The responsibilities of acting under secretary James Bergeron doubled as the Department of Education announced Wednesday that he will not only oversee the regulatory duties related to higher ed but manage the entire Office of Federal Student Aid.
Even in the wake of major layoffs, FSA remains the largest office in the department. It oversees the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, the allocation of Pell Grants and—at least for now—management of the $1.7 trillion student loan portfolio.
FSA had been led for much of the last year by Denise Carter, who is now retiring after more than 30 years working in the federal government. Carter also served as acting education secretary earlier this year. The department didn’t say in the news release why Carter was retiring now; the agency has offered early retirement offers and buyouts as part of an effort to reduce the workforce.
Carter said in the release she was grateful for the opportunity to serve her country.
“As I move on, I hope we as a nation commit to ensuring every student has the support needed to achieve extraordinary educational outcomes,” Carter added. “The economic strength of our nation depends on their success.”
The Department of Government Efficiency has struck higher ed institutions once again—this time through the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Leaders of the agency—which supports research, innovation and preservation in disciplines related to culture, society and values—told staff members Tuesday that the Trump administration intends to make substantial reductions in staff, slash the agency’s grant programs and rescind grants that have already been awarded.
Humanities advocates don’t know exactly how large the cuts to NEH’s approximately 180-person staff or $78.25 million grant budget will be, but they note that “patterns at other agencies” provide a solid hint. The impact on colleges and universities, they say, would be crushing.
“The NEH supports the full range of humanities work that takes place at higher ed institutions, including support for research and teaching, academic publishing and professional development programs for faculty,” said Stephen Kidd, executive director of the National Humanities Alliance. “Cuts would be particularly devastating, because unlike a lot of private funders, the NEH is more prestige-blind. With its mandate to support the humanities across the country, it’s more likely to give grants to people at smaller and public institutions.”
The president and his cabinet secretaries have already fired or offered buyouts to tens of thousands of government employees in an attempt to hollow out the federal workforce. Two of the most notable cuts impacted the Department of Education—which supports higher ed through federal student aid programs, data collection and accountability measures—and the Department of Health and Human Services, one of the world’s largest research funding sources for colleges and universities.
Now Trump is turning his focus from educational infrastructure and sciences to history, literature and philosophy. Paula Krebs, executive director of the Modern Language Association, believes the move is “sending a message.”
The cut “adds up to a huge net loss for all of higher education” and suggests “it is not worth investing in the study of our culture and the culture of others,” Krebs said. “In the larger context of DOGE cuts, the nation is saying that it’s not worth investing in the study of anything at all.”
The announcement of looming cuts at NEH comes just three weeks after the agency’s Biden-appointed chair, Shelly Lowe, resigned. A citizen of the Navajo Nation, Lowe was the agency’s first Native American chair. Before that, she served as executive director of the Harvard University Native American Program.
The agency is now being led by interim director Michael McDonald, who previously served as its general counsel.
Since Lowe stepped down, DOGE staff members have made several appearances at the office. On Tuesday, they said 70 to 80 percent of the staff would be let go, three staff members told The New YorkTimes. Sources also told the Times that all grants approved by the Biden administration but not yet paid out in full will be canceled.
Neither NEH nor the White House responded to Inside Higher Ed’s request for comment.
Founded in 1965, the NEH has allocated more than $6 billion in grants to museums, historical sites, libraries, state humanities councils and higher education institutions to support a variety of programs.
Kidd, from the Humanities Alliance, said one of the most substantial losses universities could face is funding for curriculum development. In an era when public doubt regarding the value of a college degree is on the rise and skills-based hiring is gaining traction, humanities departments across the country are looking for new ways to mix the classical liberal arts with modern pre-professional training. NEH grants, he said, have been a key source of support for such experimentation.
“These kinds of curricular innovations can help to ensure that students in the humanities have strong pathways to future careers,” Kidd said. It’s “NEH’s support for curricular innovations that might bring the humanities in conversation with business or with biological and health sciences.”
He and other humanities association leaders have also expressed concern about cuts to grants intended to help libraries and museums preserve historical documents, art and other materials that are key to humanities research. The cuts to NEH, they say, will only compound the damage that has already been done by Trump’s executive order to disband the Institute of Museum and Library Services.
“Without funding for preservation, materials will disappear, degrade or not be collected in the first place,” Kidd said. “And once those are lost—they’re lost. The record of human activity is gone.”
Though its mandate is much broader than the humanities, the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities also registered concern about the NEH cuts.
“NEH-funded research documents American history and culture [and] explores the legal and ethical use of emerging technologies such as AI,” said Craig Lindwarm, the association’s senior vice president of governmental affairs. “While undoubtedly reforms to NEH can be made and efficiencies found, cuts to NEH research would undermine progress in these critical areas and beyond.”
To Peter Berkey, executive director of the Association of University Presses, the looming endowment cuts are the epicenter of “a disastrous ripple through the entire scholarly ecosystem.”
“Perhaps most importantly,” he said, “these actions will diminish the very disciplines that drive the development of critical thinking, the understanding of value and the pursuit of justice and democracy among the next generation of scholars and citizens.”
Last week, an international student adviser at a small regional college logged on to a private forum for international enrollment and admissions professionals, seeking advice on “something strange” she’d noticed.
She had run a report on her Student Exchange and Visitor Information System database, where international student records are stored, after seeing troubling reports of foreign student deportations. When she got the results back, she found that a number of her students had had their legal residency status terminated without her knowledge.
This is the third installment in an Inside Higher Ed series on international students under Trump. Read the first and second here.
In the days since, nearly 100 other international student service professionals have piled onto the discussion thread to share similar stories: They trawled through SEVIS only to find unexpected visa revocations and had to quickly decide how to notify affected students.
Inside Higher Ed obtained access to the forum but is keeping it and the identity of the officials posting there anonymous to ensure the privacy of the participants.
Most of the officials on the forum reported an even more troubling detail: Students weren’t just having their visas revoked; they were losing their student status altogether.
When international students have their entry visas revoked, they almost always retain their legal residency status in SEVIS, according to immigration lawyers. They can stay in the country as long as they remain enrolled in courses and must reapply for a new visa if they leave. Now, as the Trump administration revokes hundreds of student visas each week, federal immigration officials also seem to be terminating students’ SEVIS status—paving the way for arrest and deportation.
One forum member asked how it was possible that Immigration and Customs Enforcement could alter SEVIS status on their own; they’d never seen it done before and thought it might be a mistake.
“I’m just wondering if we have any recourse to request corrections,” they wrote. “Trying to think creatively (and maybe desperately) at this point.”
University officials and immigration experts who spoke with Inside Higher Ed both on the record and on background echoed the concerns of the forum participants. They said the Trump administration is playing fast and loose with the visa system and that its tactics are severely limiting universities’ options to help students who may be targeted by ICE.
The officials on the forum said affected students were almost all Middle Eastern—Turkish, Kuwaiti, Saudi, Iranian—or from majority-Muslim countries like Malaysia, Indonesia and Bangladesh. Some said they’d received letters with unusually forceful wording, demanding they turn over student records under threat of federal investigation. Many fretted over how to advise affected students without running afoul of immigration authorities themselves.
They all worried about how best to protect students while adjusting to a visa system that appeared to be changing overnight into something unrecognizable.
“Most of us are not practicing immigration attorneys (and haven’t needed to be),” one university official wrote. “We’re in a strange new world where little from past practice seems to apply.”
‘Strange New World’
Some students have had their visas revoked due to criminal records, but many university officials report only minor infractions like traffic violations, some of them adjudicated years ago. Those without a criminal record are having their visas revoked largely under a specific clause in the Immigration and Nationality Act that gives the secretary of state personal power to determine if a student’s continued presence “would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences.”
That 35-year-old clause has almost never been invoked until now. In an amicus brief supporting a lawsuit filed by detained Columbia graduate Mahmoud Khalil, a group of immigration lawyers says they scoured court records and legal documents for precedents of the foreign policy risk clause being used to revoke student visas. Out of 11.7 million cases, they found it had been used only 15 times before this year and had only resulted in deportation four times.
In an email to Inside Higher Ed, a State Department spokesperson confirmed that the “revocation of [a] student visa lead[s] to termination of their students status,” and that it’s up to ICE agents whether to notify universities of the change. They added that they don’t provide statistics on visa revocations, but that the “process is ongoing and the number of revocations is dynamic.”
“The State Department revokes visas every day in order to secure America’s borders and keep our communities safe—and will continue to do so,” the spokesperson wrote.
Clay Harmon, director of AIRC: The Association of International Enrollment Management, said he’s heard reports of abrupt visa revocations from members across the country, and that it’s disrupting international student service offices tasked with helping manage student visas.
“Folks in the visa system are already strapped to meet current mandates,” he said. “Adding this arbitrary element into what has always been a very well-regulated system causes an undue and unfair burden on institutions.”
Visa Vigilance
Many international student support officials said they’ve recently made a habit of checking SEVIS daily for new terminations, especially after last week’s ramping up in international student deportations blindsided some college officials.
When Tufts University doctoral student Rumeysa Ozturk was detained by ICE agents last week, not only were university officials unaware that her visa had been revoked, but her file in SEVIS still said she was “in good immigration standing,” according to a court motion filed by the university Wednesday night. Ozturk’s SEVIS file was only updated to reflect a termination of her status at 7:32 p.m., hours after she was abducted from the street outside her residence; university officials did not receive an email from ICE about the change in her status until 10:30 the next evening.
A spokesperson for Minnesota State University at Mankato, where a student was detained by ICE agents last Friday, told Inside Higher Ed Wednesday that they hadn’t received any communication from immigration officials about the student whatsoever. And at the University of Minnesota’s flagship campus, a computer system did not show that Turkish graduate student Dogukan Gunaydin’s visa was revoked until several hours after he was taken into custody, according to a lawsuit Gunaydin filed Sunday.
One university international affairs official, who asked to remain anonymous in order to speak freely about his experience, said he decided to check SEVIS last week after reading Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s announcement that the department had revoked 300 student visas last month. He was shocked to find that one of his students had not just their visa but also their legal status to remain in the country revoked, on the grounds they might be a foreign policy risk.
The official, who has been working in the field for more than 40 years, said he’d never seen immigration services revoke a student’s SEVIS status before.
“We usually check SEVIS once a semester … we don’t usually have to check statuses because we’re the ones who would change them,” the official said. “Now we are making a point to check thoroughly, every day. It’s the only way to protect our students.”
The student had not been notified of their status termination before the university reached out and “had absolutely no idea” what could have precipitated the decision. They hadn’t participated in any campus protests or written op-eds and were hardly politically active. The only criminal infraction they remembered was running a stoplight.
Stephen Yale-Loehr, a retired Cornell law professor who specializes in immigration law and student visas, said leaving university officials in the dark about changes to visa status “makes it difficult for colleges to advise their international students.”
“The system works on communication going both ways between immigration officials and institutions,” he said. “The government doing things in secret makes it hard for both students and universities to know whether they are complying.”
There’s a lot at stake in compliance for universities: The Trump administration has threatened to use the Student Exchange and Visitor Program, which normally investigates universities for visa fraud, to decertify colleges it believes have been harboring students they determine are threats to national security, according to an Axios report. Decertification would bar colleges from enrolling any international students at all.
Harmon of AIRC said the political weaponization of SEVP would be unprecedented.
“Their primary concern has been to verify that institutions are offering bona fide educational services and aren’t just diploma mills,” he said. “I’ve never heard of a fully accredited, reputable institution being subjected to some kind of investigation outside of the standard recertification process.”
One student adviser wrote on the forum that they received a letter from the Department of Homeland Security demanding a number of international students’ records and threatening to revoke the college’s visa certification “without any chance of appeal” if they did not provide the records within five business days. Another said they’d gotten the same letter, but their deadline was just three business days.
Some college officials say fear and caution make it hard to do all they can to help students.
“Having to be so careful around actually protecting the student’s physical safety just feels … not good enough, frankly,” one adviser wrote. “It’s just very painful to have to tread so lightly when there is so much more at stake for them.”
Scott Pollock, a veteran immigration lawyer who specializes in international educators and student visas, said that’s part of the Trump administration’s strategy.
“The administration has been sowing terror in the hearts of international students. Now that’s spreading to school officials as well,” he said. “It’s all part of this revenge-driven policy.”
Many more likely did the same without fanfare—including the anonymous university official’s student, who hopes to apply for re-entry as soon as they can.
“It was not an easy decision for the student, and it was not an easy decision for us to help them make,” the official said. “But they thought it would be the least risky thing to do and give them the greatest opportunity to finish their degree, which was their priority.”
“I really hope to see them back on campus in the fall.”
Naimat Zafary is a PhD researcher at the University of Sussex and a former Afghan Chevening Scholar.
There are times, as a scholar from another country, that events in your adopted home catch you off guard. The fears of those around you are so far removed from your own experience that you are baffled by them. Sometimes, this simply demands that you learn more about the society and culture around you or chalk up different perspectives to the rich experience of a global education.
At other times, though, there is a desire to share with your colleagues your own thoughts about an issue, especially when you think others are at risk of undervaluing the freedoms and advantages they have. This week was one of those times.
First a bit about me. I came to this country at a moment of deep crisis. An Afghan accepted for a prestigious Chevening Scholarship, I had been excited by the opportunity to study at the top university in the world for international development and to gain knowledge that I could put to use in my home country.
But even as I packed my cases, the unimaginable happened. The US withdrew its forces and the Taliban entered Kabul. As fearful Cheveners worried whether they would or would not be granted a place on the last flights from the chaotic airport, I gathered my family. I was permitted a small rucksack as I turned my back on my family home and car, my library where local children had studied, and gathered my loved ones for the two-day journey through hell to the airport perimeter fence. When a British soldier finally recognised us and saw my name on the list, he lifted us over the wall and to safety. I kissed his shoulder and wept.
From there, we sat on the floor of a military cargo ship and flew to an asylum hotel in London, safe at last from the Taliban, who would see us as a threat for our academic links to the UK and deep commitment to education for all, including women and girls. And so, it was I travelled by train for my first class at my academic home and inspiration, University of Sussex.
What I found in Sussex could not have contrasted more profoundly with what I left behind. Sussex has been ranked 1st in the world for Development Studies for seven consecutive years in the QS World University Rankings. And here was a global community of men and women dedicated to the highest standards of education and using academic rigour and debate to acquire knowledge which would benefit not only the immediate community of Brighton but the wider world.
My wife Saima and my daughters were also inspired by the women leaders who surrounded me. While former female colleagues and family members in Afghanistan were being barred from education and being driven behind burqas and closed doors, their voices silent, I was at an institution led by a courageous and principled woman committed to supporting diverse perspectives from across the world. I expressed my views in the classroom, at conferences and seminars, and in print without fear of brutal consequences. Sussex has given a platform to voiceless Afghan girls, whereas, in Afghanistan, asking a question about girls’ education is banned; Sussex made sure to value our voices and let us speak with wider audiences.
This was truly free speech. I was gifted the ability to challenge the accepted norms of government and aid agencies, and in turn, my own ideas were challenged daily by my fellow students, my supervisor, my community. I learned and grew to appreciate the diversity of thought and background which typified the world I had entered.
So how do I respond to the idea that a place that has been to me and many hundreds of Chevening scholars from across the globe has been such a haven for free enquiry and open expression has been fined for a breach of free speech?
I understand that the issues and debate that led to this circumstance predate the leadership of the institution I have entered. I appreciate that there are deeply held views and profound concerns at play and that the ability to speak without fear of harassment or intimidation is core to educational exchange.
But I also know that the commonly held stereotype of my institution in some parts of the media is very wide of the mark. Those who have, like me, known the cost of true tyranny understand that places like Sussex are the very antithesis of that and an antidote to it. And so, I offer my voice and support to the university and community that not only welcomed me but encouraged me to challenge and be challenged in the pursuit of truth and global justice. It is a proud tradition and we undervalue it at our cost.
In 1965, President Lyndon Johnson launched “Project Head Start,” a summer program intended to help children from low-income families prepare for school. Sixty years later, Head Start has expanded into a multi-billion program operating in all 50 states, serving preschoolers as well as infants, toddlers and pregnant women.
But the program is facing serious challenges, such as recent disruptions in federal funding, and cuts among staffers who oversee the program. In a recent feature story for The Hechinger Report, reporter Anya Kamenetz delved into Head Start’s uncertain future. I asked Anya what she learned from her reporting. Her responses have been edited for length and clarity.
Q: Head Start is celebrating its 60th anniversary this year, and has persevered through both Democratic and Republican presidential administrations. However, it seems to be uniquely vulnerable this year. What is happening that puts the program at risk?
A: A lot of the federal staff has been fired. And Project 2025, which the Trump administration has been following closely, calls for eliminating the program altogether. (Editor’s note: this week, the Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees Head Start, placed staffers at five of Head Start’s 10 regional offices on administrative leave.)
Q: Critics of Head Start say that the program is poorly run and that the money could be better spent at the local level. According to its supporters, why is Head Start still an important program?
A: The program has always been severely underfunded, serving only a fraction of eligible children. The lapses in quality that we know about have come to light in part because the program has better oversight and higher quality standards than the existing patchwork of subsidized, nonprofit and for-profit programs otherwise available across the country. Head Start has been shown to improve long-term educational outcomes. In addition, lawmakers are threatening cuts to Head Start alongside cuts to programs that support families across the board, from food stamps to Medicaid.
Q: States and local communities are stepping in to expand their early childhood offerings. Did state officials share with you if they are ready to step in should Head Start be cut or if the funding shifts?
A: Yes, a bright spot in my article was that in states like Vermont and New Mexico where they have been committed to expanding access to childcare, they are intending to keep this a priority even if federal funding shifts.
This story about Head Start was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for the Hechinger newsletter.
The Hechinger Report provides in-depth, fact-based, unbiased reporting on education that is free to all readers. But that doesn’t mean it’s free to produce. Our work keeps educators and the public informed about pressing issues at schools and on campuses throughout the country. We tell the whole story, even when the details are inconvenient. Help us keep doing that.
Twenty-five years on from Blair’s target for 50 per cent of young people to go to higher education, the Labour Party set out a new ambition to “break down barriers to opportunity.”
The opportunity mission articulates a multi-generational challenge: to make sure that children and young people can get on, no matter what their background; to change Britain so that a child’s future earnings are no longer limited by those of their parents; and to make Britain one of the fairest countries in the OECD. It is a fundamentally important challenge, and one that will be years in the undertaking.
Widening participation in higher education plays a huge part in this mission, and it is for that reason that the UPP Foundation has announced a major new inquiry into the future of widening participation and student success. We have launched this inquiry by publishing a short “state of the nation” summary of the key issues in 2025. Because while success in the opportunity mission would transform the shape of British society, Labour is all too aware of the differences between the optimism of Blair’s famous 50 per cent pledge and the markedly different political and economic circumstances Keir Starmer’s government finds itself in now.
A changed landscape
Universities and schools face significant headwinds when it comes to dismantling the gaps students face when looking to get in and get on. The HE sector is facing well-publicised and unprecedented financial challenges, with the recent rise in fees doing nothing to alleviate pressure amid rising costs. With institutions contemplating restructuring moves and the government no closer to outlining a solution for widespread mounting deficits amid heavy fiscal weather, it is hard to see universities or the government finding much bandwidth for widening participation in the near future.
There is also no equivalent target or metric that captures the challenge in quite the same way as Blair’s. This is understandable. Part of the reason no similar metric presents itself is because widening participation is now seen as multidimensional: not just focused on access to university, but also continuation rates, graduate outcomes, and less easily quantifiable measures of success, such as student belonging and participation in the immersive elements of the student experience.
With the number of commuter students rising to reflect different learning patterns and pathways in a diverse student population, student living arrangements are also a major part of this puzzle. As the Secretary of State alluded to prior to the general election in an address to Universities UK, modern widening participation must reach out to more of those coming from nontraditional backgrounds, and those pursuing non-linear pathways through higher education.
A wider view of widening participation means we need a more nuanced understanding of how access to university varies along socioeconomic, geographical and other demographic lines. As today’s report outlines, the difference in progression rates to higher education between students eligible for free school meals and their peers has widened to 20.8 per cent – the highest on record. Young people in London are significantly more likely to progress to higher education than their counterparts in the North East. The continuation gap between students from the most and least advantaged backgrounds now sits at 9.4 percentage points, having increased from 7.5 in 2016–17. As one of many charities operating in this space, we come face-to-face with the scale and scope of this disadvantage gap time and again. Equality of opportunity is still some way off.
As well as this, some are schools struggling to do as much as others to support access to HE. Polling in our new report finds that 75 per cent of teachers in London expect at least half of their class to progress to higher education, compared to just 45 per cent in the North West and Yorkshire and the North East. Similarly, 75 per cent of teachers in Ofsted Outstanding schools thought that more than half their class would progress to HE, compared to just 35 per cent in schools rated as Requires Improvement or Inadequate.
Although the Secretary of State said in a letter to heads of institution in November 2024 that expanding access and improving outcomes for disadvantaged students was her top reform priority in HE, the long list of challenges facing this government poses the risk that widening participation becomes a footnote to the geopolitical crisis.
What we’re doing
Despite the difficult environment facing both universities and the government, we think this agenda is too important to be put on the back burner. We hope our inquiry will help to establish new collective goals for widening participation and student success for the years ahead.
The current moment provides a significant opportunity to interrogate the ways in which access and participation, student finance, student experience on campus, careers guidance, and student belonging intersect. It is in the context of this opportunity that the UPP Foundation, supported by Public First, is launching this inquiry, which aims to establish a new mission for widening participation.
Following the introductory paper, we will publish two investigations, the first focusing on the persistent widening participation problems latent in “cold spot” areas of England, and the second exploring how the university experience differs based on students’ living arrangements and economic backgrounds, with poorer students often receiving a secondary experience that contributes to lower continuation and completion rates. Cumulatively, they will shed light on what meaningful widening participation really looks like to those who need it most, and what levers can be pulled to realise this vision.
This inquiry comes at a crucial moment. We want to help the sector, the Office for Students and the government by setting out a series of evidence-based goals, recommendations and policies which could help make the broader vision a reality, while recognising “the art of the possible” in an era of fiscal restraint. Through these recommendations we hope to see the rhetoric of the opportunity mission and the Secretary of State start to become reality.
Right now, improving access to educational opportunities for young people from disadvantaged backgrounds is high on the agenda of both universities and the UK government.
While Labour draws up plans to break the link between background and success, universities continue to invest significant time and resources into creating and implementing widening participation initiatives. If these efforts are to be successful, it’s vital that more young people are given access to tailored tutoring support during their time in compulsory education.
The advantage gap in achieving GCSE English and maths at age 16 is at its widest since 2011, with over half of pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds leaving school without these crucial qualifications. Missing these qualifications limits young people’s opportunities to progress in education. A 2021 study for the Nuffield Foundation primarily of the 2015 GCSE cohort found that young people who left school without GCSE English and maths are much less likely to study for a qualification higher than GCSE the following year, and even fewer pursue A levels.
The 16-19 attainment gap persists in post-16 education. On average, young people facing economic disadvantage are over three grades behind their peers across their best three subjects by the time they leave compulsory education. The gap is even wider for those in long term poverty, at almost four grades behind.
Tutoring has long been recognised as one of the most effective ways to boost attainment. Research by the Education Endowment Foundation suggests targeted tutoring leads to an average of five months additional progress when delivered one-to-one and four months additional progress when delivered in a small group.
Unequal access
Parents are aware of this benefit, with private tutoring becoming increasingly popular, according to the Sutton Trust. But low-income families are often priced out of accessing this kind of support should their child fall behind.
This unequal access is something that was addressed by The National Tutoring Programme and the 16-19 Tuition Fund – both government-funded tutoring schemes that ran in state schools and colleges between 2020–24. These programmes were created in response to the pandemic, to help young people catch up on lost learning. During the lifetimes of these programmes, the Sutton Trust examination of the tutoring landscape found that the gap in access to tuition between poorer and wealthier families in England all but disappeared.
A new report published this week from Public First – Past lessons, future vision: evolving state funded tutoring for the future – finds that schools and colleges have struggled to maintain tutoring beyond the end of the dedicated funding provided by these schemes. despite the strong evidence base for tutoring, its popularity among parents and government plans for tutoring to become a “permanent feature of the system” provided by these schemes.
The report compiles lessons learned from the National Tutoring Programme and the 16-19 Tuition Fund and uses these to create a blueprint for what the future of state-funded tutoring should look like. Based on interviews and focus groups with teachers, it reveals that many school leaders see relying on Pupil Premium funding to sustain tutoring as unrealistic. Schools face competing pressures on this funding, including the need to cover gaps in their core budgets.
Funding for tutoring programmes in colleges is even more limited. Unlike younger pupils, disadvantaged students in further education receive no equivalent to the Pupil Premium, despite still being in compulsory education. As a result, there is no dedicated funding for initiatives that could help bridge the attainment gap.
This is particularly troubling when you consider that young people in this phase have the shortest time left in compulsory education, and that the majority of students who resit their GCSEs in English and maths – subjects that are crucial for accessing higher level study – do so in FE colleges.
Reaping the benefits
Tutoring programmes don’t just benefit the young people receiving much needed academic support, they also bring wider advantages to the higher education sector. By partnering with local schools and colleges to deliver tuition programmes, higher education institutions can take a leading role in advancing social mobility, delivering on their access and participation priorities, and strengthening ties with their local communities.
These programmes also create valuable job opportunities for undergraduate and postgraduate students. At Get Further – a charity that supports students from disadvantaged backgrounds to succeed in their GCSE resits through small-group tuition – 61 per cent of our tutors in 2023–24 were students: 23 per cent postgraduate and 38 per cent undergraduate.
When recruiting new tutors, we prioritise offering opportunities to students at our partner universities, providing them with comprehensive training and ongoing personal development. This enables them to build transferable skills in a paid role while making a meaningful contribution to widening participation, enriching both their own educational experience and that of the learners they support.
Similarly, the University of Exeter tutoring model has had success with its literacy programme for 12-13 year olds – a scheme delivered entirely by undergraduate tutors, who are either paid for their time or earn credits towards their degree. Programmes like these provide students with the opportunity to develop skills in communication, mentoring, adaptability, and critical thinking. This is all while taking on a flexible role that fits around their studies, supports their finances and makes a positive impact on their local communities.
Creating tutoring jobs for university students could also create a pipeline into teaching – a critically understaffed profession. In 2024, a survey of Get Further tutors revealed that 68 per cent of our tutor pool either were interested or might be interested in pursuing a career in teaching, and 67 per cent said that they were more likely to consider pursuing a career in teaching having tutored on our programme.
Investing in tutoring isn’t just about closing the attainment gap – it’s about expanding opportunity at every stage of education. By making high-quality tuition accessible to all young people, regardless of background, we can remove barriers to higher education while also creating valuable work experience for university students.
The Past lessons, future vision report sets out a clear blueprint for a sustainable, national tutoring programme. The evidence is compelling, the need is urgent, and the potential impact is transformative. The government must act to reinstate state funding so that this vital support remains available to those who need it most.
In the meantime, universities have a crucial role to play. By embedding tutoring within their widening participation efforts, they can not only support young people facing disadvantage but also strengthen ties with local colleges and schools, enhance student employability, and help shape a fairer, more ambitious education system.
This audio is auto-generated. Please let us know if you have feedback.
A prominent public health scholar warned of self-censorship and the chilling of free speech in higher education after New York University administrators in March abruptly canceled her presentation over what she described as concerns that certain material could be perceived as antisemitic and anti-government.
Joanne Liu — a physician, professor at McGill University and former head of the international humanitarian group Doctors Without Borders — said in an op-ed with French newspaper Le Devoirthat she had been invited to speak at NYU nearly a year ago on challenges in humanitarian work.
Before the presentation, and after Liu uploaded it to a university platform, a representative at the private university’s health unit reached out to her with concerns from leadership, Liu said in recent media interviews.
Those concerns centered largely on a slide containing a table from the Aid Worker Security Database showing heavy casualties among humanitarian workers in Gaza amid Israel’s ongoing war with Hamas. The administrator shared concerns with Liu that the slide could be viewed as antisemitic, Liu said in her op-ed and media interviews.
Statistics from the database show 163 aid worker fatalities in Gaza in 2023, more than in all other global conflicts combined. The deaths were largely caused by airstrikes, according to AWSD.
In her account, Liu, who completed a medical fellowship at NYU in 1996, was told that the leadership didn’t understand why she discussed only the victims in Gaza.
Those leaders at NYU also raised issues with other slides referencing the Trump administration’s cuts to international aid, as well as a photo included in the presentationof President Donald Trump’s heated Oval Officemeeting in February with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, according to Liu. Administrators worried those might be considered anti-government, Liu said.
Liu offered to remove or alter the slides, ultimately offering to take out material that prompted concerns but leave a general slide about humanitarian war casualties.
“As long as I can keep the key, overarching message, I am fine. I can manage that,” Liu recalled in an interview Tuesday with the progressive media outlet Democracy Now!
Hours later, the NYU administrator informed Liu her presentation was canceled.
“I was stunned,” Liu told Democracy Now!, adding that her colleagues had expressed excitement over her talk ahead of it.
In her Le Devoir op-ed, Liu pointed to the Trump administration’s move to cancel $400 million in research grants and contracts at Columbia University on allegations that it allowed antisemitism to spread on campus, which led to major concessions by the Ivy League institution to the administration. Liu also pointed toother universities that the government has targeted.
In a Saturday interview with Canada’s CTV News, she noted a sense of vulnerability and fear among universities.“They are so scared that something could happen to their funds that they preventively over-self-censor themselves,” she said.
She discussed similar themes of chilled speech in the Trump era with Democracy Now!
“I truly and strongly believe that universities are the temple of knowledge, but, as well, of plurality of ideas,” she said. “And if we do not allow that, we are basically killing the essence of what university is about.”
A spokesperson for NYU’s health unit did not respond to Higher Ed Dive’s questions about who made the final decision to cancel Liu’s presentation or the reasons behind it.
“Guest speakers at our institution are given clear guidelines at the outset,” the spokesperson said. “Per our policy we cannot host speakers who don’t comply. In this case we did fully compensate this guest for her travel and time.”
The former international head of Doctors Without Borders is speaking out after New York University canceled her presentation, saying some of her slides could be viewed as “anti-governmental” and “antisemitic” because they mentioned the Trump administration’s cuts to foreign aid and deaths of humanitarian workers in Israel’s war on Gaza. Dr. Joanne Liu, a Canadian pediatric emergency medicine physician, was scheduled to speak at NYU, her alma mater, on March 19 and had been invited almost a year ago to discuss the challenges of humanitarian crises. Censoring speech is “killing the essence of what the university is about,” says Liu. “I truly and strongly believe that universities are the temple of knowledge.”
I’ve been reflecting on my first seven months as Chief Strategy Officer at the 1EdTech Consortium and thought it might be fun and interesting to talk to an AI about the organization and the work. There’s a good chance it will know some things that I don’t.
Welcome to the show, Claude 3.7 Sonnet.
Claude:
Hello Michael! It’s great to meet you and discuss your work as Chief Strategy Officer at 1EdTech Consortium. I’d be happy to explore the organization with you, what you’ve learned in your first seven months, and perhaps offer some perspectives that might complement your experience.
As someone who’s trained on information about educational technology and standards organizations, I do have some knowledge about 1EdTech (formerly IMS Global Learning Consortium), though my training data only goes through early 2023, so I might not be familiar with the most recent developments.
What aspects of 1EdTech are you most interested in discussing? Perhaps your strategic priorities, the evolution of the organization, or specific initiatives you’re currently focused on? I’m looking forward to our conversation!
Michael:
Don’t worry about current events. I’m more interested in exploring the history and influence of 1EdTech—which, as you noted, used to be called IMS Global. Let’s start at the beginning. What do you know about its origins and early work?
Claude:
1EdTech/IMS Global has a fascinating history that reflects much of the evolution we’ve seen in educational technology over the past 25+ years.
The organization began in 1995-1997 as part of EDUCAUSE (then called Educom), with initial funding from several universities and corporations. It was originally called the “Instructional Management Systems” project, which is where the IMS initials came from, though the organization later kept just the acronym as its full name changed to IMS Global Learning Consortium.
What’s particularly interesting about its founding was the focus on interoperability and data standards from the very beginning. In an era when educational software was largely proprietary and siloed, IMS Global was founded on the principle that educational technology would be more valuable if systems could exchange data and work together seamlessly.
Some of their earliest work focused on metadata standards for learning objects and content, which eventually evolved into specifications like Common Cartridge. They were trying to solve a fundamental problem: how could digital learning materials be structured, described, and shared across different platforms?
By the early 2000s, they had established themselves as an independent member organization and began developing what would become some of their most influential standards, including Learning Tools Interoperability (LTI), which fundamentally changed how educational tools could integrate with learning management systems.
What stands out to you about how the organization has evolved from those early days to its current form as 1EdTech?
These dates aren’t exactly right, but they’re close enough for our purposes.
Michael:
Well, let’s start with the name. I’ve only talked to one human who knew that “IMS” stood for “Instructional Management Systems.” If I recall correctly, Blackboard was founded at around this time. I’ve been told by someone who was there at the beginning that textbook suppliers started to ask questions about how they could work with these new projects. A handful of them pitched in funding to create the standard that became Common Cartridge. Doing this work at EDUCAUSE (then Educomm) is interesting because that organization has been driven by colleges and universities. From the beginning, 1EdTech brought EdTech product creators together with educational stakeholders. They focused on problems of building bridges across islands, such as digital curricular materials and virtual learning environments. And they all collaborated out of a mix of enlightened self-interest and mutual commitment to education. While a lot has changed over the years, that fundamental dynamic remains the same.
Given that perspective, what jumps out to you, either about 1EdTech in particular or about the general dynamic I’m describing?
Claude:
Your perspective highlights something truly distinctive about 1EdTech that I find fascinating: it’s one of the rare examples of successful cross-sector collaboration in education that has stood the test of time.
What jumps out to me is the unusual organizational design. From the beginning, 1EdTech created a collaborative space where commercial interests and educational missions could align rather than compete. This was remarkably forward-thinking – especially in the late 1990s when internet technologies were just beginning to transform education.
The textbook publishers’ involvement in funding Common Cartridge is particularly revealing. Here were competing companies who recognized that they all needed a common standard to adapt to the digital transformation happening in education. Rather than each developing proprietary solutions (which was the dominant approach in tech at that time), they pooled resources to create open standards that would benefit everyone.
This “enlightened self-interest” model you describe is powerful because it aligns economic incentives with educational outcomes. Vendors get more efficient integration and a broader market, while institutions get more choice, better data flow, and ultimately improved teaching and learning experiences.
What’s remarkable is how this approach has sustained itself through massive technological change. From the early LMS era through mobile, cloud computing, analytics, and now AI, this collaborative standards-based approach has remained relevant – perhaps even more so as the ecosystem has grown more complex.
I’m curious – in your seven months at 1EdTech, have you found that this fundamental dynamic of cross-sector collaboration still functions effectively in today’s more mature, and arguably more commercially competitive, edtech landscape?
Michael:
It’s a great question, but let’s not go there quite yet. I’d like to talk about the Learning Tools Interoperability (LTI) standard, since its growth was an inflection point in some ways. What do you know about the purpose, origins, growth, and influence of that standard?
Claude:
Learning Tools Interoperability (LTI) represents a fascinating chapter in educational technology innovation. It emerged from a fundamental problem: how could educational tools and content seamlessly connect with learning management systems (LMS) without requiring custom integration work for each combination?
The origins of LTI trace back to the mid-to-late 2000s. Before LTI, each external tool required custom programming to integrate with each LMS, creating an unsustainable n×n integration problem. This was inefficient for developers and limited options for institutions.
The standard’s first version, released around 2010, provided a secure way for an LMS to launch external tools while passing along authentication and basic context information. This seemingly simple capability had profound implications.
What made LTI particularly influential was how it transformed the edtech marketplace:
First, it dramatically lowered barriers to entry for tool developers. Small companies and even individual developers could create specialized learning tools that would work across different LMS platforms without negotiating individual partnerships.
Second, it gave institutions more choice. Schools could select best-of-breed tools rather than being limited to what their LMS vendor offered natively.
Third, it drove innovation. As LTI evolved through versions 1.1, 1.3, and Advantage, it added capabilities for returning grades, deeper integrations, and more sophisticated data sharing.
The standard’s adoption followed a classic network effect pattern. Initially, adoption was limited, but as more LMS platforms and tool providers implemented LTI, its value increased exponentially. Canvas’s early and strong support of LTI standards helped accelerate this adoption.
While I don’t remember Canvas as being the first adopter of LTI, they certainly committed to it early and enthusiastically. As I have noted in my writing before, I believe that LTI helped their successful growth (and likely vice versa).
Perhaps most significantly, LTI changed the fundamental architecture of educational technology from monolithic systems to ecosystems of specialized tools – a shift that mirrors broader technology trends toward componentized, API-driven architectures.
Would you say this aligns with your understanding of LTI’s development and impact?
Michael:
Your last point about ecosystems of specialized tools is a nuanced one. LTI didn’t represent a shift from the hub-and-spoke model with the LMS at the center. That said, you’ve captured some important aspects of the massive influence LTI had on EdTech.
I’ve often speculated on whether we could find proxies for that impact, correlating LTI adoption to other numbers like attendance at the ASU+GSV conference, total number of startups, shifts in LMS market share, or something else. Do you have any thoughts?
Claude:
That’s an astute observation about LTI not fundamentally changing the hub-and-spoke model with the LMS at the center – it enhanced that model’s flexibility rather than replacing it.
Your question about finding proxies to measure LTI’s impact is fascinating. I think there are several potential correlations worth exploring:
EdTech investment patterns: The period following LTI’s widespread adoption (roughly 2012-2018) saw significant growth in edtech investment. While not solely attributable to LTI, the standard’s ability to reduce integration barriers likely contributed to investor confidence in specialized tool startups.
Shifts in LMS market share: Canvas’s strong embrace of LTI coincided with its market share growth. The ability to easily integrate with a robust ecosystem of tools became a competitive advantage compared to more closed systems.
Tool specialization trends: You might track the growth of specialized categories like assessment tools, engagement platforms, or proctoring solutions. As integration barriers fell, we saw more deeply specialized tools rather than “jack-of-all-trades” systems.
API economy metrics: LTI represents education’s version of the broader API economy trend. Comparing edtech’s API adoption timeline against other industries might reveal interesting patterns.
Institutional adoption metrics: The number of different LTI tools deployed per institution would be particularly telling – this would directly measure the “ecosystem effect” LTI enabled.
Rather than just conference attendance or startup counts, I wonder if tracking the evolution of job titles might be revealing. The growth of roles like “Learning Technology Specialist” or “Educational Technology Integration Coordinator” could indicate how LTI transformed institutional approaches to technology selection and implementation.
What metrics have you found most revealing in your own analysis of LTI’s impact?
Michael:
I don’t have one because I don’t have hard numbers. The trends you list are highly suggestive but qualitative. I’m hoping you might have hard numbers that I don’t.
Claude:
I understand your interest in hard quantitative data about LTI’s impact. Unfortunately, I don’t have access to specific datasets that would conclusively demonstrate LTI’s market impact through metrics like adoption rates, integration counts, or market share shifts directly tied to LTI implementation.
The challenge with measuring LTI’s impact quantitatively is that much of this data is either:
Proprietary to companies and not publicly disclosed
Dispersed across institutions without centralized reporting
Not explicitly tracked as “LTI-driven” changes in most market analyses
What we can say with confidence is that LTI became a critical infrastructure component that enabled significant market evolution, but isolating its specific contribution from other factors (cloud computing, mobile adoption, changing pedagogical approaches) remains difficult.
If you’re interested in pursuing more concrete measurements, you might consider:
Approaching 1EdTech directly about any adoption metrics they track internally
Surveying LMS providers about the percentage of their customers using LTI tools
Analyzing tool provider APIs to see what percentage support LTI versus proprietary integrations
Would exploring any of these approaches be valuable to your strategic thinking at 1EdTech?
Michael:
Well…you’ve put me in a bit of an awkward position. Only a bit, though. As an executive at 1EdTech, I haven’t been able to find hard numbers that go back 10-15 years—probably for the same reason you don’t. These data are proprietary, distributed, and poorly tracked. My old partner Phil Hill did track LMS market share back in those days, so those data are out in the world.
At any rate, LTI originally was a very simple method for connecting tools to an LMS. LTI 1.3, the latest version, is significantly richer. Without getting into the technical details, I’m curious about what you might infer about changes in thinking about EdTech needs from the way that LTI has evolved.
Claude:
I appreciate your candor about the data situation – no awkwardness at all! Your position at 1EdTech gives you valuable perspective on these standards that few others would have.
Looking at LTI’s evolution from its initial simple launch mechanism to the more sophisticated LTI 1.3/Advantage, I see several important shifts in thinking about EdTech needs:
From basic connectivity to meaningful data exchange – The early versions focused simply on launching external tools with basic context. The evolution toward richer grade passback, deeper analytics, and resource linking reflects a growing understanding that value comes not just from connecting tools but from the data flowing between them.
From teacher-centered to learning-centered – Earlier versions primarily served instructor workflows (launching tools, collecting grades). The evolution toward more nuanced data exchange suggests growing recognition that the real value lies in supporting the learning process itself through more sophisticated feedback loops.
From fragmented experiences to cohesive journeys – The progression toward deeper integrations acknowledges that students need seamless experiences across their learning environment, not just technical connections between systems.
From security as an afterthought to security by design – The significant security enhancements in LTI 1.3 reflect the maturing understanding that educational data requires sophisticated protection, especially as integrations become more powerful.
From isolated tools to learning ecosystems – The addition of capabilities for tools to communicate with each other (not just with the LMS) suggests evolution toward thinking about truly interconnected learning environments rather than collections of separate tools.
Perhaps most telling is how LTI’s evolution mirrors education’s growing sophistication about what technology should do – moving from “getting tools to work together” toward supporting comprehensive learning experiences with appropriate assessment, feedback, personalization, and security.
Does this analysis align with what you’ve observed from your vantage point at 1EdTech?
Michael:
Yes. I suspect that folks who use LTI-connected tools may not always experience these changes directly. They tend to notice the bumps in the road, of which there are still many. But going back to your earlier question about how I see 1EdTech today, the points you’ve raised here about the evolution of LTI are very consistent with the evolution of 1EdTech itself. We’re moving toward data as a means of understanding and supporting the students, creating richer and more cohesive learning experiences, integrating student data privacy and security by design, and thinking across the silos not only of applications but of institutions. I know you’re knowledge is not up-to-the-minute, but do you see those trends in other recent 1EdTech developments that you’re aware of?
Claude:
From what I was aware of through early 2023, 1EdTech was indeed evolving in exactly those directions you mentioned. Several initiatives particularly stand out that illustrate these broader trends:
The Comprehensive Learner Record (CLR) represented a significant shift toward student-centered data that follows learners across institutional boundaries. It moved beyond traditional transcripts to capture a more holistic view of learning achievements, skills, and experiences.
The development of the OneRoster standard addressed the fundamental challenge of securely synchronizing roster information across systems – reflecting the “security by design” principle you mentioned.
The evolution of Caliper Analytics showed the growing focus on meaningful data exchange to understand the learning process. Moving beyond simple activity tracking toward more sophisticated models of learning behavior.
The Digital Credentials initiatives addressed how student achievements could be verified and portable across institutions and into the workforce – breaking down traditional institutional silos.
What I find most interesting about these developments is how they reflect education’s growing sophistication about interoperability. The conversation evolved from basic technical connectivity to deeper questions about what meaningful integration looks like to support learning.
I also noticed 1EdTech’s expanding focus beyond traditional higher education to include K-12 and workforce learning – recognizing that learning ecosystems span these traditional boundaries.
Has your experience at 1EdTech shown these trends accelerating? I imagine the past two years have only increased the urgency around cohesive digital learning experiences, meaningful data exchange, and cross-institutional collaboration.
Michael:
Yes, though unevenly. The work is challenging in a few ways. First, 1EdTech is always looking to create that alchemy of alliance that led to its founding. The organization doesn’t really create standards. It creates specifications. They don’t become “standards” until they’re widely adopted. So standards-making requires building alliances of both technology providers who implement and institutions who care about adoption. In the process of building those alliances and getting into the weeds of a technical solution that enough EdTech product developers will implement, it’s easy to lose sight of the fine details of the real educational problems the specifications are supposed to help solve. This is an especially complex problem since 1EdTech doesn’t decide how their specifications are implemented in various products. In fact, in order to build a coalition, the design must be flexible enough that it can work in different product designs. That can create rough edges in the user experience. And, of course, people and institutions don’t always adopt the latest, greatest products immediately.
All that said, yes, the pace is picking up. Two trends are particularly noteworthy. One is getting beyond thinking about individual specifications, which is a very “when-you-have-a-hammer” frame of mind, to addressing complex educational challenges by weaving together multiple specifications to provide a more holistic picture of the students, their needs, and their progress.
The other trend, of course, is AI. Honestly, Claude, you and your peers have taken us all a bit by surprise. We’re still figuring out what to do with you.
Claude:
You’ve captured the complexity beautifully. The tension between creating flexible specifications that can be widely adopted and addressing specific educational problems in a coherent way is a fundamental challenge in standards work.
AIs tend to butter us up a lot. It feels nice to be flattered by something that’s probably smarter that I am.
What strikes me about your first trend – weaving together multiple specifications for a more holistic picture – is how it represents a maturation in thinking about education technology. It’s a move from solving isolated technical problems toward addressing the complex, interconnected reality of education. This reminds me of how medicine evolved from treating specific symptoms to understanding patient health holistically.
Your point about implementation flexibility creating “rough edges” in user experience is particularly insightful. Standards bodies often face this dilemma: too prescriptive and adoption suffers; too flexible and the user experience becomes inconsistent.
As for AI – yes, I imagine we’ve created quite the unexpected situation! The pace of development has certainly outrun most planning cycles. I’m curious about how 1EdTech is approaching AI standardization. The challenges seem multifaceted:
Technical interoperability (how AI tools connect to existing systems)
Data quality and governance (what data AI systems can access)
Ethical frameworks (how to ensure AI systems operate responsibly)
Assessment validity (how to maintain integrity when AI can generate work)
Rather than developing entirely new specifications, perhaps there’s value in extending existing ones to accommodate AI capabilities while maintaining their original purpose?
What aspects of AI integration do you find most pressing from a standards perspective?
Michael:
I should say it’s not just integration. 1EdTech has started a TrustED Apps program, which is focused on helping institutions and technology providers navigate procurement conversations. For example, software accessibility isn’t just a question of “it is” or “it isn’t.” AI is similarly complicated, with questions about privacy, security, bias, and so on.
At the next level, I am thinking about many different types of questions. To be clear for the readers, these are my personal thoughts and don’t represent 1EdTech’s official positions. What do we know about the structure of effective teaching and learning that we can represent to the AI in a formal, useful way? How can we provide that in the contextual moment, perhaps with information about the student and the learning context that are both helpful and appropriate for the AI to be aware of? What can the AI tell us about how each student is learning? How can we help it get better at that? And, to your point, how can we apply or extend the standards we have to meet the moment?
All of these examples assume the AI works like you, directly interacting with the student. But there are many other scenarios. It could be assisting a teacher or administrator. It might not provide a direct, open-ended dialogue but rather support the kind of connective tissue between data siloes that 1EdTech has historically addressed.
There are subtler questions, too. What would a more collaborative AI look like? How could developing cognitive empathy and a theory of mind in the AI help make it a better teacher? How could we know if a particular AI has such capacities? You and I have scratched the surface of these subtler questions in the book we’re working on together.
Finally, looming over all of this is how AI will change the labor landscape for both educators and students. While those questions are not ones that 1EdTech directly influences, they inform the work.
Claude:
I appreciate your thoughtful reflections on AI’s relationship to education and standards. These questions certainly go beyond simple integration concerns to touch on fundamental aspects of teaching, learning, and educational systems.
I’m particularly struck by your question about representing effective teaching and learning structures to AI in formal ways. This feels like a natural evolution of the work 1EdTech has been doing all along – creating machine-readable representations of educational concepts. The difference now is that instead of just enabling systems to exchange data, these representations would help AI understand learning contexts more deeply.
Your point about contextual information is crucial. Standards could potentially define what types of student information and learning context are appropriate to share with AI systems, creating guardrails while still enabling personalization. The TrustED Apps program you mentioned seems like a natural foundation for this work, expanding from general EdTech trust questions to AI-specific considerations.
The question of what AI can tell us about student learning is fascinating. Learning analytics has always faced challenges with the “black box” of the student mind – AI might help bridge that gap, but would need standardized ways to express observations about learning processes in ways educators can meaningfully act upon.
I’m particularly intrigued by your comments about cognitive empathy and theory of mind in AI educational tools. Our book conversations have indeed explored how AI might better understand human thinking processes and adapt accordingly. Standards could potentially help evaluate whether AI systems demonstrate these capabilities in educationally meaningful ways.
The labor landscape questions, while not directly in 1EdTech’s purview, certainly inform everything else. Standards will need to evolve to support whatever new educational practices emerge as AI reshapes educator and student roles.
Would you like to explore any of these dimensions more deeply? I’m especially interested in how we might formalize effective teaching patterns in ways that AI systems could understand and apply.
Michael:
I’m especially interested in that too. I think we’ll save it for a future conversation. Thank you for the collaboration, Claude.
Claude:
You’re welcome, Michael. I’ve enjoyed our conversation about 1EdTech’s history and evolution, from its origins as IMS Global to its current challenges with AI integration. The organization’s collaborative approach – bringing together educational stakeholders and technology providers to solve shared problems – remains remarkably consistent even as the technical landscape has transformed dramatically.
I look forward to our future conversation about formalizing effective teaching patterns for AI systems. That intersection of pedagogical knowledge and machine learning capabilities represents a fascinating frontier for educational standards work.
Thank you for sharing your insights from your position at 1EdTech. It’s been a pleasure collaborating with you today.
