Beyond U.S News and World Report
The latest international rankings should give American universities cause for worry.
Author Profile
William Leonard
William Patrick Leonard has a Ph.D. from the University of Pittsburgh, an M.B.A from Loyola University, Chicago, and B.S. and M.S. degrees in education from Indiana University. In March 2009, he assumed the position of director of academic personnel and student services and is now the acting dean at Solbridge International School of Business, Daejeon, Republic of Korea. Leonard has been an officer at a number of public and private four-year institutions around the world and throughout his administrative career has taught business courses on a part-time basis. His essays and reviews number over 150. He was associate editor of Business Library Review from 1985 to 2001 and has published articles in Economics of Education Review, Journal of Higher Education Administration, Journal of Academic Librarianship, Review of Education, EconJournalWatch, and other professional journals. He is currently an advisor to the Journal of Qafqaz University, Azerbaijan.Articles by William Leonard
The Vision Thing
The 2008 financial crisis, which still lingers in the higher education community, should not have been a surprise. Higher education has a financial cycle—trough, recovery, peak and decline—that mirrors the business cycle. Neither corporate nor university executives can predict with any certainty when the next downturn will occur, but institutional leaders could have prepared their institutions by containing their ambitions, creating safeguards, and developing contingency plans.
My heretical view is that mainstream public and private not-for-profit higher education boards of trustees have neither the will nor the incentive to control their institutions’ costs. The pursuit and maintenance of prestige are more valued than fiscal responsibility.