The Chicago Council's newest Heartland Paper, "A Master Plan for Higher Education in the Midwest," by James J. Duderstadt, is a magisterial piece of work, living up to the author's goal of a "roadmap" to Midwestern education, especially higher education, and its role in the region's economic future. From K-12 to universities to lifelong education, the former University of Michigan president covers the scope of education, as seamless as it is ambitious.
Duderstadt's roadmap is a guide to the long-range future, but it also is very timely -- more timely, in fact, that we had expected when we asked him to write it for us. Readers of this blog got a preview last week, and the report itself is to be unveiled this Thursday, March 31. A couple of his recommendations seem to pop from the week's headlines and demand attention now.
Professor Duderstadt is the author of The Chicago Council’s forthcoming Heartland Paperreport on “A Master Plan for Higher Education in the Midwest: A Roadmap to the Future of the Nation’s Heartland.” The report will be released at an evening public program on Thursday, March 31, in Chicago where a panel featuring Professor Duderstadt; Michael Hogan, president of the University of Illinois; and Jerry Sue Thornton, president of Cuyahoga Community College, will comment on the findings and recommendations. This event is open to the public, and registration information is available online here.
by James J. Duderstadt, President Emeritus, Professor of Science and Engineering, and Director of the Millennium Project at the University of Michigan
History may not repeat itself, but it sometimes passes itself on the way back.
From River Rouge to Republic Steel, from Flint to the Haymarket, the biggest battles in the rise of industrial unions took place on Midwestern soil. Now, from Columbus to Madison, the fiercest struggles over the survival of public employee unions have come back to the Midwest.
There’s a reason for this historical resonance. Nowhere else can public sector workers -- the union members who still have decent salaries, pensions and working conditions –- see so clearly what will happen to them if they lose the bargaining power that their unions give them.
