The Work of the University (review)

This book is a collection of speeches and essays by Richard C. Levin published on the occasion of his tenth anniversary as president of Yale University. The book is divided into seven sections. "From the Beginning" contains two chapters in which Levin stakes out the goals and objectives he had when he became Yale's president. "The Purpose of a College Education" contains 10 chapters which were Levin's welcoming addresses to incoming Yale freshmen. "The Role of the University in Society," four chapters, discusses how universities contribute to the wider world through liberal education, the creation of knowledge, investment in local communities, and the cultivation of a liberated worldview in light of globalization. The eight chapters in "The Graduate's Role in Society" were Levin's salutary addresses to departing Yale seniors. "Building a Better Yale" contains two chapters in which Levin discusses his strategies for making Yale more renowned. "Honoring Schools, Teachers, and Traditions" contains eight chapters that recognize the contribution and influence of places (such as Princeton and Oxford) and people (such as Richard Nelson and Shimon Peres) on Levin and others. Finally, "Reflections on the American Economy" contains two chapters in which Levin comments as an economist on the importance of competitiveness in American industry and on the relationship between democracy and market economies.

Referring to the parts of these sections as "chapters" is something of a misnomer. Most of them are between four to six pages long, five are somewhat longer, and eight are shorter. Moreover, one does not predicate another. This characteristic could be seen as a strength: The book may be read front to back, back to front, from the middle out, or hop-scotching around without any loss of understanding. On the other hand, the brevity of the speeches and essays precludes a depth that many students of the American university might seek. Those in search of a sustained engagement with ideas that form a developed analysis of the core functions served by a major American research university and its president will have to wait for Levin's memoirs, when he has the time to write them. Indeed, if there is one point around which this collection coheres, it is that the modern university chief executive no longer has the time to write about the president's role and that of a university that seeks to lead others.

Still, the book contains an interesting set of snapshots, both on the duties performed by Levin and those in similar shoes and on Levin's understanding of Yale—its identity and mission—in the wider context of colleges and universities. In "Yale's Fourth Century," Levin discusses the prospects of Yale's future in light of its past; this essay is particularly instructive about the institution's claims on a distinguishing role. In Levin's view, Yale's mission is marked by two distinctive qualities: (a) a commitment to excellence in undergraduate education in the midst of a major research enterprise, and (b) the inculcation and training of leaders.

Precisely how such goals are accomplished forms the work of many a social scientist; but in Levin's talks to freshmen and seniors, we get glimpses of how such a mission is linked to recruiting ambitious students who are then socialized in an environment that mandates their achievement in scholarly, personal, and civic engagement. In the classroom, on the field, and perhaps especially in the close quarters of Yale's elaborate residential college system, borrowed from Cambridge, students learn Yale's motto: "We don't fail." Measured merely in terms of student retention and their graduation rates, let alone the socioeconomic attainments of graduating classes, Yale succeeds like almost no other institution.

The same essay points to additional institutional practices that account for Yale's niche in American higher education. Levin adopts the term "selective excellence" to...