John Edwards a year ago: Universal Higher Ed

I sat down with John Edwards in Chapel Hill last year before he was a declared candidate for the Democratic nomination for president. I was interested in interviewing him for The Chronicle of Higher Education because we were in the midst of a series called the Growing Divide in which were were looking at the haves and have-nots in higher education and Edwards focused on "the two Americas" a lot during the 2004 presidential campaign. In the interview, which you can find here on The Chronicle's Web site, Edwards talked about how he thinks the country should basically adopt universal higher education. The suggestion surprised me given the cost, but Edwards maintained that the reason this hasn't been debated publicly is because no one has made the case for it.

-- Jeff Selingo

P.S. I promise to leave John Edwards to Jay Mathews after this post. It just had to be said.