An Accidental Triumph

The Improbable History of American Higher Education

Sol Gittleman

• Publisher: Vesto Books
• Year: 2023
• Print ISBN: 9781959000044
• eBook ISBN: 9781959000051
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education Biographies

The story of American higher education, written with insight and humor, by an acclaimed educator.
"There's no more important story to be told at this moment in America then why higher education matters. And there's no more adept and engaging storyteller than Sol Gittleman." —Larry Tye, New York Times bestselling author of Satchel and Demagogue

"Hardly a day passes without reference to some scandal, fraud, intellectual or moral failure, or other ill associated with American academic institutions," writes Sol Gittleman in his bracing new book, An Accidental Triumph. "If American higher education is such a failure, why are students and scholars from all over the world still so eager to secure a place in one of these institutions? Is American higher education a disaster or the envy of the world?"

Gittleman confronts this contradiction in this dynamic mix of history, analysis, and personal reflection. An Accidental Triumph tells the engaging story of how American higher education evolved from a patchwork of seminaries in the early nineteenth century into the world's leader in research by the middle of the twentieth. Gittleman links this fascinating story to his own fifty-year academic career, which coincided with an explosive rise in enrollment, spurred by the GI Bill, and an unparalleled postwar boom in faculty hiring, prompted by massive new federal support for academic research from organizations such as the National Science Foundation.

Writing with authority, frankness, and unfailing wry good humor, Gittleman surveys the triumphs, tragedies, and tensions of the history of American higher education. Despite the relentless criticism, Gittleman finds good reason to remain optimistic about the future of teaching and research at the college and university level in the United States. 

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Preface. A History like No Other
• Chapter 1. In the Beginning: The First 200 Years
• Chapter 2. Transformation of Sorts: 1860–1900
• Chapter 3. Second Best at Best: 1900–1940
• Chapter 4. National Socialism and the German Universities, 1933–1945
• Chapter 5. Taking Us to the Top of the Mountain: A Man Named Bush
• Chapter 6. The Perfect Storm
• Chapter 7. Beyond Belief: A Refusal to Accept the Honor
• Epilogue. The Future of Higher Education in America
• Acknowledgments
• Index
• About the Author