Biology Education: What Next?

Abstract

College enrollments are expected to peak around 1982 at about 13.6 million students and to decline throughout the remainder of that decade. The number of students enrolled for degree credit in all types of colleges will reach a maximum of 11 million in 1980, and the subsequent modest growth will be due to increases in the numbers of students not in degree programs. In the two-year colleges, enrollment will increase through 1985 when it will account for 31% of the students in degree programs and an even larger percentage of the nondegree enrollment. Public colleges will enroll increasing proportions of students at the expense of the private colleges. In 1960, only 60% of degree students attended public colleges; by 1985, 80% will attend public institutions. The reasons students go to college are also changing. First, improved earning capacity no longer provides a strong incentive for attending college. Based on a 1970 report of the Carnegie Commission (Hecht and Traub 1974), lifetime earnings of a college graduate exceed those of a high school graduate by approximately $60,000-about the equivalent of the cost of college and the foregone earnings. Second, by 1980, a college education will offer less assurance of getting a job commensurate with one's educational attainment. By that time college graduates will comprise 20% of the civilian labor force; buf only 15% of the jobs will require a college degree (Best 1978). We need not limit this discussion to students pursuing degrees, for all of our educational institutions abound with students who have what Washington Post columnist, William Raspberry (1978b) calls great and unrealistic expectations. He asserts that we teach skills but fail to teach young people what those skills are likely to produce in income. Many students expect to finish a vocational program and quickly land a $25,000-a-year job. A few even prefer to remain on welfare rather than to work for less than the salary they expected. Changes in life plans will have farreaching effects on what parts of one's life are spent in school. Some futurists believe that the linear life plan-childhood, education, and employment-is becoming obsolete. The cyclic life plan (Best 1978) suggests that people might enter the work force in the teen years, work for several years, return to school for a year or two, and continue to alternate work and school throughout a lifetime. These trends seem to indicate that the student population will become increasingly diverse in interests and needs at the same time it is decreasing in size. We will be confronted with greater competition for a smaller number of faculty positions. Those of us who remain in teaching will be challenged by the task of serving this diverse population of students.