Talk:Public university/Archive 1

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Archive 1

europe

it would be good to see what about italy, france, geramany, spain, austria and other estates of european community or european continent :)

LAC?

Regarding the inclusion of the liberal arts colleges references (an dindeed that entire paragraph):

1. Any evidence that the role of public institutions is increasingly important?

2. Any evidence that "Most public schools in the US boast tuitions and fees of 1/3 or less the cost than comparable private school."?

3. Do liberal arts colleges need to be referenced in an article on universities?

4. Would a reference to the existance of liberal arts colleges suffice? I.e., what is the relevance of the Council of Public Liberal Arts Colleges?

Cka3n 00:40, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

These are fair questions to ask. I do believe it is important to indicate that there are public institutions which are modeled on liberal arts colleges (since this is a fact and it is not well known), some of which are universities themselves. This is one reason I added the link, Council of Public Liberal Arts Colleges, since it lists the institutions which fall in this category (and you can see which ones function as universities). However, I do agree that this may not be the best paragraph to put the sentence in, I just wasn't certain where on the page it would belong. I am open to suggestions for a better way to convey this information. -Classicfilms 02:13, 7 April 2007 (UTC)
I took a stab at editing this. I removed the language re: cost, etc. largely because of the concerns I noted above. I left the LAC sentence, although I moved the Council note into a reference. Cka3n 06:21, 8 April 2007 (UTC)
Looks great! -Classicfilms 06:50, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

Richard Moll?

the link in the article to Richard Moll is to wikipedia page of Richard Moll the actor (best known for his role on Night Court)

I seem to think the Richard Moll the article is referencing is the author and educational administrator (from California?)

Of course they could be one in the same person, though nothing I know about the actor would suggest he was in fact the same person. Admittedly, I am not a Richard Moll expert. But if they are indeed two different people, I would suggest a correction but there are a number of alternatives:

- removing the erroneous link,
- adding a new article for the other Richard Moll,
- pointing the link to an article about his writing...

Europe

Turkey is not part of Europe and should be moved from this section. Possibly Asia or Asia Minor as this is where the majority of its country is located. Titheniel (talk) 01:47, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Turkey may well join the European Union, which means that politically and geographically it is a part of Europe (despite the majority of the country being in Asia). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.9.131.117 (talk) 21:48, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Europe NOT a country

It is completely wrong to group all the European nations together in the same section. They are independent, sovereign nations, not a single country. It would be like grouping the USA, Canada, Mexico and half a dozen Caribbean countries together as 'America'.

Furthermore, the UK system is sufficiently different to elsewhere in Europe that it should definitely not be grouped together with them. The UK system has far more in common with Australia, Canada - even India than it does with, say, the French system. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Guyfwoodward (talk • contribs) 14:04, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

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W&M

....was not founded as a public university, and didn't become a public university (in the conventional sense) until 1906, and has remained so ever since, was not founded as such. William & Mary was a private institution from 1693 until just after the American Civil War and has been public since 1888. It is, as the vast majority would define it, not really the first public university in the USA. I realize I have my own opinion on this matter, but it seems that they shouldn't really be in contention.

65.190.27.96 (talk) 05:17, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Oops, the above was me. Forgot to log-in. Sorry about that.

Artifactblue (talk) 05:18, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

If the are no objections, for which I have allowed ample time, I'm going to change it soon.

Artifactblue (talk) 18:11, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

Move

Shouldn't this be moved to Public university (United States) or something? That seems to be what the article is about. / Uppland 09:28, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

  • I don't think it should. Other countries have public universities too, and the principle is generally the same. Darkcore 17:50, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)
    • I noted in the article that communist countries have only public universities. -- 8^D gab 18:06, 2005 Mar 25 (UTC)
    • OK, I tried to rewrite it to make it less US-centric. / Uppland 18:23, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)

UC-Berkeley is 'Cal'. Stop changing it.

-I'd like to note that it's absurd that the University of Washington, Seattle was not included in the list of prestigious public universities. It's currently ranked 3rd in public institutions in the US and is one of the largest research institutions world-wide. It is also in the more updated list of public ivies by Greene's Guides, 2001. Moll's list was made over 20 years ago. It's outdated and misleading.

This isn't the place to spat about UW, but just out of curiosity, where is it ranked 3rd? It missed top 10 by the US News rankings, http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/college/rankings/brief/t1natudoc_brief.php. The Institute of Higher Education, Shanghai Jiao Tong University ranked it the #5 public school (although that ranking had a very suspicious west coast tint, as the public schools were berkeley, ucsd, ucla, wisconsin, uw, and ucsf to start). Washington Monthly ranked it 9th amongst publics.
I mention this only because the sentence referring to it is suffering some serious bloat: Historically, the most prestigious universities in the United States have been private. However, public universities like University of California, Berkeley, University of Michigan, College of William and Mary, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, University of Virginia, University of Washington, University of Illinois, University of California, Los Angeles, University of Texas at Austin, University of Wisconsin-Madison, and The Pennsylvania State University are highly prestigious as well. If it is public universities like, we really only need a school or two to make the point. I suggest, unless there is good reason otherwise, to reduce this to Berkeley and Michigan (neither of which I attended).Cka3n 05:20, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

The opening paragraph

A. Commonwealth v. Britain v. UK

I'm not sure if there is guidance elsewhere, but the article could use some clean-up to make its nomenclature more consistent. Right now, the opening paragraph reads:

A public university is a university that is predominantly funded by public means through a national or regional government. In The Commonwealth and most European countries the majority of universities are public. British universities have institutional autonomy, which is well respected as it has developed over centuries. In the 20th century they came to rely on the government for most of their funding. The only university which is wholly privately financed in the UK is the University of Buckingham, which has a low profile and caters largely for overseas students.

It appears (to me at least), that one political entity is referred to in that one paragraph by three different monikers: The Commonwealth, Britain, and the United Kingdom. (I realize that the terms may technically refer to different entities, but the paragraph reads as if they are being used as if they were interchangeable.)

Query, then: 1 - Am I reading that incorrectly? E.g., are those three terms actually referring to different entities? If so, the paragraph should be re-written to make clear what is being referred to by each term.

2 - If I am reading the paragraph correctly, then we should pick a consistent terminology. Although "The Commonwealth" might be clear to many readers, it wasn't clear to me. (I had a guess as to what it meant given the context, but I had to click on through to figure things out. While clicking on through isn't the worst thing in the world, articles should, presumably, be written with clarity in mind.) I'd guess the same lack of familiarity with the term is far from rare amongst Wikipedia's readers.

Moreover, given the European context, I am not sure that the broader political entity should be the focus of the sentence. Nor am I am sure that one could easily find a source for the public/private status of the universities in all 53 independent states in the Commonwealth or that there is a good reason for organizing the analysis by this organization (as opposed to the geographic organization followed in the rest of the article).

Accordingly, unless there are strong countervailing reasons, I'd suggest using either England or the United Kingdom.

B. Trimming the opening text

Regardless of the first issue, I suggest that the first text be trimmed substantially. Some of the text would be more appropriately placed in a region-specific section within the article, and the listing of schools is too long to be particularly useful other than to promote the listed schools.

Hence, I propose the text prior to the Contents tabled be replaced with:

A public university is a university that is predominantly funded by public means through a national or regional government. Worldwide, prominent public institutions are highly influential centres of research, and many of these universities are ranked among the world's best in The Times Higher Education Supplement and the Academic Ranking of World Universities.

(More could be added in terms of a general opening, but I want to at least take the initial step of pruning back.)

Some of the other text could certainly form the beginnings of a subsection on the history of the public university as an institution (e.g., "British universities have institutional autonomy, which has developed over centuries. In the 20th century they came to rely on the government for most of their funding." and "Many public universities were formerly private or religious institutions."). That, however, I leave for another day.

Given the scope of these changes, and the fact that they are essentially deletions, I wanted to set forth my reasoning for commentary prior to enacting them. Unless there are objections, I will make these changes (and then watch, of course, as they get instantly reverted). Cka3n 22:56, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Does the "many of these universities are ranked among the world's best in The Times Higher Education Supplement and the Academic Ranking of World Universities" statement need to be in the lead? It sounds like a pre-emptive attempt to defend the quality of public institutions and such a defensive reaction is out of place, particularly in the lead. --ElKevbo 16:11, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Federally chartered universities

I'm trying to find out which universities in the domestic US were federally chartered. Your article says that only US military insitutions and West Point are federally chartered. However a goole search has shown me that the following were all federally chartered:

Southeastern University, Washington, D.C. American University, Washington, D.C. Gallaudet, Washington, D.C. Institute of American Indian Arts, NM

Does anyone know where I might find a complete list, as I don't think google is the best way to find my answer.

Dmz7 14:04, 3 May 2007 (UTC)

Changed pic and shortened list

I changed the pic so that this article could have a pic of a British public university. I winnowed down the list a little, including taking out Oxford and Cambridge in order not to confuse an international audience who might have a different definition of "public"; there seems to be some controversy as to whether in fact they are public. Someone who's familiar with this issue really needs to clean up the "United Kingdom" section of this article as well. --AntigrandiosËTalk 08:19, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

There is a fundamental problem with this article (and it's sister private university) which is that there is no universal definition of the terms Public University and Private University. They have very clear meanings in the USA, and these meanings translate moderately well to a small number of other countries, but there is no overall international meaning. There is an attempt at the start of the article to provide a universal definition, based on extent of public funding, but this doesn't make much sense as most US private universities receive extensive public funding for research, and many of them would be public universities by the definition given. It seems likely that the intention was to refer to public funding for teaching, but even this doesn't really make sense internationally. The case of the United Kingdom is reasonably typical: all universities in the UK are private bodies, but all universities except Buckingham currently choose to receive significant public funding for some undergraduate courses. For this reason the UK usually makes a distinction between "Private Universities" (Buckingham) and "Universities" (everywhere else), with the term "Public Universities" rarely used except by sociologists and politicians. Note that all UK universities can opt out of the public funding system at any time if they wish, and several regularly discuss the possibility of doing so.
In Oxford the "standard undergraduate fee" for ordinary EU undergraduates will be £3,375 per year for students starting in 2011, although the fee varies greatly among degrees (the MBA fee is £36,300). The contribution to teaching from public funds is hard to calculate as it comes in several different ways, but is about £4000 per year. From 2012 the standard fee will be £9,000, and the direct contribution to teaching from public funds will be very much reduced (zero for most degree subjects). There will still be an indirect contribution in the form of a cheap loan system.
My aim here is not to rehash the arguments over whether Oxford is public or private, but to reiterate the position that the words (or at least the description "public") simply don't make sense in a UK context, and any rewrite of the UK section should reflect this. From my reading of the sections on several other countries it seems clear to me that similar issues arise (see, for example, Japan, where universities are divided three ways into "public", "private", and "national") and the whole article needs major reform. Jonathan A Jones (talk) 09:43, 14 April 2011 (UTC)
couldn't agree more. The main distinction should be the extent of regulation (and over what functions), rather than the amount of funding flowing through the institution. At present, the article as a whole is very uneven. Matt Whyndham (talk) 16:21, 12 September 2012 (UTC)

Quotas in Brazil

I've changed the sentence "There are quotas for students whose secondary (high school) education was made entirely in a public funded school, and there are also racial quotas (generally 50%)" to "In many Universities, there are quotas for students whose secondary (high school) education was made entirely in a public funded school (generally, the quota is 50%), and there are also racial quotas, but usually restricted to students from public high school too". There were three reasons. First, the sentence made it implicit that every public university in Brazil offer quotas, but that is not true. I included the example of UFMG, that has no quotas at all, despite having a bonus system. Second, the position of "(generally 50%)" right after racial quotas implied that racial quotas were about 50%. That is not true, most Universities give 50% to public school students, not to racial quota. Third, the sentence didn't show that racial quotas are almost allways restricted to public shool students. In Brazil race is usually decided by self-declaration, so a system that does not restrict racial bennefits would fail completly, hence the policy of giving racial quotas only to public school students. Most of them are poor and the composition of the lower class is considerably darker than the higher class, despite both high and low Brazilian class being heavly mixed, when compared to countries like USA. 201.58.186.9 (talk) 04:31, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

United Kingdom

Could somebody who knows about it please sort out the first paragraph of the United Kingdom section. It is currently ungrammatical to the point of being incomprehensible, and also out of date ("... will happen in 2012"). GrindtXX (talk) 11:27, 20 July 2013 (UTC)

Women's colleges that become coeducational

I have a question about this since Florida State University was recently included in this group. FSU was established in 1851 as a men's only university and became coed in 1858 when it absorbed a women's school. FSU was coed until 1905, when Florida passed a law making FSU female only. FSU was made coeducational again in 1947 and has been so ever since. So basically FSU was a women's college from 1905-1947, only a fraction of it's history.

Is it appropriate to include it in the "women's colleges that became coeducational" category? For example, Vassar College was founded as a women's college and is one of the Seven Sisters Colleges. FSU was most clearly founded as a men's college and later became coeducational. Does FSU really fit in this category?Sirberus 03:01, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

I think you make a very strong case - this is quite a fascinating history. Perhaps we need to create a new category "Men's Colleges that became coeducational" and then FSU could reside in both. -Classicfilms 00:25, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

Private Schools cost less than Public Schools.

Public university tuition, if any, is typically lower than in private universities.

Is this refering to American Universities or Universities elsewhere? If it is refering to State Universities in the U.S., then it is misleading. Most research shows that State Universities, regardless of their "sticker price", charge more for tuition than private universities, not less.

Above by DougRisk.
The College Board reports that for 2005-06 average US private 4-year tuition is $21,235, vs. $5,491 for public tuition. Scholarships and financial aid affect the "sticker price" at both private and public schools, of course. Remember that the wording you modified in the article referred to the tuition fee, not a per-student cost that may somehow factor in state-subsidies. I'm inclined to revert the change you made without further evidence, along with a similar change at Public school, so please post links. Jkiang 18:39, 2 January 2006 (UTC)"

Private universities offer far more endowment for people with incomes below 80,000 a year. Often--in fact, in most cases--if you make less than 60,000 a year, you can go to a private university (especially a prestigious one) for cheaper than a public university. I believe most of the Ivy League and Stanford have eliminated tuition for students whose family or personal income is below 45,000 a year.

Morrill Act

I don't think the statement about the Morrill Act is correct. The Morrill Act set up land grants to fund universities, not necessarily to provide land for their campuses. A number of land-grant universities are not sited on their land. Cornell University, for example, was granted land in northwest Wisconsin and the timber from that land provided funds for the university; however, the university is in upstate New York.--76.237.186.14 04:53, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Different Meanings of Public University

I believe it is important to stress the different meanings of the term "public university" as used in English-speaking countries and elsewhere in the world. In continental Europe or Latin America, a public university normally meansan institution of higher learning that is actually run by the state (normally subordinate to some central or regional government ministry). By contrast, most British and several Canadian universities (e.g. McGill) are only "public" to the extent that most (though not all) of their funding comes from the state in terms of teaching or research grants. Otherwise, they are privately-managed, independent institutions meaning that: (1) they elect their own officials/administration normally without state interference; (2) they hire their own faculty and staff (who, unlike in France or Germany, are not career civil servants/governmment employees); (3) they own property and other (short and long-term) assets; (4) they define their own standards/criteria for the admission of students, again normally without state interference; (5) they independently set out the curricula for the different courses of studies they offer and specify the requirements that have to be fulfilled for awarding different academic degrees; and, finally, (6) they are free to charge tuition and other ancillary fees from matriculated students, although, in this case, that may be subject to government regulation in certain jurisdictions (in England for example, there are statutory limitations on tution fees that can be charged to undergraduate domestic students; those restrictions however do not apply to international (non-EU) or graduate students, who make up a considerable percentage nowadays of the student body). Furthermore, the fact that a few UK universities like Cambridge or Oxford actually have sizeable private endowments of their own (at least, by European standards) also helps to reduce their dependence on central government grants. 161.24.19.82 12:04, 25 September 2006 (UTC)

This is not quite true. British universities are established by Royal Charters issued by the Crown, and they are regulated by the Privy Council.

Important: Public versus Private

The following quote from the LSE talk page seems to support the view that UK universities (and indeed a few older Canadian universities established by Royal Charter) are actually PRIVATE entities, although maintained mostly by public funds:

" The LSE is a private institution. Indeed, since the privatisation of the polytechnics in 1992, all higher education institutions in the United Kingdom are private entities. Most are incorporated by a royal charter. The LSE is incorporated under the UK Companies Act. Public bodies in the UK can only be established by a parliamentary act and cannot be established by Royal Charter only nor under the UK Companies Act.

The question of public vs private is indeed an ownership not a funding issue. Harvard University, a U.S. private institution, receives more public funds than some U.S. public institutions. The University of California is a public university system (with multiple campus) and its assets are owned by the State of California through its appointed Board of Regents (trustees of the state). The Swiss Federal Institute of Technologies - one in Zurich, the other in Lausanne - are both public institutions, its assets owned by the Swiss Federal Government.

Marcel Bigger Vice Chairman of the Executive Committee LSE Alumni Association"

Please note the important point above that the term "public university" applies only to institutions like German/French universities or state universities in the U.S. whose assets are actually owned by the State, and not to bodies like Cambridge or McGill whose assets are privately owned. I strongly believe the Wikipedia is making a serious legal mistake by referring to UK and Canadian universities as "public universities" and, accordingly, I think professional legal review of the contents of this article is needed. Mbruno 19:49, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

This article is a mess and causes more confusion than clarification

I'm from the UK and this article is highly problematic - it is causing all sorts of Universities in the UK to be labeled as public due to this rather broad idea that if you receive money from the Government you are a public university. BPP University should be public on that basis and of course that is a nonsense and they themselves describe themselves as private. Cameron Scott (talk)

It actually says "receives significant public funds", not any money. BPP University is not listed among the providers receiving public funds by the UK's Office for Students, so would not be considered public on this basis. Almost all UK universities are, however, considered public universities – it is entirely correct that "all sorts of universities" are public, from large research universities like UCL or Oxford to small specialist institutions like Arts University Bournemouth. Robminchin (talk) 06:55, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
That's the block grant - BPP still accesses the student loan book which is a significant larger amount of money that the tiny amounts in the block grant. The ONS reclassified large chunks of student loans as government spending earlier in the week, so the issue cannot dodged by saying it's off the books and not public funds. Indeed, the ONS doesn't even use the term 'public University' but rather classifies UK Universities as being in the 'non-profit institutions serving households (S.15) sector'. Cameron Scott (talk)
The whole public/private distinction doesn't really make sense in the UK, which is pretty what this page says. The corresponding section at Private university#United Kingdom is perhaps slightly clearer. Jonathan A Jones (talk) 11:57, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
That actually doesn't make much sense either - BBP for example accepts some regulation in order to access the Student Loan system... Cameron Scott (talk) 12:41, 19 December 2018 (UTC)
The ONS has partly reclassified student loans as public expenditure, but the loans are made to students not universities. I have seen nothing to suggest that the fee income of universities has been reclassified as direct income from the government. Robminchin (talk) 06:51, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
To be more formally accurate, the government will now be writing off the value of the loan that is expected to never be repaid immediately, rather than 30 years later. The money is still a loan, it hasn't been transformed into a grant or any other form of direct support, it is the partial write-off of the loan that is the government expenditure. This does not, therefore, affect whether a university is in receipt of public funds. Robminchin (talk) 07:14, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
The correct position is that currently all UK universities are formally private universities, in the sense of being independent self-governing organisations, not owned or managed by government. All UK universities are regulated, either as universities or as educational charities, but this does not make them public bodies. However the great majority of UK universities accept greater regulation as a consequence of receiving government funding and of their students being eligible for student loans, and so are widely considered to be in some sense public. But fundamentally they are not public bodies because they could choose to leave such additional regulation, by ceasing to receive such funding, at any time. Jonathan A Jones (talk) 14:27, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
Some are not even educational charities - LSE is incorporated as a private company. Cameron Scott (talk) 11:00, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
This is mistaken. LSE is an exempt charity incorporated as a company limited by guarantee ([1]) – one of the standard forms for charities ([2]). Robminchin (talk) 16:22, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
Note that "exempt charities" are no longer exempt in the old sense, and now have to be regulated, although they have some choice about the identity of their regulator [3]. Jonathan A Jones (talk) 17:15, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
They're also considered public bodies for the purposes of the Freedom of Information Act and the Equality Act (and probably others) while they receive public funding. In the 19th century, universities were considered public bodies even though they didn't receive government funding, simply by virtue of being universities (thus justifying government interference through royal commissions, etc.), e.g. [4]. As the law treats universities receiving public funding as public bodies, describing them as public universities does not seem inappropriate. Robminchin (talk) 16:47, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
With a bit more digging, it seems that Higher Education Corporations (mostly former polytechnics) are always considered public authorities for the purposes of the Equality Act and the FOI Act, even if they're not receiving public funds (they all are). To stop being public authorities, they would first have to dissolve the HE Corporation and replace it with another form (Company Limited by Guarantee being the obvious one), which requires an order from the Secretary of State. These universities (unlike those which are civic, statutory or chartered corporations) are thus constitutionally public bodies and unable to change this by their own will alone.
It seems there is therefore a three-fold taxonomy:
  1. Universities that are civic, statutory or chartered corporations or that are not-for-profit companies, which may choose whether or not they are treated as public authorities by deciding whether or not to accept block-granting funding from the government;
  2. Universities that are Higher Education Corporations, which are constitutionally public authorities;
  3. Universities that are for-profit companies, which may not receive block-grant funding from the government and are thus never treated as public authorities.
To this could be added that civic, statutory or chartered corporations (virtually all 'old universities', only LSE isn't in this category as far as I know) have to have changes to their statutes approved by the Privy Council, whether or not they are in receipt of block-grant funding. The example of Buckingham, frequently referred to as private, and talk of Oxford and Cambridge 'going private' would appear to indicate that this level of regulation is not generally thought to make an institution 'public'.
I'm trying to identify non-primary sources for this (i.e. not having to read through the texts of the laws and amendments), so I can add some clarification to the article. Robminchin (talk) 19:36, 24 December 2018 (UTC)

Definition

The definition for the article is: "a university that is in state ownership or receives significant public funds through a national or subnational government, as opposed to a private university." There is no source for this definition and I have not been able to find one. All the sources I have seen on public universities discuss government run universities, such as the state or provincial college systems in the U.S., Western Canada and Australia or the redbrick universities of the United Kingdom. TFD (talk) 02:50, 4 November 2019 (UTC)

The summary text at the top summarises what is in the article. As the definition of public university varies between countries, the summary of what a public university is must necessarily be slightly vague in order to encompass the different definitions. However, you are mistaken in your reading as the UK, Australian and Canadian public universities are in receipt of government funds but are not government run. A definition based solely on government ownership or being government run would exclude almost all UK, Canadian, Australian, etc., public universities.
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