Introduction

In no country is higher education so widely available to so large a share of people as it is in the United States. During the past two decades no country has worked harder than the United States to extend opportunities for higher education to the poor and disadvantaged. Despite this effort, a large gap remains between those served by higher education and those not served. And now, in the early 1980s, economic pressures and a mood of conservatism are beginning to narrow access to higher education for those disadvantaged and unconventional students who were beginning to be reached with increasing frequency and success. Nowhere is this recent downturn more apparent than in the inner cities of the nation's large urban centers—where the poor, minorities, unemployed youth, recent immigrants, and other underprivileged groups are so heavily concentrated.

The job of educating city dwellers, particularly the poor and disadvantaged, falls largely to those colleges and universities based in the city and primarily dedicated to serving the people of the city. These urban-oriented colleges and universities are an essential resource both to the city and to its people. For persons who are poor and disadvantaged, these institutions can open the door to fuller participation in the mainstream economy. The health and well-being of both cities and their people depend in large part on the improved delivery of education to people at all levels of city life.

In this report, we discuss problems faced by urban-oriented institutions generally. We also describe the experience of such institutions in six cities during a grant program sponsored by the Ford Foundation and summarize the results of research undertaken with Ford funding. (See the Foreword and Appendix B.) The views, analyses, and conclusions presented are our own. They are based on three years of extensive involvement in the grant projects and on consultations with a wide range of people—not only those who make policy but also those