"the preservation of eternal truths, the creation of new knowledge, the improvement of service whenever truth and knowledge may service the needs of man."

In this quote form Clark Kerr's The Uses of the University the author attempts to provide a simple answer to a complicated question. "What is the purpose of higher education?" But though his answer may seem simple it is in fact more than just poetic words. It signifies the changing role of higher education in the university. In the modern university of today the purposes of higher education are to 1) enlighten the individual , 2) provide adequate training and preparation of the individual and 3) prepare the individual to connect and function with the real world.

In the area of enlightenment, universities have enjoyed a long, rich history of individuals who have engaged themselves in the quest for scholastic excellence. Scholars such as John Newman believed that the university as an institution should be wholly concerned with intellect. And though the prescribed curriculum for intellect varies greatly from what we have today the need for enlightenment is still as great. The university must be able to provide an education that not only gives the student knowledge, but one that forces the student to draw upon that knowledge to use for higher reasoning. In an age where we are constantly bombarded by information from a variety of sources, it is especially important that the university "enlighten" the individual to be able to process and discern that information in a useful and beneficial manner.

The second purpose of higher education, that is, to provide adequate training and preparation of the individual, is something that the universities has only recently begun to do. Thus, this is the subject of much controversy between scholars who debate about the validity of research and training in the university. However, in this complex age of machines and computers there can be no doubt that individuals required specialized training in order to operate the machines that run our society. Thus, the university must fall more in line with the beliefs of Abraham Flexner who says that the university should be chiefly concerned with scholarship in both research and teaching. It is from this scholarship (particularly in research) that the university is able to form programs in which students can gain expertise in a specific field or discipline. And it is this expertise that will enable the individual to deal with the technologically sophisticated world that we live in.

The third and final purpose of higher education is to prepare the individual to connect and function with the real world. This may seem like a simple statement but throughout the history of the university, connecting students with the real world has been something akin to connecting the sky with the sea. From a distance the two look like they meet, but upon closer inspection the barriers of reality become disturbingly obvious. Part of the reason for this barrier between school and the "real world" had to do with the type of students who attended the university of the past (usually children of wealthy families) and the other part stemmed form the type of curriculum taught at the university (items such as rhetoric and Latin that had no practical application).

Fortunately, today's' s university are much more inclusive of people from the real world, and as such, these people have increasingly demanded that their education be able to connect them with the world they come from. To an even greater extent, society today has demanded that the university come down from the clouds and began to identify with and pay service to its needs. As Clark Kerr points out, this has resulted in faculty becoming participating members of society, even to the point of gaining national and international attention. And since the faculty serve as the primary role models for their students, than the students too are able to recognize and appreciate this capacity and thus begin to form their own bridge with the real world

The purpose of higher education has been something that both scholars and lay men have debated about for many, many years now. Whether the university should be a ivory palace for sophisticated intellects or a silicon assembly line for technicians and specialist are all questions that weigh heavily on the minds of people connected with higher education today. But perhaps the solution is not as one sided as people have made it out to be. The university is a dynamic living part of our society and as such is capable of taking on more than one role. The university will always have the primary role of enlightening the individual, but in this day and age it need not be restricted to just that. The purpose of higher education at the university should also serve to provide adequate training and preparation of the individual as well as prepare the individual to connect and function with the real world. It is only when an individual is able to be enlightened, trained, and connected with the world in which we live that a person will truly be ":educated:" And this in a nutshell is what the what the university or as Kerr calls it the "multiversity" should always be about.