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For Profit and For Good opens up for critical examination a sector of higher education that surprisingly is rarely scrutinized in depth: the corporate institutions that have made up the fastest growing sector of US higher education in this century. It explores in detail the development of one such institution, Walden University, from its emergence out of the social turmoil and progressive education movement of the 1960s, through the succeeding decades, characterized by changes on every front. It looks frankly at the impact of these forces on the university’s original mission and describes the university’s response to them. It investigates the idea of whether the resources and incentives of being for-profit have changed higher education in a way that benefits not only investors but also learners, their workplaces, and the larger community. Business models of management, technological developments, and changes in an ever-evolving society are issues every university faces and seeing how this institution grappled with them will be instructive. Fundamentally, this book addresses the essential ethical question of whether the for-profit sector in higher education adds value, and, if so, what that added value might be.

This book will be of interest to researchers and students of the history of education, alternatives in higher education, the economics of education, education administration, reform and new developments in higher education, online learning, and policy studies in education. It is also relevant for policy makers and other managers in edubusiness.