In the past, there was a very definite compact in U.S. higher education so far as teaching was concerned. The elite ‘one percenter’ universities were well off and populated by staff who lived comfortably. These universities taught very few students but, obviously, given their wealth and consequent ability to buy excellent staff and small staff-student ratios, taught them well. The state universities and community colleges taught the bulk of students, often very well indeed but obviously in larger classes on the whole. Now that balance is being disturbed and the elite universities can seem like they want it all. This is going to be a real tension in U.S. higher education which, I suspect, will be mirrored all around the world as elite universities indulge in what might seem like the IT equivalent of a land grab in pursuit of further boosts to their reputation.
http://chronicle.com/blogs/worldwise/the-future-of-undergraduate-teaching/29672
