The Uses of Institutional Culture: Strengthening Identification and Building Brand Equity in Higher Education (review)

turn to the thoughts of citizens, business leaders, public offi cials, and academics about existing inattention to the “critical attributes” and the resulting gap between rhetoric and reality. Predictably, opinions and perspectives on the topic vary and in some cases, they vary dramatically. Chapter 6, titled “Creating a Thoughtful Market,” serves as the transition point leading the reader to the authors’ mandates for change. They demonstrate the consequences of poor market formation by highlighting the shortcomings of the intercollegiate athletics market. The authors effectively distinguish among strategy, politics, and policy as the key elements in market formation and analyze the tension between accountability and regulation. Chapters 7 through 10 each target a specifi c functional area that requires attention when developing a market designed to preserve and further the public purpose of higher education. For example, in Chapter 8, the authors argue that opportunities for learning are not maximized because professors are focused primarily on content delivery and not on depth or quality. Based on their argument, neglect of leadership development, civic responsibility, and community service is also rampant in the modern curriculum. Surprisingly, they do not identify a role for student affairs in connecting classroom learning with practical experience through co-curricular involvement. While the authors do not directly dismiss the out-of-classroom experience, they characterize several components of student life (e.g., Greek life, commercialization of facilities) as co-conspirators in the competition for prestige. This approach sells short the potential for collaboration between professors and student affairs professionals in recreating the learning environment. In Chapter 10, the authors argue that the development of a competitive market for research funding could serve as a model for developing incentive-based systems to reinvigorate teaching and service. They believe that a system of competitive, peer-reviewed grants for teaching and service can stimulate the type of change required to ensure that not-for-profi t higher education maintains its privileged status in the United States. While their vision is inspirational and their rationale logical, drawing from the recommended funding sources to support new grant programs could intensify existing problems. Specifi cally, they propose a $1 billion federal grant program for teaching and a $3–$4 billion federal and state matching-grant program for service. The authors argue that redirecting funding from existing service programs and existing research grant funding to new teaching initiatives could adequately fi nance their proposed programs. However, higher education leaders must protect against redirects from declining need-based fi nancial aid allocations that could strengthen existing barriers to low-income student access. Because expanding access and attainment is also an area of focus within the authors’ plan, any zero-sum solution that results in a decrease in federal funding for need-based fi nancial aid programs works against their vision. Additionally, some critics would argue that grant-based research funding has fostered winner-take-all competition. Following such a model for teaching and service grants could exacerbate the growing disparity in wealth between institutions. In the fi nal two chapters, the authors offer a compelling vision for the future. While they attempt to inspire by emphasizing possibilities, the authors are also explicit about the consequences of failing to respond to the challenge. The strategic planning framework they employ as an organizing device, with some modifi cation to capture specifi c environmental intricacies, can potentially guide leaders who are developing (or contemplating) an institutional planning processes. A college or university strategic plan grounded in the seven “critical attributes,” fi rst presented in Chapter 4 and revisited in the closing chapter, can guide faculty, administrators, governing board members, and students toward market-oriented initiatives that preserve the public purpose of higher education. When writing about the future, a temptation to hedge predictions by suggesting many possible outcomes that are short on detail often exists. In The Future of Higher Education, Newman et al. have chosen an alternate path, a more aggressive approach that models what they expect in response to their research. The analysis offers more than predictions; it is a vociferous call to action for higher education leaders during a period of unprecedented transformation.