本书正文部分共四章，第一章，讨论了美国高等教育所面临的外部环境；第二章探讨了美国高等教育所面临的两难困境；第三章阐述什么是普通教育；第四章从普通教育的角度论述了什么是高等教育。作者在书中提出的许多观点，如高等教育中的职业教育化倾向、学科间的孤立主义现象、学习经典名著的价值和意义、大学应强调学生的思维训练等等，至今仍有很强的现实意义。

Perhaps the pivotal book in the reform of higher education in the United States, Robert M. Hutchins' classic is once again available, with a brilliant personal and professional appreciation by Harry S. Ashmore. When it was published in 1936 The Higher Learning in America brought into focus the root causes of the controversies that still beset the nation's educational system. Hutchins began tenure as a university president by declaring that the learning available in even the most prestigious universities was grossly defi cient. The curricular reforms and administrative reorganization he undertook at Chicago are set forth in this volume, along with the philosophical arguments he worked out to explicate and defend his views. Review “Dr. Hutchins' pages are packed with the stuff of study and challenge and purpose. His book represents the swing of the pendulum away from the practical and material toward the intellectual, not only in education, but in the conception of the good life.”–New York Times “Few men have said as much about any subject in a hundred pages as President Hutchins of the University of Chicago has said about education in this brief and brilliant book. Into four lectures he has packed not only a criticism of education in contemporary America but a description of education which he would put in its place if he had the power.”–Books --