Learning Resources

Abstract: Global society has “overshot” the long-term human carrying capacity of Earth. This unsustainable state is an emergent property of the systemic interaction of techno-industrial society as presently configured and the ecosphere. It cannot be corrected without fundamental changes to critical socio-cultural variables that determine the interaction. To the extent that higher education (re)produces the dominant cultural paradigm, it is a source of the problem. Universities must strive to reduce the ecological footprints of both their own operations and, more importantly, of the growth-oriented materialistic worldview they promote. Indeed, the real challenge for higher education is to help articulate an alternative life-sustaining worldview.

Abstract: To facilitate successful planning in an environment of great social, environmental, and technological change coupled with limited resources, planning efforts must work simultaneously on the external policy level and the internal, institutional one. Examines the American Council on Education Policy Commission and the California State University Cornerstones project for clues on how to plan on both levels and work towards common goals.

Abstract: Consortia, their impact on cooperating institutions, and critical factors in inter-institutional planning were the subject of a recent study for the United States Office of Education, directed by Harold L. Hodgkinson of the Center for Research and Development in Higher Education at the University of California at Berkeley. The critical issues, according to the study findings, are problems of reciprocity and autonomy, coordination of programs among diverse institutions, and strategies for campus involvement and leadership. The following article, by three staff members of the New Hampshire College and University Council—one of the consortia in the Hodgkinson study—is devoted to a discussion of the process of consortium decision-making, touching on the three key issues. The authors are: Lynn G. Johnson, the Council's associate director in charge of academic programs; Dr. William W. Barnard, consultant and coordinator of a two-year Cooperative Curriculum Project, and Douglas W. Lyon, coordinator of January Term Programs and communications coordinator.