in the United States (Olson, 1985). The concept of making education free, or relatively so, to the direct beneficiary (the student) was not so much the fulfillment of a populist ideal, as it was a means of insuring that competently educated individuals in the required numbers would be available to American industry (Bartlett and Price, 1965). Thus, since the last half of the nineteenth century, industry and the educational establishment have been, in a sense, partners.
As the complexity of the American economy increased, the technical requirements of American industry increased (Sundquist, 1989). The increases in both organizational complexity and technological requirements changed the shape of industry involvement in the education process. Over the decades, industry moved toward a more direct form of involvement in education (Cummings and Wise, 1990). The relationship between industry and education, developed into a sort of partnership.
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, it became evident to some individuals in industry and in
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