The commercialization of public higher education: Balancing academic, fiscal and market values

This study explored the effects of a growing phenomenon in higher education---commercial values assuming a primacy in academic life. The impacts of commercialization---both obvious and not---are presently playing out in universities today (Bok, 2003; Newman, 2000; Slaughter & Leslie, 1997; Washburn, 2005; and Zemsky, Wegner, & Massy, 2005). The purpose of the study was to examine, describe and explain the influence of corporate culture and changing academic values and behavior at a public Research I university. The intent was to understand changes in mission and funding decisions with the influx of entrepreneurial values that have become part of university landscapes since the early 1980s. Quantitative and qualitative methods were used. A content analysis of university mission statements from 1980-2005 was conducted, which demonstrated the change in priority of the educational mission. The study tracked budgetary allocations and compared two academic units to examine the influence of commercial values on budgetary decisions and processes. Interview questions were grounded in the findings from the content and budget analyses. Higher education leaders were interviewed and discussed shifts in the mission, budget and overall decision-making at the institution. Leadership perspectives, other insights regarding the loss of traditional educational moorings, the preservation of traditional academic values, and the future and sustainability of higher education were areas that interviewees discussed during the open-ended portion of the interview.; The data suggests a confluence of complex factors contributed to the tidal wave of commercialization in higher education. External forces identified were (1) governmental forces, (2) economic forces, and (3) technological forces. Internal forces operating were social and behavioral in nature. The changes wrought by commercialization have been largely unnoticed and not discussed because they have come in ebbs and flows and seen in glimpses, not in panorama. Leaders need to be able to balance the apparent dichotomy of traditional academic values and commercial values, and perhaps models of social entrepreneurship can provide a strong vision for how to sustain the unique values of higher education in today's commercial world.