Public–Private Partnerships for Higher Education Institutions in the United States

Abstract

Public–private Partnerships have become a common delivery method for diverse types of projects ranging from transportation and energy infrastructure to social infrastructure. Previous research has mainly focused on PPPs for infrastructure and other non-social projects. Although PPP projects for higher education institutions share some common attributes with their traditional counterparts, they also have unique aspects such as institutional culture as well as structure of ownership and management. Hence, the objectives of this research were to (1) conduct a systematic collection and analysis of PPP projects in higher education institutions in the United States; and (2) conduct a gap analysis to provide recommendations for future projects and lessons learned from past ones. A gap analysis of the published data on higher education PPPs was undertaken, identifying 45 educational PPP projects in the United States. The main areas of study were type of project (e.g., housing, commercial, mixed use, etc.), size, and investment made. Additionally, a questionnaire survey was disseminated to experts in the field to collect data on these projects and report on them. The results showed an increasing trend in project size between 1994 and 2018 with the majority being for housing developments while a smaller percentage was for commercial and utility projects. A geographical representation shows a large number of projects clustered in the Southern and Northeastern regions of the United States. Additionally, a questionnaire survey was used to identify samples of these projects and present them as a case study. The number of PPPs is expected to rise due to funding cuts and state appropriation cuts. Finally, the proposed recommendations can also be extrapolated for other social or infrastructure projects.

In the name of health and illness: An inquiry into Covid-19 vaccination policy in postsecondary education in Canada (published https://researchandappliedmedicine.com/revistas/vol1/revista6/vacunacion-covid-ingles.pdf)

“…Consider, for instance, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation award of $11.6bn in funding to 471 universities and higher education institutions in 66 countries over the past 10 years, most of them in North America (UniversityPhilanthropy.com, 2021), and the public acknowledgement by Bill Gates that his "best investment [in vaccines] turned $10 billion into $200 billion worth of economic benefit" (Belvedere, 2019). Additionally, the increasing reliance of academic funding, over the past few decades, on so-called private-public partnerships (Khallaf et al, 2022) raises concerns about what drives academic policies and practices (Mollenkamp, 2022). These facts, we argue, go a long way in explaining academia as a new engine of medicalization, and deserve further research.…”

Exploring the impacts of public-private partnership investments and collaborative solutions for tackling inadequate funding in French language education

“…By pooling the resources, expertise, and infrastructure of both sectors, PPPs can offer innovative solutions to address the funding gap in French language education. Public-Private Partnerships (PPPs) have emerged as a promising solution to address funding gaps in education [13][14][15] . However, the literature lacks specific research focusing on the effectiveness and applicability of PPPs in the context of French language education.…”