Public Service: Our New Mission

Abstract

democratic but too many Americans do not participate in public life. Social scientists have documented a decline in voting, attendance community meetings, and involvement in voluntary activities. In addition, peoples' interest in public issues, their ability to argue for their beliefs, and their respect for differences in cultural groups are in question. Higher can contribute to civic engagement, but many universities have de-emphasized their civic mission. Whereas universities once promoted education for democracy or for society, today it is hard to find top administrators consistently committed to this purpose or faculty members who consider it central to their work. Among America's institutions of higher education, research universities are strategically situated for civic engagement. Many early universities helped build the new nation. They were later joined by institutions whose leaders expressed strong social values. Charles Eliot of Harvard University, for example, wrote that at bottom, most of the American institutions of higher are filled with the democratic spirit. Other leaders argued that the route to a civil society went through the universities. It would be just as mistaken to conclude that these individual expressions became institutional behaviors, as it would to ignore that some universities practiced racial and religious discrimination. But the ideas were expressed nonetheless. Those early universities have developed into institutions with immense resources. Modern research universities have faculty members with credentials in academic disciplines and professional fields such as business and economic development, and engineering, health and human services that have great potential for problem solving and program planning. And they have large libraries, laboratories, and telecommunications facilities. They are more than educational institutions; they are also major employers, providers and consumers of goods and services, and powerful social and economic units, whose decisions affect communities regardless of the level of community involvement in knowledge development. In the process of expanding, the universities transformed themselves from civic institutions into powerful research engines, which gave rise to major changes in their objectives and operations. The professionalization of the academic disciplines, the drive for Cold War supremacy and national security, and other factors caused the institutions to expand. As they did, they also became the target of public officials, business leaders, and other critics who have charged that much classroom teaching in universities does not develop civic competencies, that much research does not serve community needs, and that universities themselves have lost' their sense of civic purpose. Today's college students want to provide direct community service, such as serving meals in a homeless shelter, but few aspire to leadership roles, such as organizing homeless people for more affordable housing. Nor are most students prepared to argue their beliefs about low-income housing policies for the nation. Indeed, studies show that the interest of entering undergraduate students in public causes is an all-time low, and that their interest actually decreases during the college years. Faculty members are ideally positioned to renew the civic mission of higher education, but many believe that the civic Barry Checkoway is professor of social work and