Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YarRXJtVp10

17-01-2012 12:50 academicpartnerships.com Since long before we were a nation, Americans had a commitment to higher education. Only 16 years after the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock, Harvard opened its doors to 9 students. All of our early institutions were characterized by small student enrollments from the elite families of their day. The concept of a broad based, highly educated population began its journey to reality a 150 years ago, when Abraham Lincoln signed the Morrill Act in 1862. The Act called for the establishment of "at least one College in every state upon a sure and perpetual foundation, accessible to all, but especially to the sons of toil". Now, over a century and a half later, a hundred years after the Industrial Revolution in a nation of 315 million people where over half of all new jobs require a college education, the promise of the Morrill Act is more important than ever. The words of Abraham Lincoln when he signed the Act are as relevant today as they were then "The dogmas of the quite past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise to the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew." Despite the unprecedented success of America's public university system that is the envy of the world, reduced state and federal funding, a trillion dollars in student loans, tuition soaring out of reach for middle class families, stunning demographic changes and declining preparedness for college-level work, today's ...

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Future of Public Education | Academic Partnerships - Video