Abstract
The Wisconsin Idea is a widely acclaimed late nineteenth-century vision for Wisconsin higher education that promotes democratic engagement, the search for truth, and developing knowledge of importance to Wisconsin citizens. While the Wisconsin Idea is often celebrated as an enduring feature of public higher education in Wisconsin, this paper points to a myriad of cultural, economic, and political forces that have reshaped its meaning. Among these forces, fragmenting purposes of higher education, globalization, and changes in state political culture have edited understandings of the Wisconsin Idea in ways that have eliminated its moral and democratic purposes. These shifts that occurred throughout the twentieth century and early twenty-first mirror changes in the broader American higher education landscape. Ultimately, such changes have resulted in divided lives among students, faculty, staff, and administrators that seek wholeness, connection, and deep civic purposes in their work. This paper retraces the Wisconsin Idea’s history and concludes with a discussion about ways in which its early notions might be revived to inspire new thinking about higher education’s role in society.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 12-34 |
| Number of pages | 23 |
| Journal | Good Society |
| Volume | 30 |
| Issue number | 1-2 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - 2021 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:September 1947; “UW Public Services Reach Citizens throughout State,” Board of Regents, July 1947; “Our University Serves Wisconsin,” UW Information Service, 1947. 42. “On, Wisconsin: University Gets Benefits from Its State-Wide Service Idea,” Milwaukee Journal, March 20, 1949. 43. Drury, “Wisconsin Idea.” 44. John Thelin, A History of American Higher Education (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004). 45. Thelin, History of American Higher Education; Arthur M. Cohen and Carrie A. Kisker, The Shaping of American Higher Education: Emergence and Growth of the Contemporary System (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2010). 46. Marvin Lazerson, Discontent in the Field of Dreams: American Higher Education, 1945–1990, Pub. No. NCPI-3-01 (Stanford, CA: Stanford University, National Center for Postsecondary Improvement, 1997). 47. Thelin, History of American Higher Education. 48. Dan Berrett, “The Day the Purpose of College Changed,” Chronicle of Higher Education, January 26, 2015; Edward St. John and Michael Parsons, Public Financing of Higher Education: New Contexts and Changing Rationales (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004). 49. “How Good Is the Megaversity?,” Newsweek, February 26, 1968, 80. 50. Hoeveler, “University and the Social Gospel.” 51. David Weerts and Justin Ronca, “Examining Differences in State Support for Higher Education: A Comparative Study of State Appropriations for Research Universities,” Journal of Higher Education 77, no. 6 (2006): 935–965. 52. Bryant Kearl, “Who Killed the Wisconsin Idea?,” Madison Literary Society, March 9, 1992. 53. John Wyngaard, “UW Fault Talent Rarely Borrowed,” Sheboygan (WI) Press, March 6, 1978; “Adamany Criticizes UW,” Madison Capital Times, January 26, 1976, 1; John Welter, “Time for a Swift Kick in the Laurels, Suggest Educators at University,” Madison Capital Times, June 25, 1976. 54. Kearl, “Who Killed the Wisconsin Idea?” 55. “UW-Madison and Open Education: A restatement of the Wisconsin Idea by a Faculty Committee” (125th anniversary event, February 5, 1975), 47. 56. David J. Weerts, Gwendolyn F. Freed, and Christopher C. Morphew, “Organizational Identity in Higher Education: Conceptual and Empirical Perspectives,” in Higher Education: Handbook of Theory and Research, vol. 29, ed. M. N. Bastedo (New York: Springer, 2014), 229–78. 57. George Keller, Academic Strategy: The Management Revolution in American Higher Education (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1983). 58. George Keller, “The Wisconsin Idea: Yesterday and Tomorrow” (presentation sponsored by the Wisconsin Idea Commission, January 15–17, 1986), 27. 59. Daniel Sarewitz, “Saving Science,” New Atlantis, Spring/Summer 2016, 5–40. 60. Sarewitz, “Saving Science.” 61. Sean Johnstone, “The Technological Fix as Social Cure-All,” IEEE Technology and Society Magazine, March 2018, 37–54. 62. Donna Shalala, “Mandate for a New Century: Reshaping the Research University’s Role in Social Policy” (David Dodds Henry Lecture, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, October 31, 1989). 63. Shalala, “Mandate for a New Century,” 7.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA.
Keywords
- Wisconsin Idea
- civic renewal
- democratic engagement
- higher education
- public universities
