The Future of Higher Education - 16

Part 5: Concluding Thoughts
Taken together, higher education faces a series
of challenges from what seems like all directions.
Demographic pressures, global politics,
national politics, campus politics, changing
macroeconomic forces, declining enrollment,
continuous technological innovation, and the
climate crisis appear to be squeezing colleges
and universities like a potter's hands on a clay
pot, shaping and reshaping until new forms
emerge. The many opportunities we have
outlined - open education, XR visualization,
and expanded climate teaching and research,
to name a few - also shape our institutions:
expanding programs, altering governance.
Campus services face this era of transformation
in a very immediate way: supporting students,
faculty, and staff as they do their work of
research, teaching, learning, and service. These
trends may operate at a distance sometimes,
but they will be felt eventually as society and
the academy respond. They can point to needed
alterations in funding and reporting, as well
as evolving strategic priorities, which service
departments must ultimately carry out.
Recent history suggests one opportunity that
we can all realize. As campuses confronted
financial crises, a global pandemic, and political
instability, we were able to communicate and
collaborate across traditional boundaries. No
one academic unit emerged as the ultimate
authority for any of these crises; instead, we
put our collective heads together to figure out
how to proceed. I hope we can remember that
practice and apply it, going forward. Professional
organizations like the National Association of
College & University Food Services (NACUFS) are
one venue for the work.
Part 5: Some Concluding Thoughts as Prompts for Discussion
Part 4: The Challenge of Climate Change
13
The Future of Higher Education

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of The Future of Higher Education
