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But liberal arts colleges are reluctant to expand in size out of fear of diminishing the quality of their experience. Their small-class and residential-campus models are expensive to provide, as are the financial aid programs they deploy to ensure diverse student bodies. Administrators fear breaking down the four-year, full-time model, which they believe is crucial to developing well-rounded students. And the liberal arts curriculum isn’t necessarily tied to preparing students for a specific career, and certainly not a single job

Despite significant looming challenges related to affordability, access, public skepticism about value, changing student demographics, and the influence of technology on students and education -- which all the attendees readily acknowledged -- most of the presidents of the liberal arts colleges here this week aren’t planning on substantively changing to how their institutions operate or their economic models.

I had an educator approach me at a conference recently to volunteer that “Our school is not ready for Google Docs.” Set aside whatever you happen to think about Google Docs; it’s a word processor in a Web browser, right? I told the tech director, “Congratulations, your school district has apparently managed to employ the last breathing mammals in the solar system incapable of using a word processor.” Isn’t it odd that technology directors are not held accountable for such failure over three decades? Could they possibly be enabling co-dependent behavior and helplessness in the teachers they are meant to lead?