Unequal Higher Education: Wealth, Status, and Student Opportunity 9780813593531

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Unequal Higher Education

The American Campus Series editor, Harold S. Wechsler The books in the American Campus series explore recent developments and public policy issues in higher education in the United States. Topics of interest include access to college and college affordability; college retention, tenure, and academic freedom; campus l­abor; the expansion and evolution of administrative posts and salaries; the crisis in the humanities and the arts; the corporate university and for-­profit colleges; online education; controversy in sport programs; and gender, ethnic, racial, religious, and class dynamics and diversity. Books feature scholarship from a variety of disciplines in the humanities and social sciences. Vicki L. Baker, Laura Gail Lunsford, Meghan J. Pifer, Developing Faculty in Liberal Arts Colleges: Aligning Individual Needs and Orga­nizational Goals Derrick R. Brooms, Jelisa Clark, and Matthew Smith, Empowering Men of Color on Campus: Building Student Community in Higher Education W. Carson Byrd, Poison in the Ivy: Race Relations and the Reproduction of In­equality on Elite College Campuses Nolan L. Cabrera, White Guys on Campus: Racism, White Immunity, and the Myth of “Post-­Racial” Higher Education Jillian M. Duquaine-­Watson, Mothering by Degrees: Single ­Mothers and the Pursuit of Postsecondary Education Scott Frickel, Mathieu Albert, and Barbara Prainsack, eds., Investigating Interdisciplinary Collaboration: Theory and Practice across Disciplines Gordon Hutner and Feisal G. Mohamed, eds., A New Deal for the Humanities: Liberal Arts and the ­Future of Public Higher Education Adrianna Kezar and Daniel Maxey, eds., Envisioning the Faculty for the Twenty-­ First C ­ entury: Moving to a Mission-­Oriented and Learner-­Centered Model Ryan King-­ White, ed., Sport and the Neoliberal University: Profit, Politics, and Pedagogy Dana M. Malone, From Single to Serious: Relationships, Gender, and Sexuality on American Evangelical Campuses A. Fiona Pearson, Back in School: How Student Parents are Transforming College and ­Family Barrett J. Taylor and Brendan Cantwell, Unequal Higher Education: Wealth, Status, and Student Opportunity

Unequal Higher Education Wealth, Status, and Student Opportunity

B A R R E T T   J . TAY L O R B R ENDA N C A N T W E L L

RUTGERS UNIVERSITY PRESS NEW BRUNSW ICK, C A MDEN, AND NE WA R K, NE W JER SE Y, AND LONDON

Library of Congress Cataloging-­in-­P ublication Data Names: Taylor, Barrett Jay, author. | Cantwell, Brendan, 1980-­ author. Title: Unequal higher education : wealth, status, and student opportunity / Barrett J. Taylor, Brendan Cantwell. Description: New Brunswick, New Jersey : Rutgers University Press, [2019] | Series: The American campus | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2018032219 | ISBN 9780813593500 (cloth) | ISBN 9780813593494 (pbk.) Subjects: LCSH: Universities and colleges—­United States—­Evaluation. | Universities and colleges—­United States—­Finance. | College costs—­United States. | Education, Higher—­Economic aspects. | Education, Higher—­Social aspects—­United States. | Educational equalization—­United States. Classification: LCC LB2331.63 .T38 2019 | DDC 378.73—­dc23 LC rec­ord available at https://­lccn​.l­ oc​.­gov​/2 ­ 018032219 A British Cataloging-­in-­P ublication rec­ord for this book is available from the British Library. Copyright © 2019 by Barrett J. Taylor and Brendan Cantwell All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher. Please contact Rutgers University Press, 106 Somerset Street, New Brunswick, NJ 08901. The only exception to this prohibition is “fair use” as defined by U.S. copyright law. The paper used in this publication meets the requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—­Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1992. www​.­r utgersuniversitypress​.­org Manufactured in the United States of Amer­i­ca

We dedicate this volume to our ­children—­Liam and Rose, Oliver and Agnes—in the hope that their generation w ­ ill forge a more just and equitable social compact.

CON T EN T S

Introduction

1

1

The Roots of Unequal Higher Education

21

2

A Field Account of Unequal Higher Education

41

3

Mapping Unequal Higher Education

53

4

Unequal Public Higher Education: Stratification and Drift

72

5

Unequal Private Higher Education: Per­sis­tent Inequalities

90

6

Unequal Higher Education and Student Opportunity

7

Consequences of Unequal Higher Education: Student



Success and Mortgaged ­Futures

121

8

Contesting Unequal Higher Education

137

Appendix

159

104

Acknowl­edgments

173

Notes

175

Bibliography

187

Index

203

vii

Unequal Higher Education

Introduction

Families want good opportunities for their ­children. That is why getting kids into the right college is an impor­tant goal for so many ­house­holds. Some fami­ lies start thinking about college when ­children are born; ­others do not plan for higher education u ­ ntil much l­ater. Regardless, college admission is widely seen as an accomplishment (and rightly so!). College admission is something to cel­ ebrate, and we do not want to rain on anyone’s parade. Still, as higher education researchers, we tend to carry umbrellas. Rains come. ­E very college admission letter is part of a complex and competitive system that is fraught with in­equality. An offer of admission is always some­ thing to celebrate, but some offers bring far more promise than do o ­ thers. Our book is devoted to understanding why in­equality among colleges and universities is durable. We also focus on what in­equality among institutions means for students. The term students is, in many ways, a con­ve­nient fiction. T ­ here is no such ­thing as the student, and collectively students are so diverse that the term is almost meaningless. Some students have never known want, while o ­ thers have strug­ gled to make ends meet throughout their lives. White students benefited—­often unconsciously—­from white privilege, while students of color have faced discrim­ ination on both macro and micro levels. To understand the consequences of the system of unequal higher education, it is necessary to understand who has what opportunities at a given point in time. Criticisms about higher education are common. Facing high tuition prices, students and families often say that colleges are becoming like corporations, soaking up as much money as pos­si­ble. It is true that colleges and universities seek revenue. But they also strive for recognition. In more formal terms, colleges and universities are both revenue maximizers and status seekers.1 This means that higher education institutions compete on two fronts si­mul­ta­neously. Institutions 1

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U N E Q U A L H I G H E R E D U C AT I O N

pursue both dollars and prestige. The interaction of money and status drives institutional in­equality in higher education. Rising institutional in­equality is not evident by all mea­sures. Despite dramatic changes in the financing of higher education, total spending per student has remained at about the same level of in­equality in recent de­cades.2 However, total spending per student does not tell the ­whole story. Colleges and universities get revenue from multiple sources, and the source of money ­matters. Consider two hy­po­thet­i­cal colleges. One institution relies heavi­ly on tuition. ­Because enrollments fluctuate, this institution’s tuition reliance makes long-­range planning difficult. Another institution draws revenue from many sources and so is relatively insulated from fluctuation in any one source of support. While t­ hese two institutions might appear similar in aggregate spending, they ­really are very dif­fer­ent. One is chaotic and uncertain, effectively reinventing its bud­get ­every time a new cycle of student recruitment begins. The other is stable and secure, knowing that its staff w ­ ill be able to select whom to admit from a wide pool of applicants who are attracted by the campus’s reputation and resources. As the hy­po­thet­i­cal example of two campuses illustrates, conceptualizing in­equality among colleges and universities is a complex task. We have identi­ fied two axes along which colleges and universities differ. First, institutions com­ pete in vertical space. Vertical competition implies that more is better. Total spending per student or greater admission selectivity, all e ­ lse equal, is prefera­ ble to more limited means or lower levels of demand for admission. Second, insti­ tutions differ horizontally. In the horizontal dimension, no set of practices is preferable to another. An institution may enroll many students, like a flagship research university, or fewer students, like an intimate liberal arts college. Insti­ tutions in both groups can provide an excellent education. The purpose of this book is to map the ways that colleges and universities differ, to explain why t­ hose differences have grown over time, and to explore the consequences of ­those changes. Our account adopts a field-­level approach, mean­ ing that we consider the rules, resources, and mixture of organ­izations avail­ able in the field of U.S. higher education at varying points in time.3 Most of the best work in this vein, such as higher education researchers Sheila Slaughter and Gary Rhoades’s book Academic Capitalism in the New Economy (2004), highlights the consequences of changing field conditions for institutions, faculty, and stu­ dents. We instead seek to understand how the landscape of available institutions has changed over time. We ask: What is the available inventory of colleges and universities at a given moment? What explains membership in vari­ous groups of institutions? Which students attend what kinds of institutions? Answering ­these questions allows us to map the contours of an unequal field. We offer explanations for this asymmetrical landscape and highlight the consequences of orga­n izational in­equality for student opportunity. In short,

I ntroduction

3

we outline the set of relationships that we term the system of unequal higher education.

Investigating Institutional Wealth, Status, and Student Opportunity The dynamics of in­equality within a social field are complex. It is easy to become lost in details. As academic researchers, it is our obligation to back up our argu­ ments with data and facts. We do this throughout the volume. However, it is also useful to have an outline of our main arguments as an introduction to the book’s overall course. Our central arguments are (1) that competition for resources and social sta­ tus creates a system of unequal higher education, (2) that the retreat of direct government funding has unleashed this competition with growing intensity, (3) that over the past forty years policy choices and cultural practices have increased in­equality among colleges and universities in the United States, and (4) that growing institutional in­equality systematically disadvantages underserved stu­ dents. To provide as strong an account as pos­si­ble, we illustrate the connections between an institution’s wealth and its status using data and details in ways that sometimes seem granular. We have worked to provide as plain an account as pos­ si­ble, but sometimes precise analy­sis of data is needed to demonstrate the basis of our arguments. The details themselves are not the point. We seek to illumi­ nate why the system of unequal higher education exists in the form that it does, its consequences for students, and the ways in which it might be changed. We focus on the system ­because we are interested in the consequences of rising institutional in­equality for individual students. College education plays an extraordinarily large role—­perhaps too large a role in the eyes of some skeptics4 — in an individual’s prospects for upward mobility. Yet no one simply goes to college. Rather, every­one attends a par­tic­u­lar college or university. The range of institu­ tions available to any given student constitutes a large part of the opportunity that higher education offers to that individual. As we document throughout this book, the landscape of available colleges and universities has changed dramatically since about 1980. Over time, more institutions have become lower-­status, financially struggling campuses. At the same time, the number of Elite and Super Elite institutions (more on t­ hese cat­ egories l­ater) has remained about the same. As a result, ­there are fewer good opportunities now for college students than ­there w ­ ere in the past. ­Going to col­ lege is, for almost every­one, better than not ­going to college. However, it is now more difficult and more expensive to find one’s way to a college that provides good value than it was even a few years ago. We came to this basic conclusion a ­ fter conducting three types of analyses: (1) synthesis of existing research and historical analy­sis, (2) conceptual analy­sis

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using social theory, and (3) quantitative analyses of empirical data. Our his­ torical and conceptual analyses span the period from around 1980 to the pres­ent. The resulting narrative provides the backbone of our argument. Quantitative analyses lend empirical support to our claims and help to paint a clear and detailed picture about the system of unequal higher education. ­Because of data coverage limitations, our quantitative analyses are restricted to the period between 2005 and 2013 and, as a result, we give this time frame the most detailed attention. Our win­dow of data covers the years just prior to, during, and ­after the ­Great Recession. Analyzing data over this period is impor­tant ­because, as we explain l­ater, state governments’ responses to the G ­ reat Recession have had a profound effect on making higher education more unequal. Rising institutional in­equality restricts opportunity for all students. How­ ever, ­these changes are particularly concerning for underserved students. Our results indicate that students of color and low-­income students are concentrated at the lowest-­resource, lowest-­status institutions in the United States. While ­these students often overcome extraordinary barriers to achieve successes, we are concerned that the barriers exist in the first place. We seek to identify the sources of ­these barriers to opportunity and to identify leverage points for removing them. This is a daunting task. To keep ourselves on track, we regularly refer back to the subtitle of the book: Wealth, Status, and Student Opportunity. We have used it as a map to guide our writing, and we hope it w ­ ill serve to make the book more useful for readers. Although we conceptualize wealth and status as distinct, the two tend to go together. Most of the time, a wealthy institution is also a presti­ gious institution. The question then becomes how many institutions are invested with how much wealth and status and which students have access to the cam­ puses that have the most of both. We think this question is impor­tant ­because it addresses which students enjoy the opportunity to benefit from wealthy, high-­status institutions and which ones must overcome obstacles to opportunity. Throughout the volume, we w ­ ill refer back to t­ hese three concepts: wealth, status, and student opportunity.

An Overview of Unequal Higher Education Institutional in­equality is a durable feature of American higher education. More than four de­cades ago, Alexander Astin and Calvin Lee (1971) noted that hun­ dreds of colleges w ­ ere “invisible” due to their low status and uncertain finan­ cial outlook. Much of this in­equality is intentional. Policymakers designed state systems of higher education to be unequal in an effort to balance the impera­ tives of broad participation, high quality, and total cost.5 The archetype of such a system is the vaunted California Master Plan, with its elite flagship campuses, its expansive state universities, and its open enrollment community colleges.6

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5

Such a system takes institutional in­equality for granted and attempts to leverage it as a strength, providing both expensive education for select students and broad access for the general population. If unequal higher education is long-­standing and often intentional, why read a book about it? The short answer is that the in­equality in the system ­today is more severe than in the past. The sort of designed in­equality found in the Cali­ fornia Master Plan was not the focus of concern for Astin and Lee, nor is it ours. Although the Master Plan and its replicates in other states w ­ ere never perfect, during a time of po­l iti­cal and financial support they worked reason­ ably well.7 We do not focus on the mid-­century in­equality that provided some students with a good-­value option (a mid-­century California State University campus) and offered ­others a great-­value option (a mid-­century University of California campus). Rather, we focus on pres­ent in­equality in which virtually all students feel compelled to enroll in college yet few have the opportunity to attend a good-­value institution. Opportunities for many students have been restricted by changes in the mixture of available institutions. ­There are sim­ ply more low-­status institutions and fewer high-­status institutions—­especially in the public sector—­than was the case even a de­cade ago. We believe that prior levels of institutional in­ equality have been exacerbated—­reaching levels not intended by the architects of stratified public systems—by two forces. The first of ­these destabilizing forces is financial. Costs per student have risen rapidly.8 Si­mul­ta­neously, direct government sup­ port for public institutions has declined,9 and only a few private institutions can marshal large pools of resources via investments and fundraising.10 This ­simple r­ecipe—­rising costs and uncertain revenues—­has placed a growing number of institutions on a financial precipice. Decision-­makers at such insti­ tutions are desperate for any revenues they can secure. At the same time, institutions can accumulate resources in­def­initely; no amount of money is too much to invest in fulfilling a mission of educational excellence.11 ­B ecause ­there is no limit to the resources that can be spent on education, the most prestigious institutions work hard to capture as many resources as pos­si­ble. ­Whether out of desperation, the endless quest for excellence, or some combi­ nation of the two, colleges and universities compete with feverish intensity for ­every available resource. The second destabilizing force is cultural. Colleges and universities are not firms that seek to maximize profits and disburse them to shareholders. Instead, they are mission-­driven organ­izations that engage in status-­seeking be­hav­iors even when ­these operations are not profitable.12 Selective admission practices may indicate mission fulfillment insofar as an institution’s mission is to educate the “best and brightest” students available. Admission selectivity is also—in most cases—­a money loser. A student denied admission is revenue forsworn. Busi­ nesses generally want as many paying customers as pos­si­ble, but virtually all

6

U N E Q U A L H I G H E R E D U C AT I O N

presidents would like their college or university to turn away more students ­because selective admission is a key indicator of status. Both financial and cultural ­factors point to increased competition among colleges and universities, which has made the field even more unequal than it used to be. What is more, the dynamics resulting from heightened competition are largely self-­reinforcing. The incentives to compete for resources and status remain strong and so are likely to produce even more competitions and even greater in­equality. We refer to ­these self-­perpetuating dynamics as the system of unequal higher education. The system of unequal higher education reflects the dynamics of institu­ tional wealth and status, and it entails impor­tant consequences for the oppor­ tunities available to individual students. Consider a hy­po­thet­i­cal example that is rooted in the results of our primary quantitative model (see chapter 3). Imag­ ine being a low-­income student who is trying to select a college. In 2005, you might have been able to select among multiple Subsidy Reliant campuses that offered low tuition to residents of your state. Any of t­ hese options would have spent more on your education than you spent in tuition. You could not neces­ sarily afford a high-­priced Elite private campus, and might not have been able to secure admission to the state flagship Multiversity, but would have had sev­ eral high-­value, low-­price options from which to choose a best fit. By 2013, however, ­things would look quite dif­fer­ent. The number of Subsidy Reliant publics had dropped steeply since 2005 (chapter 3) due to a complex series of financial and cultural ­factors (chapter 4). Your state might now offer only one Subsidy Reliant institution from which to choose. A study of that indi­ vidual Subsidy Reliant institution would find that the campus you are considering has done better at expanding equality and participation than has its peers. For you as a student, however, the operations of one campus m ­ atter less than the fact that ­there are fewer such campuses that you can consider when selecting a college. Your opportunities have been circumscribed not by any par­tic­u­lar insti­ tution but by the change in the mixture of available institutions—in other words, by the system of unequal higher education. ­There are simply fewer good seats available to you than ­there w ­ ere a de­cade ago. The real­ity of dwindling good value opportunities becomes apparent when considering the field of avail­ able campuses. To be sure, well-­intentioned campus administrators, researchers, and phil­ anthropic organ­i zations are working hard to improve the education at many beleaguered campuses. Better practices on campus can ameliorate the worst con­ sequences of the system of unequal higher education. ­These noble efforts can­ not redress the profound ways in which it circumscribes student opportunity by limiting the number of enrollment destinations that are well positioned to support student success.

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7

The Argument in Brief ­There are several key ele­ments of our argument. ­These points illustrate how we build on prior understandings of institutional in­equality.

Unequal higher education is multidimensional, encompassing both horizontal

■

and vertical ele­ments. The simplest way to think about in­equality is a vertical hierarchy. Campus A has more money, practices more selective admissions, and receives higher positions in rankings than does Campus B; therefore Campus A stands above Campus B in the field hierarchy. Hierarchy of this sort plays a role in institutional in­equality. However, ­there are also horizontal differences among institutions. American col­ leges and universities espouse many diverse missions, come in many dif­fer­ent sizes, and result from distinct institutional histories.13 Efforts such as the Car­ne­gie Classifications attempt to describe horizontal dif­ ferences by sorting institutions based on the degrees that they offer. While t­ hese efforts are laudable (and influential), they ignore the fact that institutions are also vertically differentiated into a hierarchy. It is very dif­fer­ent to be a large endowment private university with few, carefully selected undergraduates than a large enrollment public university with lagging state support. However, both institutions can belong to the same Car­ne­gie group. Similarly, rankings and other accounts of vertical differ­ entiation often compare institutions that are playing very dif­ fer­ ent games. A Super Elite research university can accumulate wealth and sta­ tus via many ave­nues, while an Elite college only has access to the ave­ nue of admission selectivity. Our map of unequal higher education is dynamic enough to account for both vertical and horizontal differences among institutions. This marks a distinct departure from prior work on the topic.

Horizontal and vertical differences have become tightly linked. Historically,

■

horizontal and vertical differences have been relatively in­de­pen­dent of one another. Mission and status w ­ ere on two separate axes. Results of our analyses suggest this pattern may no longer hold true. As costs have increased, some public and a few private institutions have staved off financial ills by growing their enrollments. Institutions that lacked suf­ ficient demand from would-be students could not grow. Such campuses disproportionately became Vulnerable. In the most general terms, in the middle-­and lower-­status parts of the system, universities fared better than did colleges ­because it was easier for them to become larger. A sim­ ilar pattern occurred at the high-­status end of the spectrum. Elite col­ leges and universities have attained a dif­fer­ent form of status than that attained by Super Elite universities. In essence, ­there have been parallel

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hierarchies for vari­ous horizontal positions. Bowdoin and Swarthmore once could operate as the equivalent of Prince­ton in the hierarchy of liberal arts colleges. This relationship still holds to some extent; the Elite liberal arts colleges continue to fare well. Nonetheless, it is clear that some hierarchies extend upward far beyond o ­ thers. The Super Elite private research universities attain wealth and status that even the Elite colleges cannot match. Institutions like Grinnell and Pomona may pos­ sess enormous endowments per capita but simply cannot keep up with their somewhat larger (but not too large) competitors such as Stanford and Yale. As a result, ­there was ­little movement between the Elite and the Super Elite groups. If left unchecked, the system of unequal higher education likely ­w ill lead to ever-­greater accumulation of wealth and status. The Super Elite universities ­w ill leave even the Elite ­behind. The smaller and somewhat less wealthy Elite colleges and universities simply cannot capture as many total resources as can the best endowed and most selective private research universities.

In recent years, heightened competition has exacerbated in­equality. Competi­

■

tions produce both winners and losers. When many participants vie for the same opportunity, t­here is only one winner and many losers. This is the case in sports tournaments, an analogy that economist Paula Stephan developed and applied to competitions for research funding.14 Similarly, many admissions counselors recruit a student, but only one campus enrolls her. Resource competitions in higher education tend to be zero-­sum games. This creates conditions for heightened in­equality resulting primarily from a growing number of “losers” and a small num­ ber of “winners.” Most mobility is downward.

The results of ­these competitions have changed the field itself. As “wins” and

■

“losses” accumulate at each campus, the landscape of available institu­ tions has changed. A major finding from our quantitative analyses is the birth of a new institutional type: the Vulnerable public campus. Largely abandoned by state governments and without ample student demand to compensate for t­ hose lost revenues, t­ hese institutions teeter on the brink of tough bud­getary choices.15 It is no longer merely small privates that are Vulnerable. A growing number of public universities are now close to the financial precipice. This change in the mixture of available col­ leges and universities means that the next competition ­w ill be dif­fer­ent than the previous one. As an institution moves down in the vertical hier­ archy, it is less likely to recruit the next student or seek the next grant successfully. It is more likely to lose again. As a result, ­there are few paths back to better status and financial security. The dynamics of the system of unequal higher education have changed the field itself over time. A growing number of institutions that ­were once middle-­status campuses

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9

are now low-­status Vulnerable institutions. By contrast, ­there has been ­little change in the number of Elite institutions b ­ ecause very few colleges and universities have been able to move up.

Tuition reliance is an institution’s distress signal. In a sense, this assertion

■

is counterintuitive. High tuition prices are associated with high-­status education to such an extent that low-­status institutions often raise their prices in an effort to improve perceptions of their quality.16 Yet it is also true that high-­status institutions, all ­else equal, tend to have access to a wider range of revenues than do their lower-­status peers. Revenue diver­ sification is a well-­established path to stability and status.17 In this con­ text, growing tuition reliance is a warning sign. The more heavi­ly that a college or university depends on tuition to fund its operations, the more likely that institution is to be—or soon become—­Vulnerable. Tuition reli­ ance is a useful leading indicator of an institution’s fortunes.

­These changes to the field entail impor­tant implications for student opportu-

■

­ atters a g ­ reat deal both for f­uture nity. Where students go to college m earnings and for on-­campus experiences.18 It is no surprise, then, that students and families are increasingly anxious about securing admission to the “best pos­si­ble” college or university.19 Such anxiety is only height­ ened as the number of Vulnerable public institutions swells. With fewer good value seats from which to choose, students have fewer opportuni­ ties. Researchers know that better resourced and higher status campuses help underserved students attain greater social mobility. That is why ­there have been well-­intentioned efforts to help underserved students apply for and attend the very best college or university that w ­ ill admit them.20 Programs that match talented underserved students with high status institutions help individuals but do nothing to address the field dynamics that reduce the number of good-­value college options avail­ able to the majority of students. What is more, as tuition dependence increases—­especially among public institutions—­students at Vulnerable institutions increasingly fund campus operations through student loans, gaining access only to below-­average graduation rates for their trou­bles. The change in the mix of available institutions, in other words, has resulted in the mortgaging of many students’ ­f utures. The assertions summarized above require a good deal of supporting evi­ dence. Much of this book is devoted to supplying that evidence. Drawing upon a review of prior scholarship and theory, we developed a quantitative model that would categorize institutions based on indicators of horizontal and vertical posi­ tion. We selected indicators in two domains. Enrollment characteristics indi­ cated an institution’s status, while financial mea­sures described its material position. The resulting model sorted institutions into seven categories. We have

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U N E Q U A L H I G H E R E D U C AT I O N

­TA BLE   I.1

Describing the Groups of Unequal Higher Education Group name

Group description

Vulnerable institutions

Small colleges that spend very ­l ittle per student and rely on tuition for about 80% of spending.

Subsidy Reliant institutions

Small colleges that spend ­l ittle per student and rely on nontuition sources for about 65% of spending.

Smaller Typical Universities

Universities of about 13,000 students that are close to average on financial and admission characteristics.

Larger Typical Universities

Universities of about 25,000 students that are close to average on financial and admission characteristics.

Multiversities

The largest universities, ­these organ­i zations spend more per student, are less tuition reliant, and are more selective in admissions than are the Typical Universities.

Elite

Small institutions that practice selective admissions and spend a large amount of money per student.

Super Elite

Medium-­sized institutions that practice highly selective admissions, spend lavishly per student, and rely on tuition for a small share of total spending.

already referred to some of the resulting categories, such as Super Elite, Subsidy Reliant, Vulnerable, and so on. We describe each of ­these seven categories in ­table I.1. To understand the under­lying concepts, it helps to visualize our quantita­ tive model. Figure I.1 depicts the enrollment characteristics of the seven catego­ ries of institutions within the system of unequal higher education. The vertical axis indicates the percentage of applicants granted admission. This indicates vertical position b ­ ecause the score (i.e., admitting fewer students) signals higher or lower status. The horizontal axis reports full-­time equivalency (FTE) enroll­ ment in which differences indicate choices that are not necessarily preferable to one another. Variations in size often reflect institutional history and mission rather than greater or fewer resources. The size of the dot indicates the number

11

Percentage applicants admitted 30 40 50 60 70

80

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Vulnerable Smaller Typical Subsidy Reliant

Larger Typical

Multiversity

20

Elite

Super Elite

0

10,000

20,000 30,000 FTE enrollment

40,000

50,000

FIGUR E I.1  ​Vertical and horizontal dimensions of enrollment in the system of

unequal higher education, by category.

of institutions in the category. The numerous Vulnerable institutions have a large dot, the few Super Elite institutions have a small dot, and so on. The four categories with the most members (institutions) w ­ ere Vulnerable and Subsidy Reliant institutions, followed by Larger and Smaller Typical Univer­ sities. Members of ­these four categories ­were very similar to one another verti­ cally b ­ ecause all ­were relatively nonselective. The average member of each group offered admission to about two-­thirds of applicants. However, members of ­these four groups differed notably along the horizon­ tal axis. The average Vulnerable or Subsidy Reliant institution was small, enroll­ ing only a few thousand students. T ­ hese are the two largest categories; the vast majority of colleges in the United States are small and nonselective. By contrast, the Typical Universities ­were larger. The average Smaller Typical topped 10,000 FTE, while the average Larger Typical enrolled more than 20,000 FTE. Members of this last category ­were larger, on average, than any institutions except the Multiversities. Taken together, ­these two mea­sures provided a snapshot of an institution’s status ­because they signaled demand for seats. Vulnerable and Subsidy Reliant institutions admitted almost all applicants yet had few students. The impli­ cation was that ­there was l­ittle demand for admission. Man­ag­ers at Typical Universities had more latitude in charting their institutions’ courses, as ­these

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campuses received more applications for admission than did their smaller peers (see chapter 4). Campus officials could opt to be more selective in whom to admit, with the likely consequence of remaining small. Instead, they opted to admit a larger proportion of applicants and grow to greater size. This allowed Typical Universities to operate at an economy of scale, thereby creating some slack resources that could be invested in preferred activities. Greater demand for seats meant that leaders of Typical Universities enjoyed some freedom in decision-­ making that might be absent at Vulnerable or Subsidy Reliant campuses. Multiversities ­were notably more selective than w ­ ere members of the first four categories. The average Multiversity admitted about half of applicants. Despite being relatively selective, total enrollments ­were massive, topping 40,000 FTE on average. Receiving an enormous volume of applications (see chapter 4) allowed Multiversities to attain large sizes while practicing relatively selective admissions. Multiversities ­were high-­status institutions, and t­ here was ample demand for a seat at one of ­these campuses. Elite institutions w ­ ere even more selective than Multiversities, offering admission to about 40 ­percent of applicants. However, ­these selective admission practices came at a cost. Absent extraordinary application volume—­which few Elite institutions received—­total enrollments could not grow too large. T ­ here was simply not enough demand for admission to an Elite campus to allow ­these insti­ tutions both to be selective and large. Given the choice, leaders at Elite institu­ tions seemed to have opted for selectivity rather than size. Administrators of Super Elite institutions faced no such choices. Demand for a seat on ­these campuses was extraordinarily high. This allowed campus officials to practice the most selective admissions of any category of institu­ tions, while at the same time enrolling notably more students than did the Elite campuses. The Super Elite enjoyed the best of both worlds, operating on a large scale while carefully selecting the students whom they enrolled. Figure I.2 reports financial characteristics of the seven categories of unequal higher education. The vertical axis represents education and related (E&R) spending per FTE. This is a vertical indicator ­because more is unambiguously better. The horizontal axis indicates the share of E&R spending drawn from tuition. Dif­fer­ent institutional types (e.g., public and private campuses) have long differed in their reliance on tuition. The mixture of revenues by sources, then, did not connote the unambiguous indication of status signaled by E&R spend­ ing. Dif­fer­ent approaches could yield similar levels of aggregate spending. Thus, tuition’s share of E&R is a horizontal indicator ­because vertical positions can be achieved by dif­fer­ent means. Fi­nally, as above, the size of the dot indicated the number of institutions in the category. As when considering enrollment characteristics, the four large-­membership categories w ­ ere grouped vertically in our analy­sis of financial characteristics. Education and related spending per student was broadly similar across Subsidy

13

Super Elite

E&R spending per FTE 40,000 60,000 80,000

100,000

I ntroduction

Elite

20,000

Multiversity Subsidy Reliant

30

40

Vulnerable

Larger Typical Smaller Typical

50 60 70 Percentage E&R from tuition

80

90

FIGUR E I.2  ​Vertical and horizontal dimensions of finance in the system of unequal

higher education, by category.

Reliant, Vulnerable, Larger Typical, and Smaller Typical institutions. The average member of each category spent between $14,000 and $19,000 per student. How­ ever, horizontal financial differences among ­these four categories ­were perhaps even starker than was the case with total enrollment. Subsidy Reliant institu­ tions drew l­ ittle of their spending from tuition. On average, only about one-­third of spending came from students’ own payments. Typical Universities drew a ­little more than half of their educational spending from tuition, which is notably more than their Subsidy Reliant counter­parts but not particularly more than the Multiversities or Elite institutions. Vulnerable institutions stood alone, drawing more than eighty cents of e ­ very dollar from tuition. No other category exceeded fifty-­five cents on average. This utter dependence upon tuition distinguished Vulnerable institutions from all other colleges and universities. When tuition dependence was combined with low demand for admission, institutions became Vulnerable b ­ ecause their pri­ mary source of revenue was students who showed l­ittle interest in paying to attend. The only source of revenue was meager and unreliable. A staggering num­ ber of colleges and universities fit this description. Indeed, t­ here are more insti­ tutions in this category than in all o ­ thers combined. Multiversities ­were slightly less tuition reliant than their Typical University counter­parts. At the average Multiversity, student payments constituted a ­little

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less than half of E&R spending per student. However, at a l­ ittle less than $24,000 per student, spending was notably higher than in the four lower-­spending cat­ egories we have thus far reviewed. This meant that the average student at a Mul­ tiversity received a large subsidy in total dollars, even if it amounted to only about half of total spending. Students at ­these campuses paid a smaller share of greater spending than did their counter­parts at Typical Universities or Vulner­ able institutions. Elite institutions w ­ ere somewhat more tuition reliant than the Multiversi­ ties. At Elite institutions, tuition constituted almost the exact same share of E&R—­about 54 ­percent—as in the two groups of Typical Universities. Total spending per student soared above the Multiversities and Typical Universities. At about $45,000 per student, Elite institutions spent more than twice as much on each student as did Vulnerable, Subsidy Reliant, or Typical institutions. Even though students contributed a ­little more than half of this spending, they none­ theless received considerable subsidies from endowments and other sources. Indeed, the average student at an Elite institution received a subsidy greater than total educational spending in the four lowest-­spending classes of institutions. It is no won­der that so many students want to attend Elite institutions, which allows ­these campuses to practice selected admissions. Although prices w ­ ere high, seats ­were heavi­ly subsidized and therefore coveted. As in the case of enrollment characteristics, Super Elite institutions stretched the outer bound­aries of both mea­sures. Spending was lavish. T ­ hese top-­shelf campuses spent more than twice as much per student as did Elite insti­ tutions and more than four times as much as did the Multiversities. Shockingly few of ­these dollars came from tuition payments. At about 27 ­percent, tuition reliance was lower than at Subsidy Reliant institutions that by definition depended upon funding from nontuition sources. On most campuses, decision-­makers faced trade-­offs. Grow enrollment (like the Smaller and Larger Typical Universities) or increase selectivity (like the Elite institutions)? Increase spending by raising tuition (like the Elite institutions) or maintain low prices by curtailing spending (like the Subsidy Reliant institu­ tions)? T ­ hese are hard choices. Only administrators of the Super Elite privates ­were able to avoid them.

Increased Competition and Downward Mobility Most of the book is dedicated to an analy­sis of the self-­perpetuating field that we term the system of unequal higher education. The best way to convey our ideas about the field is often to convey them in aggregate and even abstract terms, as we have done in t­ able I.1, figure I.1, and figure I.2. But below the aggre­ gation and abstraction are real institutions that enroll real students. The stories of ­these institutions help to illustrate what is ­going on in the field. We therefore

I ntroduction

15

pres­ent a handful of miniature case studies to introduce the system of unequal higher education. ­These institutions w ­ ere selected based on the results of our quantitative model. Their stories highlight impor­tant ele­ments of the system of unequal higher education. We ground t­ hese cases in our under­lying theoretical and empirical models to ensure that they add texture to our account while remaining faithful to our overall argument. The first two cases are both private ­women’s colleges located in the south­ eastern United States. From 2005 to 2011, Agnes Scott College and Sweet Briar College ­were considered Elite colleges. The two colleges maintained small enroll­ ment sizes by practicing selective admissions. Both enrolled fewer than 1,000 full-­time equivalent (FTE) students in 2005. Both colleges also spent far more per student than did the average institution and drew less than an average share of that spending from tuition. This meant that both Agnes Scott and Sweet Briar spent, on average, about as much on students as students contributed themselves through tuition. Such revenue diversification is a crucial sign of status. It would be difficult to think of two institutions that ­were better suited for comparison in 2005. Comparing ­these two similar cases illustrates how precarious the posi­ tions of even the relatively well-­to-do can be. Agnes Scott remained in the Elite group for all years from 2005 through 2013, the final year of our analy­sis. With some variation, its spending remained about $40,000 per FTE, and only about 30 ­percent of t­ hese dollars came from tuition. Most years, about half of applicants ­were admitted. This means that the college relied relatively ­little on students to pay its bills and so enjoyed some latitude in selecting students to enroll. Agnes Scott thereby maintained its position in the Elite despite the turbulent forces that characterized the system of unequal higher education. Sweet Briar did not fare nearly as well. It fell precipitously from the Elite group in 2005 into the Vulnerable group in 2012 and 2013. This change in cate­ gorization indicated meaningful differences in the way Sweet Briar operated. By 2012, its staff admitted more than 80 ­percent of applicants, but the college enrolled fewer than 750 FTE students. This suggested that relatively few prospec­ tive students wanted to attend. Limited demand portended financial trou­bles, as spending per student dropped from almost $45,000 per FTE in 2005 to about $37,000 per FTE in 2013. Alarmingly, the college was spending less per student even though ­there ­were fewer students on whom to spend. Even as total spend­ ing fell, reliance on tuition soared. Tuition payments made up only 37 ­percent of spending in 2005 but w ­ ere about half of E&R by 2013. Each of ­these mea­sures traces erosion in Sweet Briar’s position from 2005 to 2013. Its finances and status worsened notably in less than a de­cade. It is no surprise, then, that Sweet Briar was reclassified as a Vulnerable institution in 2012. In the case of Sweet Briar, this qualitative change in class membership appears to be a meaningful indicator of “on the ground” realities. On March 3,

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2015, the board of trustees of Sweet Briar College announced that the campus would cease operations at the end of that academic year.21 At the time the trustees deci­ded to shutter its doors, Sweet Briar did not face imminent financial ruin. According to figures compiled annually by the National Association of College and University Business Officers (NACUBO), in 2014 Sweet Briar controlled an endowment of more than $95 million—up 6.8 ­percent from the year before.22 This fair market value was by no means exceptional but was large enough to place Sweet Briar in the top 500 of all colleges and universities in the country. Accordingly, Sweet Briar’s faculty, alumnae, students, and gov­ ernment officials resisted the planned closure and filed suit to keep Sweet Briar open.23 ­These parties ultimately prevailed, and Sweet Briar officials announced the institution would continue operations.24 Given that Sweet Briar possessed sufficient resources to continue operations in the short term, why was its continued existence ever questioned? At least one pos­si­ble answer to this question can be found in the differences between Sweet Briar and Agnes Scott. Closure only made sense in the context of Sweet Briar’s position relative to its competitors. Sweet Briar had always fared well, but over time it did less well. As Sweet Briar’s position eroded, its ability to compete with other institutions declined. Sweet Briar’s prob­lem was less about w ­ hether it could remain operational than about ­whether it could wrestle students and status away from better-­positioned institutions such as Agnes Scott. In the trustees’ judg­ ment, Sweet Briar was no longer competitive among American colleges and thus was hard pressed to fulfill its mission. The story of Sweet Briar, in other words, was not about an organ­ization that could no longer continue operating, but about a campus where decision-­makers realized that financial pressures and the search for status made it highly unlikely that Sweet Briar would ever re-­establish itself as an Elite institution. The college had lost its status and was unlikely to regain it. Remarkably but perhaps reasonably, Sweet Briar’s trustees—­the very ­people charged with the institution’s care—­determined that it could no longer provide good-­value opportunities to students.

The Retreat of the State and the Birth of the Vulnerable Public Institution In many ways, the story of Sweet Briar is the story of unequal higher education. Competitive pressures erode status positions that once seemed secure, with the result of downward mobility for all but a very few. T ­ here are many variations to this general account. Perhaps the most dramatic result of our analy­sis is the birth of the Vulnerable public institution, meaning a state-­supported college that relies on tuition for its operating bud­get. In 2005, our analy­sis identified only a few such institutions. By 2013, almost 12 ­percent of all publics ­were classified as Vulnerable.

I ntroduction

17

The University of Southern Maine typifies the kind of public institution that became Vulnerable during the 2000s. Like the majority of public institutions, the University of Southern Maine was Subsidy Reliant for most of the study period. This means that it depended upon nontuition revenues for much of its bud­get. Subsidy Reliant institutions are, on average, similar to Vulnerable insti­ tutions. Members of both groups tend to be small, practice nonselective admis­ sions, and spend relatively ­little per student. The only ­thing that keeps Subsidy Reliant institutions from becoming Vulnerable is the subsidy provider. For pub­ lic institutions, meaningful subsides almost always come from state appro­ priations. If the state abandoned the University of Southern Maine and other campuses like it, trou­ble would likely follow. The crucial difference in the source of income—­tuition payments or govern­ ment support—­entails profound consequences for student opportunity at Vul­ nerable and Subsidy Reliant institutions. Students at Subsidy Reliant institutions find that one dollar of tuition spending nets an average of about two dollars in ­ nless a student can secure admission to a nontuition spending (see figure I.2). U highly competitive Super Elite institution, she could not secure a better return on investment than to attend a Subsidy Reliant institution. ­These dollars buy pro­ found transformations in a student’s life. Subsidy Reliant institutions are often “opportunity engines” that allow underserved students to travel the greatest dis­ tances ­toward higher lifetime earnings and better outcomes.25 By contrast, enrolling at a Vulnerable institution is often a poor return on investment for the student. On average, one dollar of tuition spent at a Vulnerable institution nets only about twenty cents in institutional spending (see chapter 3). Students at Vulnerable institutions are not very heavi­ly subsidized ­because they constitute the institution’s primary source of revenue. When an institution moves from the Subsidy Reliant to the Vulnerable group, it likely moves from an engine of opportunity to a revenue maximizer—an organ­ization that is desperate to collect as much tuition as pos­si­ble in order to survive. The effects on students are potentially profound. Completing a degree at a Vulnerable institution is almost certainly bet­ ter than earning no degree at all. The wage premium associated with college education—­meaning the gap between the average pay earned by degree-­holders and non-­degree-­holders—is high.26 However, a student’s experiences on campus also m ­ atter. Receiving a more highly subsidized education for about the same tuition price is highly desirable. Not surprisingly, the University of Southern Maine’s fall from Subsidy Reliant to Vulnerable institution resulted in falling demand. The university’s enroll­ ment dwindled from almost 8,000 FTE in 2005 to about 6,500 FTE in 2013. At the same time that demand dropped, the University of Southern Maine became ever more dependent upon students and their tuition dollars. Only about one in three dollars of E&R spending came from tuition in 2005. By 2013, that figure had

18

U N E Q U A L H I G H E R E D U C AT I O N

risen to nearly six in ten. In an effort to bolster its total enrollment, the campus had become less selective in its admission practices, but this desperate strategy proved in­effec­tive. Each of ­these indicators suggested that the University of Southern Maine was a profoundly dif­fer­ent institution in 2013 than it had been in 2005. Wide­ spread student protests indicated that ­those enrolled at the university perceived the changes as likely to damage their life prospects. No won­der the students protested. In 2014 stark bud­getary realities prompted furloughs, downsizing, and the consolidation of core academic departments into larger, less autono­ mous units.27 Our quantitative model appears to have well captured the real­ity at the University of Southern Maine, whose substantive position in 2013 seemed far weaker than it had been a few years before. Notably, the University of Southern Maine is far from an isolated case. Dozens of public institutions became Vulnerable between 2005 and 2013. This pattern proved especially pronounced ­after the ­Great Recession prompted dramatic cuts in state bud­gets.28 Institutions such as Evergreen State College in Washington and Lake Superior State University in Michigan became Vulnerable in 2012. ­Others, such as Northern Michigan University and Texas A&M University−Com­ merce, followed the same path a year ­later, becoming Vulnerable in 2013. ­These details suggest the general trend. Between 2005 and 2013, the Vulnerable public institution was born. Its consequences for student opportunity w ­ ere stark. Col­ leges that ­were once engines of opportunity increasingly focused on maximiz­ ing tuition revenues rather than enhancing student success.

Plan of the Book The arguments found in this volume are relatively s­ imple. Wealth and status are increasingly concentrated at a few institutions, leaving the majority of campuses to fall farther b ­ ehind. T ­ hese changes restrict student opportunity. More students now attend college, but the number of good-­value seats has not grown. For most students—­especially for students of color and low-­income individuals—­this change in the landscape of available institutions has restricted aggregate student opportunity. Although relatively easily stated, t­ hese arguments require substantial sup­ port. As such, they unfold in several stages throughout the volume. The first two chapters constitute the heart of our argument, outlining our reasons for under­ standing the system of unequal higher education as we do. This system, like all systems of social relations, comes from somewhere. Unequal higher education has a past. Accordingly, in chapter 1, we review the historical foundations of the system of unequal higher education. This overview explains why we think cer­ tain features of the system are particularly impor­tant for efforts to understand institutional in­equality and student opportunity. It also situates our analy­sis as

I ntroduction

19

a crucial component of ongoing policy discussions, as we understand the sys­ tem of unequal higher education as largely resulting from policy decisions. Chapter 2 outlines the theoretical basis for understanding the system of unequal higher education as a field guided by taken-­for-­granted rules and char­ acterized by an enduring hierarchy. Businesses follow the ­simple rule of profit maximization within the constraints of regulation. Colleges and universities are guided by complex f­actors. Some of t­ hese f­actors are financial and relatively transparent; wealth is better than penury, especially as costs rise. Other ­factors are cultural and more difficult to discern. We believe that financial and cultural ­factors shape institutions in broadly similar ways but do not produce sameness. Rather, common field conditions produce a stable hierarchy within which insti­ tutions move over time. Having developed our argument historically and conceptually, we test it empirically. In chapter 3, we pres­ent results of a latent profile analy­sis (LPA) that identify the seven categories that characterize the field. T ­ hese categories are summarized in ­table I.1. We also map how membership in ­these categories changed from 2005 to 2013. Our analyses indicate that most mobility has been downward. ­There w ­ ere more Vulnerable institutions in 2013 than ­there had been in 2005. As institutional in­equality widened, students had fewer good-­ value opportunities from which to choose. Of course, t­ here is substantial variation within a field as large and diverse as U.S. higher education. Perhaps no institutional characteristic is as salient as institutional control. A public campus that is subsidized and regulated by a state government differs profoundly from a private not-­for-­profit institution that is overseen by its own trustees and must generate revenues to support its own operations. We take ­these institutional differences into account in chapters that explore the pathways by which a public (chapter 4) or private (chapter 5) insti­ tution comes to belong to a category. Chapters 6 and 7 review the consequences of growing in­equality for student opportunity. As the number of good-­value seats declines and total enrollment grows, opportunity constricts for each individual student. ­Because the distribu­ tion of students throughout the system is not random, students of color and low-­ income individuals are heavi­ly concentrated in the lowest resource, lowest status campuses. T ­ hese institutions undertake crucial work, and students surmount formidable obstacles. Nonetheless, it is impor­tant to understand the social forces that prevent underserved students from attending Elite and Super Elite institutions at representative rates. This is especially urgent ­because the grow­ ing number of Vulnerable institutions combines low graduation rates and extreme tuition reliance to produce mortgaged ­f utures for the many students who attend them. The consequences of unequal higher education for student opportunity are grim. More dismally still, we view the system of unequal higher education as

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self-­perpetuating. Left intact, we expect gaps in institutional wealth and status to continue to widen. Accordingly, we expect the available field of enrollment destinations to continue shifting ­toward the extremes, yielding reduced oppor­ tunities for most students. However, we are not determinists. The system of unequal higher education reflects a series of policy choices as well as historical contingencies. Dif­fer­ent choices could be made. Chapter 8 concludes the volume by offering some ideas for a new public compact centered upon broad reinvestment in higher educa­ tion and student opportunity.

1 The Roots of Unequal Higher Education

Historical legacies m­ atter a g­ reat deal in higher education. Con­temporary higher education systems reflect their pasts, and even radical changes are s­ haped by what came before.1 The system of unequal higher education reflects the lengthy and complex history of educational inequity in the United States. Vol­ umes are dedicated to this topic.2 In this chapter, we consider events that are particularly relevant to the con­temporary system of unequal higher education. The context that ­matters the most for our analy­sis begins around 1980. As we detail below, events from 1980 to 2013 exert an outsized influence on con­ temporary colleges and universities. This period is characterized by rising costs, declining government support, wide variations in donations and endowments, and growing tuition reliance. In other words, financial uncertainty created the conditions for greater institutional in­equality. Students are classically understood as responsive to price. When prices go up, demand for higher education goes down. High prices, in this account, mean fewer ­people ­w ill be able to pay. Yet soaring prices for higher education ­were accompanied by soaring demand during the 1980–2013 period.3 How could this be? One answer is that more and more students want to go to college than ever before. ­Going to college, in other words, is a social demand as much as an eco­ nomic calculation.4 The rising expectation that all students would attend a col­ lege or university entails profound consequences for the system of unequal higher education b ­ ecause growing numbers of applicants mean that some insti­ tutions can be more selective than ever before. Status-­seeking via selective admissions can become a widespread aspiration even if few institutions achieve it. During the 1980–2013 period, competition to attract and enroll the best students became a second crucial mechanism for making institutions more unequal.

21

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­These two changes in conditions since 1980—­financial instability and status-­ seeking—­created and sustained the system of unequal higher education. The resulting changes ­were dramatic. By 2013 the landscape of institutions available to students was profoundly dif­fer­ent than it had been in the 1980s. We document this change throughout the book. First, however, it is impor­tant to understand how financial instability and status-­seeking became the cornerstones of the sys­ tem of unequal higher education.

Deep Roots: Unequal Higher Education Prior to 1980 In the 1970s, U.S. higher education largely resembled the system that was devel­ oped following World War II. Historians sometimes call the mid-­century period Amer­i­ca’s “golden age” of higher education. Public higher education was unequal by design. Multiversities enrolled large numbers of students, spent relatively gen­ erously on each student, and conducted expansive research operations. Other publics spent less but usually charged lower tuition prices and admitted a larger percentage of applicants, thereby providing crucial access points. Access had expanded, albeit unevenly, for all students ­because public higher education was generously supported by the states and tuition was low.5 As a result, opportuni­ ties for social mobility w ­ ere relatively high.6 The California Master Plan typified state systems of this sort. While the mul­ tiple campuses of the high-­status University of California enjoyed more money and prestige than the state’s other public institutions, the numerous California State University and community college campuses nonetheless provided fairly well-­f unded opportunities that satisfied rising levels of student demand.7 The Master Plan’s hierarchical design sought to balance the goals of excellence, access, and cost management.8 Similar efforts to balance ­these three compet­ ing imperatives ­were made in many other states. Con­temporary assessments of ­these mid-­century planned systems show that they never fully lived up to the ideal. In­equality, particularly gaps in attainment by race, class, and gender, remained rampant. On the ­whole, however, ­these hierarchical public systems proved more successful than their forebears9 at providing both excellence and access.10 Broad government support for institutions produced a wide range of desir­ able outcomes in U.S. higher education. Generous state appropriations meant low tuition prices that facilitated access on a massive scale.11 Although pain­ ful gaps in access and attainment remained, unpre­ce­dented numbers of stu­ dents enrolled in U.S. colleges and universities.12 Entering the 1980s, public higher education was unequal and inequitable, but it was also more productive and more accessible than it had been in the past.13 The United States, as we dis­ cuss in chapter 6, hosted the world’s first mass system of higher education.



T he R oot s of U nequal H igher  E ducation

23

This state of affairs did not last long. Over time appropriations failed to keep up with growth in the student population. More students came, but state gov­ ernments supported them with lower levels of per-­student funding.14 Entering the 1980s and 1990s, states began to experiment with how they funded higher education, often putting greater emphasis on per­for­mance mea­sures.15 In­equality among private institutions ­adopted a dif­fer­ent but also recogniz­ able form at the end of the “golden age.” Whereas state systems tended to reflect designed in­equality, differences in wealth and status among private institutions resulted from historical pro­cesses. ­These pro­cesses reflected patterns of enroll­ ment preferences and wealth accumulation that had been established as early as the seventeenth c ­ entury. A familiar cadre of top-­shelf private institutions was vis­i­ble. ­These institutions had turned their large financial holdings into massive endowments and had translated national student markets into intense demand for admission.16 Many added research revenues to ­these riches, leveraging fed­ eral research and development (R&D) support to lift overall status and financial position.17 In contrast to t­ hese high-­resource, high-­status behemoths, the vast major­ ity of privates strug­gled to attract enough students to make ends meet. This meant unselective admission practices and severe tuition reliance. This set of circumstances rendered many private institutions “invisible” to the average student18 and therefore prone to mission drift and even closure.19 The hierarchy of private higher education was steeper than that of most pub­ lic systems. Elite privates w ­ ere wealthier and more prestigious, and low-­status privates more imperiled, than their public counter­parts. State systems w ­ ere designed both to establish and to limit institutional stratification in order to pro­ vide attractive and affordable options for growing numbers of students. With­ out direct state support to subsidize lower-­status organ­izations, the set of privately controlled colleges and universities has long resembled the current, steeply stratified system of unequal higher education. The gentler dynamics of the public sector continued so long as funds ­were available from state govern­ ments.20 As we demonstrate in chapter 3, however, public in­equality would rise rapidly once funds from state governments began to dry up. It is not pos­si­ble to pinpoint a moment or even a year at which t­ hese arrange­ ments began to change. Ronald Reagan was elected president in 1980, which is seen as a landmark shift in the welfare politics that had dominated U.S. policy­ making starting with the New Deal. Con­ve­niently, 1980 also coincides with the publication of Howard Bowen’s The Costs of Higher Education. Bowen’s book is impor­tant for our analy­sis ­because it introduced Bowen’s law or the “revenue theory of costs,” a narrative that formalizes a core tenet of orga­nizational be­hav­ ior in higher education. In Bowen’s account—­whose conceptual roots stretch deep into the nineteenth ­century—­there is no limit to how much an institution

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could or should spend on its mission.21 The ­great majority of higher education institutions raise all the money they possibly can and spend it all. ­Because t­ here is no end to the production and dissemination of knowledge, the mission of higher education can never be fully satisfied. The work of a university is never done, and neither are efforts to fund its operations.22 Bowen’s law means that most colleges and universities exist on a knife’s edge. The changes symbolized by President Reagan’s election would make ­those positions even more precarious. Rapid change in technology, shifting regulation that often benefited for-­profit institutions,23 internationalization,24 and the ero­ sion of social support for the higher education sector25 are all part of the story. By raising costs and reducing direct government support, each of t­ hese f­ actors contributed to the many changes wrought upon the system of higher educa­ tion.26 Institutions would compete with growing fervor for dollars and status. The result of ­these broad changes has been a profound shift in college and university operations. Campus officials prioritize competitions for status and resources as well as—or, in some cases, in place of—­fulfillment of their tradi­ tional missions. T ­ hese changes have been described as “academic capitalism,”27 “privatization,”28 or—­most optimistically—­“entrepreneurialism.”29 On balance, each account describes the same basic pro­cess: except for a few Elite and Super Elite institutions, colleges and universities since 1980 have faced growing finan­ cial uncertainty and heightened competition for status, resulting in frantic efforts to stave off disaster.30 In our analy­sis, ­these changing conditions have prompted profound shifts in the landscape of higher education. The kinds of colleges and universities that are available to students have changed notably since 1980. Finances have never been certain, and status has always been unequal. However, the gaps between institutions have widened rapidly during this period b ­ ecause competition for money and status has become even more heated. ­Today’s students have a dif­fer­ ent array of institutional options than did students in previous times b ­ ecause financial and cultural changes since 1980 have created the system of unequal higher education.

Financing Unequal Higher Education since 1980 Changes in available revenues have long prompted shifts in college and univer­ sity be­hav­ior. In the years since 1980, revenue volatility has not been the only financial challenge confronting colleges and universities. Higher education costs—­meaning the total resources consumed to produce higher education (not just tuition dollars)—­also have grown steeply and per­sis­tently over time.31 For institutions facing constantly rising costs, ­every available dollar ­matters. Grow­ ing institutional in­equality is inextricably linked to the financing of higher education.



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Decline of State Support Rising costs always pres­ent a dilemma for campus leaders. For public institutions in the years since 1980, however, cost increases have been particularly challeng­ ing. This is ­because direct state support for higher education has declined sharply. The drop has not been even; t­ here have been brief periods of recovery along the way.32 The overall trajectory, though, has been unmistakably down­ ward. Direct state support was once the primary revenue source at most public institutions, but over time ­these funds accounted for an ever-­smaller share of ever-­greater educational costs. From the late 1970s through the early 2000s, state spending on higher education (relative to total state income) dropped nearly 30 ­percent.33 Even as it cost more and more to provide higher education, the state kicked in less and less t­ oward the cost. Rapid declines in state support during the 1980s and 1990s prompted a raft of scholarly attention.34 Explanations for declining appropriations tended to fall into two broad categories. The first emphasizes the harsh realities of constrained public bud­gets. In this telling, higher education seems to have been crowded out by other demands for funding. Almost all state governments are obliged to bal­ ance their bud­gets ­every year, which means that policymakers have a limited number of dollars to allocate to public priorities. Medicaid, K–12 education, transportation, corrections, and other government activities also require sup­ port. Increased healthcare costs and swelling prison populations put real stress on state bud­gets. Colleges and universities, virtually alone among public organ­ izations, can raise tuition to compensate for declines in state funding. Higher education, in other words, can continue to function even with gradual declines in state support. In this “balance wheel” explanation, higher education received what was left over ­after other priorities had been met.35 The result of the balance wheel is a slow decline in state appropriations to public higher education. This decline is temporarily interrupted by economic booms, but appropriations drop rapidly in lean times. To be sure, t­ here is impor­ tant variation by state. Drops seem to have happened most rapidly in states with declining populations and shrinking tax bases, which makes sense as such states have a limited ability to fund public priorities.36 But the overall story is straightforward. States have contributed fewer dollars per student even as costs per student have risen sharply. The second, more critical account of declining state support emphasizes the po­liti­cal arrangements that created bud­getary shortfalls. Suzanne Mettler argued that po­liti­cal polarization and hostility to public higher education by the Amer­ ican Right have contributed to public divestment.37 The politicization of higher education funding was evident as early as the 1970s, with Republican officials more hostile to higher education than ­were ­others.38 Throughout the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s, Republican-­controlled state governments typically provided

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less generous support and more intrusive accountability mechanisms than did state governments controlled by Demo­crats.39 Results from a 2017 Pew survey showed that a majority of p ­ eople who identify as Republican believe higher edu­ cation has a negative effect on the country. This result suggests that the antipa­ thy of policymakers may be shared by their voters, confirming that po­liti­cal discord has contributed to the decline in public funding for higher education.40 In many ways, however, declining support for higher education was a bipar­ tisan proj­ect.41 ­A fter all, the “tax revolt”—­which exacerbated balance wheel dynamics by reducing funds collected by state governments—­originated in left-­ leaning California.42 Politicians from across parties seemed to agree both that appropriations should be reduced and that tuition was rising too quickly.43 Declining state support may be po­liti­cal without being strictly partisan. Criti­ cally inclined scholars such as Christopher Newfield44 and Sheila Slaughter and Gary Rhoades45 tended to see financial trends not merely as sites of partisan rancor, but as evidence of social elites’ concerted efforts to undermine the demo­ cratic, participatory ele­ments of twentieth-­century colleges and universities. Admittedly, we incline t­ oward the latter more critical explanation for declin­ ing funding. And understanding the relationship between po­liti­cal motivations and practical consequences m ­ atters a g ­ reat deal as we attempt to chart a way forward, as we discuss in chapter 8. For the purposes of understanding the con­ sequences of the past, however, it ­matters less why state funding declined than that it declined. The scale of declines in funding and their implications for the landscape of institutions available for students to attend are far more impor­ tant for our account. By almost any mea­sure, the changes ­were staggering and long-­lasting. An initial wave of declining state funding was evident in the late 1980s and early 1990s. The average state spent almost $8,000 per full-­time student in 1987 and 1988. In constant (i.e., inflation-­adjusted) dollars, that number dropped precipitously over the next several years. By 1993 and 1994, average spending was a l­ittle less than $7,000 per student. Temporary recoveries occurred, as suggested in the balance wheel account. Improving economic conditions allowed the average state appropriation to exceed $8,000 per FTE again by 2000 and 2001, but this recovery proved short-­lived. Another period of steady decline fol­ lowed the economic dip of 2001, with state support bottoming out around ­ fter that, state support grew slowly for a few $6,700 per FTE in 2004 and 2005. A years u ­ ntil the ­Great Recession of 2007–2009.46 The effects of the recession began another cycle of deep cuts. Indeed, reductions in funding ­were so deep that direct government support had not recovered to pre-­recession levels by 2014–2015.47 The average state appropriation per student fell more than 20 ­percent from 2000 to 2016.48 Over a period of thirty years, public investment went up and down, but the net result was steep decline in per-­student state support for higher education.



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State appropriations per FTE

11,000 10,000 9,000 8,000 7,000 6,000 5,000 2005

2007

2009 Year

2011

2013

25th percentile appropriations Median appropriations 75th percentile appropriations

FIGUR E 1.1  ​State appropriations per FTE for public institutions that appear in ­every

year 2005–2013.

This pattern is observable in our own analy­sis of data from 2005 to 2013. Figure 1.1 reports state appropriations per FTE in constant dollars. Well-­supported (seventy-­fifth percentile), average (median), and poorly supported (twenty-­fifth percentile) public institutions all witnessed approximately stable levels of state ­ fter the recession, funding in the years from 2005 up to the ­Great Recession. A support for institutions at all levels dropped precipitously. By 2012 well-­supported (seventy-­fifth percentile) public institutions received lower levels of per-­student support from state appropriations than a poorly supported public (twenty-­fifth percentile) had received in 2005. This was an extraordinary change. The most a student could reasonably expect a state to pay in 2013 (the seventy-­fifth percen­ tile) was about the same as the least a student would have feared a state would pay (the twenty-­fifth percentile) only a few years earlier. ­These dramatic changes would profoundly shape the kinds of institutions that w ­ ere available to students. The consequences of declining state support appear to be stark. Well-­ supported institutions are not perfect—­the history of accountability efforts is long 49 —­but, given their reliance on state support, public colleges and universi­ ties tend to do the kinds of t­ hings that policymakers want them to do. Growing enrollments, facilitating degree completion, and keeping tuition prices low have been central policy goals for most states. Sufficient state funding is a useful

28

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ingredient to achieve ­these goals, especially when it comes to student success and degree completion.50 Students do better when campuses spend more on their education,51 and public colleges and universities have more to spend when appro­ priations are generous. For the vast majority of public campuses, the concerns that outcomes would decline as a result of declining appropriations appear to have come to fruition.52 Students and institutions faced the uneasy choice of reducing spending or raising tuition. Given that reduced spending tends to cor­ relate with poorer outcomes, the overwhelming majority of public institutions have chosen the latter path and become increasingly reliant on tuition.

Rising Tuition Reliance: An Institution’s Distress Signal Tuition reliance and tuition dependence are terms indicating that an institution uses income from student fees to cover most of its bud­get. No campus leader wants to preside over a tuition-­ reliant institution. Revenue diversification increases orga­nizational autonomy and stability.53 Thus, diversification is a goal of most campus man­ag­ers. Unfortunately, it is a goal that is not easily attained. For most institutions, realizing the freedom that comes from diversified fund­ ing is not pos­si­ble. Costs are on the rise, and students are the most likely source of funds to meet ­those obligations. Tuition reliance is a fact of life on most campuses. Tuition reliance has long characterized most private colleges and universi­ ties. B ­ ecause they do not commonly receive direct support from state govern­ ments, private institutions typically charge high rates of tuition. In recent years even ­these already high prices have been on the rise. “Sticker prices”—­the tuition price listed on an institution’s website or other promotional materials—­rose dra­ matically from 1995 to 2015. Notably, however, net prices—­what students actually pay ­a fter student financial aid has been applied—­rose far more slowly. Indeed, ­after peaking around $15,000 per student in 2008, net tuition at the average pri­ vate institution declined or stayed approximately the same through 2015.54 Divergence between the sticker and net prices reflects de­cades of aggres­ sive student financial aid practices designed to influence student choice. Strate­ gic student financial aid is a core ele­ment of most enrollment management operations. Typically, ­these practices involve the awarding of a “scholarship” that is ­little more than a price discount intended to convince a student to enroll.55 Colleges put their ser­v ices on sale for the students they prefer. ­These efforts are intended to maximize tuition revenues by attracting high-­income students who can pay tuition but need to be courted with sweeteners.56 Such “scholarships” are less likely to be rewards for student merit or offsets for student need than attempts to convince a student to pay some tuition by enrolling on a campus. This means that flat or declining net tuition revenues per student should not be seen as evidence of shrinking tuition reliance among private institutions. In fact, the opposite is likely to be true. When ­ every dollar of tuition is precious,

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20

Percentage of E&R from net tuition 40 60 80 100



2005

2007

2009 Year

25th percentile public 75th percentile public Median private

2011

2013

Median public 25th percentile private 75th percentile private

FIGUR E 1.2  ​Share of E&R expenditures covered by net tuition at public and private

institutions that appear in e ­ very year 2005–2013.

campus officials are likely to discount prices aggressively in an effort to enroll as many students as pos­si­ble. Tuition-­dependent institutions are therefore more likely to enroll students who pay less than sticker price ­because any reve­ nues at all are welcome. Figure 1.2 shows that institutions are using tuition discounts more ­because they rely more on tuition income. This figure reports the share of education and related (E&R) expenses covered by net tuition for institutions that appear in ­every year of our analy­sis. As this figure illustrates, t­ here has essentially been no change in tuition reliance among private institutions. The ­great majority of privates was tuition reliant in 2005 and remained so in 2013. In all years, more than 75 ­percent of private institutions drew at least two-­thirds of E&R expenses from net tuition. With the exception of a few high-­status campuses, private col­ leges and universities run on tuition. ­Because they received more generous appropriations from state governments, public institutions at one time ­were far less tuition reliant than their private counter­parts. In 1985, for example, at the average public institution net tuition was less than one-­third of the average appropriation.57 Over time, net tuition rev­ enues increased and appropriations dropped.58 Although ­there are many expla­ nations for rising tuition, the association between declining state support and rising prices was hard to miss. By 2004, net tuition exceeded half of state

30

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appropriations. As prices climbed and appropriations fell, this ratio continued to drop. By 2016, net tuition at the average public institution was only $650 less than state appropriations on a per student basis.59 Public colleges and universi­ ties w ­ ere raising tuition prices rapidly in an effort to fill the holes that retreat­ ing state support had left in their bud­gets. This relationship intensified over time. Tuition reliance is undesirable from the perspective of orga­nizational lead­ ers ­because it limits in­de­pen­dence.60 Accordingly, growing tuition reliance may be interpreted as a sign of orga­nizational distress. From 2005 to 2013, that alarm was sounded most frequently on public campuses. Figure 1.2 includes three lines representing tuition reliance among public institutions that appear in ­every year of our sample. In 2005, net tuition was a relatively small portion of most public institutions’ bud­gets. Half of all publics relied on tuition for 38 ­percent or less of E&R. Only about a quarter of publics counted on tuition for 40 ­percent or more of spending. Over time, tuition reliance among public colleges and universities grew rap­ idly. By 2013, about half of publics relied on tuition for 50 ­percent or more of E&R. Put another way, very few publics relied on tuition for half of their spend­ ing in 2005, but most did so by 2013. What is more, by 2012, the twenty-­fifth per­ centile public institution was as tuition reliant as the median public had been in 2005. Even high-­status public institutions became increasingly dependent on tuition during the 2000s. Given that all but the top tier of private institutions ­were already tuition dependent, heavy reliance on student payments became a central characteristic of the financial conditions that sustain the system of unequal higher education.

Alternatives to Tuition Reliance Tuition reliance is not the only strategy available to deal with rising costs and declining government support. College and university decision-­makers often tout their plans to diversify institutional revenues and seek funding from other sources.61 For most institutions, however, this approach has not worked. Campuses could turn to philanthropists and investment opportunities. Seeking charitable support is encouraged by the federal tax code, which grants benefits to donors who support higher education.62 Further, by necessitating a new office to expand and maintain networks of potential supporters, develop­ ing charitable and philanthropic gifts is popu­lar among campus leaders who wish to expand administrative capacity.63 The popularity of seeking philanthropic support is not wholly misplaced. Donors have long given to higher education, and surplus wealth can be invested to endow the support of f­ uture students. Once accumulated into large endow­ ment holdings, gifts tend to grow quickly. In part, this occurs ­because endowment



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earnings historically have been exempt from taxation. However, endowment growth also reflects changes in the way institutions manage their holdings. Beginning in the 1970s, the fiduciary standards for managing endowments changed in ways that encouraged aggressive investment in pursuit of high rates of return. For institutional administrators, the prospect of high yield funds, even with exposure to bigger risk, was tempting.64 ­These efforts included expanded fundraising operations and sometimes even developing in-­house investment teams headed by a Chief Investment Officer.65 Although s­ imple in princi­ple, in practice accumulating large amounts of capital has proven difficult for most. Over the twentieth c ­ entury, large capital investments tended to earn greater returns than did smaller holdings.66 This meant that wealthy institutions captured the disproportionate share of endow­ ment returns, often enjoying benefits that dramatically outstripped t­ hose of their less-­advantaged peers.67 The large gains made by wealthy endowments also reflected the ability of a few institutions to attract—­ a nd handsomely compensate— ­elite fund man­ag­ers.68 Additionally, top endowments grew rap­ idly ­because wealthy institutions attracted large gifts.69 Wealthy institutions typ­ ically invested ­these donations while less elite colleges and universities spent them in order to meet operating demands.70 Fi­nally, while the benefits of finan­ cial markets ­were captured by a few high visibility universities, the costs of bor­ rowing ­ were distributed widely.71 As higher education institutions became increasingly enmeshed with financial markets, only a few institutions benefited while virtually all incurred some costs. When all of the complex f­ actors listed above ­were added together, the result was surprisingly ­simple. Money followed money, and wealthy institutions tended to grow wealthier over time. Over the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s, top endowments swelled rapidly while smaller holdings grew much more slowly.72 Tuition-­reliant institutions by definition started with small endowments that tended to stay small, meaning they ­were unlikely to generate enough revenues through dona­ tions and endowments to cover rising costs and ease the burdens borne by students. A second potential source of nontuition revenues is funding for R&D. Dur­ ing the 1980s and 1990s, many institutions tried to “research up,” seeking addi­ tional revenues from industry and government in exchange for increasing their R&D activities. ­These efforts made sense at that time. At the same moment that direct state support for higher education declined, the federal government increased the amount of public money spent on academic R&D. During the course of the 1990s and early 2000s, Congress more than doubled the bud­get for the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the country’s largest science funding agency.73 ­These funds must have tantalized campus man­ag­ers. Further, changes to intellectual property laws allowed institutions to monetize publicly funded

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discoveries.74 In response, many universities intensified their efforts to secure external R&D funding and generate income from research commercialization. Man­ag­ers on t­ hese campuses invested in start-up funding and “seed money” for new hires, targeting “star scientists” to capture some federal money.75 Accord­ ingly, institutional contributions to R&D expenditures—­meaning dollars from other sources that had been repurposed to support research—­soared, rising faster than any other category of research support during t­ hese years.76 The effects of strategies designed to win research funds w ­ ere widespread and evident in m ­ atters both prosaic and profound. Colleges became universi­ ties,77 and faculty members increasingly found their ­career prospects linked to their research achievements—or, in some cases, to their ability to generate exter­ ­ very institution, it seemed, the watchword nal revenue through research.78 At e was more (funded) research in an effort to stave off financial ruin while fulfill­ ing part of higher education’s traditional mission. Research revenue strategies ­were successful to a limited extent. The num­ ber of institutions receiving at least one federal research grant r­ ose dramatically during the 1980s.79 On balance, however, R&D support remained concentrated at a small handful of institutions. Partly this reflected the tournament nature of competition for research support. Grants are sought by all, but only a few—­often the same individuals over and over again—­are awarded support.80 Star scientists who reliably received grants w ­ ere increasingly concentrated in a small handful of institutions during t­ hese same years.81 ­Because star scientists often brought research support with them, the concentration of ­these individuals in a few (mostly private) institutions channeled R&D funding to a handful of campuses. Even when institutions secured research support and attempted to monetize it as intellectual property, t­ hese efforts ­were often compromised by institutions’ low tolerance for protracted and costly litigation to defend property rights.82 Research support could lift a few institutions such as Boston University out of tuition reliance. For the vast majority of campuses, however, the financial returns to R&D ­were uncertain at best and non­ex­is­tent at worst. As a result, most institutions found that R&D support was not a realistic alternative to tuition. Even during the period of expanded grant-­getting in the 1980s, almost 97 ­percent of research support flowed to only 200 institutions.83 Perhaps securing entry into this group of 200 campuses—­so-­called tier one universities—­might ease tuition reliance. Yet even this faint hope was rarely real­ ized ­because funds have been distributed asymmetrically within this small group. A few institutions secured more than $1 billion in total research support each year, but many—­including most public flagship institutions—­captured much smaller bases of support.84 Indeed, it proved so difficult to “research up” that R&D revenues seemed scarce b ­ ecause the institutions’ appetites for research funding seemed to grow more rapidly than the dollars themselves. Securing R&D funds was an impor­tant indicator of a campus’s status during the 2000s. Few public



T he R oot s of U nequal H igher  E ducation

33

institutions could accomplish this; the majority of institutions moved down the hierarchy as state support waned and R&D revenues failed to fill the gap.85 In summary, donations, endowments, and research revenues had limited potential to replace retreating state support. Decision-­makers on most campuses found their bud­gets consistently stressed. By the 2000s, growing tuition reliance was the only option for many institutions. Tuition reliance was not the result of neoclassical economic pro­cesses but reflected a complex interplay of policy con­ ditions, social relationships, and financial realities. Given the limits of earning revenue through philanthropy or by winning research grants, tuition reliance implies that institutions would engage in both social and economic competition for students. Competition increased sharply, becoming in some ways the hallmark of U.S. higher education in the twenty-­first ­century.86 However, competition for tuition-­paying students was a game that was stacked heavi­ly against most institutions. Growing tuition reliance made a cam­ pus less attractive to prospective students precisely as t­ hose students’ payments became more central to orga­nizational survival. Institutional leaders had l­ittle choice but to compete in a contest they ­were unlikely to win.

Status-­Seeking and Unequal Higher Education since 1980 Colleges and universities are fundamentally social entities. Although they require revenues to operate, money is not their primary reason to exist. The institutions considered in this book are nonprofit organ­i zations, meaning that they seek to fulfill missions.87 B ­ ecause their missions can never be completed, assessing orga­nizational per­for­mance is difficult. Colleges and universities there­ fore tend to vie for prestige rather than maximization of output or outcome mea­sures.88 Status-­seeking carries secondary benefits for institutions. Students respond to markers of status, such as rankings, further motivating tuition-­thirsty institutions to bolster their social standing.89 Higher education is an enterprise of status seeking at least as much as it is a business of revenue maximization. Colleges and universities adopt a variety of cultural practices to demonstrate their status. ­These practices vary based on context. For example, universities tend to demonstrate their global status through research while using undergrad­ uate student demand to indicate prestige locally and nationally.90 ­Because we are most concerned with student opportunity in the United States, we focus on student demand (i.e., institutional admission practices) and outline the ways that ­these practices have changed over time. Admission selectivity is a broadly use­ ful indicator of status ­because just about ­every institution provides instruction of some kind.91 Admission selectivity is also a straightforward indicator to inter­ pret: the more applicants who are denied admission to an institution, the higher that campus’s status.92 Most of the time, selective institutions are high-­ status institutions.

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Given the relationship between selectivity and status, campus officials work to make their institutions more selective. Many colleges and universities opened ­ hese enrollment management operations during the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s. T all-­in-­one operations gathered together admissions, student financial aid, and activities such as advising in an effort to stabilize revenues by making enroll­ ments more predictable. Ideally, an enrollment management operation also would increase the number of applicants, thereby making the institution more selective in the students to whom it offered admission.93 Enrollment manage­ ment begins with intensive recruitment efforts, including the development of expensive communications tools such as viewbooks and websites for prospec­ tive students.94 Savvy pricing and the strategic use of student aid are also wide­ spread practices.95 The targeted recruitment of students who pay higher tuition rates—­including international students and, for public institutions, residents of other states—­has also become widespread.96 In addition to the expansion of enrollment management operations, insti­ tutional decision-­makers increasingly invest in activities and facilities that are not directly related to the educational mission. It is pos­si­ble to exaggerate the extent to which colleges and universities are engaged in an “amenities arms race.”97 Even so, expenditures on residence halls, gyms, and other amenities are ­ ecause student on the rise.98 Colleges and universities invest in ­these facilities b enrollment decisions tend to reflect amenities rather than academics.99 Campus investment decisions are further driven by attempts to improve position in col­ lege rankings, from which prospective students may glean information about potential enrollment destinations.100

Growing Participation Pursuing ever greater admission selectivity is a power­f ul means by which to attain and maintain status.101 As a result, just about all colleges and universities want to be more selective. ­These wishes can be hard to translate into real­ity. Several conditions must be met for institutions to become more selective. Top among ­these conditions is growing participation. Becoming more selective is about rejecting more students. To be more selective, higher education institu­ tions need more students among whom to choose. Growing participation—­ meaning the increase in total enrollments over time—is a central f­ actor in the rising selectivity of high-­status institutions.102 Selective admissions did not become pos­si­ble ­until the early twentieth ­century when broad access to secondary education allowed a few institutions—­ mostly high-­status colleges in the northeast—to begin denying admission to some applicants.103 Over time, competition for admission to the most prestigious schools became fierce. The emergence of accomplished students who ­were will­ ing to move across the country for the right fit prompted swelling applicant pools and increased admission selectivity at the most prestigious institutions.104

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4,000,000

Total enrollment 6,000,000

8,000,000



2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 Year Public institutions Private institutions FIGUR E 1.3  ​Total enrollments at public and private not-­for-­profit higher education

institutions in the United States, 2003–2014.

Rising participation in U.S. higher education has long been documented, with enrollments growing steadily throughout the twentieth ­century.105 Accord­ ing to figures compiled by the National Center for Education Statistics, in 1980 about six million students ­were enrolled in public or private nonprofit four-­year institutions.106 Around 70 ­percent of ­these students ­were in the public sector. By 2014, enrollments at public four-­year campuses had grown by 66 ­percent from 1980 levels. Private nonprofit enrollments grew more slowly but r­ ose steadily. By 2014, private four-­year enrollments w ­ ere about 50 ­percent greater than they had been in 1980. Participation expanded markedly even during the limited period covered in the empirical part of this book. As shown in figure 1.3, enrollments at public colleges and universities grew over the period (2003–2014) from approximately 6.65 million students to approximately 8.25 million students. This amounts to an increase of over 24 ­percent, or about one-­quarter over the period. The pri­ vate sector grew at a somewhat slower rate—­approximately 20 ­percent between 2003 and 2014—­but added nearly 670,000 students, rising from approximately 3.30 to 3.97 million total enrollments. Together, public and private institutions increased enrollments by an average of about 207,000 students each year. Something like the population of Boise, Idaho, was added to the system each year.

36

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Growing participation did not merely reflect growth in the total number of college-­age individuals. According to U.S. Census data, the eighteen-­to twenty-­ four age cohort grew by 13 ­percent between 2000 and 2010, suggesting that the system of unequal higher education expanded access at a rate that exceeded growth in the population of its prime consumer base.107 Rising rates of participa­ tion among traditional college-­age students, coupled with growth in the number of nontraditional-­age students seeking higher education, meant that participa­ tion grew more rapidly than census data would suggest. By any mea­sure, enroll­ ment growth indicated an impressive expansion of access to the system. Enrollment expansion occurred despite rising tuition prices. In the public sector—­where prices soared as appropriations waned—­enrollments grew par­ ticularly rapidly.108 In part, this may reflect the growing “wage premium” for higher education.109 As the earning potential of ­those without a college degree stagnated or fell, the returns on a college education appreciated steadily over the 1990s and 2000s.110 Still, economic advantage is not the only force driving participation. Participation has increased in­de­pen­dently of economic growth.111 The sociologist Martin Trow long ago identified a shift in the way p ­ eople thought about g ­ oing to college.112 When only a few attended, g ­ oing to college was seen a privilege. When more attended, higher education became an expectation for middle-­class families with corresponding credential demands by employers. When wide swaths of high school students go on to college, which is the situa­ tion now, participation becomes almost required. In a high participation system of higher education, p ­ eople are obliged to go to college in order to get a decent job and to show they are members of society in good standing.113 ­Under ­these circumstances, many students feel like they have no choice but to enroll, even if the price of tuition is beyond their means.114 Growing participation raises some concerns, but it is also something to celebrate. The dramatic rise in participation was fueled by the growing enroll­ ment of historically underserved students. The number of low-­income stu­ dents receiving the federal Pell Grant grew steadily over time, peaking during the ­Great Recession.115 Racial diversity also increased, albeit too slowly to close long-­standing gaps in opportunity. Enrollments of black and Latinx students increased rapidly during the late 1990s and 2000s, although again at rates that fell well short of representativeness.116 The result was that higher education became more racially diverse as it expanded, even as it remained less diverse than it should have been. Unfortunately, increased participation was also associated with increased in­equality among higher education institutions. More students entering the sys­ tem allowed already successful institutions to become even more selective ­because ­there ­were more applicants for high-­status campuses to reject.117 As in other domains of social life, campus man­ag­ers pursued ever-­finer gradations of distinction to separate themselves from their peers.118 Being selective was



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insufficient; becoming very highly selective distinguished the “crème de la status campuses became even crème” from the “merely” successful.119 High-­ higher status by denying admission to more applicants. Starting in the 1980s, competition for admission to highly selective institutions intensified dramati­ cally.120 It is harder to get into Prince­ton, Stanford, and other highly selective campuses ­today than it was in 1980. In a troubling sign of the toll imposed by the system of unequal higher edu­ cation, underserved students w ­ ere not distributed widely across institutions. Elite campuses tended to enroll students from the upper reaches of society and to route ­those students ­toward high-­earning, high-­status jobs.121 High-­status institutions did not become notably more diverse despite dramatic gains in racial and socioeconomic diversity for higher education as a ­whole.122 By extension, expanded participation brought both growing access and widening in­equality of opportunity for students.123 ­These trends ­were worsened by the fact that, just as participation among historically underserved students swelled, state govern­ ments began to reduce their support for public colleges and universities. The number of good-­value seats began to deteriorate at precisely the moment that underserved students began to enroll in large numbers.

Asymmetrical Demand Expanding systems of higher education can accommodate growing numbers of students. However, admission to any given institution is a scarce positional good, meaning that not all seats are equally valuable and equally available.124 Just about any student who completes high school in the United States may feel rea­ sonably confident of securing admission somewhere, but even the most accom­ plished student cannot expect admission to Harvard or Stanford. The more valuable a seat becomes—­the scarcer it is, the more students vie for it, the better social position it seems to offer—­the greater the institution’s status. In addition to growing participation, then, institutions must experience variable rates of demand in order for selectivity to distinguish one campus from another. If all colleges and universities increase selectivity at the same rate, none become more prestigious. Admission selectivity can only serve as an effective marker of sta­ tus if a few institutions become more selective while the majority do not. This exact state of affairs occurred in U.S. higher education in the 1990s as competition for admission to high-­status institutions intensified to unpre­ce­ dented levels.125 Elite institutions—­especially top privates—­spent far more on their students than did their competitors, including public flagship campuses.126 The educational opportunities available on the most selective campuses are simply unobtainable elsewhere. As they became aware that admission to the most prized campuses has become more difficult to secure, affluent families mobi­ lized considerable resources to prepare their students for the college application pro­ cess. This granted the well-­ to-do a substantial advantage in securing

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admission to selective campuses.127 By the 2000s, competition to be selected had intensified to the point that it became almost a full-­time vocation for students and parents.128 Admission to a selective institution has long been tinged with racist, anti-­ Semitic, sexist, and classist practices.129 Although the mechanisms for se­lection may have changed, Elite institutions appear to have converged around a series of admissions practices that continue to advantage high-­income white students who can afford to cultivate the admission profiles that the schools require.130 As a result, Elite institutions in the 2000s remained notably less racially and socioeco­nom­ically diverse than was higher education as a w ­ hole.131 Pointedly, the vast majority of students and institutions did not participate in this rarefied air. For most students, the admission pro­cess was an effort to secure a seat somewhere. For most institutions, the admission pro­cess was an effort to fill seats and generate tuition dollars in order to keep the lights on. As with tuition reliance and other financial changes, heightened competition for status saw the majority of higher education institutions falling even farther ­behind a small handful of high-­status campuses. This entailed profound conse­ quences for student opportunity. The vast majority of students in the 2000s found that rising tuition prices and heightened competition for admission meant that the most desirable campuses w ­ ere off limits to them. As a result, most stu­ dents w ­ ere left to choose among tuition-­reliant, lower-­status institutions.

Policy Responses to the Emergence of Unequal Higher Education The system of unequal higher education is the result of a complex history, but the basic ele­ments that created the system follow a few general patterns. Over time, it cost more for institutions to provide a college education, constantly put­ ting pressure on their bud­gets. Except for a few institutions with access to big endowments, research revenues, or both, funds ­were insufficient to cover t­ hese cost increases. Tuition ­rose, climbing both in real terms and as a share of insti­ tutional revenues. The result—­tuition dependence—­was an orga­nizational dis­ tress signal that indicated troubled finances, stagnant demand, and mission displacement. Cultural practices such as efforts to recruit students often shifted in concert with deteriorating financial fortunes. As more institutions became tuition dependent, institutions expanded their operations in ways that might increase tuition revenues but also drove up costs. Institutional strategies there­ fore tended to net few permanent gains. Wealth, status, and student opportu­ nity moved together. This resource-­reputation complex meant that students had many options for ­going to college but few opportunities to attend a school with sound finances and a good reputation.



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We are not the first to observe that the concentration of wealth and status at a few campuses may have restricted student opportunity. Many scholars and policymakers came to similar conclusion as early as the 1980s. ­These research­ ers sought to blunt the worst effects of the emerging system of unequal higher education through a series of carefully crafted policy responses. Perhaps the most common policy response was the more precise targeting of public support for higher education. Often, policymakers attempted to simu­ late ­free market conditions, harnessing competition to make resource alloca­ tion more efficient. ­These policies ­were fundamentally technocratic, meaning that they relied on better administration rather than renewed investment in higher education. Targeting made intuitive sense: as dollars became scarcer, they should be allocated in the areas where they would do the most good. In a classic article on higher education finance, James Hearn and David Longanecker outlined one way in which state dollars could be targeted more precisely.132 In contrast to the “traditional model” that subsidized all students by investing in institu­ tions, Hearn and Longanecker described an “emerging model” in which state funds ­were allocated via portable need-­based student financial aid. In this account, appropriations ­were inefficient ­because they benefited all students, including the well-­to-do who could pay high tuition for their college education. By reducing appropriations, increasing tuition prices, and providing more gener­ ous need-­based student financial assistance to qualified students, states could spend less while achieving more. This desirable state of affairs would be brought about by precise targeting of dollars to the students who needed them most. Crucially, Hearn and Longanecker outlined several assumptions that must be met for the “high tuition, high aid” model to function as expected.133 In other words, although they offered a technical solution to a policy prob­lem, they cast that solution as contingent upon social context. When the context changed—as it inevitably did—so should the policy response. This injunction was prudent. Unfortunately, policymakers proved far more e ­ ager for technical adjustments than for the kind of assumption testing for which Hearn and Longanecker also called. One key assumption was that aid had to keep up with tuition prices. This warning went unheeded. Barely a de­cade ­after Hearn and Longanecker’s work, Carolyn Griswold and Ginger Marine found that policymakers routinely v ­ iolated the “high tuition, high aid” formula by failing to link student financial aid amounts to tuition prices.134 This pattern proved remarkably per­sis­tent. Two de­cades l­ater, Sara Goldrick-­Rab showed that the financial aid system, built on “high-­tuition, high aid” thinking, was fundamentally outdated b ­ ecause it was not designed to accommodate the combination of high participation and low levels of state investment.135 Yet, as described above, t­hese ­were among the defining characteristics of U.S. higher education in the early twenty-­ first

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­century. According to Goldrick-­Rab, portable aid and other policies designed to target resources to ­those most in need did ­little to make college affordable for students or to provide adequate resources for public colleges and universi­ ties. When targeting did not keep pace with changing times and rising tuition prices—­violating the assumptions that undergird a well-­targeted system—­both student opportunity and institutional in­equality w ­ ere affected.136 Despite this track rec­ord of underwhelming results, policymakers contin­ ued their efforts to target funds more precisely throughout the 1990s, 2000s, and 2010s.137 The results have been uneven at best, at least in part ­because the land­ scape of higher education has changed and policies have not been adjusted to reflect this new real­ity. Hearn and Longanecker would not be surprised.138 The vast majority of institutions—­ including many public campuses—­ face more urgent financial pressures than they did de­cades ago. With uncertain finances, campus leaders often adopt cultural practices and administrative strategies aimed at improving status, with the hope of converting social status into better finances. But the real­ity for most is that financial pressures often are joined with low institutional status, leading to a self-­reinforcing state of affairs. Status-­ seeking raises expenditures without guaranteeing additional revenues, thereby eroding institutional position even further. The more precise targeting of lim­ ited funds made sense when public institutions w ­ ere relatively well funded and tuition prices ­were relatively low. However, technical fixes have proven unable to interrupt the dynamics of the system of unequal higher education that grew up ­after 1980. To be sure, technocratic policies and improved administrative practices reflect good intentions. We are in ­favor of improving practices to the greatest extent pos­si­ble. At the same time, the effects of such techniques are likely to be limited u ­ nder current conditions. Addressing growing institutional in­equality and its consequences for student opportunity requires a broad infusion of resources into higher education. Substantial reinvestment is necessary ­because the system of unequal higher education is largely self-­perpetuating. Absent rad­ ical interventions, we argue, institutions are likely to continue to grow farther apart in wealth and status, creating even greater disparities in student oppor­ tunity. In the next chapter, we outline our reasons for conceptualizing the system of unequal higher education in this way.

2 A Field Account of Unequal Higher Education

Higher education in the United States consists of over 3,000 four-­year colleges and universities.1 ­These organ­izations are nominally in­de­pen­dent of one another; each has its own president, its own faculty, and its own admission pro­cess for selecting students. Each one seems distinct—­and, in some re­spects, each one is. In most ways, however, colleges and universities are intimately connected to one another. Some links are competitive. Institutions compete vigorously for resources.2 Prospective students, faculty members, and funds are sought aggres­ sively. Other relationships are professional and educational. Scholars from dif­ fer­ent campuses interact with one another at conferences and in the peer review pro­cess. Gradu­ates of one campus often go on to become gradu­ate students at another. The purpose of this chapter is to conceptualize ­these interrelationships and theorize how they sustain the system of unequal higher education. ­B ecause many of the interrelations between colleges and universities are competitive, higher education is often understood as a market.3 Market-­like competition is a central feature of higher education in the United States.4 How­ ever, higher education is not a laissez-­faire market as ­imagined by neoclassical economists.5 Instead, higher education is a competitive social arena constructed by policy and social norms.6 Po­liti­cal scientist Suzanne Mettler describes the arrangement in which policy supports and sustains a competitive system as the “submerged state.”7 In this account, government is central in establishing the rules of resource allocation and other guidelines but does not obviously appear to be the actor making decisions. Submerged state policies that create competition are likely to channel resources t­oward the already advantaged ­because t­ hese individuals and organ­i zations possess the social skills and finan­ cial resources needed to win most competitions. The power­f ul also are more likely to have influence when setting the rules of the game. As a result, policies

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often exacerbate the tendency of inherited advantages—­such as college and university endowments—to compound themselves over time.8 We argue that understanding higher education only as an economic mar­ ket w ­ ill lead to problematic conclusions. The market for higher education is a competitive space created and sustained by government action. As outlined in chapter 1, colleges and universities are not profit-­maximizers who adapt to fill market niches. Campus man­ag­ers tend to try to maximize a college or univer­ sity’s social status as well as its revenue streams. Defining higher education as a market also risks a more fundamental prob­lem. Higher education is not strictly about pursuing advantage. Colleges and universities have a profoundly social dimension. Students and parents typically welcome news of college admission even if the result of attendance is uncertain and the f­ amily does not know how the bill w ­ ill be paid. Learning can make us happier individuals and better com­ munity members. Higher education is not merely a market in which competi­ tions unfold. It is one of the central institutions that sustains a society,9 which is part of why it has expanded rapidly alongside other institutions that are char­ acteristic of modern democracies.10 Rather than a market, we conceptualize higher education as a social field. We use the term field to denote both the institutions that conduct this enter­ prise and the set of rules that identify which organ­izations are engaged in higher education and which are not.11 Market-­like competition is a prominent charac­ teristic of this field but is not the field’s only dimension.12 Indeed, status in the field does not result from “winning” in market-­like terms such as by satisfying consumers or achieving efficiencies. Rather, status reflects an institution’s abil­ ity to comply with the rules of the field, by which we mean the taken-­for-­granted standards, norms, habits, and resource allocation mechanisms that determine which institutions attain prestigious positions. To map standing in an unequal field, then, it is necessary to identify the rules that are used to determine who “wins” and who “loses.” Higher education fields are or­ga­n ized by individual and collective actors whose be­hav­ior is coordinated by social mechanisms.13 Fields do not merely hap­ pen, and individual students, faculty members, and administrators do not sim­ ply act. T ­ here are broad taken-­for-­granted scripts that communicate and embody field conditions for individuals, who in turn enact and reproduce ­these rules.14 The field of higher education and the individuals who participate in it are inex­ tricably linked by t­ hese scripts. A field-­level perspective allows us to understand both the rules that con­ strain be­hav­ior and the strategies by which individuals and institutions seek to navigate ­those constraints. We can understand both systemic in­equality and efforts to resist or circumvent it. For t­ hese reasons, we explic­itly conceptualize higher education as a field and draw attention to the mechanisms that shape and sustain the system of unequal higher education.



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Higher Education as a Field A field is a bounded social space defined by shared opportunities, constraints, and taken-­for-­granted rules.15 Fields are about relationships. Focusing on the field means emphasizing the interaction of environmental conditions, orga­ nizational be­hav­iors, and individuals’ actions. ­Because of shared environmental conditions, actors within the field—­both individuals and institutions—­usually behave in predictable ways. We are not determinists who think the environment forces campus officials to do what they do. The ability to choose is real, and actors can (and do) behave strategically. But choices are not unlimited and usually reflect se­lection from a menu rather than ­f ree play on a blank screen. T ­ here are material constraints to available choices ­because resources in the field are limited. T ­ here is also a cultural basis for bounded choice; the taken-­for-­granted rules of the field mean that some be­hav­ior is deemed unacceptable. Consider an imperfect but helpful analogy in which we compare a college to a restaurant. Patrons can choose to eat what­ever they want so long as it is on the menu. A diner cannot order a dish u ­ nless the restaurant possesses the ingredients—­the material resources—to make it. Social conventions also m ­ atter. A guest who chooses to sling food across the room ­w ill prob­ably be asked to leave. No one has to tell most diners this. The rule “do not throw ­things” is taken-­ for-­granted and tacitly enforced. It is no coincidence that Pierre Bourdieu wrote extensively about food as a lens into position in a social field.16 Material bound­ aries and cultural norms shape the offerings made available by colleges and the be­hav­ior of students, administrators, and faculty, much as they do in dining. Of course, restaurants compete for critical esteem and customers. Innova­ tion is pos­si­ble and is often rewarded. Avant-­garde chefs can challenge the con­ ventions of cuisine. However, even the most ambitious restaurants stick with more of the industry conventions than they break. Food and drink are served to paying customers who are usually seated at ­tables. In this way, even the innova­ tive approaches of creative individuals reflect environmental conditions ­because new strategies are intended to improve position within the field rather than to overthrow the field itself. Molecular gastronomy is still gastronomy. Innovation bears the imprint of the field in which the innovator hopes to succeed. We have good reasons to think that higher education forms a field. Virtu­ ally all colleges and universities engage in teaching, and virtually all students enroll to learn. The g ­ reat majority of actors have a common understanding about goals, which is a shared opportunity to work together to pursue educational mis­ sions. All of the institutions that we consider in this analy­sis are nonprofit organ­izations, meaning that they reinvest surplus resources in their missions rather than disbursing it to ­owners as profit. Nonprofit status is a shared con­ straint, a rule of the field.17

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Fields are not easily mea­sured or mapped ­because they are social, rather than physical, spaces. It takes some work to identify who is in the field, what con­ stitutes its rules, and so on. What is more, rules and membership change. While social fields have staying power, they also tend to evolve. In ­these ways, social fields differ from other durable h ­ uman creations. A field is not like a bridge or skyscraper, both of which exist with only periodic maintenance a ­ fter they are built. Rather, fields are created and maintained through daily h ­ uman interac­ tions.18 To fully understand a field, then, it is also necessary to understand the mechanisms that link individual action to broad environmental conditions ­because it is t­ hese links that sustain the field. By focusing on ­these interactions, the field can be identified and mapped. In turn, mapping the field’s contours can help us to understand what it is that individuals, organ­izations, and policies do to implement and create larger social ­orders. A field-­level approach can highlight both how broad patterns are created by daily life and how ­those patterns, in turn, shape the next day’s life. This ana­ lytic range helps to explain why a growing number of scholars frame their anal­ yses of higher education at the field level in an effort to gain new insights into per­sis­tent prob­lems.19 Of course, thinking of higher education as a single field risks being overly general. T ­ here are many subfields within higher education, and the actors within each subfield often behave in dif­fer­ent ways.20 For example, each state system of public higher education constitutes a field with its status hierarchy, resource base, and set of rules. No ­matter where a state flagship university stands in the field more broadly, it sits atop its public in-­state hierarchy. ­There are also sub­ fields that may be identified by distinctive institutional missions. Residential lib­ eral arts colleges,21 religious institutions,22 and groups of other organ­izations sometimes behave in ways that differ notably from the norms of higher educa­ tion more generally. Despite t­ hese impor­tant variations, we want to understand the field broadly. Our approach highlights some ­things (e.g., general trends over time) while mak­ ing o ­ thers less clear (e.g., distinctive subfields). We think this is a trade worth making. We focus on the one field perspective in this analy­sis b ­ ecause we are interested in the relationship between student opportunity and the mixture of available colleges and universities. Understanding that dynamic means study­ ing the general conditions shared by the vast majority of subfields.

Dynamics of Higher Education as a Field Dif­fer­ent schools of thought understand social fields in slightly dif­fer­ent ways. For neo-­institutionalists, fields tend to be stable and stabilizing b ­ ecause taken-­ for-­granted norms, habits, and practices shape be­hav­ior when ­there is no clear metric to determine optimal conduct. Although some neo-­institutionalists have



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emphasized the material components of social institutions,23 culture is the dom­ inant explanatory ­factor in the neo-­institutional tradition,24 and orga­nizational convergence is its primary consequence. In higher education, this means that cultural pressures to conform with field rules prompt colleges and universities to become more like one another.25 Other analysts blend cultural and material dimensions in conceptualizing fields. Pierre Bourdieu, for example, casts fields as hierarchical spaces whose rules codify and further the advantages enjoyed by the already successful.26 For Bourdieu, fields are both cultural and material. The material dimension tends to be dominant in Bourdieu’s account, and cultural practices primarily serve to legitimate material in­equality.27 The result is a series of steep hierarchies, both within and between fields, with the power­f ul jealously guarding their positions against challengers.28 In higher education, this means that apparently anodyne cultural practices—­such as the ways in which students choose colleges,29 faculty members go about their work,30 and institutions behave31—­reflect deep-­seated power relations. Our own view of fields draws upon the way the neo-­institutional and Bour­ dieusian approaches have been synthesized by the sociologists Neil Fligstein and Douglas McAdam.32 Fligstein and McAdam combine t­ hese two traditions with Anthony Giddens’s notion of “structuration” and social movement theory.33 Structuration theorists assume that individuals and social structures are mutu­ ally dependent, and social movement theorists indicate that p ­ eople can act col­ lectively through organ­ i zations to change the social world. Fligstein and McAdam’s assembly of theories allows them to foreground the role of cultural and material field conditions while allowing for greater possibility of strategic action and re­sis­tance than have other field-­based accounts. Fields shape what ­people do, but fields are also ­shaped by ­people. Field-­based analyses are power­f ul, but they are also general.34 As such, it is impor­tant to specify the dynamics of higher education as a field. ­These dynamics are the background conditions that undergird growing institutional in­equality.

Colleges and Universities Are Anchored by Cultural Practices Across their many differences, colleges and universities share several cultural practices that shape which institutions are considered the most prestigious. Per­ haps no cultural practice is as widely shared as seeking status through admis­ sion selectivity.35 ­There is no material reason that admission selectivity should signal status more clearly than, for example, high prices. However, selectivity is the stronger status signal. Tuition prices are similar across institutions (relative to other revenues) whereas selectivity varies widely.36 Why is denying a student admission a more reliable indicator of status than coercing a student to pay a high price? T ­ here is no obvious answer to this question. It is just the way t­ hings

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are, a taken-­for-­granted indicator of position. Position in the field is deeply cultural.

Colleges and Universities Compete with Each Other on Terms That Are Unequal Campus leaders almost always want to improve their standing and get to “the next level.”37 Institutions with the most status and resources in the field are “incum­ bents” whereas t­ hose with lesser standing but a desire to improve are “chal­ lengers.”38 ­Because culture is the foundation of status, the leaders of low-­resource colleges do not want to change how resources are allocated. Rather, they want their institutions to “win” so that they become high-­resource colleges. “Striv­ ing” reflects efforts to win the game through strategic action, not to change the rules. Indeed, calls to change the game itself largely fall on deaf ears.39

Change Is Pos­si­ble through Strategic Action . . . ​but ­There Are Limits ­B ecause higher education is a social space, t­ here is room for change in most aspects of the field. Strategic action—­the collective mobilization of ­people and resources—­can reshape the field. Even admission practices can be shifted. Higher education researcher Cassie Barnhardt and her colleagues show how activists within some institutions ­were able to change the way admissions offices con­ sidered racial diversity as a decision-­making criterion.40 Fortunes and reputa­ tions are sometimes enhanced through collective action, such as the few public universities that captured substantial amounts of federal research support dur­ ing the 2000s.41 More often, strategic action nets few or diminishing returns.42 For example, the strategic make­over of a campus may enhance a few individuals’ c ­ areers— launching f­ uture leaders to other campuses—­but leaves the field itself unchanged.43 The rich and power­ful usually win. Partly this is ­because successful organ­ izations possess the resources necessary to redeploy and prevail in the next competition. Repeated successes for the already-­successful also occur b ­ ecause field conditions themselves tend to f­avor incumbent organ­izations. “Gover­ nance units,” such as regulatory agencies that enforce laws and professional associations that set best practices, enforce the field’s rules.44 Rule enforce­ ment typically benefits power­f ul incumbents even when conducted impartially ­because the rules themselves tend to ­favor incumbents. Fairness is enough to perpetuate in­equality and often is enough to negate the effects of strategic action.

Fields Involve Contest and Strategy The give-­and-­take between existing rules and hierarchies, on the one hand, and strategic action, on the other, gives the higher education field its par­tic­u­lar



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dynamics. ­Things are both stable and constantly changing. This means that shifts in the field can occur in ways that do not promote sameness and conver­ gence. The fortunes of some rise, while ­others’ fall. At the same time, ­because the rules themselves are rarely challenged, fields tend to stabilize quickly a ­ fter shifts. “Resettlements” typically resemble previous states of affairs, with old incumbents still atop familiar hierarchies.45 Consider the case of Georgia State University. U ­ nder the ambitious leader­ ship of president Mark P. Becker, Georgia State gained widespread notoriety for student-­success and enrollment-­growth innovations beginning around 2015. The Washington Post described Georgia State as a “perpetual laboratory for new ideas on using ‘big data’ to improve higher education.”46 Georgia State made impor­ tant improvements, such as substantially narrowing the graduation gap between white and black students. By 2016 Georgia State’s overall graduation rate was better than in years past, yet Georgia State still did not rank among the top 200 national universities according to U.S. News and World Report in 2017.47 Becker earned esteem through innovation and was able to enhance student success, but the status of the university changed ­little. Why would a university that performed better by one of the few objective criteria available not see its position improve? To return to our first description of the field, this is b ­ ecause status in higher education begins with cultural prac­ tice. Resources also ­matter greatly, as they are tightly encumbered with cultural practices; it is easier to engage in status seeking when resources are abundant. Technical criteria such as efficiency or effectiveness do not seem to ­matter as much as ­these social and financial markers. It is crucial to understand the taken-­for-­granted rules of the field that deter­ mine which institutions attain prestigious positions. For this reason, we explic­itly draw attention to the mechanisms that shape and sustain the field. T ­ hese mech­ anisms make the field of unequal higher education a self-­perpetuating system. Based on our review of the history of unequal higher education in chapter 1, we identified two mechanisms: (1) the material dimension of the finance of higher education, and (2) the cultural dimension of social se­lection and distinction seeking. Understanding more precisely how each of ­these mechanisms oper­ ates ­w ill highlight the ways in which an institution improves or loses position in the field.

The Financial Mechanism and Unequal Higher Education The economist Gordon Winston wrote that higher education features “awkward economics” b ­ ecause higher education finance differs from standard economic theory.48 Understanding ­these awkward economics requires attention to the taken-­for-­granted rules of the field and the existing hierarchy of institutions.

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Rising costs, variable revenues, and heightened competition are three key characteristics of the field that make the economics of higher education awk­ ward. In turn, ­these same peculiar rules drive in­equality among institutions.

Rising Costs When students and parents speak of rising costs, they often mean increases in their tuition bills. We use the term differently. Costs include all of the resources—­ money, facilities, time, ­labor, and so on—­that an institution consumes to operate. Cost differs greatly from the price that students actually pay. Almost all students receive a subsidy from their institution, which uses resources from other pro­ viders to underwrite educational activities. As a result, cost and price are linked, but the nature of that connection varies widely from one campus to another. ­Under some circumstances, cost and price move in lockstep; an institu­ tion that consumes more resources to operate may also charge its students higher prices. In other cases, growing subsidy dollars can meet rising costs so that tuition price grows more slowly than cost. Most commonly in recent history, sub­ sidies may stagnate or shrink, meaning that rising costs yield soaring prices.49 Costs have risen steadily since the 1970s.50 While ­there are many reasons for growing costs, it is likely that two f­actors are prime culprits. First, institu­ tions are d ­ oing more than they used to do. B ­ ecause they compete for status and not efficiency, colleges and universities engage in more and more activities. This means that campuses have expanded their scope. For example, at around the same time that Georgia State began pursuing enhanced student success initia­ tives, the campus added an NCAA Division I football program. Adding one new academic program might not have been particularly disruptive, but adding an entirely new operation—­one that involved recruitment, facilities, compliance, and so on—­was sure to drive costs upward. A second reason that costs have risen is that colleges and universities tend to spend on quality improvements—or, at least, activities that are likely to be seen as indicating higher quality—­rather than increasing quantitative outputs. In terms used by the economists Archibald and Feldman, higher education is a “low productivity growth” industry.51 This in part reflects the rules of the field: mass-­producing large numbers of gradu­ates at low cost is not a path to status. Rather than seeking efficiency, most institutions exercise at least modest discre­ tion over whom to admit.52 Almost all institutions seek to maximize revenues and spending in an effort to demonstrate status.53 As the costs of most goods fall, high-­skill ser­vices such as higher education become relatively more expensive.54 The result is that the total costs incurred by the typical institution in 2010 dwarfed ­those that a comparable campus faced in 1970. For the majority of cam­ puses, securing sufficient resources to remain solvent is the main operating concern. Only a few institutions can pursue status-­conferring activities and sur­ plus resources.



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Variable Revenues Rising costs pres­ent a dilemma ­under any circumstances. When growing obli­ gations meet variable or declining revenues, the mixture becomes especially troublesome for campus decision-­makers. Most institutions confront precisely t­ hese conditions. Most visibly, public colleges and universities faced declining direct state support during the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s.55 As ­these once reliable funds retreated, public institutions came to rely increasingly on tuition revenues.56 Tuition revenues are inherently volatile; if you do not enroll a student, you do not generate income. Volatility in core revenues led many campus man­ag­ers to consider revenue diversification.57 Colleges and universities could invest any holdings they might have to endow the institution’s mission, but only the wealthiest institutions hold substantial endowments.58 A strategy intended to stabilize financial position, therefore, netted handsome returns for the already wealthy but very ­little for lower-­status campuses with smaller endowments.59 Similarly, pursuing research funding is a common effort to diversify revenues. An institution with a diverse suite of resources can reinvest its wealth in the pursuit of new initiatives includ­ ing expanded research and development (R&D).60 The result is that research funding also typically flows to the usual suspects (see chapter 1), allowing them the latitude to develop new initiatives and proj­ects. By contrast, the vast majority of campuses depend disproportionally upon a single revenue stream—­tuition. Tuition dependence is a sign of distress. This field condition limits officials at most institutions from engaging in long-­term strategic thinking. Most orga­ nizational effort is instead devoted to survival.

Endless Competition The result of rising costs and uncertain revenues has been heightened competi­ tion among institutions for any and all available funds.61 Competitions for resources are typically winner-­take-­a ll events. ­E very student who enrolls at a prestigious institution does not attend a resource-­poor one. ­Every donation that flows to a college with a lavish endowment is withheld from other campuses. While the vast majority of institutions enter competitions for resources, very few prevail. Higher education competition produces few winners and many losers. The overall result is downward mobility within the field, as successful institu­ tions amass wealth and their competitors fall farther b ­ ehind.62 Given that heightened competitiveness erodes the positions of most insti­ tutions, why do so many colleges and universities compete at all? Steep cost increases and variations in core revenues mean that very few institutions can afford not to compete. The risk of failure is usually more appealing than the cer­ tainty of financial shortfalls. The cycle then repeats itself. Costs increase even

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faster as campuses reor­ga­nize to compete. Pursuing money costs money. Pro­ fessionalized enrollment management and advancement offices are expensive to operate and maintain.63 Competitions also impose high opportunity costs. Faculty members re­orient themselves away from teaching ­every time that they heighten their research emphases.64 Less focus on teaching—­which is closely tied to the generation of tuition revenue—­seems nonsensical at tuition-­dependent institutions. Yet it is precisely what happens b ­ ecause competition takes on a life of its own and becomes self-­perpetuating. Most institutions are no longer competing to get to a par­ tic­ u­ lar place; they are competing b ­ ecause it is taken-­for-­granted that they ­w ill do so. Competition is endless.

The Cultural Mechanism and Unequal Higher Education As a social enterprise, higher education is both material and cultural.65 While financial f­actors help to explain growing in­equality in the field, it is crucial to remember that higher education also shapes daily life in noneconomic ways. This happens through professional formation, the cultivation of individual and ­family aspirations, the allocation of social positions, and the generation of relevant knowledge.66 Ultimately, the basis of legitimacy in higher education is not finan­ cial but social. Colleges and universities attain status through the perception of academic excellence. T ­ here is no outer bound to excellence, meaning that institutions pri­ oritize status-­seeking as well as—­indeed, in some cases, rather than—­the “bot­ tom line.”67 Colleges and universities raise revenue to engage in ever more elaborate activities that might demonstrate excellence.68 The result is a field of activity driven by taken-­for-­granted standards of how best to demonstrate sta­ tus rather than by economic notions of efficiency or effectiveness.69 ­Because vir­ tually all institutions enroll students, undergraduate admission selectivity is perhaps the clearest indicator of an institution’s status. Two pro­cesses related to undergraduate selectivity drive unequal higher education: distinction though exclusion and distinction through refinement.

Distinction through Exclusion Admission selectivity—in essence, how many prospective students are turned away—is a primary mea­sure of institutional status. ­Little more than a ­century ago, very few colleges practiced anything like selective admissions. Even institu­ tions that are now widely regarded as elite destinations, such as Prince­ton and Swarthmore, strug­gled to identify individuals who w ­ ere prepared to undertake a college education.70 With the emergence of standardized testing and rapid transportation across the continent, however, students in the second half of the twentieth c ­ entury w ­ ere able to apply to more colleges, in more places.71 The g ­ reat majority of institutions remained unselective, but admission to a small subset



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of campuses became extraordinarily competitive.72 By the closing de­cades of the twentieth ­century, admission selectivity was well established as a marker of sta­ tus and was tightly linked to total resources.73 ­There is no rational reason why campus officials care about how selective an institution is so long as they can fill the campus with capable, motivated stu­ dents. Why turn away a student who is willing to pay and able to succeed? Busi­ nesses rarely turn away paying customers, yet officials throughout the system of unequal higher education work diligently to make their campuses as selective as pos­si­ble ­because selectivity confers status.74 Put simply, being selective m ­ atters, and campus decision-­makers seem to pursue ever-­greater selectivity regard­ less of its expected returns. One result is that it is now more difficult than ever to secure admission to selective institutions.75 Another result is hierarchy and in­equality among insti­ tutions without differentiation in the overall mission. ­Because almost all institu­ tions want to become more selective, few campuses ever try dif­fer­ent approaches. The rules of the field are power­f ul. Hierarchy is also power­f ul, and most cam­ puses never attain status through selectivity. The few that manage to become selective work tirelessly to become even more selective and so to achieve further distinction. As with the finances of higher education, exclusion becomes a self-­ perpetuating system that exacerbates in­equality among institutions.

Distinction through Refinement It is not enough merely to practice selective admissions. The students selected must have the “right stuff.” Elite colleges want alumni who are ­going to be “win­ ners,” who w ­ ill donate to their alma mater, and who w ­ ill reinforce institutional status through individual accomplishments. The White House and Supreme Court disproportionally have been populated by white men from Harvard and Yale. High-­status, high-­paying firms hire disproportionately from Elite universi­ ties.76 In The Chosen, sociologist Jerome Karabel shows that admission to the country’s most prestigious universities is a cultural se­lection pro­cess that results in a class composed overwhelmingly of students from elite families.77 Through refined se­lection, the sociologist Mitchell Stevens asserts, a class—­both a group of admitted students and a segment of a stratified society—is created.78 This pro­ cess of elite se­lection had intensified over the de­cades, even as formal barriers to admission among historically underserved and excluded students receded. Students from a wide variety of backgrounds demonstrate academic excellence and life-­enriching experiences, but only the families from the social and eco­ nomic elite are likely to have the sorts of credentials prized by the Ivy League. Wealthy and even upper-­middle-­class families know that good grades are a necessary but not sufficient condition to get into a good college. Competition at selective institutions is won by ­those who have cultivated a good application portfolio, including favored extracurricular activities.79 The sociologist Lois

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Weis demonstrated that families’ desire to get into a good college, coupled with the anxiety of potential downward social mobility, prompts extensive efforts to groom students for success in selective admission pro­cesses.80 ­E very detail of wealthy students’ high school experiences can be packaged for ­f uture admis­ sion to a prestigious college. Even students whose grades and test scores are not sufficient to be competitive at the most selective institutions compete intensely ­ hese pro­cesses of applicant for admission to moderately selective schools.81 T refinement push excellent students without the wherewithal to participate in intensive applicant grooming out of the most prestigious segments of the sys­ tem. Indeed, recent empirical research shows that low-­income individuals and black students have limited access to selective institutions despite formidable grades and test scores.82

Theory Use Using theory to guide empirical research is what researchers call “operational­ ization.” Researchers operationalize theory by tying concepts to data. This pro­ cess allows us to learn something new. That is our goal in the next chapter and the rest of the book. We learn something new by using our conceptualization of higher education as a field to map what we have identified as the system of unequal higher education. Although theory is abstract, it is also useful. Understanding the contours of social stratification tells us something impor­tant about the role of higher edu­ cation in society. A field perspective enables us to learn both about higher education itself and about the social, po­liti­cal, and economic systems of which it is a part.83 Such knowledge, in turn, can help us to understand the conse­ quences of an increasingly unequal field and to identify means of responding to growing in­equality.

3 Mapping Unequal Higher Education

The system of unequal higher education creates and sustains a hierarchy among colleges and universities. In the previous chapters, we reviewed the history of this system and identified two mechanisms that undergird it. We see unequal higher education as the result of the financing of U.S. higher education and the endless pursuit of status. Describing unequal higher education, and the mechanisms that shape the system, is a challenge for researchers ­because in­equality in higher education is difficult to mea­ sure. Consider the difference between mea­ sur­ ing income in­equality and in­equality in higher education. National income in­equality is described with a single statistic, the Gini coefficient. Countries with a higher Gini statistic are more unequal than countries with a lower Gini statistic. Pro­ viding a single in­equality statistic is not pos­si­ble in higher education b ­ ecause a number of dif­fer­ent variables contribute to an institution’s overall wealth and status. We do not have a single mea­sure for in­equality in higher education, but we do have rankings, which try to distill many variables into a single order. Rank­ ings like U.S. News and the Academic Rankings of World Universities simply arrange institutions in a vertical hierarchy by weighting and combining dif­fer­ent vari­ ables. This mea­sures unequal higher education but also oversimplifies it. Col­ leges and universities have diverse missions.1 Some institutions focus on intensive undergraduate teaching, some prioritize gradu­ ate education and research, and ­others are most excellent at providing access and engagement. Each of t­ hese missions is impor­tant. Nonhierarchical mission diversity is recognized by familiar classification schemes such as the one compiled by the Car­ne­gie Foundation for the Advance­ ment of Teaching. An advantage of the Car­ne­gie Classification is that it facili­ tates institutional grouping based on qualitative differences rather than a 53

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reductionist rank order. Despite this appeal, ­there are also crucial limitations to the Car­ne­gie system. Classifying institutions based on their missions makes comparison between categories difficult and masks real differences within cat­ egories. In other words, a Carnegie-­style classification ignores institutional strat­ ification. Williams College and Harvard University have dif­fer­ent missions and belong to dif­fer­ent Car­ne­gie groups, but both are well-­resourced and highly selective institutions that compete for many of the same students. Harvard and Williams, however, do not regularly compete for research funds. Harvard fac­ ulty members often compete against their peers at large public institutions for ­these grants. While Harvard and flagship public universities like the University of Washington in Seattle do not often directly compete for undergraduate enroll­ ments, as major research universities they do compete with one another for federal research funding. ­These observations lead us to infer that institutions are differentiated both horizontally by function (what they do), and vertically by available status and resources (what resources they have to do it). The horizontal dimension is anal­ ogous to the Car­ne­gie Classification of institutional types, and the vertical dimension echoes hierarchical rankings such as the U.S. News survey. Combin­ ing both t­ hese dimensions produces a more nuanced classification. In this chapter, we pres­ent our classification system. We propose that each college and university occupies a par­tic­u­lar position within the field of higher education at a given time. Each position is related to how an institution fits into the system horizontally as well as vertically. While no two institutions are alike, ­there are broad categories that describe groups of institutions whose positions are closer to one another than to other institutions in the field. ­Because t­ here is no mea­sur­able characteristic that indicates the place of a higher education institution in the field, the category to which an institution belongs is a latent characteristic. As the name implies, latent characteristics are pres­ent but not directly observable. However, using manifest variables we can identify latent constructs. To identify groups of institutions within the system of unequal higher education, we need observable mea­sures that correspond with the ideas already introduced in this volume. We must study indicators of finan­ cial health and institutional status along both horizontal and vertical axes to map institutions’ positions.

Developing the Categories That Describe Unequal Higher Education A good map of the system of unequal higher education should include a series of nonoverlapping categories that are distinct both vertically and horizontally. We find that just four institutional mea­sures are needed to produce a clear map of the system. Finance is one mechanism we identify as driving unequal higher



M a p p ing U nequal H igher E ducation

55

­TA BLE   3.1

Four Mea­sures Used to Map Unequal Higher Education

Finance mea­sures

Social / Orga­nizational mea­sures

Horizontal differences

Share of education expenses (E&R) from tuition. Mea­sure of how an institution operates.

Total enrollment (FTE). Mea­sure of the size and scope of an institution.

Vertical differences

Education expenses (E&R) per student (FTE). Mea­sure of how many resources an institution has.

Admission rate. Mea­sure of institutional prestige.

education, so we consider how much money institutions spend on education and how much of that money comes from tuition. Social status is the other mecha­ nism of unequal higher education, and so we also consider an institution’s admission selectivity and how many students are enrolled at that institution. The first variable associated with each mechanism is used to mea­sure vertical differences, and the second is used to mea­sure horizontal differences (see ­table  3.1). Figure 3.1 depicts the field of unequal higher education in two-­dimensional space. Educational and related expenditures (E&R) per full-­time equivalent (FTE) student and admission rate are at vertical poles, indicating that more is better. Per-­student E&R mea­sures vertical differentiation financially and rate of admis­ sion mea­sures vertical differentiation socially. Total enrollment (FTE) and the share of education expenses derived from tuition are at the horizontal poles of the figure b ­ ecause variation along t­ hese axes is part of the institutional diver­ sity that has long characterized U.S. higher education.2 Tuition dependence mea­ sures differences in how institutions operate financially, and size of the student body mea­sures social differences in operations. The center point, where the hor­ izontal and vertical axes intersect, divides the field into four quadrants. Figure 3.1 operationalizes the theoretical model outlined in chapter 2. Each of the four variables that outline the par­ameters of the field mea­sures one of the financial and cultural mechanisms that we identified. Educational expenditures mea­sure the ever-­increasing costs of higher education whereas tuition reliance (share of E&R from tuition) indicates exposure to revenue volatility. Admission rate directly mea­sures se­lection through exclusion, and total enrollment is a

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Admit Rate

Total FTE

Share E&R Tuition

E&R per FTE FIGUR E 3.1  ​Visualizing the theoretical model.

mea­sure of se­lection through refinement b ­ ecause campuses that are able to select carefully on student characteristics tend to limit enrollments. Position within the field overall reflects positions in each quadrant. Together, t­ hese four variables provide a robust conceptual and empirical basis for our study. The resulting map of unequal higher education helps us both to understand the system and to mea­sure individual institutions’ positions within the field. No model is perfect but, as we illustrate in subsequent chap­ ters, ours explains a g ­ reat deal. Why use only four variables? Our overarching objective was to develop a model capable of mapping the entire system of unequal higher education while remaining s­ imple and easy to understand. We followed the minimalist maxim that less can be more and settled on this model for two reasons. First, our model is parsimonious. We take a s­ imple approach to fit our conceptual frame while at the same time yielding a robust empirical model. Second, we selected the four variables ­because they met a set of criteria. Each variable included in the model was selected b ­ ecause: (1) it matched our conceptual frame, (2) it was easy to understand and interpret, (3) it was accurate, and widely available. In order to identify the latent categories that allow us to map the system of unequal higher education, we used statistical techniques that analyzed mani­ fest variables to identify unmea­sured but meaningful groups. More succinctly, we used traits we can mea­sure to identify categories that cannot be mea­sured



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directly. This ­family of quantitative techniques is known as “finite mixture models.” We employed latent profile analy­sis (LPA) ­because it is adapted for the continuous indicator variables that we employ.3 Additional details on how we fit our model are available in the methodological appendix. The logic for any LPA is s­ imple. The technique is appropriate when a sample contains two or more distinct subsamples.4 Using theory, prior research, and experience, researchers identify mea­sur­able traits that distinguish groups from one another. The variables that are selected depend upon what it is you want to classify. In order to map the system of unequal higher education, we include mea­ sures of wealth and status, along vertical and horizontal dimensions. This makes sense given that we view the system of unequal higher education as ­shaped by finance and prestige. ­These variables therefore should provide a rough outline of an institution’s position in a stratified field. ­A fter the categories have been identified, theory and findings from previ­ ous research can help to determine their positions relative to one another.5 We drew on our knowledge of the field of higher education to develop labels for each category that would describe the common characteristics of institutions in the group. Our study includes multiple years of data, extending from 2005 to 2013. Individual colleges and universities should move among ­these categories as their positions change, which means that the categories themselves are fixed over time.

Which Institutions Are Categorized? As outlined in chapter 2, we understand the system of unequal higher educa­ tion as shaping the opportunities, constraints, and strategies available to all colleges and universities, and by extension, their students. No institution—­ however prestigious—­operates without attention to other colleges and universi­ ties. T ­ here are impor­tant horizontal differences in mission, but concerns about vertical position are never far from view. Campus man­ag­ers seek revenues and status more or less constantly. The system of unequal higher education is the context in which decision-­makers make choices. Except for a few small enroll­ ment or special-­focus institutions, our study includes all four-­year public and pri­ vate not-­for-­profit colleges and universities in the United States. We study all of ­these institutions from 2005 to 2013. Using this time frame provided us with access to the most recent data (at time of writing) on the state of unequal higher education. Insight into con­temporary phenomena is a hall­ mark of social scientific work that seeks to shape policy and practice. T ­ hese data also provide insight into a period of notable changes in the system of unequal higher education. The G ­ reat Recession of 2007–2009 dramatically ­shaped the finances of colleges and universities by reducing direct state sup­ port, curtailing charitable giving and investment returns, and increasing enrollments.6 Analy­sis of this period allows us to analyze ways in which the

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system of unequal higher education changes in response to major social and economic developments.7

The Basic Map Our LPA identified seven distinct groups of colleges and universities.8 We named ­these categories: (1) Vulnerable institutions, (2) Subsidy Reliant institutions, (3) Smaller Typical Universities, (4) Larger Typical Universities, (5) Multiversities, (6) Elite colleges and universities, (7) Super Elite universities. Basic descriptions of each group are found in ­table 3.2. This ­table also reports the results of statistical tests (t-­ tests) indicating w ­ hether members of the group differed significantly from the average institution in our sample. T ­ hese seven categories are the basis for mapping unequal higher education. To understand the contours of this map, we describe each of ­these seven groups in some detail. In ­doing so, we group the categories that share horizon­ tal space to highlight the ways in which they are vertically dif­fer­ent from one another. This highlights the ways in which groups are both similar and dissimi­ lar to one another. Understanding t­ hese relationships between the groups is essential to the analyses in the chapters that follow.

Small Colleges and Universities The first two groups of colleges and universities—­Vulnerable institutions and Subsidy Reliant institutions—­shared many characteristics. Both Vulnerable and Subsidy Reliant institutions enrolled relatively few students, spent less than the average campus on E&R, and practiced nonselective admissions. However, members of ­these two groups differed in one crucial way. Vulnerable and Sub­ sidy Reliant institutions drew their funds from dif­fer­ent sources. Vulnerable institutions w ­ ere highly tuition dependent, while Subsidy Reliant institutions depended on nontuition revenue sources. Given their numerous similarities, members of t­ hese two groups w ­ ere closely linked to one another. A Subsidy Reliant institution that lost subsidy dollars likely would not have the enrollment demand or bud­getary slack to absorb such a loss. The horizontal differences between t­ hese two groups entailed vertical con­ sequences. Subsidy Reliant institutions could move down into the Vulnerable group should their subsidies vanish. While in princi­ple Vulnerable institutions could move up as well, in practice we observed no institutions making such a change. V ULNER A BLE INSTI T UTIONS.  ​A s their name implies, Vulnerable institutions

­were on a knife’s edge. This was the largest of all institutional groups. Account­ ing for 57 ­percent of all cases, it was larger than all six other categories combined. The large number of institutions that belonged to the Vulnerable category



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reaffirmed a central insight of the system of unequal higher education: The large majority of institutions w ­ ere (and are) small and resource poor. The characteristics that defined this category befit the group’s name. The average Vulnerable institution spent about $1,300 less on E&R per student than did the sample as a ­whole. What is more, the preponderance of educational spending, 82 ­percent on average, came from students’ tuition payments. Draw­ ing eight out of ­every ten dollars from tuition meant central educational activi­ ties could be imperiled by small enrollment declines. ­These institutions w ­ ere classified as Vulnerable b ­ ecause even slight changes could have profound con­ sequences for their operating bud­gets and educational ser­v ices. Vulnerable institutions ­were significantly less selective than the sample as a ­whole, admitting about 69 ­percent of all applicants. However, the practice of broad access admissions did not yield large institutions. Enrollments averaged about 2,500 FTE students, or about 41 ­percent of the sample average. Broad access admission standards and small enrollments indicated the limited demand for seats at t­hese campuses. Vulnerable institutions w ­ ere therefore particularly likely to experience enrollment dips ­because low demand left ­little slack for weathering lean times. Extreme tuition dependence meant Vulnerable institutions had ­little cush­ ion if enrollments declined. Economists use the term fixed costs to refer to com­ ponents of an operating bud­get that are constant regardless of short-­term changes to scale of operation. The president’s salary, ensured by contract, and the operation and maintenance of the campus are examples of fixed costs ­because they do not change regardless of how many students enroll in a par­tic­ u­lar year. Since Vulnerable institutions spent relatively ­little per student and had comparatively few students, their bud­gets w ­ ere, on average, small. This meant a large share of their bud­gets covered fixed costs. Financial flexibility was there­ fore limited, which provided another source of vulnerability. Vulnerable colleges already spent close to the bare minimum, meaning ­there was l­ittle fat to trim in lean times. The vicious cycle of financial constraints and limited demand could prompt a Vulnerable institution to close its doors, as Sweet Briar College’s trustees voted to do in 2015 (see introduction). Vulnerability was a gnawing daily real­ity that extended more or less in­def­initely despite campus officials’ attempts to avoid it. According to IPEDS rec­ords, in 2009 Oakwood College in Huntsville, Alabama, changed its name to Oakwood University. “Upgrading” an institution’s name has long been a common rebranding technique among low-­resource institutions.9 Yet Oakwood—­and several other colleges that changed their names—­remained in the Vulnerable category for all nine years of the study. Moderate enrollment growth was accompanied by dwindling per-­student spending and an on­go­ing heavy reliance on tuition, indicating that the new name did not improve Oakwood’s status. The path out of Vulnerability was difficult to identify.

-­

$20,097.64 (12,352.73)

E&R expenditures per FTE

Subsidy Reliant institutions

$18,771.90** (5,378.21)

$14,224.40** (4,332.19)

$14,863.94** (5,424.89)

$17,794.74** (7,676.47)

$23,560.00** (11,363.17)

$44,947.04** (9,146.05)

New York University of University Texas at San Antonio Wellesley University of University of College Kentucky Washington

$93,133.63** (23,225.10)

Duke University Car­ne­gie Stanford Mellon University University Georgetown University of Pennsylvania University Arizona State University

Northeastern University

Super Elite

Elite

Multiversities

Smaller Typical Larger Typical Universities Universities

Appalachian Black Hills California State State Lutheran University University University Brigham Young Johnson and Prescott Wales University–­ College University Hawaii University of Chicago State Stetson Maine University University

Vulnerable Sample mean institutions

Recurrent institution(s)

VARIABLES

The Seven Categories of Unequal Higher Education

­TA BLE  3.2

6,613 57.3%

2,062 17.9%

12.8%**

66.7%** (19.0)

4,584.5** (2,524.0)

36.0%** (10.6)

1,179 10.2%

15.9%**

68.7%** (16.2)

13,617.2** (2,832.9)

53.6%** (21.2)

642 5.6%

10.6%**

64.6% (16.9)

24,800.2** (3,624.3)

52.9%** (19.1)

175 1.5%

8.6%**

54.6%** (18.1)

40,802.6** (6,123.9)

49.6%** (16.4)

718 6.2%

98.7%**

39.1%** (17.5)

3,443.1** (3,435.0)

53.7%** (18.8)

Results of “two-­tailed” t-­tests indicating w ­ hether group mean differs from sample mean depicted as ** p