Introduction
The public service role of higher education, as a third mission alongside teaching and research, is usually the least developed and elaborated in university policies and strategic plans. This is especially the case for an institution’s community engagement.
According to (Bergan and Damian, 2010), the teaching of student competencies for democracy and diversity should be accompanied by programs of civic engagement and social responsibility in the framework for its public service mission. This means that mechanisms should be put in place to encourage, support, and reward practices of public service by academics, students, and staff. Public service expectations and requirements within any institution of higher learning should be as clearly defined as those of teaching and research.
Although many institutions of higher learning in the United States were founded with the intention of preparing students to actively participate in a diverse democratic society, their focus has slowly been lost over the years (Checkoway, 2001). This is mainly due to the fact that there is a lack of commitment from key individuals in academic and other public institutions to oversee the implementation. This paper seeks to establish whether higher education adequately prepares students for life.
The Treatment of Civic Education in University Study
According to Checkoway (2001), civic education is a vital requirement in the education system of any society that has a desire to train students the values of diversity and democracy. For institutions of higher learning to produce active and responsible citizens, it is important to reinforce civic education.
Institutions should come up with mechanisms to help equip learners with critical competencies for future life. However, this must be driven by a team that is fully aware of the honorable tasks that institutions of higher learning have to prepare students with requite skills for life that goes beyond the classroom.
Besides designing appropriate academic programs, implementers must be fully convinced that they have to work hard to succeed. Unfortunately, this has not been the case for most institutions due to laxity and lack of focus (Checkoway, 2001). In addition, there are serious concerns that institutions of higher learning in the United States have lost their original mission and are now concentrating more on research.
Higher Education and Student Preparation
According to Bergan and Damian (2010), different countries and institutions of higher education have their own unique way of handling their programs. The discourses on the development of competences for democracy and diversity in Europe and the United States, for example, are strikingly different. In the US context, it is very rare to find higher education institutions that do not have civic and social involvement mentioned in their mission statement.
This attitude reflects the historical development of American universities where the traditional roles of teaching and research have been modified by including close social ties and service to the community in which they were established. The community colleges, as a distinct sector of higher education in the United States, are particularly vocal in highlighting the purpose of offering services to and catering for the educational needs of their local communities.
Compared to Europe, it can be noted that the US higher education has a particularly well-developed practice of service-learning, especially community service, which has a relatively high rate of participation by students. Such learning is also widely considered as an effective way of educating for diversity and democracy.
Less clear, however, is whether individual students actually develop civic and social competences within formal courses. A liberal arts and sciences education is particularly well suited for providing general education courses, including those that explore civic and social concepts, and should enable students to develop these competences.
Nevertheless, many students do not take courses that are essential for preparing them for future life as responsible citizens. In many higher education institutions, there certainly is a need to strengthening institutional policies on the provision of general education, which would ensure that students are effectively prepared to be active, responsible, and ethnically sensitive citizens.
Judging from the European system, US higher education institutions do not appear to fully apply democratic principles within their structures and procedures. In particular, the governance mechanisms seem not to encourage full participation from faculty and students, and their influence on actual decisions made in these institutions appears to be limited. Key institutional decisions tend to be taken by a relatively small group of people, usually close to the President.
Given the rather strong presidential system of governance in the United States, decisions concerning the development of student competencies and other aspects of institutional civic mission are typically decided by the President and those closer to him or her. It is, therefore, necessary be to reconsider whether democratic principles could be better modeled within the governance mechanism to improve the operations of higher education institutions throughout the nation.
Unlike the United States, Europe’s higher education is not typically considered to be responsible for the general education of students who have opted for higher-level professional training or academic education in any discipline. The absence of liberal arts and sciences in higher education makes it more challenging to find a space for the development of competencies that are of essence to diversity and democracy in disciplines other than social sciences and humanities where such topics can be covered.
Principles of democracy and diversity have to be embedded in institutional policies, practices, and structures. One major aspect of applying such principles is the transparency of, and student participation in institutional decision making. Students have to be seen as partners within the higher education community and their contribution should be accommodated.
Another aspect is to widen access to higher education in order to provide equal opportunities and to help make the student body reflective of the diversity that exists in the overall population. It is certainly important for higher education institutions to actively recruit students from a varied background so as to have student populations that are reflect of the diversity in the society.
Such recruitments may include admissions that are not strictly on merit with the precondition that once accepted their grades and academic degrees will be based on merit. This also implies that additional educational support may have to be offered to weaker students so as to ensure their successful performance. Furthermore, diversity has to filter through the entire institutional life and be modeled by making faculty and staff diverse.
To a large extent, higher education institutions make an ideal forum for even the most contentious debates within their local communities and the whole society. Academic space is by definition free from ideological choices and built on freedom of enquiry and the search for truth based on dialogue and rigorous scientific research.
Academics have a reputation for independence and credibility, as well as sharing their expert knowledge and perspectives with the general public. Higher education institutions should carefully guard this space and continue to provide a forum for critical and intellectually honest discussion about even the most contentious and emotionally charged issues in our societies.
It is important to note that preparing students for life in a multi-cultural setup is a complex issue that must be handled very carefully. Curriculum developers should come up with programs that are focused on ensuring that besides the desire to excel academically, students are equally prepared to fit into the general society as they slowly work their way out of school into the society.
Some dangerous taboo topics that can be destructive to the development and success of students as citizens in a multi-cultural environment are, however, slowly emerging.
Conclusion
The development of student competencies for democracy and diversity can not be seen simply as the consequence of an institution’s education quality or an automatic by product of higher education experience. It is imperative to note that good education does not prepare students automatically for citizenship and civic and ethical responsibilities.
Development of key competences is rather a function of an institution’s systematic and strategic effort to present students with learning opportunities for these competencies within teaching, research, and public service, and to facilitate students’ active engagement with the various curricular and extracurricular learning opportunities. These three core functions should incorporate mechanisms for preparing students for life after higher education to be active, responsible, and ethically sensitive citizens.
However, how these measures and initiatives are to be achieved depends on the particular higher education institution. It will be a reflection of how the institution sees its contribution to the society, as well as the particular environment in which it is embedded. Each individual institution has the responsibility to develop an authentic institutional practice that fits the particular environment the institution belongs to.
The management of universities must place emphasis on merit rather than mediocrity. This would make both staff and students begin to see their future as being a function of how hard working they are, rather than how sycophantic they can be.
Universities must also organize regular seminars, workshops, and conferences that build bridges across ethnic, religious, and social divides. Therefore, although universities can help to foster the development of students and prepare them effectively for life in the future, this depends on how individual institution’s approach to the learning process.
Based on the arguments presented in this paper, it is clear that higher education in most institutions across the world is not well structured to prepare students for life. Although the United States has made attempts to meet this need failure has resulted from a lack of commitment form implementers. Goodwill from these implementers is necessary if success is to be realized.
Having a good foundation without the support of strong-willed individuals is like having none at all. As institutions around the world seek to learn from the American system, it is important to realize that this can only work and yield the desired results when the force behind the implementation is unwilling to compromise. Failure to do so will create a situation where great ideas only exist on paper, while institutions continue to produce individuals who are ill-prepared to deal with societal issues.
References
Bergan, S. & Damian, R. (2010). Higher Education for Modern Societies: Competences and Values. Strasbourg, France: Council of Europe Publishing.
Checkoway, B. (2001). Renewing the Civic Mission of the American Research University. The Journal of Higher Education, 72 (2): 125 – 147.