We in the United States have rightly been proud of our system of higher education, with close to 5,800 public and private universities, four-year liberal arts colleges and community or junior colleges.

It has often been rightly stated that the thriving of the United States depends on the health of these institutions -- to provide research for a dynamic economy, to train those needed to run it and to educate a competent citizenry -- not to mention the broadening of minds that makes us a civilized country.

But there are trends which constitute a danger to the health of these vital institutions.

Begin with tuition and fees.

In the last 30-plus years, tuition and fees have risen almost three times as much as general inflation -- an increase even greater than that of medical costs.

To give a local example: In 1997-1998, tuition at the University of Pittsburgh for Pennsylvania residents averaged around $4,500, rising to $15,000 in 2009-2010. For out-of-staters, the increase went from about $14,000 to $26,000. Across the country, 58 institutions charged more than $50,000 a year in 2009.

Income has not gone up nearly as fast as tuition and fees. Yes, tuition payments are offset by financial aid, but you can be sure that such help has not increased concomitantly.

As a result, higher education has become less affordable and the debts of those who have braved it have become ever greater.

These astronomical increases in cost have converted students and their parents into consumers, where they once were clients of educational institutions who knew best. Among other consequences, this has led to huge college and university expenditures for buildings and staff that minister to students' non-educational "welfare," such as plush athletic and recreational facilities. Nice, perhaps, but diversions of funds needed for education -- the point of college, after all.

One reason for tuition increases is the constantly decreasing infusion of public funds, especially from strapped state governments. But another is the huge increase in administrative costs, thanks to the addition of what is euphemistically called support staff.

"Over the last two decades," begins an April 20, 2009, New York Times story, "colleges and universities doubled their full-time support staff while enrollment increased only 40 percent...." I am guessing that the Northwestern University dean's office is today three to four times as large as it was when I left it in 1987.

These new folks are not engaged in evil activities, but few of them, you can be sure, serve the primary functions of teaching and research. There is little doubt in my skeptical mind that, over time, administration has become an end in itself.

At the same time that "support" is more handsomely financed, the funding for teaching has shrunk markedly, certainly relative to enrollment. In institutions across the board -- from prestigious private universities to modest community colleges -- lecturers and adjuncts, full-time and part-time, have replaced regular tenured and tenure-track faculty.

"In the 20-year period, the [same] report found, the greatest number of jobs added, more than 630,000, were instructors -- but three-quarters of those were part-time (italics added)."

There are at least two consequences for education of this shift of teachers from regular faculty to ill-paid itinerants, an actual or potential Lumpenproletariat.

Granted that many lecturers do a conscientious job of teaching, but not remotely are they selected with the same care as are tenure-track faculty, not to mention the formidable hurdle that achieves tenure.

Second, the faculty cadre that debates and decides on educational policy, such as graduation requirements, is an ever-decreasing fraction of those who actually teach undergraduates.

These are issues that "consumers" of higher education should worry about.

Last and indeed least in financial effect, there has been a phenomenal increase in the compensation of college and university presidents.

A New York Times article of Nov. 2, 2009, reports that "23 Private College Presidents Made More Than $1 Million." Not many years before that none of them earned as much as half of that. The financial impact of this inflation is small relative to the total cost of the system of higher education, but its symbolic significance could not be greater.

University presidents have become CEOs of institutions now regarded as corporations. But colleges and universities are not like corporations. Their mission is not to invest money to make more money, ultimately the sole goal of a business.

The job of educational institutions is to accrue funds so as to educate undergraduate and advanced students, engage in research that pushes out the frontiers of knowledge and serve society as advisers and helpmates -- a different game altogether.

We must learn -- quickly -- to support institutions of higher education that are not built on the model of corporations. For if universities don't play the game of university, no other institution in our society will take their place. We cannot afford to lose them.

Cartoonist Rob Rogers does "Rob's Rough," an early look at his work and his creative process, exclusively at PG+, a members-only web site of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Our introduction to PG+ gives you all the details.