New state policies toward higher education have stressed the importance of efficiency and accountabilty in postsecondary institutions. The diversification of the system, the building of alternative financial sources, cuts in spending, concerns about productivity and the establishment of multiple levels of evaluation have been the major issues affecting higher education. Progress in these areas has been uneven. Government policies promoted institutional diversity. Institutional differentiation, however, was not complete.
Many technological schools look like universities.
These institutions have received less funding than equivalent organizations in the university subsystem. Public universities still rely mainly on public financing. Internal budgetary cuts have concentrated on tremendous faculty and staff salary reductions with damaging effects on academic performance. Diverse universities and entire disciplines have been regarded as unproductive while the notion of productivity in higher education is still ambiguous and ill defined. Evaluation has been presented as the most important policy device.