Spellings: Higher Education Is “A New Civil Right”

She’s already been on the job for more than seven months – but on Thursday, UNC held an inauguration ceremony for still-new system president Margaret Spellings.

Speaking at Memorial Hall, Spellings delivered an inaugural address that called North Carolinians to recognize higher education as “a new civil right.”

“Mass public education was an American invention, and it underpinned the American century,” she said. “It’s time to raise our expectations once again.

“Higher education is the next frontier – a new civil right.”

More on Spellings’ address at the UNC system website, NorthCarolina.edu.

Spellings takes over as UNC system president at a critical moment in higher education. The cost of a college education is skyrocketing at a far higher rate than any other good or service – and that’s making college increasingly inaccessible to more people, at a time when a college degree has never been more essential.

The UNC system has long been recognized for its efforts to remain accessible; UNC-Chapel Hill in particular is often ranked as one of the best “value” universities in the nation. But Spellings said the challenge is growing, and the UNC system must do better.

“Our system too often fails those who come from rural, low-income, first-generation and minority families,” she said. “As long as we tolerate such divides in opportunity, the fundamental promise of higher education remains unfulfilled.”

Spellings pointed especially to income disparities, racial disparities, and geographic disparities – observing that a high school senior in one county might be twice as likely to attend college as a high school senior just one county over.

“We cannot allow a child’s future to be dependent on zip code,” she said.

And she concluded that eliminating persistent inequalities – “pernicious gaps in opportunity” – needs to be a central part of UNC’s mission.

Spellings did not offer any specific new policy proposals in her address – but she did conclude with an optimistic note. Eliminating inequality is a daunting challenge, she said – but UNC is up to the task.

“That’s never been done before – not here, not anywhere else,” she said. “But it’s plainly needed if our state, and our people, are going to thrive in the century ahead.”