A Model for the Reinvented Higher Education System: State Policy and College Learning.

Higher education structures need to be redesigned to make them more responsive to the public's demand for more attention to teaching and learning and the reality of limited financial resources. The enterprise model can serve as a 21st century paradigm, with three new "tools": (1) customer influence on delivery of services; (2) accountability driven by those served--including students, parents, employers, and units both on and off campus; and (3) the assumptions that students want high quality education and can be trusted and that faculty want to perform and are highly energetic about their work. The proposed higher education model "unbundles" the current system--separating its functions into public enterprises, each accountable to its own customers. These enterprises would not receive legislative appropriations, but would earn revenues through service contracts. The model is structured as a family of public corporations operating under the guidance of the Higher Education Policy Board. Corporations include the learning connection, learning bank, and four educational enterprises (teaching, learning resources, learning technology, and facilities). Day-to-day operation of the model is outlined in four areas: learner services, programs, infrastructure, and governance. Two different paths toward implementation of the model are described: moving an entire higher education system toward the enterprise paradigm, or establishing only one of the enterprises at first. (JDD)