunded mandate with little prospect for resurrection in the immediate term. Without adequate state funding, and with a high level of institutional autonomy guaranteed in the state constitution, the university community is much less likely to continue the path of unfunded enrollment growth that erodes the quality of its teaching, research, and public service programs.

As part of a larger effort to fund public universities, variable fees at the graduate and undergraduate levels are a topic of discussion in the United States and increasingly throughout the European Union. This essay describes the relatively new shift to have students pay for a significant portion of their university education, emerging fee structures, and discusses the possible policy implications of variable fee structures. We argue that emerging cost-sharing fee policy in the United States and in England is being pursued incrementally, without an adequate conceptual model for long-term funding of universities and their possible impact on students and academic programs.

trends and innovations in the instructional technologies are widely believed to be creating new markets and forcing a revolution in higher education. Much of the rhetoric of "globalists" has presented a simplistic analysis of a paradigm shift in higher education markets and the way nations and institutions deliver educational services. This essay provides an analytical framework for understanding global influences on national higher education systems. It then identifies and discusses the "countervailing forces" to globalization that help to illuminate the complexities of the effects of globalization (including the General Agreement on Trade and Services) and new instructional technologies on the delivery and market for teaching and learning services. Globalization does offer substantial and potentially sweeping changes to national systems of higher education, but there is no uniform influence on nation-states or institutions. All globalization is in fact subject to local (or national and regional) influences.

(2005). Higher education as a national resource. Change: The Magazine of Higher Learning: Vol. 37, No. 5, pp. 30-38.

This essay compares and contrasts approaches to access and equity in these two nations, focusing largely on higher education (HE) in England and public HE in select states in the US. Three general themes are offered in the following narrative. The first is the transition of admission policy making from an internal academic decision to an increasingly external and politically driven process, and linked to the drive to develop mass systems of HE. Seven general phases are identified in the effort to expand access, and to increase the diversity of students, particularly within public universities. A second theme compares the cultural differences between the UK and the US and their influence on policymaking. A third theme relates to the contrasting organization of HE and the influence on admission policies. There are significantly different sources of power and authority in the US and in the UK. Even with these differences, however, one sees a pattern of convergence in policy goals, and in the type of initiatives intended to broaden access and to increase the participation rate of designated populations.

US higher education and distinct state systems such as in California offer comparative models for UK higher education. This essay provides a comparative analysis of US and UK higher education, followed by a description of the development, and contemporary structure of California’s system. California offers a broadly accessible network of colleges and universities that are highly differentiated, and that collectively offers multiple routes to a higher education program and degree. It has also proven highly efficient in costs to taxpayers and students. This model provides a lens for an evaluation of the strengths and weaknesses of UK higher education, and in particular the highly decentralised systems in England and Wales. But in looking to California for possible inspiration, a few words of caution are offered. California may provide ideas about differentiation, governance, access and cost containment. It does not, however, offer much in regard to the difficult process and politics of reorganising or modifying significantly developed higher education systems like that in the United Kingdom.

L’enseignement superieur americain et les systemes mis en place dans les differents Etats (la Californie, par exemple) offrent des modeles comparatifs pour l’enseignement superieur britannique. Cet essai est une analyse comparative de l’enseignement superieur americain et britannique, suivie d’une description du developpement et de la structure actuelle du systeme californien. La Californie possede un reseau largement accessible de colleges et d’universites extremement differencies qui offrent collectivement de multiples voies d’acces aux programmes et aux diplomes de l’enseignement superieur. Un reseau qui a egalement demontre sa grande efficacite en termes de couts pour les contribuables comme pour les etudiants. Ce modele permet d’evaluer les points forts et les points faibles du systeme d’enseignement superieur britannique et, en particulier, des systemes hautement decentralises de l’Angleterre et du Pays de Galles. Mais si l’on cherche une eventuelle inspiration du cote de la Californie, quelques mots de mise en garde s’imposent. Le systeme californien peut fournir des idees en matiere de differenciation, de gouvernance, d’acces et de maitrise des couts. Mais il n’apporte pas grand chose pour ce qui est de la politique et du difficile processus de reorganisation ou de modification de systemes d’enseignement superieur extremement developpes comme celui du Royaume-Uni.