Title III , unique among higher education enactments in emphasizing the developing rather than the prestigious or populous institution, attempts to identify colleges having a potential for making substantial educational contributions. It calls for a partnership between the federal government and the developing colleges by supporting cooperative programs that link culturally different regions of the country and by fostering a national system of higher education. If the program were imaginatively administered and supplied with greatly increased federal support, a dramatic payoff would be possible. The history of the growth of interinstitutional cooperation, the movement to strengthen Negro colleges, the expansion of federal funding, and the development of Title III legislation, illustrate the program's main purpose, to generate social change. Because additional information is needed to guide federal decisions, application forms should be revised to include data on the established and developing college's social and academic contribution to its students, faculty, administrators and community, on how the program can be continued beyond the grant's term, and on the influences of the college's regional environment. Underadministered at present, the program needs aggressive leaders to help accelerate the movement toward more univeral higher education, the achievement of greater educational opportunity, the experiencing by students of a higher quality of learning, and toward focusing higher education upon relevant problems plaguing society. (JS)