For most of recorded history higher education was reserved for the elite few. Today, the number of students attending colleges and universities around the world is exploding — a phenomenon specialists call the “massification” of education. Worldwide, university enrollment has grown from about 100 million in 2000 to 158 million today and is expected to reach 263 million by 2025. Higher education is also becoming much more international. The number of students studying outside their home countries is soaring; universities are opening branch campuses in other nations and expanding partnerships with foreign institutions at a rapid pace. But the massification of education also has raised concerns. Some experts worry that educational standards are falling, while others say a glut of graduates could find themselves saddled with debt and facing limited job prospects. Some even question whether the traditional university model still makes sense in the Internet age.

Reed Karaim, a freelance writer living in Tuscon, Arizona, has written for The Washington Post, U.S. News and World Report, Smithsonian, American Scholar, USA Weekend and other publications. He is the author of the novel, If Men Were Angels, which was selected for the Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers series. He is also the winner of the Robin Goldstein Award for Outstanding Regional Reporting and other journalism awards. Karaim is a graduate of North Dakota State University in Fargo, North Dakota.