ABSTRACT
To claim that higher education is experiencing a variety of stresses is to understate the obvious. Many institutions are beset by chronic problems that are manifested by concerns about college price escalation (The National Commission on the Cost of Higher Education, 1998), decreasing affordability for most American families (The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, 2002), changes in public policy relative to college choice (Davis, 2003; The Institute for Higher Education Policy, 2002), and more limited access to institutions of higher education for students from modest economic backgrounds (Terenzini, Cabrera, & Bernal, 2001; Wolanin, 2003). In addition to these financial challenges, others have raised concerns about poor graduation rates (Wingspread Group, 1993) and what students have learned (Hamrick, Evans, & Schuh, 2002).
