ABSTRACT
The field of higher education has a complex landscape with more agencies and associations than colleges and universities. I present my approach of how I navigated this terrain and what contradictions I surfaced along my path. Starting with the hidden hand of agencies and associations that are shaping the field, I analyze how they are tackling the iron triangle of cost-access-quality problem. In the tug-of-war between agencies representing the faculty, the administrators, and the regulators, the iron triangle remains unrelenting. It is this unresolved triangle that the emerging alternate world of education is trying to untangle. But it seeks legitimacy from those very agencies that are part of the problem. I bring forth a broad range of contradictions that need to be addressed by the emerging alternate world.
