Kalamazoo College is a member of the Council of Independent Colleges (CIC). CIC President Richard Ekman participated in a panel discussion in San Francisco on April 29 on the topic, “What’s the Value of a College Education?” Other panelists included Mary Marcy, president of Dominican University of California; Alecia DeCoudreaux, president of Mills College; Claude Steele, executive vice chancellor and provost at the University of California Berkeley; and Mohammad Qayoumi, president of California State University San Jose. Monica R. Martinez, deeper learning senior fellow for the Hewlett Foundation and commissioner of the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanics, served as moderator.

The show will air on Friday, May 15 at 8:00 p.m. on KQED88.5 FM Radio in San Francisco and will be subsequently broadcast on hundreds of radio stations nationally. The program was just over an hour.

Program Description: For the United States to remain competitive in the global economy, our citizens need to be innovative, versatile, and well-educated. To provide for these qualifications, does our model of higher education need a wholesale renovation? What would an education that is tailored to the needs of the 21st century – and affordable to all – even look like? Join this distinguished panel of public and private college educators to tackle the difficult challenges ahead: What is the value of a liberal arts college education versus a preprofessional vocational skill-building model? Why does college cost so much? How can we close the gap between attendance and graduation rates? Can we design blended in-person and online courses that are both instructive and cost-efficient? And finally, how can we get our state and federal governments to continue to support higher education and to take the financial burden off of students?