News Releases
Office of Governor Gary Locke
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE - February 4, 1998
Contact:  Governor's Communications Office, 360-902-4136

Locke says re-tool higher education for the future

OLYMPIA - In what may be the most comprehensive approach to improving Washington's higher education system ever taken, Gov. Gary Locke today launched his plan for creating an innovative system of life-long learning for all Washington citizens.

Locke announced he has assembled a panel of top leaders from business, technology, labor, education and communities all across the state to conduct a searching appraisal of how Washington can best create a world-class system of life-long learning by the year 2020.

"Washington's outstanding colleges and universities have served us well for the past 100 years," Locke said. "To meet the challenges of the next 100 years, however, we must change and excel at a higher level. Our system of higher education must become more accountable, more competitive, more efficient, more flexible and more responsive to student and business needs."

The 2020 Commission on the Future of Higher Education, which begins its duties this month, will take a broad approach in assessing what Washington citizens need from colleges and universities and the best ways to fulfill those needs. The commission will produce recommendations by the end of September 1998.

Locke said the 21-member commission will tackle issues of academic excellence, accountability, quality improvements, educational reforms, affordable access, life-long learning opportunities that use technology, and a competitive workforce that contributes to economic vitality. He directed the commission to reevaluate in truly fundamental ways how higher education is provided, and to think in very new and creative ways about possible changes.

Many experts, including the numerous presidents of distinguished universities and others serving on a national panel known as the Kellogg Commission, have said the colleges and universities of the future will not necessarily be bound by the four walls of a classroom. Through technology and other innovations, instruction could be provided where and when the student wants it.

In the future, higher education is not expected to serve mainly the 18- to 24-year-old population who can live on a college campus, but will instead serve the needs of adults of all ages who need updated training and knowledge throughout their careers and for the personal enrichment of all citizens.

Locke said a key goal in this effort is to guarantee that people from all corners of the state will have the same access to top quality instruction, whether they live in Aberdeen or Zillah, Seattle or Spokane.

Co-chairing the commission will be John W. Creighton Jr., who served as chief executive officer for the Weyerhaeuser Company from 1991 until his retirement in December 1997. He is a member of the University of Puget Sound Board of Trustees. Sharing the commission chairmanship is Bob Craves, senior vice president of membership and marketing of Costco. Craves is on the Board of Trustees of Seattle University and Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C.

» Return to this month's News Releases
» View News Release Archive

Access Washington