To serve as a light to Afaha People.asu Over the last half-century, new pressures have challenged the traditional purpose of higher education.
Society expects that degree-granting institutions will ensure that college students develop discipline-specific competences (e.g., knowledge, attribute, responsibility) as well as generic skills (e.g., communication, written, oral) and dispositions (e.g., attitudes,
beliefs, curiosity) at the completion of a bachelor’s degree. Current research suggests that undergraduate education is not just abo
ut discipline specific knowledge or applied skills; instead, dispositions and generic skills that enable graduates to be effective citizens are also valued outcomes for students completing a college degree in the 21
st
century. Utilizing Critical Interpretive Synthesis (CIS), this paper reviews and synthesizes the purposes and aims of undergraduate education from the perspective of (a) higher education institutions and (b) undergraduate students. More specifically, this article aims to address two research
questions: (a) What are the differences between students’ and institutional aims, expectations,
goals, outcomes, and purposes with regards to generic skills and dispositional outcomes of a college degree and (b) Is there a consensus as to what the goals of a college degree are in terms of core competencies. To answer such questions, a comprehensive search of the literature identified approximately 30 peer-reviewed articles, twenty-five books, five magazines/newspaper articles, and three policy briefs published between 2000 and 2015. Nine domains of the purposes and goals were found and while there was some agreement between
institutions and students on the “non
-
economic” benefits of higher education, especially
concerning intellectual cognitive attainment, the review was characterized by a significant misalignment. Our findings suggest that student expectations for completing an undergraduate education tend to be very instrumental and personal, while higher education institutional goals and purposes of undergraduate education tend towards highly ideal life- and society-changing consequences. This paper calls for significant “Tuning” in higher education to define what a
college student should know and be able to do at the completion of higher education. On one hand, the purpose of higher education tends to reproduce what the larger society is expecting of them. On the other hand, one would also argue that they should be aiming for more ideal contributions to the commonwealth society. That conundrum has posed persistent dilemmas about the goals and aims of higher education.
2
Notably, both public and private higher education institutions across the world face unprecedented challenges on a wide number of issues including support for student aid, higher tuition, diminishing appropriations, modified governance relationships, and the value of a college degree.
3
Generally, colleges and universities exist to create, advance, absorb, and disseminate knowledge through teaching and learning; help rapid industrialization of the economy; contribute to the development and improvement of education; and develop higher order cognitive and communicative skills in young people, such as, the ability to think logically, the capacity to challenge the status quo, and the desire to develop sophisticated values.
4
However, today’s society has
also viewed higher education as a training ground for advanced vocational and professional skills. These developments, in turn, have often created tensions between higher education as a public good and higher education as a private benefit
5
, where the growth in market forces have become increasingly diverse and political within which they are located.
6
This has all resulted in the rise of commercialization, corporatization, and managerialization of higher education processes
7
, as well as the increasing political polarization and plutocracy of public policies
8
, which is often seen as a contradiction to the traditional academic, scholarly goals of contemplating important ideas.
9
In other words, higher education are not only under pressure to promote college affordability, access, and completion
in today’s uncertain future
but to also enhance individuals core competencies and dispositions such as knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs for entry into the global knowledge-based economy.
10
Today’s knowledge economy requires highly skilled personnel at all
levels to deal with rapid technological changes.
11
To meet current societal needs, higher education institutions worldwide are striving to reconstruct curriculum, pedagogy, and assessment policies to ensure that all students have the desired attributes and competencies at the completion of a college degree.
12
Statistically speaking, young college graduates entering in the U.S. labor force today have substantially declined since the 1990s, and are now at an all time low since 1972.
13
While many jobs posted online requires at least
a bachelor’s degree
- approximately 80 and 90 percent.
