The Erosion of Professional Schools: The Right Blend in a Time of Decline

Abstract

" Schools of Art , Education and Natural Resources to be reviewed! " read the headlines in Michigan Daily, soon to be followed by smaller but equally as serious headlines in the Ann Arbor News, The Detroit Free Press and, yes, even the New York Times. What followed was two years of agonizing effort by the students, faculty and administration of a major, Big Ten University to grapple with the perceptions, hopes and reality of a review that would leave in its wake a demoralized faculty and reduced enrollment. The School of Education, rated number one in the United States by at least one outside reviewer, was being challenged by the spectra of closure. Closure of a school of education in a university noted for having the first permanent chair, in 1879, devoted exclusively to the training of secondary school teachers and administrators; closure of school noted for having John Dewey so involved in teaching and research that he forgot and left the perambulator containing his baby in front of the Ann Arbor post office one sunny day; closure of a School of Education rated in 1977 as having the best undergraduate teacher education program and in 1983 the best graduate teacher preparation program . The fact of review sank in slowly for the faculty and students and is still sinking in. With relief, we can say that the recent reports of our demise have been greatly exaggerated. The fact is not that the School of Education is headed for closure but that the School of Education at The University of Michigan will take a 40% budget cut over the next five years.