Abstract
Universities in the USA and in many other countries have, over the years, made significant contributions to regional economic development, and continue to do so. However, several internal conditions have thus far limited this contribution to less than its full potential. This article focuses on three of these conditions: (a) in their approach to outreach as well as in their teaching, universities continue to adhere to a linear model for knowledge flow, and a hierarchy of values that ranks basic science above technology, and both above application; (b) universities, on the whole, continue to be collections of quasi-autonomous individuals. They have difficulty in defining, let alone implementing, collective goals; and (c) the prevailing system of recognition and rewarding of faculty work lacks mechanisms for evaluation and fails to provide incentives for innovation and achievement in externally oriented activities. These barriers to greater contribution to regional economic development by universities go to the very heart of the self-definition and value system of the faculty in these institutions. Change at best will be slow and difficult to perceive, yet there is reason to believe that it is beginning to take place, and that it will have an impact on all aspects of the societal role of universities, not only on regional economic development.
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