Crow joins talks on future of higher education

ASU President Michael M. Crow joined U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and other college and university presidents from across the country to discuss the biggest challenges facing higher education today, which Duncan summarized as "high prices, low completion rates, and too little accountability," reported TIME writer Kayla Webley.

Hosted by TIME magazine, including managing editor Rick Stengel and editor at large Fareed Zakaria, the TIME Higher Education Summit addressed the financial, digital, global and access factors of getting one's degree.

Webley writes: "There was also a lot of frank discussion about access and how to ensure that more Americans not only have the opportunity to go to college, but have the tools to succeed so they can make it to graduation day."

Crow made opening remarks in the first panel titled "The Real Cost of College: The Economics of Higher Education."

"In most industries, competition leads to lower prices," Webley writes. "But the opposite is true in higher ed, where, as Michael Crow of Arizona State put it, 'quality and status is often connected to exclusivity.' Too many schools are trying to compete with Harvard—state-of-the-art gyms, anyone?—and maintain the highest-profile faculty, and those costs trickle down to the students."

The daylong event took place Oct. 18 in New York City.

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