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Getting in and getting on needs to go up the agenda, not down

In January I attended an event alongside colleagues from over 50 universities spanning the breadth of the country.

Collectively we held a significant chunk of the sector’s strategic responsibility for developing, writing and delivering activity linked to the Office for Students’ vision for fair access and participation.

We came from different regions and geographic contexts, working in a range of providers of different sizes, histories, and specialisms.

What brought us together, however, was a passion and commitment to a set of underlying principles which form the foundation of our collective endeavours.

The Forum for Access and Continuing Education (FACE), a charity committed to enabling opportunities across the educational landscape, held their annual summit at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.

With speakers such as Public First and John Blake, Director for Fair Access at the Office for Students, the event examined how work which promoted fair access and participation could help us navigate a period of significant turbulence within the HE sector, and society as a whole.

Challenges and threats

It’s fair to say that doing so won’t be easy. The opening plenary from Public First brought home the gravity of the challenge ahead. Whilst many of us thought that a change in government, and an end to the relentless attacks on the sector linked to culture wars narratives, would make life easier for the sector, we may have been overly optimistic.

Providers may not be bracing themselves for a barrage of criticism from policymakers, but we are far from the top of the list of governmental priorities for support.

Polling of voters demonstrated that education, let alone higher education, just wasn’t at the top of issues that they cared about. When this is combined with the fact that, compared to schools with leaky roofs and a Further Education sector whose funding has been decimated, universities seem pretty awash with cash – and it makes it difficult to gain the buy-in necessary to bring about much-needed reform in the sector.

Without reform, it is highly likely that those who will be hardest hit by challenges linked to a financial crisis will be students who already navigate multiple barriers linked to experiences of inequality.

Whether it be cuts to university access funding, the hours that they will have to work alongside their studies, or a lack of subject breadth available to study locally due to course closures, we would be naive to assume that these challenges wouldn’t be compounded for students who have fewer cultural, social and economic opportunities afforded to them to begin with.

It leaves us facing the possibility that, without these students being robustly advocated for in conversations linked to policy and practice, any progress made in greater equity of opportunity to date could unravel quickly and significantly.

Opportunities

But where there are threats and challenges, there are also opportunities – for a bold, innovative approach to the ways in which we meet them.

It would be fair to say that, at times, the sector may have rested on laurels with regard to fair access and participation. Generally speaking, the Blairite goal of “getting more bright poor kids” to university has succeeded. We’ve seen a massive expansion of student numbers, and a significant increase in the diversity of the sector in terms of types and sizes of institution.

However, it has also become painfully obvious that this isn’t enough. For our sector to truly fulfil its potential, we need to demonstrate how it can be achieved through enabling opportunity. The conversation about this to some degree has already begun. In December John Blake, announced his vision for the future of collaborative outreach. Within this was greater focus on regional partnerships as cornerstones in our national efforts to tackle inequity of opportunity.

Within the ocean of policy decisions facing the new government, this is just a ripple. DfE has consultations on on the school curriculum and school inspections, there’s a delay in the rollout of the Lifelong Learning Entitlement, and serious thought is being given toward a National Youth Strategy.

For those of us who work as professionals in university access and participation, the capacity for our work to contribute to the generation of civic, social and economic opportunities are readily apparent.

But when it comes to the articulation of higher education’s value, our significant efforts are often overlooked or untapped. As a community, we convened at the FACE Summit to mobilise and become larger than the sum of our parts – to, as a collective, begin to proactively engage in policy issues which directly impact upon on the lives of people, young and old, who we have made it our vocation to support.

That means creatively and innovatively engaging with the role of universities in meeting the challenges presented in wider society, and to be bold in our articulation of a fairer, more equitable future.

If the sector wishes to robustly demonstrate how it breaks down barriers to opportunity, talking to us would be a very good place to start.

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February 4, 2025
Analysis: Harvard’s settlement adopting IHRA anti-Semitism definition a prescription to chill campus speech

Just one day after President Trump took office, Harvard agreed to settle two lawsuits brought against it by Jewish students that alleged the university ignored “severe and pervasive anti-Semitism on campus” and created “an unbearable educational environment” in the wake of the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel and the ongoing war in Gaza.

While the settlement language itself does not appear to be public, a press release filed on the official docket of The Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law v. President and Fellows of Harvard College included some details. Most notably, Harvard agreed to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA’s) definition of anti-Semitism. FIRE’s worry, shared by many others — including the definition’s primary author — is that, when added to policies used to punish discriminatory harassment on American campuses, the definition is too likely to be used to punish speech that is critical of Israel or its government but that is not motivated in animus against Jews or Israelis.

FIRE has repeatedly proposed steps to address anti-Semitic discrimination on campus that would safeguard students from harassment while protecting freedom of speech, most recently in our inauguration-day letter to President Trump. Getting this right is important; any proposal that chills or censors protected speech on campus won’t pass constitutional muster at public universities, won’t square with free speech promises at private universities (like Harvard), and won’t effectively address anti-Semitism.

Nevertheless, attempts to codify the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism into laws or regulations are nothing new. FIRE posted a roundup of the widespread civil libertarian opposition to its codification last year, when Congress considered adopting it as federal law. Among those opponents is the definition’s primary author, Kenneth Stern, who spoke at length with FIRE’s Nico Perrino on our So to Speak podcast about why it’s not the right tool for the job of regulating speech. As Stern wrote back in 2016 for The New York Times: “The definition was intended for data collectors writing reports about anti-Semitism in Europe. It was never supposed to curtail speech on campus … And Jewish students are protected under the law as it now stands.” (Perhaps “as it is now written” would have been more precise; whether colleges follow the law is a different issue.) As Stern predicted in that piece:

If this bill becomes law it is easy to imagine calls for university administrators to stop pro-Palestinian speech. Even if lawsuits alleging Title VI violations fail, students and faculty members will be scared into silence, and administrators will err on the side of suppressing or censuring speech.

Stern’s prediction is about to receive ground testing at Harvard, and likely at other universities that may follow its lead.

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At public universities, which are bound by the First Amendment, it’s possible that the test will not last that long. In a case over the definition’s adoption by Texas public institutions by gubernatorial executive order, a federal judge ruled last October that Students for Justice in Palestine was likely to succeed in its claim that policies using the IHRA definition “impose impermissible viewpoint discrimination that chills speech in violation of the First Amendment.” The policies are still in place until the trial, which is scheduled for January of 2026.

But even if use of the IHRA definition is struck down at public universities, that would not prevent its use at Harvard or hundreds of other private institutions. FIRE’s opposition to the use of the IHRA definition for the purpose of regulating speech is not because we do not believe anti-Semitic harassment is not happening. Obviously, it is. Nor is it because we believe anti-Semitic harassment is not worth attention or not prohibited by civil rights law. Again, it is. Our concern is with the IHRA definition itself and the way campuses across the country are likely to misapply it to further chill speech — and use it as an entering wedge to do the same with speech on every other topic under the sun. If the underlying issue were bigotry against any other group, our concerns would be the same. (And if you are aware of such efforts, please bring them to our attention.)

The IHRA definition and anti-discrimination law

At the outset, the adoption of the IHRA definition to define anti-Semitism is itself novel in that laws and rules in the United States generally do not define what acts specifically are racist, sexist, religiously bigoted, or anti-Semitic. They are written from the perspective of prohibiting discrimination against a class of people protected by that law. In the case of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, for example, that includes race, color, and national origin. But the law does not go on to say “and here is what is racist” followed by a list of examples or a definition. That is left to judges and fact-finders to determine, taking into account the facts and context of a given case.

Detailed definitions and examples are much less novel on college campuses, though they have long been problematic. Back in 2007, FIRE took issue with the University of Delaware for a mandatory freshman orientation that (among a massive number of its problems) defined “a racist” as “all white people (i.e., people of European descent) living in the United States, regardless of class, gender, religion, culture, or sexuality.” Sexual harassment is often (too broadly) defined simply as “unwelcome conduct of a sexual nature,” which is unhelpful and overbroad, and then further runs aground on examples like Cal State-Channel Islands’ (our July 2019 Speech Code of the Month) “derogatory posters, cartoons, drawings, symbols, or gestures.”

The IHRA definition combines a couple of these problems. Its website explains:

On 26 May 2016, the Plenary in Bucharest decided to:

Adopt the following non-legally binding working definition of antisemitism:

“Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.”

Let’s look at this with an eye towards enforcement. Did a person accused of discriminatory harassment do so based on having “a certain perception of Jews?” What perception is that? Hatred? Not exactly, as it “may be expressed as hatred towards Jews.” But if it “may be expressed as hatred towards Jews,” it may also not be expressed as hatred towards Jews. That leaves open the possibility that anti-Semitism can be expressed by anything. The definition then moves on to say that it can be directed toward “Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property.” The group of “Jewish and non-Jewish individuals” includes literally everyone. It is more specific about community institutions and religious facilities, excluding those that are not Jewish.

The IHRA definition’s flexibility and reach introduce serious problems when the definition is being used as a speech code that can result in the discipline of individuals or the silencing of their speech.

Most of the definitional work, then, is left to be done by analogy to the examples, which IHRA makes clear, saying, “To guide IHRA in its work, the following examples may serve as illustrations.” Some of those examples include hard-to-argue-with propositions like “Calling for, aiding, or justifying the killing or harming of Jews in the name of a radical ideology or an extremist view of religion,” or “Accusing Jews as a people of being responsible for real or imagined wrongdoing committed by a single Jewish person or group, or even for acts committed by non-Jews.” But other examples have a much greater potential overlap with political critiques, such as “Drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis,” and “Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor,” both of which were cited by the judge in the Texas lawsuit mentioned above. Still others are somewhere in between, like “Applying double standards by requiring of it a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.”

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For the IHRA definition’s intended purpose — to identify anti-Semitism in Europe so that the IHRA may catalog and identify it — the breadth of the examples isn’t too much of a problem. It is common, at FIRE and everywhere else, to ask someone to look for examples of a certain kind of incident by telling them “look for things that look like this.” The sweep of the examples is likely helpful for the IHRA’s intended aim, in that they may capture “edge cases” that don’t strictly fall into the definition but nevertheless seem like part of what it was intended to cover.

Yet the IHRA definition’s flexibility and reach introduce serious problems when the definition is being used as a speech code that can result in the discipline of individuals or the silencing of their speech. The definition is simply not constructed in a manner that makes for fair and predictable application by different individuals, even if all of those individuals are trying their level best. That’s likely why the IHRA went out of its way to label it both a “non-legally binding” and “working” definition, building into the definition’s very text the recognition that it was neither intended to be used as a regulation nor the final word.

Having said that, IHRA goes on to couch things even further. Preceding the examples, it writes:

Manifestations might include the targeting of the state of Israel, conceived as a Jewish collectivity. However, criticism of Israel similar to that leveled against any other country cannot be regarded as antisemitic. Antisemitism frequently charges Jews with conspiring to harm humanity, and it is often used to blame Jews for “why things go wrong.” It is expressed in speech, writing, visual forms and action, and employs sinister stereotypes and negative character traits.

Contemporary examples of antisemitism in public life, the media, schools, the workplace, and in the religious sphere could, taking into account the overall context, include, but are not limited to: […]

The bolded phrases are all qualifiers that leave more openings for interpretation — a situation that courts recognize as a problem in the area of free speech because it makes the rule too vague to follow or fairly administer. In Grayned v. City of Rockford, a landmark 1972 case, the Supreme Court explained that a law (or regulation) is unconstitutionally vague when it does not “give a person of ordinary intelligence a reasonable opportunity to know what is prohibited, so that he may act accordingly.” And vagueness is a particular problem when the rule concerns free speech: “[W]here a vague statute abut[s] upon sensitive areas of basic First Amendment freedoms, it operates to inhibit the exercise of [those] freedoms. Uncertain meanings inevitably lead citizens to steer far wider of the unlawful zone … than if the boundaries of the forbidden areas were clearly marked.”

Harvard is private, so the First Amendment doesn’t directly apply on its campus, but the underlying problem for any institution that claims to be committed to free speech is the same.

Applying the IHRA definition in practice

Let’s walk through one example to see how this can play out.

Accusations that Israel is an “apartheid state” are common on campuses (including at Harvard). Are they anti-Semitic? Many would say yes; the ADL calls labeling Israel as an apartheid state “inaccurate [and] offensive,” and notes it is “often used to delegitimize and denigrate Israel as a whole.” A large majority of Americans may find it unconvincing — only 13% in this April 2023 poll agreed that Israel was “a state with segregation similar to apartheid.” Yet saying that Israel’s Jews are oppressing Palestinians by running an apartheid regime is most certainly criticism “similar to that leveled against” countries like the United States, India, Malaysia, and course the former regime of South Africa (the country from which the term originates), along with many others, past and present. If applying the actual words of the IHRA definition, then, this seems to mean that accusations of Israeli apartheid “cannot be regarded as antisemitic.”

On the other hand, Israeli apartheid accusations do sound similar to several of the IHRA examples. Is the apartheid accusation “[d]enying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor?” That’s close, but not exactly right; you may think that Israel should exist, but with different policies. Is it “[a]pplying double standards by requiring of it a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation?” This depends on whose expectations or demands are being considered. And is making the claim while mostly around American Jews rather than Israeli Jews a form of “[h]olding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel,” since most of your Jewish listeners are likely to be American, with little influence on what Israel does?

None of these are easy questions. Regardless of your personal view, you will find reasonable people who disagree on the answers. And that’s exactly why the IHRA’s examples, when used as part of a speech regulation, threaten protected speech.

Nobody asked the IHRA to come up with a law or rule to define anti-Semitism for purposes of determining what might be discriminatory harassment on American campuses. It’s not the IHRA’s fault that the definition is not right for that purpose.

Ask yourself: What would you do if put in the position of the fact-finder tasked with using the IHRA definition to determine whether a person had engaged in prohibited discriminatory harassment by constantly banging the drum about “Israeli apartheid?” First, you would look to see if the accused said or did something else that would make the prohibited discriminatory intent — that the real reason for their activity was prejudice, not political disagreement — more obvious. If so, problem solved: you can either ignore the apartheid accusation or feel fairly safe assuming that this particular person did mean it to be anti-Semitic.

But if there’s no other helpful evidence, you have to make a decision: Do I believe the IHRA definition actually means what it says about how “criticism of Israel similar to that leveled against any other country cannot be regarded as antisemitic?” The rules of grammar and logic dictate one answer. But, you think, “that can’t actually be what the rule means, can it?” You look at the examples and can’t figure it out, so you just pick one meaning and go with it. This isn’t an application of the rule based on the facts before you. It’s essentially a coin-flip, and replacing it with an actual coin-flip would produce an equally accurate outcome.

More likely, though, you’re on the disciplinary panel because you care about the college community and are determined to try to do what’s best for it. You ask yourself: “Is anyone really that angry about political discrimination in a far-off land, or is it really hostility towards Jews? Might they escalate to physical violence if I let them ‘get away’ with it? Maybe it’s better safe than sorry; after all, this person sounds unpleasant to be around.”

Either way, you don’t have the information you need to know whether the person is guilty or innocent, because you don’t know what the rule actually forbids. You can speculate about what it means, and you have incentives to find a certain way. But the main thing you have to fall back on is the one thing for which you don’t need any process or information at all: prejudice. Imagine the most likely result with a white student named Stacy. Then a Latino student named Reuben. Then a black student named Denise. Then an Arab student named Mohammed. Are all these cases equally likely to come out the same way? The obvious answer is no.

That’s the cost of punishing people for breaking rules that are too vague to understand, or too confusing to follow, or that reasonable people can read entirely differently from one another.

This is bad practice with any rule, but it’s particularly bad with rules that can affect expression. Vague and incomprehensible rules about income taxes are certainly bad, but people are still likely to work and pay (most of) their taxes. Vague rules about speech means people silence themselves, at least in public, which only encourages resentment and radicalization.

Nobody asked the IHRA to come up with a law or rule to define anti-Semitism for purposes of determining what might be discriminatory harassment on American campuses. It’s not the IHRA’s fault that the definition is not right for that purpose. It will be the fault of a school who adopts it when the inevitable injustice results, and quite possibly turns a persuadable political opponent into someone with a racial or religious ax to grind.

Harvard compounds the problem through hypocrisy

Harvard’s FAQ attempting to explain how this applies only makes the situation worse.

A few days after announcing the settlement, Harvard also released a Frequently Asked Questions document about its updated policy. It’s more than 3,500 words long, and refers students to the IHRA definition as well as Harvard’s own (also long) Non-Discrimination and Anti-Bullying Policy. It states that “[d]iscrimination on the basis of the following protected categories, or any other legally protected basis, is unlawful and is prohibited,” with those categories being

According to the press release, Harvard agreed to include discrimination against Zionists as a form of punishable discriminatory harassment, apparently independent of whether those Zionists are or are perceived to also be Jewish. The FAQ confirms this, but with a twist — it covers anti-Zionists, too:

Does conduct that would violate the Non-Discrimination Policy if targeted at Jewish or Israeli individuals also violate the policy if targeted at Zionists?

Yes, provided that the conduct meets the requirements for discriminatory disparate treatment or discriminatory harassment. The Non-Discrimination Policy includes among its protected categories religion, national origin, shared ancestry or ethnic characteristics, and political beliefs. For many Jewish people, Zionism is a part of their Jewish identity. Conduct that would violate the Non-Discrimination Policy if targeting Jewish or Israeli people can also violate the policy if directed toward Zionists. Examples of such conduct include excluding Zionists from an open event, calling for the death of Zionists, applying a “no Zionist” litmus test for participation in any Harvard activity, using or disseminating tropes, stereotypes, and conspiracies about Zionists (e.g., “Zionists control the media”), or demanding a person who is or is perceived to be Jewish or Israeli to state a position on Israel or Zionism to harass or discriminate.

Such conduct would need to meet the standards expressed in the Non-Discrimination Policy for discriminatory disparate treatment or discriminatory harassment, as described above.

Zionists, anti-Zionists, and non-Zionists are all protected against discriminatory disparate treatment and harassment under the policy.

Does conduct that would violate the Non-Discrimination Policy if targeted at Muslim, Arab, Palestinian individuals also violate the policy if targeted at individuals who support Palestinian rights?

Yes, parallel to the question and answer above, provided that the conduct meets the requirements for discriminatory disparate treatment or discriminatory harassment. The Non-Discrimination Policy includes among its protected categories religion, national origin, shared ancestry or ethnic characteristics, and political beliefs such as support of Palestinian rights.

On one hand, this can be seen as solving the problem of appearing to carve out special protections for those with a particular religious or political belief (Zionism is at least one of those and sometimes both) by according the same level of protection to those with the opposing belief. Perhaps this will end up being a net benefit for Jewish or Zionist students who are discriminatorily harassed — if one assumes that Harvard administrators did not already know that Zionism was, if not a religious belief, certainly a political belief. (That seems hard to swallow, but it’s possible.) What Harvard appears to do with this FAQ is simply subsume the settlement into its pre-existing protections against discrimination against people based on their political beliefs.

And that’s where this all breaks down, because it’s quite possible that there is not a single person on this planet who sincerely believes that Harvard does not engage in disparate treatment of people based on their political beliefs. (Start here and keep on scrolling.)

It is no exaggeration to say that FIRE would not exist if Harvard didn’t play favorites with regard to politics. Its decades of doing so were a major factor in leading FIRE co-founder Harvey Silverglate (a graduate of Harvard Law who to this day resides in Cambridge, and who often represented Harvard students at its disciplinary hearings) to realize that something had gone terribly wrong on our nation’s college campuses. He would eventually join FIRE’s other co-founder, Alan Charles Kors, to publish The Shadow University back in 1998, and to found what began as the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education the following year. Harvard’s written prohibition against political discrimination was already in place when then-president Claudine Gay stepped on a metaphorical rake regarding anti-Semitism in front of Congress in 2023, starting a chain of events that led to her resignation.

Simply put, if Harvard was serious about preventing discrimination against Jewish or Zionist students, it already had the ability to do so. Whether based on status or belief, they were certainly protected under Harvard’s existing policies. Harvard just didn’t feel like enforcing those rules for the benefit of those students.

Nor did Harvard feel like using the correct standard for discriminatory harassment in the educational context — the Davis standard that behavior must be “severe, pervasive, and objectively offensive” (as well as fulfill several other factors) to be punishable discriminatory harassment. FIRE has written exhaustively about the importance of the Davis standard (here’s a primer in two parts on it), and why the constant attempts of schools to water it down by pretending “and” is the same as “or” are dangerous for free expression.

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Harvard has done exactly that, watering down the Davis standard to require only that to be punishable, offensive behavior merely be severe or pervasive, not both. Here’s the thing: a great deal of activism is meant to be pervasive. Ongoing protests, social media campaigns, distribution of literature, the display of flags and signs, and many other forms of expression can all go on for days, weeks, or months. The messages may well be offensive, even objectively offensive. Requiring that the communication of these messages also reach the level of severity is a fundamental guardrail preventing the use of discriminatory harassment policies to silence protected speech — and Harvard has gone ahead and pulled that guardrail right out.

Presumably, the plaintiffs are hoping that this settlement will at least focus Harvard’s attention on discrimination against Jewish and Zionist students. This is likely to be true, at least until the heat is off. Given the past couple of years, it’s hard to blame anyone involved in the Israeli-Palestinian controversy for being upset about how campuses have treated them. But the permanent effect of broadening the reach of discriminatory harassment policies so that virtually every cultural, political, or religious disagreement becomes a potential matter for investigation will inevitably be to chill speech on any topic that might be controversial.

Harvard is likely just fine with that chilling effect, and even more content to know that the more overbroad, vague, and complicated it can make its harassment policies, the more discretion its administrators have to simply do whatever they want. Not only does the vagueness guarantee this outcome, but the FAQ contains plenty of “savings clause” language that gives Harvard the ability to apply the policy arbitrarily. How about this gem:

Ordinarily, it will not violate the NDAB Policies for members of the Harvard community to make controversial statements in the course of academic work or in scholarship; express disagreement with another person’s political views; or criticize a government’s policy or the political leaders of a country.

“Ordinarily” it won’t — which means sometimes it will. Can you determine when that might be by reading the policies? No. The answer, then, is “when we say it will.”

This is not a win for free speech or for anti-discrimination. This is a license for Harvard to go right on doing whatever it wants.

The double standards are the real problem

The words “Equal Justice Under Law” are carved on the front of the Supreme Court for a reason.

There is little that is more corrosive to a society or community than rules that allow the authorities to treat offenses differently depending on who the alleged victims or offenders might be. This is a common thread in many FIRE cases, but it’s impossible not to notice how clearly it takes front and center in complaints by Jewish or pro-Israel students that they are subjected to treatment that no campus would accept were it aimed at other minority groups.

The complaint in the Brandeis Center v. Harvard case at issue is just one among many examples. It’s literally the first thing they bring up in the complaint. While Harvard promises to prohibit “[b]ullying, hostile and abusive behavior,” the plaintiffs write:

[A]s to Harvard’s Jewish and Israeli students, these promises are empty. In recent years, and especially in the last few months, Jewish and Israeli students have been subjected to cruel antisemitic bullying, harassment, and discrimination. And when Harvard is presented with incontrovertible evidence of antisemitic conduct, it ignores and tolerates it. Harvard’s permissive posture towards antisemitism is the opposite of its aggressive enforcement of the same anti-bullying and anti-discrimination policies to protect other minorities.

FIRE has spoken to enough students at Harvard and other institutions to give us no reason to doubt this is true. While a perennial problem with regard to many issues, the transparent application of double standards has been particularly central to the complaints of Jewish and pro-Israeli students.

The extent to which this is acutely felt by Jewish and pro-Israeli students is further compounded by the fact that the application of double standards to Jews and/or Israel is widely considered to be a central characteristic of specifically anti-Semitic bigotry. After all, the words “double standards” literally appear in one of the IHRA examples of potential anti-Semitism: “Applying double standards by requiring of [Israel] a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.”

Consider this allegation, taken from the Brandeis Center’s complaint:

On October 18, 2023, another member of JAFE and the Brandeis Center, Member #4, an Israeli Jew and a student at the Harvard Business School (“HBS”), was walking through campus when he encountered an outdoor anti-Israel protest and decided to video the event, as others were doing. When protestors saw him and identified him as Jewish and/or Israeli, they accosted him. A mob surrounded him, engulfed him with keffiyehs, and chanted “Shame! Shame! Shame!” in his face. The assailants grabbed him, and one hit him in the neck with his forearm, before forcing Member #4 out of Harvard’s quad…. The video of the assault is shocking. But more remarkable perhaps is that Harvard has not taken any action to date to redress both the physical assault and the clear violations of its Anti-Bullying and Anti-Discrimination Policies.

Assuming this account is anywhere near the truth, it is impossible to imagine this being Harvard’s reaction to, say, a group of white students doing this to an African-American student. Nor is any change to policy required to handle this situation. You don’t even need a discrimination policy to prevent people from shoving others around. If Harvard truly sat on its hands here, that’s because it wanted to.

The solution to this problem will not come from making people at Harvard more aware of what represents anti-Semitic discrimination, expanding the number of protected classes, or broadening their interpretation in a way that cannot help but scare people away from speaking. It can only be solved when the people in charge are either no longer willing or no longer able to apply noxious double standards in order to advance their own political, religious, or cultural agendas.

Adopting the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism will chill campus speech. We can hope that it will also help at least a few Harvard students whose episodes of discriminatory harassment might otherwise be ignored, assuming the Harvard administration feels the need to make a show of things. It won’t address the root problem. But it will set Harvard up for plenty of new ones.

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February 3, 2025
Enrollment Trending Upward After COVID-19

Title: Current Term Enrollment Estimates: Fall 2024

Source: National Student Clearinghouse Research Center

Total fall 2024 enrollment rose across multiple factors—including sector, selectivity, and urban-rural classification—bringing it closer to pre-pandemic levels, according to a new report from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Service. Compared to fall 2019, overall enrollment increased by 0.4 percent, and compared to fall 2023, it grew by 4.5 percent.

Enrollment gains were particularly strong in associate programs (up 6.3 percent), bachelor’s programs (up 2.9 percent), master’s programs (up 3.3 percent), and doctoral programs (up 2.0 percent). Private for-profit four-year institutions saw the most significant increase in first-year enrollment, surging by 26.1 percent with more than 11,000 additional students. Public institutions also experienced notable growth, with primarily associate degree-granting baccalaureate institutions up 8.4 percent and public two-year institutions increasing by 6.8 percent.

First-year enrollment overall grew by 5.5 percent, with the most significant gains among students from the lowest-income neighborhoods (up 9.4 percent). Enrollment increases were generally aligned with neighborhood income levels, with students from the highest-income areas seeing the smallest rise (3.6 percent).

At Historically Black Colleges and Universities, enrollment increased at both the graduate (6.5 percent) and undergraduate (3.4 percent) levels. Meanwhile, public four-year institutions in rural areas experienced the largest enrollment growth (5.6 percent), while public two-year institutions saw the biggest increases in towns (7.9 percent). Urban areas continued to enroll the most students at public two-year institutions, surpassing 2.3 million.

Patterns of growth varied across selectivity and sector. Less selective private nonprofit four-year institutions saw the most substantial gains (5.7 percent), with similar increases at less selective public four-year institutions (5.0 percent). Enrollment at highly selective institutions followed a different trend, rising at public four-year institutions (2.9 percent) but declining at private nonprofit institutions (-2.5 percent).

Regionally, enrollment increased at similar rates in the Northeast, South, and West (4.7 percent each) and rose by 3.1 percent in the Midwest. Utah led the nation in enrollment growth (12.1 percent), while the District of Columbia (-1.9 percent), Vermont (-0.6 percent), and Nebraska (-0.4 percent) saw declines. Graduate enrollment patterns diverged in some areas, with notable decreases in Mississippi (-4.3 percent), Delaware (-3.9 percent), and Missouri (-3.4 percent).

Fields of study also showed shifts, with undergraduate enrollment in health professions rising 8.3 percent—effectively reversing pandemic-related declines. Among the top 20 major fields, only two saw decreases: Liberal Arts and Sciences, General Studies, and Humanities (-3.1 percent) and English Language and Literature/Letters (-1.5 percent).

This data provides an encouraging outlook for higher education. Understanding who is enrolling and where is essential for institutional planning and for ensuring equitable access to higher education.

To explore the data, click here. For the methodology, click here.

—Erica Swirsky

If you have any questions or comments about this blog post, please contact us.

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February 3, 2025
The Growing Gender Divide in STEM Education
Title: The Hidden STEM Gender Gap: Why Progress at Top Universities Masks a Growing Crisis

Source: Brookings Institution

Authors: Joseph R. Cimpian and Jo R. King

A recent Brookings Institution article, “The Hidden STEM Gender Gap: Why Progress at Top Universities Masks a Growing Crisis,” paints a complex picture of the state of gender equity in STEM higher education. While top universities have made notable progress in narrowing the gender gap in physics, engineering, and computer science (PECS) majors, institutions serving students with lower math achievement are falling further behind.

Over the past two decades, the male-to-female ratio in PECS majors decreased from 2.2:1 to 1.5:1 at universities with the highest average math SAT scores. However, at institutions with the lowest average scores, the gender gap has dramatically widened from 3.5:1 to 7.1:1. This disparity persists even when accounting for differences in math ability, confidence, interests, and academic preparation. The findings point to institutional barriers that disproportionately impact women at less selective schools.

The institutions struggling most with gender equity serve the majority of American students, particularly students of color and those from lower-income families. PECS degrees offer a path to high-paying careers, and research suggests women may see an even greater earnings premium from these majors at less selective institutions compared to their more selective counterparts. By failing to recruit and retain women in PECS programs, we are denying millions the opportunity to benefit from these rewarding fields.

The authors propose several strategies to shrink this gap:
- Allocate resources strategically, directing support to the institutions facing the greatest challenges rather than those already making progress.
- Adapt proven practices like undergraduate research and peer mentoring to the unique needs and constraints of less-resourced institutions, forging creative partnerships to ensure successful implementation at scale.
- Mobilize external partners, from nonprofit organizations to industry groups, to strategically focus their outreach and pathway-building efforts on the schools and communities with the most severe gender imbalances.
Achieving gender equity in STEM will require acknowledging where we are falling short and building the collective determination to change. The success of top universities shows that progress is possible, but it will take targeted interventions and a sustained commitment to extending opportunities to all students. Until then, our celebrations of narrowing gaps will ring hollow for the women left behind.

To read the full Brookings Institution article, click here. The complete research is also available in the journal Science here.

—Alex Zhao

If you have any questions or comments about this blog post, please contact us.
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February 3, 2025
Operations with Cloud Based Higher Education Management Solutions
Cloud based higher education management solution

In the education industry, cloud-based technologies are driving a major revolution. Over 70% of colleges use cloud solutions to streamline operations and cut expenses as they balance budgets. Recent studies show that institutions that have adopted Cloud based higher education management solutions have seen an average reduction of 30% in reduce operational costs in higher educations, enabling them to reinvest in areas that enhance the student experience and drive academic success.

Keeping on budget while managing admissions, money, HR, and learning systems is no small task. Often caught handling costly, ineffective, error-prone fragmented systems are IT teams are assigned. Still, there is a smarter road forward. Higher education management solutions housed on clouds are meant to streamline your life. These tools are meant to combine all those disparate systems, automate tedious chores, and clear the mess of documentation. Consider it your default method for simplifying university processes.

In this blog, we’ll dive deep into how cloud based higher education management solutions are optimizing university operations, enabling smarter decision-making, and unlocking efficiencies that were once unimaginable with legacy systems.

Cloud based higher education management solutions: why?

Cloud technology is improving campus operations, including:
- Automating and removing paper workflows saves institutions up to 30%.
- Efficiency: Real-time data and better cooperation boost productivity.
- Scales smoothly: A rise in students? Program expansion? Your needs shape cloud systems.
- Upgraded Security: Multi-factor authentication, encryption, and compliance safeguard data.
Disjointed Systems Breakup

Even the most efficient teams can be slowed by obsolete technologies and paper processes. To reduce redundancies and streamline operations, cloud solutions combine these systems into a single, easy platform. IT teams can focus on strategic innovations instead of segregated platform troubleshooting.

Future-Ready Change

Agility and resilience are essential for the future of higher education. Enabling seamless scalability, strengthening cybersecurity measures, and fostering innovation, cloud-based systems guarantee that your institution remains at the forefront. Not only do these solutions address current challenges, but they also establish your campus as a leader in adapting to the constantly changing educational landscape.

Improving Efficiency with Creatrix Campus Cloud-Based Solutions

Creative Campus provides a complete solution for your university. The automation of financial operations and real-time course registration are meant to simplify and improve your work.

The platform’s easy design and customized modules let you solve campus issues. Because it’s cloud-based, Creatrix Campus integrates across departments, fosters collaboration, and supports growth without costly infrastructure updates.
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February 3, 2025
Small College America Podcast Returns for a New Season – Edu Alliance Journal
Dean Hoke and Kent Barnds Relaunch Acclaimed Series to Explore the Future of Small Colleges

Bloomington, Indiana – February 3, 2025 – Small College America, the podcast dedicated to exploring the strengths, challenges, and future of small colleges, is officially relaunching with a new season. The series is co-hosted by Dean Hoke, Managing Partner of Edu Alliance Group and former President/CEO of the American Association of University Administrators, and Kent Barnds, Executive Vice President for Strategy and Innovation at Augustana College in Rock Island, Illinois.

Both Hoke and Barnds are passionate advocates for small colleges, having graduated from Urbana University (OH) and Gettysburg College (PA), respectively. Their personal experiences and professional expertise have shaped their commitment to highlighting the vital role these institutions play in American higher education.

“The landscape for small colleges is shifting rapidly, and we believe now is the time to amplify the conversation about their future,” said Kent Barnds. ” Dean and I are both passionate advocates for these institutions because we’ve experienced firsthand the impact of a small college education.” Dean Hoke stated, “The first season of Small College America confirmed that there is a deep need for dialogue about the opportunities and challenges facing these schools. With this new season, we aim to engage with higher education leaders to explore innovative strategies that will help small colleges not just survive but thrive in an evolving higher education environment.”

The original four-part series first aired on January 10, 2023, and was hosted by Dean Hoke and Tom Davisson, who now serves as Charter Commissioner for the National Association for Academic Excellence (NAAE). The inaugural season featured insightful conversations with small college presidents, including:
- Dr. Barry Ryan, Former President of Woodbury University (Burbank, California)
- Stefanie Niles, President of Cottey College (Nevada, Missouri)
- Ryan Smith, President of the University of Rio Grande and Rio Grande Community College (Rio Grande, Ohio)
- Janelle Vanasse, President of Alaska Pacific University (Anchorage, Alaska)
The new season of Small College America will continue its mission of bringing critical discussions to the forefront by interviewing higher education leaders, policy experts, and innovators. The podcast will delve into the evolving role of small colleges, their economic impact, innovative strategies for sustainability, and how they can continue to provide a highly personalized educational experience.

Season Two will begin weekly on March 11^th at 11AM Eastern. More details, including upcoming, will be announced soon.

For updates, visit [Podcast Website] or follow Small College America on [Social Media Links].

About the Hosts

Kent Barnds is the Executive Vice President for Strategy and Innovation at Augustana College, where he has been a senior administrator since 2005. A recognized thought leader in enrollment management and institutional strategy, Barnds is deeply invested in the success of small colleges and the students they serve.

Dean Hoke is Managing Partner of Edu Alliance Group, a higher education consultancy, and formerly served as President/CEO of the American Association of University Administrators (AAUA). With decades of experience in higher education leadership, consulting, and institutional strategy, he brings a wealth of knowledge on small colleges’ challenges and opportunities.

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February 3, 2025

Kiemelkedő emberek: hozzájárulás az orvostudomány, a gazdasági tevékenység, a kreativitás és más területekhez

A híres személyiségek fontos szerepet játszanak a nyilvánosság számos szektorának fejlődésében. Ezek az egyének megváltoztatják a történelem irányát, meghatározzák a következő éveket, és inspirálják utódaikat is. A kezelés, a vállalkozói szellem, a kreativitás, a technika és a sport – ezek az irányok az emberi lét szerves részét képezik, és fejlődésüket nemcsak a tudományos-technikai haladás, hanem olyan kiemelkedő egyéniségek is előidézték, akiknek tevékenysége, sikerei jelentős nyomot hagytak a kultúrában és a társadalomban. Ha érdekli a téma a las vegas casino corvin, követheti a linket https://znaki.fm/hu/places/las-vegas-casino-corvin-setany/. Ezt a cikket szakértői csapatunk írta, melynek vezetője a András Nagy. Ebben a cikkben különböző szakmai területek ikonikus alakjait elemezzük, akiknek eredményei jelentősen megváltoztatták a közösséget.

Jelentős személyek az orvostudomány területén

Az orvostudomány az emberi tevékenység egyik kulcsfontosságú területe, ahol kiemelkedő emberek eredményei milliók életét menthetik meg.

Híres orvosok és tudósok erőfeszítéseinek köszönhetően a társadalom megtanulta megbirkózni a betegségekkel, meghosszabbítja az életet és javítja az életszínvonalat.

Példák orvosokra:

Hippokratész egy ókori görög orvos, akinek munkái lefektették a modern orvoslás alapjait. Hangot adott annak a véleményének, hogy a betegségeknek természetes tényezői vannak, és olyan kimutatási és kezelési technikákat hozott létre, amelyek ma is hasznosak.
Avicenna iráni tudós, aki fontos orvosi munkákat írt, amelyek hatással voltak az orvostudományra a középkorban.
Florence Nightingale az ápolás megteremtője. Firenze nemcsak a kórházi körülményeket javította, hanem a higiénia terén is fontos eredményeket ért el.
Dr. Fleming az a tudós, aki felfedezte a penicillint, az első gyógyszert, amely milliók életét mentette meg.

Ezek és az orvostudomány más kiemelkedő alakjai jelentősen hozzájárultak a közösség egészségének megőrzéséhez, megváltoztatták a kezelési szemléletet és a betegségek látásmódját.

Név	Loot	Művészet
	A penicillin felfedezése	XX. század
	Jelentések az orvostudományról és a filozófiáról	XI. század
	A modern orvoslás alapjai	Kr.e. 5. század
	Orvosi gyakorlat megváltoztatása	XIX. század

Jelentős személyiségek a kereskedelemben

Egyes üzleti vezetők az előrehaladás és az innováció ikonjává válnak, és ötleteiknek és törekvéseiknek köszönhetően befolyásolják a világot.

Az üzlet a gazdasági fejlődés motorjaként szolgál, amely új lehetőségeket nyit meg, és munkahelyeket is biztosít.

Minták sikeres vállalkozókról:

Az alapító Henry Ford úttörő, aki bevezette az autók futószalagos gyártását. Koncepciói megváltoztatták az autóipart, így a járművek könnyebben elérhetőek lettek a tömegek számára.
Steve Jobs újító – az Apple vállalat társalapítója, amely technológiai áttörést ért el a fogyasztói elektronika területén. Találmányai, mint például a MacBook és az iPhone, átalakították az innovatív eszközök interakciós módszereit.
Ilon Musk a Tesla és a SpaceX vállalat megalkotója. Kezdeményezései az elektromos járművek ágazatában és az űrrepülésekben megnyitják az emberiség hozzáférését egy ökológiailag és technológiailag fejlettebb időhöz.
Richard Branson a Virgin Group márka alapítója, egy olyan vállalat, amely különféle iparágakban dolgozik, a show-biznisztől az űrutazásig.

Az ilyen cégvezetők bebizonyították, hogy az innovációnak és az ambíciónak köszönhetően még a legambiciózusabb projektekben is lehet fantasztikus eredményeket elérni.

A kultúra kiemelkedő alakjai

A tehetséges alkotók rengeteg embert inspirálnak kreatív stílusukkal, és olyan remekműveket hoznak létre, amelyek sok éven át relevánsak maradnak.

A művészeti tevékenység mindig is jelentős szerepet töltött be a kultúrában, megmutatva az emberi élet összetettségét és összetettségét. a világról alkotott nézetek formálása.

Minták kiemelkedő művészekből:

Da Vinci a reneszánsz korszak egyik legnagyobb festője, aki olyan remekműveiről ismert, mint a Mona Lisa és az Utolsó vacsora. Művészeti tevékenysége mellett kiemelkedő kutató és feltaláló volt, ami a művelődéstörténet kivételes alakjává teszi.
Charlie Chaplin színész és rendező nagyszerű színész és rendező, aki jelentős mértékben hozzájárult a mozi világához. Filmjei, különösen az “Aranyláz” és a “A nagyváros fényei” című filmek a világfilmes örökség klasszikusává váltak.
Marilyn Monroe Hollywood ikonikus alakja és a 20. század egyik legnépszerűbb színésznője, akinek arculata ikonikussá vált.
Quentin Tarantino rendező kortárs filmrendező, akinek olyan filmjei, mint a Pulp Fiction, megváltoztatták a zsánermozi felfogását, és új mércét állítottak fel a moziban.

A kreativitás különleges erővel hat világképünkre, és az ilyen művészek továbbra is milliókat inspirálnak munkáikkal.

Legendás alakok a tudományos és műszaki szférában

A tudósok és mérnökök olyan tudományos és technológiai áttöréseket érnek el, amelyek az élet minden területét meghatározzák.

A tudományos kutatás és a technológiai innováció olyan területek, amelyeken kiemelkedő gondolkodók fontos felfedezéseket tesznek, amelyek alakítják jövőnket. Ha érdeklik a Magyarországgal kapcsolatos aktuális kiadványok, javasoljuk, hogy látogassa meg a https://znaki.fm/hu/ információs oldalt. ahol újságírók mesélnek a legaktuálisabb eseményekről és témákról.

Híres tudósok mintái:

Einstein Albert a relativitáselmélet szerzője, amely megváltoztatta a térlátást, az idő múlását és a gravitáció természetét.
Madame Curie az első nő, akit Nobel-díjjal tüntettek ki. Maria radioaktivitás-kutatása új lehetőségeket nyitott az orvostudományban és a fizikában.
Nikola Tesla egy feltaláló, akinek az elektromosság és a rádiókommunikáció területén végzett kutatásai nagy hatással voltak a technológia fejlődésére.
Stephen Hawking kozmológus egy legendás tudós, aki a fekete lyukak és a kvantummechanika tanulmányaival új távlatokat nyitott a világegyetem tanulmányozásában.

Ezek a tudósok megváltoztatták a világról alkotott képünket, és modern eszközöket adtak az emberiségnek a további kutatáshoz és innovációhoz.

Híres alakok a sportban

Emellett a sport javítja a fizikai állapotot, és egyben motiválja az embereket a sikerek útján, feltárva a fizikai testben rejlő kimeríthetetlen potenciált.

Példák kiemelkedő sportolókra:

Michael Jordan kosárlabda-legenda a történelem egyik vezető kosárlabdázója, sportsikerei az egész iparágra hatással voltak.
Usain Bolt gyorsasági sportoló, akit a bolygó leggyorsabb emberének tartanak. 100 és 200 méteres sprinttávon elért sporteredményeit még senki sem szárnyalta felül.
Serhii Bubka rúdugrás ukrán atléta, aki számos világrekordot állított fel rúdugrásban.
Simone Biles amerikai tornász, aki az olimpián és a nemzetközi bajnokságokon nyújtott hihetetlen teljesítményének köszönhetően új mércét állít fel sportágában.

A felsorolt sportolók nemcsak nagy sikereket értek el a választott sportágakban, hanem rengeteg embert inspiráltak sportsikereikre.

Következtetések

Az orvostudomány, a kereskedelem, a művészet, a tudomány és a sport kiemelkedő személyiségei jelentős hatással vannak a társadalom fejlődésére.

Erőfeszítéseiknek köszönhetően lehetőségünk van a legújabb technológiák bevezetésére, életünk meghosszabbítására, valamint a kultúra, a technológiai fejlődés és a sportversenyek modern korszerű élvezetére.

Hozzájárulásuk nemcsak a mai világot változtatja meg. , hanem az új nemzedékeket is új magasságok megszerzésére ösztönzi.

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February 3, 2025

Ontario in 2029 | HESA
Back in 2022, just after the last provincial election, I wrote a piece looking forward a few years and predicted that the years 2023-25 were going to be chaos for Ontario postsecondary institutions. And I was right, although I can’t claim to have anticipated any of the specifics. Given that we are now going back into an election, I thought I would try to look into a crystal ball and look at what the province’s postsecondary system will look like financially if our glorious premier is re-elected for another four years.

To do this, of course, requires making a few assumptions, not just about what will happen in the future but, given the inevitable Canadian delays in producing data, what’s been happening in the past two years as well. Hard data on the student numbers which drive aggregate tuition income does not exist beyond 2022 because the provincial government is deliberately suppressing data on this subject. Yes, really. Until last year, Ontario had one of the best records in the country when it came to openness on enrolment stats, usually publishing quite detailed data within six months of end of the calendar year. As of today, it has now been twenty-one months since the last update. By complete coincidence, the data that has not been updated covers the exact period where provincial government was asleep at the wheel in terms of oversight of international student intake. Can’t have that data going out before an election, I guess.

Anyways, that means the following projections require a bit more educated guess work than usual. For transparency, here are my assumptions:
- I have based student number projections for 2023-24 and 2024-25 on data I could find from the Ontario Universities Application Centre (OUAC) and from federal open data on student visas issued up to fall 2024.
- I am assuming that international student enrolment will bottom out in 2025-26 and resume 10% annual growth thereafter, and that domestic enrolment will grow 2% per year, in line with projected increases in the 18-21 population. The assumptions on international students might be too generous, in which case all my projections will be too optimistic. Keep that in mind as you read this.
- I am assuming that the provincial government will not add any new funding to the system beyond what was announced in the run-up to the 2024 budget, but that the extra funding announced as a response to the Blue-Ribbon Panel will be maintained past 2027.
- I am assuming the freeze on tuition will be maintained, but a gentle (but below-inflation) rise in average tuition will continue due to students switching from cheaper humanities courses to more expensive STEM ones.
- I am going to focus on the main sources of institutional operating income, which are tuition fees and provincial operating government. I am excluding from this analysis anything to do with income from federal or private non-student sources.
Let’s start with public expenditures on postsecondary education. The problem of falling real public expenditures began well before Ford took power, but this trend has worsened under Ford. Until last year, he consistently allowed inflation to erode funding. The only time he increased institutional funding was in 2024, after the report of the blue-ribbon panel, and even then the three-year package he announced barely allows funding to keep up with inflation. When this new funding evaporates in 2027, the prospects for any new funding are uncertain: I think it is more likely that the government will revert to its previous practice of holding funding constant in nominal dollars but fail to provide any help to offset inflation. Assuming this is true, the path of government funding for Ontario postsecondary institutions will be as shown below in Figure 1.

Figure 1: Ontario Government Transfers to Post-Secondary Education, 2001-02 to 2028-29 (projected) in Billions of $2023

Now of course, public funding only makes up about a third of total funding in Ontario postsecondary education. What happens when you include tuition fees? Well, it looks like the graph below, Figure 2. Again, as you can see, the “take-off” point for the system we have today clearly lies in the McGuinty/ Wynne period, but boy howdy did the Ford team double-down on the model it inherited.

Figure 2: Total Operating Income by Source and Sector, Ontario Public Postsecondary Institutions, 2001-02 to 2028-29 (projected) in Billions of $2023

Now, this is one of those cases where it helps to disaggregate what is going on in the system and look separately at what’s going on in the universities and colleges. Let’s start with colleges in Figure 3.

Figure 3: Total Operating Income by Source, Ontario Colleges, 2001-02 to 2028-29 (projected) in Billions of $2023

I’ve been writing about the big fall in college revenues for a few months now, but even I find this graph shocking. Total operating income to the college system is going to crash by about a third between 2023-24 and 2024-25 and then probably will start to recover thereafter. Basically, you should consider the period 2015-2025 as a huge fever dream that is now breaking and sending the system back to exactly where it was a decade ago, minus about 15% of its public funding and a similar drop in the number of students (domestic enrolment really crashed over the past decade).

Figure 4 repeats the exercise for universities. This one might seem puzzling for many, because it appears to show very little drop in funding in the 2020s. I mean, yes, there’s a teeny dip in 2024, but absolutely nothing like what we see in the colleges—so why are universities screaming about their untenable financial positions?

Figure 4: Total Operating Income by Source, Ontario Universities, 2001-02 to 2028-29 (projected) in Billions of $2023

Well, the answer is that universities don’t have a revenue challenge so much as a cost challenge. Colleges have an enormous amount of freedom to rearrange or reduce staff. Universities, to put it mildly, do not, partly because of tenure and partly because collective agreements between universities and faculty contain clauses about layoffs and financial exigency which impose very high barriers and costs to any institution that tries to reduce academic headcount. This forces institutions to force as many cuts as possible on non-academic staff and services, but there are limits to how much you can do before students start turning away.

Plus, of course, universities simply got in the habit of getting ever larger. Looke at what happened in the 18 years before the Ford government took power: 17 straight years where the average annual income growth after inflation was 5%. The internal political economy of Ontario universities simply evolved so that growth less than 5% was believed to be “austerity.” Since Ford came to power, annual growth has been effectively zero, even as institutions are dealing with the costs of accommodating the major shift in students from humanities to STEM. The gears inside universities are grinding to a halt and even going in reverse this year and next. And universities are—by design—poorly engineered to deal with a lack of growth.

So, what can be done? Well, in the world we all wished we lived in, this situation would be attracting serious political attention. But it’s not. Ontarians quite like having world-class universities and colleges; they just don’t feel like paying for it. Had the cuts started a few weeks earlier, or had the election been called a few weeks later, the current Program Apocalypse (which seems more than on course to deliver the closure of over 1000 programs across the province) might have become what political animals call “a kitchen-table issue,” that is an issue so important than voters talk about it at the kitchen table. Kids not being able to get into the programs they want to get into because they have been shut due to budget cuts? Yeah, that’s a kitchen table issue. One that might yet have some impact on the election, though probably not a decisive one.

Could institutions do more to make this a kitchen table issue? Yes, they could. At the university level, institutions could be more overt in saying they will no longer be able to support as many spots in expensive, high-demand programs. At the college level, institutions could be more aggressive about closing programs in the skilled trades. So far, they have been very reluctant to do this even though their high cost-per-student should probably lead a lot more of them to be on the chopping block if financial sustainability were a major issue. But institutions are reluctant to do this because it’s hard to play chicken with the government without seeming to play chicken with the general public. And the only way things could get worse for institutions right now is if they lose what’s left of the public sympathy they have. Which is to say: yes, they could be doing more, but it’s easy enough to explain their hesitation in doing so.

Anyways, sorry to readers in the rest of the country for all the Ontario-centricity. If you’d like to know more about how the mess in Ontario—partly due to inept oversight by the Ford team and partly due to an inept response by federal immigration minister Marc Miller—affects the rest of the country (and it does), have a listen to my guest appearance on the Missing Middle podcast last week. Good fun.
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February 3, 2025
Higher Education Inquirer : President Elect Lowman, PhD

Higher Education Inquirer : President Elect Lowman, PhD – talks about the Association of Black Psychologists (Sincere Media Network)

President Elect Lowman, PhD – talks about the Association of Black Psychologists (Sincere Media Network)

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February 3, 2025
Unifying supports for first-generation students on campus

First-generation students make up around 20 percent of the University of South Carolina student population.

University of South Carolina

While first-generation students are a growing population in higher education, they remain less likely to retain or complete a credential, compared to their continuing-generation peers.

A new initiative at the University of South Carolina unifies assistance for students who are the first in their families to attend college to guide them through the university and provide a sense of belonging. The First-Generation Student Center is connected to a first-generation living-learning community and offers embedded academic and socioemotional support, which reduces the need for students to seek support independently.

What’s the need: USC serves a large number of first-generation learners—one in five undergraduate students or around 6,000 individuals.

“We know from our campus data on students in our long-standing TRIO program that they do not have the gaps in retention and graduation that our other first-generation students have,” says Shelley Dempsey, assistant provost for graduation and retention. “However, the program is at max capacity.  It was time for our university to provide additional options to serve students in a similar demographic who are not able to be a part of the TRIO program.”

The center was designed to provide increased and more specialized services for learners in a physical space that promotes students’ feelings of belonging.

Dempsey sees particular benefits with first-generation student support, including social capital growth and impacting future generations of their families. But Dempsey also notes improving processes and the student experience for first-generation degree attainment is a benefit for the institution as a whole.

How it works: The First-Generation Center (FGC), which opened in fall 2024 within Maxcy College residence hall on campus, includes a variety of support services and resources.

A dedicated director and assistant director support the center, as does a faculty director, who oversees the living and learning community for 151 first-generation students.

Within the center, students can engage with an embedded mental health counselor for one-on-one in-person or virtual sessions, as well as group sessions on common themes like homesickness and exam anxiety. The Student Success Center has embedded staff presence for drop-in hours, and the FGC hosts other partners across campus, including financial aid, the career center and the meal card office, to provide insights into navigating higher ed.

“The idea is that if we can have all of these offices have a presence in the FGC as a safe space, then we build comfort and confidence with the first-generation students to utilize them in their locations outside the FGC as well,” Dempsey says.

This fall, the center hosted a series called First-Gen Connections that provided relevant information related to campus experiences and deadlines. Athletics staff led a discussion on how students can earn ticket priority for sporting events and offered students a behind-the-scenes tour of the football stadium, for example.

How it’s going: Since launching the center, USC leaders have seen an increase in first-generation student involvement. The center was advertised through meetings, events and campus media including newsletters, but word of mouth has been the most effective marketing campaign.

Several sections of University 101, USC’s first-year seminar program, also meet in the center, which helps raise awareness of the support offerings.

This fall, efforts to include first-generation students were noticeable in mini-grant applications for research and creative projects alongside a mentor, with 55 percent of applicants being first-gen learners.

“We want our first-generation students to know that they are just as capable, and sometimes that takes bringing the info to them in a designated space so that they don’t have to navigate the large university and unfamiliar lingo or jargon for themselves,” Dempsey says.

What’s next: The current target is incoming and first-year students, with the hopes of continuing to involve them as they progress through the institution, but administrators hope to reach graduate students, as well.

“We are in the process of conducting a needs assessment to know how to increase our supports going forward,” Dempsey says.

The university will also track other student metrics including involvement in high-impact practices, GPA, DFW rates, campus involvement and leadership opportunities. Additionally, leaders will compare utilization of support services among first-gen students who engage with the center compared to their peers who are also first-gen but not associated with the center.

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February 3, 2025