The Council for Aid to Education's Commission on National Investment in Higher Education (CNIHE) released a two-year study that warns a "growing shortfall in public funding may force the nation's colleges and universities to turn away half the student population by the year 2015."

CNIHE co-chairs Thomas Kean, former Governor of New Jersey and president of Drew University, and Joseph Dionne, chairman and CEO of the McGraw-Hill Companies, presented the study's findings, which recommended broad reforms in post-secondary education last month in Washington, D.C. The CNIHE study, Breaking the Social Contract: The Fiscal Crisis in Higher Education, advocates increased public funding of community colleges, four-year colleges, and universities. Reforms that would restructure and streamline higher education institutions - patterning them on models from the business community - are urged by the CNIHE study. In preparing the study, CNIHE, which includes leading academicians and business executives, analyzed trends in enrollment, costs, and public funding from the past twenty years.

"Sweeping changes must be made to halt sharp increases in tuition and increase other sources of revenue. In the twenty-first century, a high school education won't be enough for the next generation of entry-level workers to keep up in this fast-changing world," said co-chair Joseph Dionne.

The five major recommendations of the CNIHE study are:

* America's political leaders should reallocate public resources to reflect the growing importance of higher education to the economic prosperity and social stability of the United States.

* The governance systems of post-secondary institutions should adopt major structural changes in order to improve productivity.

* Post-secondary institutions should pursue greater mission differentiation to streamline services and better respond to the changing needs of their constituencies.

* Colleges and universities should develop sharing arrangements to maximize scarce resources.