November 3, 2010

US Higher Ed More Accessible Than Affordable?

Higher Education Strategy Associates, a Toronto based research firm, released a report last week that measures 17 nations on the affordability and accessibility of their higher education systems.

The report, Global Higher Education Rankings 2010: Affordability and Accessibility in Comparative Perspective, finds that while the United States ranks on the low end of affordability, it ranks 4th overall in accessibility. This counterintuitive finding is repeated across other nations in the study and suggests that these two goals are not as closely linked as some might assume. Overall, Finland scored highest on both measures.

If you don’t want to read the entire report, or scrutinize the research methodology, you can find a summary of the report and a table of the main results at the Chronicle.