The Issue at a Glance

Twenty Years in the Vineyards of Higher Education Reform

Stephen H. Balch, National Association of Scholars

In pausing to reflect on twenty years service tending the fragile vineyards of higher education reform as president and one of the founders of the National Association of Scholars, Stephen H. Balch stops to toast his hardy fellow vintners. Dr. Balch raises a weary but wiser glass to those who across the years and in many states have braved harsh academic climes and hostile intellectual winds to safeguard the tender fruits of reform. The vines remain tenuous and the atmosphere continues to prove largely forbidding, leaving reformers much more often with the bitter taste of vinegar than wine. Dr. Balch shares a cautionary cup. But through the sturdy dedication of vintners like the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, the Center for Equal Opportunity,