Review\n“Baum and McPherson provide a novel and convincing analysis of the role higher education plays in our unequal society and propose realistic policies and practices that can help us to achieve lasting change. This invaluable book is essential reading for college and university leaders, for policymakers who want to understand the enterprise they oversee, and for anyone concerned with making our society less unjust.”―Harry Brighouse, coauthor of Educational Goods\n“In this gem of a book, Baum and McPherson explore the disturbing underbelly of America’s system for handing out economic opportunity. Combining their deep expertise about higher education, these economists present an assessment that is sober without being dismal, dismissing quick fixes but offering hope based on sensible long-term policies.”―Charles T. Clotfelter, Duke University\n“This highly readable, eye-opening book affirms the essential contributions of higher education in the United States while also showing why it alone cannot ensure upward mobility and economic growth. It is also a call to action, identifying policies to broaden the impact of institutions and situate them within a more equitable and productive economy.”―David Baime, senior vice president for government relations, American Association of Community Colleges\n“This book’s unique contribution is to examine higher education not in isolation but in the context of inequality in American society, from children’s earliest experiences in life to what they encounter as adults in the labor market. Baum and McPherson draw on this more complete picture of higher education’s role to detail a set of institutional actions and policy changes that would foster a more equal society.”―Matthew M. Chingos, coauthor of Game of Loans: The Rhetoric and Reality of Student Debt\n“Written by two of the nation’s most respected experts on education, this book rejects the increasingly popular idea that reforms in higher education can level the playing field, explaining why we must pay more attention to opportunity-enhancing measures in the precollege years and the labor market. Baum and McPherson provide a well-informed, realistic, and comprehensive account of how to create more opportunity in America.”―Isabel Sawhill, author of The Forgotten Americans: An Economic Agenda for a Divided Nation\n“This important contribution provides not just a highly readable description of the current state of American higher education, it challenges us to do better. As the authors show, the stakes are high. May this compelling call to action lead to lasting and meaningful change.”―Morton Schapiro, president of Northwestern University\nWhy higher education is not a silver bullet for eradicating economic inequality and social injustice\nWe often think that a college degree will open doors to opportunity regardless of one’s background or upbringing. In this eye-opening book, two of today’s leading economists argue that higher education alone cannot overcome the lasting effects of inequality that continue to plague us, and offer sensible solutions for building a more just and equitable society.\nSandy Baum and Michael McPherson document the starkly different educational and social environments in which children of different races and economic backgrounds grow up, and explain why social equity requires sustained efforts to provide the broadest possible access to high-quality early childhood and K–12 education. They dismiss panaceas like eliminating college tuition and replacing the classroom experience with online education, revealing why they fail to provide better education for those who need it most, and discuss how wages in our dysfunctional labor market are sharply skewed toward the highly educated. Baum and McPherson argue that greater investment in the postsecondary institutions that educate most low-income and marginalized students will have a bigger impact than just getting more students from these backgrounds

Can College Level the Playing Field?: Higher Education in an Unequal Society

Politics & Social Sciences

McPherson, Michael

Baum, Sandy

Social Sciences

Princeton University Press

An invaluable primer on the role economic reasoning plays in campus debate and decision making\nCampus Economics provides college and university administrators, trustees, and faculty with an essential understanding of how college finances actually work. Sandy Baum and Michael McPherson explain the concepts needed to analyze the pros, the cons, and the trade-offs of difficult decisions, and offer a common language for discussing the many challenges confronting institutions of higher learning today, from COVID-19 to funding cuts and declining enrollments.\nEmphasizing the unique characteristics of the academic enterprise and the primacy of the institutional mission, Baum and McPherson use economic concepts such as opportunity cost and decisions at the margin to facilitate conversations about how best to ensure an institution’s ongoing success. The problems facing higher education are more urgent than ever before, but the underlying issues are the same in good times and bad. Baum and McPherson give nontechnical, user-friendly guidance for navigating all kinds of economic conditions and draw on real-world examples of campus issues to illustrate both institutional constraints and untapped opportunities.\nCampus Economics helps faculty, administrators, trustees, and government policymakers engage in constructive dialogue that can lead to decisions that align finite resources with the pursuit of the institutional mission.

Campus Economics: How Economic Thinking Can Help Improve College and University Decisions

Reference

San Miguel, a city located in central Mexico, is steeped in history; it is the place where the Mexican war for independence from Spain started in 1810. Today, San Miguel retains old-world charm as many of its elegant buildings have been preserved; the city is practically a museum of Spanish and Mexican history and architecture. This unique book displays over 350 color photographs and leads a tour of San Miguel’s indoor living at its finest. Pass into open courtyards, interior patios, and extraordinary homes through doors that are closed to the average visitor. Fifteen chapters illustrate its charming doors, living rooms, kitchens, dining rooms, bedrooms, bathrooms, stairways, furniture, lighting, art, and talavera ceramics---all with intense color that pervades the senses. Be inspired to include Mexican details into your next building project.

San Miguel's Mexican Interiors

Arts & Photography

Architecture

Schiffer

San Miguel de Allende, a city located in central Mexico, is steeped in history and old world charm. Many of its elegant buildings have been preserved and it is practically a museum of Spanish and Mexican history and architecture. This unique book displays over 325 color photographs and leads a tour of San Miguel’s outdoor living at its finest. Pass through massive gates into open courtyards, exposed rooftop patios, and extraordinary homes that are closed to the average visitor. Fifteen chapters illustrate its charming facades, gates, patios, gardens, fountains, columns, pools, cantera, windows, walls, cupolas, wrought iron, street graphics, construction…all with intense color that pervades the senses. Be inspired to include Mexican details in your next building project.

San Miguel's Mexican Exteriors

This unique book of over 325 full color photographs takes you into a little-known world of magic, mystery, and color, behind the walls of some of the most exclusive living areas in Mexico. Here you can see what typical visitors are forbidden; a world created by each of the homeowners. As an invited guest, you will witness the ingenuity of Mexican workers with a bent for the exotic, as no two gardens are alike. The variety and creative effort highlights the richness of Mexican architecture that has not diminished with time. Take a trip to Mexico’s private gardens and patios through seventeen chapters that illustrate outdoor living and dining rooms, rooftop terraces and shelters, garden walks and sculpture, outdoor fireplaces, and gardens, all in colors of the rainbow. Be inspired to include a Mexican environment into your next outdoor project.

Mexican Gardens & Patios

Crafts, Hobbies & Home

Gardening & Landscape Design

In many towns throughout Mexico, houses still retain blank exteriors facing the street, some with an occasional window. However, beyond these canyon-forming walls, one is exposed to interiors alive with rainbows of color. The front of the house may be one story, but once inside the entrance, a visitor might be exposed to two or more stories, probably with a rooftop terrace and a fantastic view of a downtown skyline. The architecture of the houses reflects eras when Mexico was at peaks in its history and when some buildings were extravagant homes built by famous families. Now they may be occupied by commercial or public venues, but their details reflect the rich quality of architecture that has not diminished with time. Over 240 color photographs present fascinating doors, interior rooms, stairways, fireplaces, lighting, ceilings, floors, and plenty of details that can inspire today's homeowners, architects, and decorators who seek to live with authentic Mexican character.

Colores: Mexican Interiors: Mexican Interiors

See beautiful hammered copper vessels made long ago and today at Santa Clara del Cobre, Mexico, a small town in the southwest state of Michoacan. From nothing more than a chunk of copper or sheet metal, artists here have spent centuries creating both useful and decorative copper items, with specially made hand tools and machinery. The richness of the work has undergone a marked improvement in design, materials, and finish during the second half of the twentieth century. Hundreds of copper items from the Museo Nacional de Cobre illustrate the art's evolution. 393 colorful photographs, a historical perspective, list and introductions to 540 copper artists, and detailed descriptions combine in this impressive reference. Be inspired to visit Mexico's Michoacan state and Santa Clara del Cobre, to meet the artists in their workshops.

Mexican Arts Series: Hammered Copper

Antiques & Collectibles

William Spratling was a U.S. educator whose artistic impact caused a successful silver jewelry industry to arise in Taxco, Mexico, in the 1940s. This book examines Spratling's Mexican work and explores how his talent attracted the attention of the U.S. Interior Department. In 1945, he was invited to create a similar program for Alaska, where it was felt that the indigenous people needed to be encouraged for their own artistic expression and economic gain. Thirty never-before-seen Alaskan models, lost for over 50 years, have been found and now are preserved at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of the American Indian. These and original designs for the project, made in 1949, are presented here along with Spratling’s original 1945 report to the Arts and Crafts Board. Also featured are Spratling’s designs that inspired a new company’s formation to carry on his legacy at Taxco. Clearly, innovation in designs and inspiration for generations of new artists have risen from Spratling’s work.

The William Spratling Legacy

Business & Money

Industries

Mexico's contemporary architecture was inspired by the vision of Luis Barragán, one of Mexico's most influential 20th century architects. This unique book showcases the original work of 26 contemporary Mexican architects, with a wide variety of impressive architectural designs. Containing over 370 full color photos and architectural plans, it takes readers into a world of creativity and beauty, a world whose roots go back centuries. These same architects succeed in creating their own version of modernism, imbuing it with the warmth and vibrancy of their native Mexico, featuring clean lines and raw color combinations. Yet their work is infused with a modern ingenuity all their own. Each architect's work is featured in a dedicated chapter showing one of their recent projects. Today's Mexican architects, both young and old, bring a new level of creativity to Mexico's architectural tradition.

Contemporary Mexican Architecture: Continuing the Heritage of Luis Barragán

Schiffer+publishing Ltd

Practical solutions for improving higher education opportunities for disadvantaged students
Too many disadvantaged college students in America do not complete their coursework or receive any college credential, while others earn degrees or certificates with little labor market value. Large numbers of these students also struggle to pay for college, and some incur debts that they have difficulty repaying. The authors provide a new review of the causes of these problems and offer promising policy solutions.
The circumstances affecting disadvantaged students stem both from issues on the individual side, such as weak academic preparation and financial pressures, and from institutional failures. Low-income students disproportionately attend schools that are underfunded and have weak performance incentives, contributing to unsatisfactory outcomes for many students.
Some solutions, including better financial aid or academic supports, target individual students. Other solutions, such as stronger linkages between coursework and the labor market and more structured paths through the curriculum, are aimed at institutional reforms. All students, and particularly those from disadvantaged backgrounds, also need better and varied pathways both to college and directly to the job market, beginning in high school. We can improve college outcomes, but must also acknowledge that we must make hard choices and face difficult tradeoffs in the process.
While no single policy is guaranteed to greatly improve college and career outcomes, implementing a number of evidence-based policies and programs together has the potential to improve these outcomes substantially.

Making College Work: Pathways to Success for Disadvantaged Students

Holzer, Harry J.

Education & Reference

Brookings Institution Press

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Books by Baum, Sandy