Impact of Higher-Ed. Report Called Limited So Far

By Meg Sommerfeld

Despite hopes of some sponsors that it would become a postsecondary version of A Nation at Risk, a 1993 report by the Wingspread Group on Higher Education has yet to produce a public outcry for radical change in the nation's colleges and universities.

Nevertheless, a meeting last week in Washington on the report and interviews with educators around the country suggest that the report's call for an overhaul of America's higher-education system is finding increasing resonance in the field.

The report by a panel of educators, business leaders, and policymakers, titled "An American Imperative: Higher Expectations for Higher Education,'' was intended as a wake-up call that would alert colleges and universities to a crisis in student achievement. It urged them to place greater emphasis on teaching and learning at the undergraduate level, to stress the importance of a core set of civic virtues, and to participate in a "simultaneous renewal'' of K-12 and higher education. (See Education...