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  • What’s next in equality of opportunity evaluation?

    What’s next in equality of opportunity evaluation?

    In the Evaluation Collective – a cross-sector group of like-minded evaluation advocates – we have reason to celebrate two related interventions.

    One is the confirmation of a TASO and HEAT helmed evaluation library – the other John Blake’s recent Office for Students (OfS) blog What’s next in equality of opportunity regulation.

    We cheer his continued focus on evaluation and collaboration (both topics close to our collective heart). In particular, we raised imaginary (in some cases…) glasses to John Blake’s observation that:

    Ours is a sector founded on knowledge creation, curation, and communication, and all the skills of enquiry, synthesis and evidence-informed practice that drive the disciplines English HE providers research and teach, should also be turned to the vital priorities of expanding the numbers of students able to enter HE, and ensuring they have the best chance to succeed once they are admitted.

    That’s a hard YES from us.

    Indeed, there’s little in our Evaluation Manifesto (April 2022) that isn’t thinking along the same lines. Our final manifesto point addresses almost exactly this:

    The Evaluation Collective believe that higher education institutions should be learning organisations which promote thinking cultures and enact iterative and meaningful change. An expansive understanding of evaluation such as ours creates a space where this learning culture can flourish. There is a need to move the sector beyond simply seeking and receiving reported impact.

    We recognise that OfS has to maintain a balance between evaluation for accountability (they are our sector regulator after all) and evaluation for enhancement and learning.

    Evaluation in the latter mode often requires different thinking, methodologies and approaches. Given the concerning reversal of progress in HE access indicated by recent data this focus on learning and enhancement of our practice seems even more crucial.

    This brings us to two further collective thoughts.

    An intervention intervention

    John Blake’s blog references comments made by the Evaluation Collective’s Chair Liz Austen at the Unlocking the Future of Fair Access event. Liz’s point, which draws on a soon to be published book chapter, is that, from some perspectives, the term intervention automatically implies an evaluation approach that is positivistic and scientific – usually associated with Type 3 causal methodologies such as randomised control trials.

    This kind of language can be uncomfortable for those of us evaluating in different modes (and even spark the occasional paradigm war). Liz argued that much of the activity we undertake to address student success outcomes, such as developing inclusive learning, teaching, curriculum and assessment approaches is often more relational, dynamic, iterative and collaborative, as we engage with students, other stakeholders and draws on previous work and thinking from other disciplinary area.

    This is quite different to what we might think of as a clinical intervention, which often involves tight scientific control of external contextual factors, closed systems and clearly defined dosage.

    We suggest, therefore, that we might need a new language and conceptual approach to how we talk and think about evaluation and what it can achieve for HE providers and the students we support.

    The other area Liz picked up concerned the burden of evaluation not only on HE providers, but also the students who are necessarily deeply integrated in our evaluation work with varying degrees of agency – from subjects from whom data is extracted at one end through to co-creators and partners in the evaluation process at the other.

    We rely on students to dedicate sufficient time and effort in our evaluation activities. To reduce this burden and ensure we’re making effective use of student input, we need better coordination of regulatory asks for evaluation, not least to help manage the evaluative burden on students/student voices – a key point also made by students Molly Pemberton and Jordan Byrne at the event.

    As it is, HE providers are currently required to develop and invest in evaluation across multiple regulatory asks (TEF, APP, B3, Quality Code etc). While this space is not becoming too crowded (the more the merrier), it will take some strategic oversight to manage what is delivered and evaluated, why and by whom and look for efficiencies. We would welcome more sector work to join up this thinking.

    Positing repositories

    We also toasted John Blake’s continued emphasis on the crucial role of evaluation in continuous improvement.

    We must understand whether metrics moving is a response to our activity; without a clear explanation as to why things are getting better, we cannot scale or replicate that impact; if a well-theorised intervention does not deliver, good evaluation can support others to re-direct their efforts.

    In support of this, the new evidence repository to house the sector’s evaluation outcomes has been confirmed, with the aim of supporting our evolving practice and improve outcomes for students. This is another toast-worthy proposal. We believe that this resource is much needed.

    Indeed, Sheffield Hallam University started its own (publicly accessible) one a few years ago. Alan Donnelly has written an illuminating blog for the Evaluation Collective reflecting on the implementation, benefits and challenges of the approach.

    The decision to commission TASO and HEAT to develop this new Higher Education Evidence Library (HEEL), does however, beg a lot of questions about how material is selected for inclusion, who makes the selection and the criteria they use. Here are a few things we hope those organisations are considering.

    The first issue is that it is not clear whether this repository is merely primarily designed to address a regulatory requirement for HE providers to publish their evaluation findings or a resource developed to respond to the sector’s knowledge needs. This comes down to clarity of purpose and a clear-eyed view of where the sector needs to develop.

    It also comes down to the kinds of resources that will be considered for inclusion. We are also concerned by the prospect of a rigid and limited selection process and believe that useful and productive knowledge is contained in a wide range of publications. We would welcome, for example, a curation approach that recognised the value of non-academic publications.

    The contribution of grey literature and less formal publications, for example, is often overlooked. Valuable learning is also contained in evaluation and research conducted in other countries, and indeed, in different academic domains within the social and health sciences.

    The potential for translating interventions across different institutional and sector contexts also depends on sharing contextual and implementation information about the target activities and programmes.

    As colleagues from the Russell Group Widening Participation Evaluation Forum recently argued on these very pages, the value of sharing evaluation outcomes increases the more we move away from reporting technical and statistical outcomes to include broader reflections and meta-evaluation considerations, the more we collectively learn as a sector the more opportunities we will see for critical friendships and collaborations.

    While institutions are committing substantial time and resources to APP implementation, we must resist overly narrowing the remit of our activities and our approach in general. Learning from failed or even poor programmes and activities (and evaluation projects!) can be invaluable in driving progress.

    Ray Pawson speaks powerfully of the way in which “nuggets” of valuable learning and knowledge can be found even when panning less promising or unsuccessful evaluation evidence. Perhaps, a pragmatic approach to knowledge generation could trump methodological criteria in the interests of sector progress?

    Utopian repositories

    Hot on the HEELs of the TASO/HEAT evaluation library collaboration announcement we have put together a wish list for what we would like to see in such a resource. We believe that a well-considered, open and dynamic evaluation and evidence repository could have a significant impact on our collective progress towards closing stubborn equality of opportunity risk gaps.

    Submission to this kind of repository could also be helpful for the professionalisation of HE-based evaluation and good for organisational and sector recognition and career progression.

    A good model for this kind of approach is the National Teaching Repository (self-upload, no gatekeeper – their tag line “Disseminating accessible ideas that work”). This approach includes a way of tracking the impact and reach of submissions by allocating them a DOI.

    This is an issue that Alan and the Sheffield Hallam Team have also cracked, with submissions appearing in scholarly indexes.

    We are also mindful of the increasingly grim economic contexts in which most HE staff are currently working. If it does its job well, a repository could help mitigate some of the current constraints and pressures on institutions. Where we continue to work in silos there is a continued risk of wasting resources, by reinventing the same intervention and evaluation wheels in isolation across a multitude of different HE providers.

    With more openness and transparency, and sharing work in progress, as well as in completion, we increase the possibility of building on each other’s work, and, hopefully, finding opportunities for collaboration and sharing the workload, in other words efficiency gains.

    Moreover, this moves us closer to solving the replication and generalisability challenges, evaluators working together across different institutions can test programmes and activities across a wider set of contexts, resulting in more flexible and generalisable outcomes.

    Sliding doors?

    There are two further challenges, which are only nominally addressed in John Blake’s blog, but which we feel could have significant influence on the sector impact of the repository of our dreams.

    First, effective knowledge management is essential – how will time-pressed practitioners find and apply relevant evidence to their contexts? The repository needs to go beyond storing evaluations to include support to help users to find what they need, when they need it, and include recommendations for implications for practice.

    Second, drawing on the development of Implementation Science in fields like medicine and public health could help maximize the repository’s impact on practice. We suggest early consultation with both sector stakeholders and experts from other fields who have successfully tackled these knowledge-to-practice challenges.

    At this point in thinking, before concrete development and implementation have taken place, we have the potential for a multitude of possible future repositories and approaches to sector evaluation. We welcome TASO and HEAT’s offer to consult with the sector over the spring as they develop their HEEL and hope to engage in a broad and wide-ranging discussion of how we can collectively design an evaluation and evidence repository that is not just about collecting together artefacts, but which could play an active role in driving impactful practice. And then we can start talking about how the repository can be evaluated.

    John Blake will be talking all things evaluation with members of the Evaluation Collective on the 11th March. Sign up to the EC membership for more details: https://evaluationcollective.wordpress.com/

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  • Seton Hall sues its former president

    Seton Hall sues its former president

    A year after being sued by ex-president Joseph Nyre for alleged breach of contract and retaliation, among other claims, Seton Hall University has hit back with its own legal action against the former leader.

    In a lawsuit filed Wednesday in the Superior Court of New Jersey, the university accused Nyre of “illicitly accessing, downloading, maintaining, and later disseminating confidential and proprietary documents, as well as documents protected by the attorney-client and work product privileges, and information after his departure as President of the University.” Those documents led to critical reports about the university’s current president, Monsignor Joseph Reilly.

    Alongside Nyre, the lawsuit also names John Does 1–10, referring to them as “persons who are in possession of documents unlawfully maintained, retrieved, accessed, and/or downloaded.”

    In a statement to Inside Higher Ed, a Seton Hall spokesperson wrote that Wednesday’s filing “makes clear that confidential documents were utilized with sections selectively released, causing damage to the University and its leadership and painting a false narrative about Monsignor Reilly.” Reilly has been accused of failing to report allegations of sexual misconduct and thus violating the university’s Title IX policies.

    An attorney for Nyre blasted the lawsuit as a “cover-up” by Seton Hall.

    A Legal Clash

    Nyre led Seton Hall from 2019 to 2023, when he stepped down unexpectedly.

    The former president later sued Seton Hall, alleging he was pushed out by the Board of Regents amid conflict with then-chair Kevin Marino, whom Nyre accused of micromanagement, improperly involving himself in an embezzlement investigation at the law school and sexually harassing the president’s wife, Kelli Nyre, among other claims. Marino, who is no longer a board member, was not named as a defendant in Nyre’s lawsuit, and an investigation found no evidence of sexual harassment.

    While Seton Hall is defending itself against Nyre’s lawsuit, it also threw a legal counterpunch in suing the ex-president. The university alleges that its information technology team confirmed that Nyre had improperly accessed materials after his departure, and in doing so, he violated confidentiality provisions in his employment and separation agreement.

    Specifically, Nyre is accused of improperly downloading confidential documents that were later provided to Politico. Those files—some of which were also obtained by Inside Higher Ed—seemed to indicate Reilly, the current president, overlooked instances of sexual harassment while rector and dean of the university’s graduate seminary from 2012 to 2022.

    However, one of the leaked documents in question—a letter from a Board of Regents member to Reilly in February 2020 that said he had violated university Title IX policies through his inaction—was an unsent draft, university officials previously told Inside Higher Ed.

    Seton Hall officials said in the lawsuit that though the Politico reporter never disclosed who provided him with the documents, “it was clear that [Nyre], directly or indirectly, was responsible” for the leak of confidential information to the news outlet between December and February. Seton Hall accused Nyre of trying to “create a false impression about” Reilly, arguing he acted in “bad faith and malicious intent” by not disclosing that the February 2020 letter was never sent.

    The allegations against Reilly have prompted calls for transparency from state lawmakers and Democratic governor Phil Murphy, who called on the university to release an investigative report that allegedly cleared Reilly. Seton Hall has thus far declined to do so, citing the need to protect the confidentiality of participants who voluntarily cooperated with the investigation.

    The allegations against Reilly come as the university is only a few years removed from the sprawling sexual abuse scandal involving former cardinal Theodore McCarrick, who sat on both of Seton Hall’s governing boards. Investigators determined in a 2019 university report that McCarrick “created a culture of fear and intimidation” and “used his position of power as then–Archbishop of Newark”—which sponsors Seton Hall—“to sexually harass seminarians” for decades. (McCarrick was defrocked but avoided criminal charges due to a dementia diagnosis.)

    As part of the lawsuit, Seton Hall is seeking a temporary restraining order to stop Nyre from allegedly sharing more documents. University officials argued in court filings that Seton Hall stands to “suffer irreparable harm” from further leaks, which “cannot be adequately compensated” monetarily.

    “The nature of the harm is such that it affects the university’s ability to maintain the confidentiality of sensitive information, which is crucial for its operations and reputation,” filings read. “Moreover, to the extent that documents to which defendant has access are protected under [the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act] or Title IX, the disclosure of such documents would directly implicate the right of students and their parents to control the disclose [sic] of such confidential educational records as well as the confidentiality rights of university employees.”

    Pushback

    In a statement to Inside Higher Ed, Nyre attorney Matthew Luber called the lawsuit “a desperate, retaliatory ploy designed to silence a whistleblower and distract from the university’s own corruption and misconduct.”

    Luber did not specifically address the allegations that Nyre had inappropriately leaked confidential documents but accused Seton Hall of ignoring red flags in hiring Reilly and overlooking Title IX infractions.

    “Let’s be clear: Dr. Nyre was not at Seton Hall when Monsignor Reilly engaged in misconduct, nor when the board knowingly violated its own policies and Title IX to install him as President,” Luber wrote. “But he was the one who warned university officials about Reilly’s disqualifying history during his presidential search—warnings that were deliberately ignored by board leadership. Instead of addressing their own failures, Seton Hall is now attempting to smear and intimidate Dr. Nyre.”

    As of publication, a judge has not set to a hearing to consider the request for a restraining order.

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  • Ilya Shapiro is back . . . with a new book — First Amendment News 458

    Ilya Shapiro is back . . . with a new book — First Amendment News 458

    I never intended to become a poster boy for cancel culture. Nor do I intend to let those four months of Georgetown farce define my life or career. But I’m using this chance to expose the institutional rot in academia and trace it to the illiberal winds blowing across America.

    Those words are from Ilya Shapiro’s latest book, about which more will be said in a moment. But a few “set up” words first.

    Today, Ilya Shapiro is a senior fellow and director of constitutional studies at the Manhattan Institute. Previously he was executive director and senior lecturer at the Georgetown Center for the Constitution, and before that a vice president of the Cato Institute and director of Cato’s Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies. And as before, Shapiro continues to file briefs in the U.S. Supreme Court.

    Ilya Shapiro speaking at the 2016 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in National Harbor, Maryland. (Gage Skidmore / Flickr.com)

    But his today comes against the backdrop of a quarrelsome yesterday involving a ‘cancel culture’ dispute at Georgetown Law School where he was slated to work with Professor Randy Barnett and others at the School’s Center for the Constitution. But things started to go south after Shapiro wrote that “we’ll get lesser black woman” instead of Biden’s pick of Judge Sri Srinivasan. He later apologized. Following a four-month law school investigation, Shapiro was reinstated, only thereafter to resign on June 6, 2022:

    After full consideration of the report of the Office of Institutional Diversity, Equity, and Affirmative Action (“IDEAA Report”), and upon consultation with counsel, family, and trusted advisers, it has become apparent that my remaining at Georgetown has become untenable. Although I celebrated my “technical victory” in the Wall Street Journal, further analysis shows that you’ve made it impossible for me to fulfill the duties of my appointed post.

    [ . . . ]

    I cannot again subject my family to the public attacks on my character and livelihood that you and IDEAA have now made foreseeable, indeed inevitable. As a result of the hostile work environment that you and they have created, I have no choice but to resign.

    Ilya Shapiro resigns from Georgetown following reinstatement after 122-day investigation of tweets

    News

    After a more than four-month investigation that led to his reinstatement last week, Ilya Shapiro resigned today from Georgetown University Law Center.


    Read More

    In the midst of the controversy, FIRE’s Greg Lukianoff and Adam Goldstein wrote:

    Shapiro’s targeting marks the 10th attempt to get a professor sanctioned for ideological reasons at Georgetown University since 2015. Five attempts have been successful, with sanctions involving investigation, resignation, suspension and termination. . . . Higher education’s credibility rests on the public belief that it is a place where all sides of every argument are subject to robust debate, disputation and discussion. If it becomes clear that these discussions are impossible on campuses, the reputation of higher education — and the shared world of facts it was intended to create — will suffer.

    And now on to Shapiro’s new book. It is titled “Lawless: The Miseducation of America’s Elites” and it’s already getting ample notice from publications ranging from The Volokh Conspiracy to the Hugh Hewitt show, including a recent podcast exchange with Nico Perrino on “So to Speak”:


    The publisher’s summary:

    In the past, Columbia Law School produced leaders like Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Now it produces window-smashing activists.

    When protestors at Columbia broke into a building and created illegal encampments, the student-led Columbia Law Review demanded that finals be canceled because of “distress.”

    Law schools used to teach students how to think critically, advance logical arguments, and respect opponents. Now those students cannot tolerate disagreement and reject the validity of the law itself. Rioting Ivy Leaguers are the same people who will soon:

    • Be America’s judges, DAs, and prosecutors
    • File and fight constitutional lawsuits
    • Advise Fortune 500 companies
    • Hire other left-wing diversity candidates to staff law firms and government offices
    • Run for higher office with an agenda of only enforcing laws that suit left-wing whims

    In Lawless, Ilya Shapiro explains how we got here and what we can do about it. The problem is bigger than radical students and biased faculty — it’s institutional weakness. Shapiro met the mob firsthand when he posted a controversial tweet that led to calls for his firing from Georgetown Law. A four-month investigation eventually cleared him on a technicality but declared that if he offended anyone in the future, he’d create a “hostile educational environment” and be subject to the inquisition again. Unable to do the job he was hired for, he resigned.

    This cannot continue. In Lawless, Shapiro reveals how the illiberal takeover of legal education is transforming our country. Unless we stop it now, the consequences will be with us for decades.

    A few selected quotes:

    • Is there anything we can do to stop or reverse . . . ill liberal tendencies? Should we — those of us who care about universities’ traditional truth-seeking mission and law schools’ commitment to the American constitutional order — just throw up our hands, gird our loins, and regroup to fight elsewhere? Surely we need to develop novel responses to heterodox challenges, ones that involve culture, legislation, and institution building.
    • The real issue here is taking exclusionary action — real discrimination, not a mere assertion that someone’s position on Israel (or anything) is ‘harmful’ or denies someone’s right to exist.
    • More than a 100 institutions have endorsed a version of the Report of the Committee on Freedom of Expression at the University of Chicago (known as the Chicago Statement), which is the gold standard. The problem is that, as I experienced personally, so many of these speech-and-expression policies aren’t worth the paper (or pixels) they’re written on, falling by the wayside when seeming to conflict with the demands of DEI.
    • Cancellation victims, and others who make national news are the tip of the iceberg. As we see from survey results, self-censorship pervades academia, detracting from any intellectual mission, to say the least. Knowledge is never developed, and many old-school professors leave academia entirely — such as the famed First Amendment scholar Eugene Volokh’s move from the UCLA school of law to the Hoover Institution and the early retirement of five right-of-center law professors from the University of San Diego (which used to be a bastion of originalism). Universities are at best failing to resist these illiberal forces and at worst encouraging them.

    Shapiro’s four main recommendations in “Lawless”: 

    1. Abolish DEI bureaucracies
    2. End mandatory diversity training
    3. Stop political coercion
    4. End identity-based preferences.

    Related


    WATCH VIDEO: Gaza protesters disrupt UC Berkeley dean’s party, triggering responses over free speech.

    Forthcoming book on ideology, science, and free speech

    Cover of Lawrence M. Krauss' book "The War on Science: Thirty-Nine Renowned Scientists and Scholars Speak Out About Current Threats to Free Speech, Open Inquiry, and the Scientific Process"

    An unparalleled group of prominent scholars from wide-ranging disciplines detail ongoing efforts to impose ideological restrictions on science and scholarship throughout western society.

    From assaults on merit-based hiring to the policing of language and replacing well-established, disciplinary scholarship by ideological mantras, current science and scholarship is under threat throughout western institutions. 

    As this group of prominent scholars ranging across many different disciplines and political leanings detail, the very future of free inquiry and scientific progress is at risk. Many who have spoken up against this threat have lost their positions, and a climate of fear has arisen that strikes at the heart of modern education and research. Banding together to finally speak out, this brave and unprecedented group of scholars issues a clarion call for change.

    “Higher education isn’t what it used to be. Cancel Culture and DEI have caused many to keep their mouths shut. Not so the authors of this book. This collection of essays tells of threats to open inquiry, free speech, and the scientific process itself. A much-needed book.” — Sabine Hossenfelder, Physicist and Author of Existential Physics: A Scientist’s Guide to Life’s Biggest Questions

    Campus speech conflicts continue

    Campus free speech podcasts

    What is academic freedom? With Keith Whittington

    In recent weeks, the Academic Freedom Podcast has released two new episodes focusing on campus free speech issues.

    First up was a conversation with Timothy Zick, the John Marshall Professor of Government and Citizenship at William & Mary Law School. He is the author most recently of Managed Dissent: The Law of Public Protests. The episode focuses on the law surrounding public protests on and off college campuses.

    Next was a conversation with Jennifer Ruth and Michael Berube about their recent book, It’s Not Free Speech: Race, Democracy, and the Future of Academic Freedom. They are both long-serving leaders in the American Association of University Professors, and the book develops a provocative proposal for patrolling the acceptable boundaries of extramural speech by university faculty.

    More to come.

    White House Associated Press controversy

    The White House barred a credentialed Associated Press reporter and photographer from boarding the presidential airplane Friday for a weekend trip with Donald Trump, saying the news agency’s stance on how to refer to the Gulf of Mexico was to blame for the exclusion. It represented a significant escalation by the White House in a four-day dispute with the AP over access to the presidency.

    The administration has blocked the AP from covering a handful of events at the White House this week, including a news conference with India’s leader and several times in the Oval Office. It’s all because the news outlet has not followed Trump’s lead in renaming the body of water, which lies partially outside U.S. territory, to the “Gulf of America.”

    Volokh weighs in on AP exclusion controversy

    [1.] The Administration has no First Amendment obligation to provide any press conferences or interviews. The question, though, is whether, once it starts doing that, it may exclude the press based on its viewpoint, or on its supposedly unfair coverage, or on its use of terms that are seen as expressing a viewpoint.

    [2.] It seems pretty clear that government officials can choose — including in viewpoint-based ways — whom they will sit down with for interviews. The President may choose to give interviews to journalists whose views he likes, and to refuse to speak with those whose views he dislikes. Indeed, a government official may even order employees not to talk to certain reporters, without thereby violating the reporters’ rights. Baltimore Sun v. Ehrlich (4th Cir. 2006).

    [ . . . ]

    [3.] It also seems pretty clear that government officials, even in large press conferences, can choose to ignore questions that express views they dislike, or to ignore questioners who have expressed those views. . . 

    [4.] This having been said, there are precedents (Sherrill, TGP, and John K. Maciver Inst. for Public Policy v. Evers (7th Cir. 2021)) that recognize a right not to be excluded based on viewpoint from large press conferences that are generally open to a wide range of reporters. Those precedents treat those press conferences more or less like “limited public fora” or “nonpublic fora” — government property where the government may impose viewpoint-neutral restrictions but not viewpoint-based ones.

    [ . . . ]

    [5.] But what about in-between events, which are open only to a small set of reporters? Air Force One apparently has 13 press seats, and I take it the Oval Office is likewise limited.

    [ . . . ]

    [6.] So I think that for Air Force One and Oval Office appearances, the best I can say is that the First Amendment analysis is unsettled.

    FIRE weighs in on AP exclusion controversy

    As one federal court proclaimed, “Neither the courts nor any other branch of the government can be allowed to affect the content or tenor of the news by choreographing which news organizations have access to relevant information.”

    And because denying press access involves the potential deprivation of First Amendment rights, any decision about who’s in or out must also satisfy due process. That means the government must establish clear, impartial criteria and procedures, and reporters must receive notice of why they were denied access and have a fair opportunity to challenge that decision.

    The AP — a major news agency that produces and distributes reports to thousands of newspapers, radio stations, and TV broadcasters around the world — has had long-standing access to the White House. It is now losing that access because its exercise of editorial discretion doesn’t align with the administration’s preferred messaging.

    That’s viewpoint discrimination, and it’s unconstitutional.

    This isn’t the first time the White House has sent a journalist packing for reporting critically, asking tough questions, or failing to toe the government line. During Trump’s first term, the White House suspended CNN reporter Jim Acosta’s press pass after he interrogated the president about his views on immigration. After the network sued, a federal court ordered the administration to restore Acosta’s pass.

    Related

    Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs sues NBC

    Sean “Diddy” Combs is suing NBC Universal over a documentary that he says falsely accuses him of being a serial murderer who had sex with underage girls as he awaits trial on federal sex trafficking charges.

    The lawsuit filed Wednesday in New York state court says the documentary, “Diddy: Making of a Bad Boy,” included statements that NBC Universal either knew were false or published with reckless disregard for the truth in order to defame the founder of Bad Boy Records.

    “Indeed, the entire premise of the Documentary assumes that Mr. Combs has committed numerous heinous crimes, including serial murder, rape of minors, and sex trafficking of minors, and attempts to crudely psychologize him,” the complaint reads. “It maliciously and baselessly jumps to the conclusion that Mr. Combs is a ‘monster’ and ‘an embodiment of Lucifer’ with ‘a lot of similarities’ to Jeffrey Epstein.”

    Executive Watch


    WATCH VIDEO: Trump says freedom of speech under threat in Europe | AFP

    Secretary Rubio on free speech and the Holocaust


    WATCH VIDEO: Marco Rubio slams CBS journalist for suggesting free speech caused the Holocaust.

    More in the news

    2024-2025 SCOTUS term: Free expression and related cases

    Cases decided

    • Villarreal v. Alaniz (Petition granted. Judgment vacated and case remanded for further consideration in light of Gonzalez v. Trevino, 602 U. S. ___ (2024) (per curiam))
    • Murphy v. Schmitt (“The petition for a writ of certiorari is granted. The judgment is vacated, and the case is remanded to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit for further consideration in light of Gonzalez v. Trevino, 602 U. S. ___ (2024) (per curiam).”)
    • TikTok Inc. and ByteDance Ltd v. Garland (The challenged provisions of the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act do not violate petitioners’ First Amendment rights.)

    Review granted

    Pending petitions

    Petitions denied

    Last scheduled FAN

    FAN 457: “Timothy Zick’s ‘Executive Watch’: Introduction”

    This article is part of First Amendment News, an editorially independent publication edited by Ronald K. L. Collins and hosted by FIRE as part of our mission to educate the public about First Amendment issues. The opinions expressed are those of the article’s author(s) and may not reflect the opinions of FIRE or Mr. Collins.

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  • JD Vance, 60 Minutes, the Associated Press, the FCC, and more

    JD Vance, 60 Minutes, the Associated Press, the FCC, and more

    From JD Vance’s free speech critique of Europe to the
    Trump administration barring the Associated Press from the Oval
    Office, free speech news is buzzing. General Counsel Ronnie London
    and Chief Counsel Bob Corn-Revere unpack the latest
    developments.

    Timestamps:

    00:00 Intro

    01:49 JD Vance’s speech in Europe

    13:27 Margaret Brennan’s comment on the Holocaust

    15:13 Weimar fallacy

    17:36 Trump admin v. Associated Press

    21:33 DEI executive order

    27:39 Trump’s lawsuits targeting the media

    28:54 FIRE defending Iowa pollster Ann Selzer

    32:29 Concerns about the FCC under Brendan Carr

    44:09 2004 Super Bowl and the FCC

    46:25 FCC’s history of using the “Section 230
    threat”

    49:14 Newsguard and the FCC

    54:48 Elon Musk and doxxing

    59:44 Foreigners and the First Amendment

    01:05:19 Outro

    Enjoy listening to our podcast? Donate to FIRE today and
    get exclusive content like member webinars, special episodes, and
    more. If you became a FIRE Member
    through a donation to FIRE at thefire.org and would like access to
    Substack’s paid subscriber podcast feed, please email
    sotospeak@thefire.org.

    Show notes:

    – “Vice President JD
    Vance delivers remarks at the Munich Security Conference    ”
    The White House (2025)

    – “Utterly bizarre
    assertion from Margaret Brennan…    ” Michael Tracey via X
    (2025)

    – “Rubio
    defends Vance’s Munich speech as CBS host suggests ‘free speech’
    caused the Holocaust    ” FOX News (2025)

    – “Posting
    hateful speech online could lead to police raiding your home in
    this European country    ” 60 Minutes (2025)

    – “AP
    reporter and photographer barred from Air Force One over ‘Gulf of
    Mexico’ terminology dispute    ” AP News (2025)

    – “FIRE
    statement on White House denying AP Oval Office access    ”
    FIRE (2025)

    – “Ending
    radical and wasteful government DEI programs and
    preferencing    ” The White House (2025)

    – “Meta
    to pay $25 million to settle 2021 Trump lawsuit    ” The Wall
    Street Journal (2025)

    – “Trump
    settles suit against Elon Musk’s X over his post-Jan. 6
    ban    ” AP News (2025)

    – “Questions
    ABC News should answer following the $16 million Trump
    settlement    ” Columbia Journalism Review (2025)

    – “Trump
    v. Selzer: Donald Trump sues pollster J. Ann Selzer for ‘consumer
    fraud’ over Iowa poll    ” FIRE (2025)

    – “A
    plea for institutional modesty    ” Bob Corn-Revere (2025)

    – “Telecommunications
    Act    ” FCC (1996)

    – Section
    230     (1993)

    – “CBS
    News submits records of Kamala Harris’ ’60 Minutes’ spot to FCC
    amid distortion probe    ” USA Today (2025)

    – “Complaints
    against various television licensees concerning their February 1,
    2004 broadcast of the Super Bowl XXXVIII halftime show    ” FCC
    (2004)

    – “Brendan
    Carr’s letter to Big Tech CEOs    ” Brendan Carr via the FCC
    (2024)

    – “NRA v. Vullo”
    (2023)

    – “She should be
    fired immediately    ” Elon Musk via X (2025)

    – “Restoring
    freedom of speech and ending federal censorship    ” The White
    House (2025)

    – “Protecting
    the United States from foreign terrorists and other national
    security and public safety threats    ” The White House
    (2025)

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  • Trump’s Authoritarian Assault on Education (Henry Giroux, Truthout)

    Trump’s Authoritarian Assault on Education (Henry Giroux, Truthout)

    Did
    you know that Truthout is a nonprofit and independently funded by
    readers like you? If you value what we do, please support our work with     a donation.

    Trump appears bent on ridding schools of dangerous practices like critical thinking and an unsanitized study of history.

    In the initial days of his second term, President Donald Trump issued several executive orders “seeking
    to control how schools teach about race and gender, direct more tax
    dollars to private schools, and deport pro-Palestinian protesters.”     On January 29, 2025, he signed the “Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling”
    executive order, which mandates the elimination of curricula that the
    administration deems as promoting “radical, anti-American ideologies.”
    This executive order is not just an attack on critical race theory or
    teachings about systemic racism — it is a cornerstone of an
    authoritarian ideology designed to eliminate critical thought, suppress
    historical truth and strip educators of their autonomy. Under the guise
    of combating “divisiveness,” it advances a broader war on education as a
    democratizing force, turning schools into dead zones of the
    imagination. By threatening to strip federal funding from institutions
    that refuse to conform, this policy functions as an instrument of
    ideological indoctrination, enforcing a sanitized, nationalistic
    narrative that erases histories of oppression and resistance while
    deepening a culture of ignorance and compliance.

    Concurrently, President Trump issued the “Expanding Educational Freedom and Opportunity for Families”
    executive order, aiming to enhance school choice by redirecting federal
    funds to support charter schools and voucher programs. This policy
    enables parents to use public funds for private and religious school
    tuition. While proponents claim that this legislation empowers parents
    and fosters competition, in reality, it is a calculated effort to defund
    and privatize public education, undermining it as a democratizing
    public good. As part of a broader far right assault on education, this
    policy redirects essential resources away from public schools, deepening
    educational inequality and advancing an agenda that seeks to erode
    public investment in a just and equitable society.

    In the name of eliminating radical indoctrination in schools, a third executive order,
    which purportedly aims at ending antisemitism, threatens to deport
    pro-Palestinian student protesters by revoking their visas, warning that even those legally in the country could be targeted
    for their political views. In a stark display of authoritarianism,
    Trump’s executive order unapologetically stated that free speech would
    not be tolerated. Reuters
    made this clear in reporting that one fact sheet ominously declared: “I
    will … quickly cancel the student visas of all Hamas sympathizers on
    college campuses, which have been infested with radicalism like never
    before. To all the resident aliens who joined in the pro-jihadist
    protests, we put you on notice: come 2025, we will find you, and we will
    deport you.”

    By gutting federal oversight, he is handing the fate of education to
    reactionary state legislatures and corporate interests, ensuring that
    knowledge is shaped by a state held captive by billionaires and far
    right extremists. This is the logic of authoritarianism: to hollow out
    democratic institutions and replace education with white Christian
    propaganda and a pedagogy of repression. At issue here is an attempt to
    render an entire generation defenseless against the very forces seeking
    to dominate them.

    What we are witnessing is not just an educational crisis but a
    full-scale war on institutions that not only defend democracy but enable
    it. What is under siege in this attack is not only the critical
    function of education but the very notion that it should be defined
    through its vision of creating a central feature of democracy, educating
    informed and critically engaged citizens.

    These executive actions represent an upgraded and broader version of
    McCarthyite and apartheid-era education that seeks to dictate how
    schools teach about race and gender, funnel more taxpayer dollars into
    private institutions, and deport Palestinian protesters. The irony is
    striking: The White House defends these regressive measures of
    sanitizing history, stripping away the rights of transgender students
    and erasing critical race theory as efforts to “end indoctrination in
    American education.” In truth, this is not about the pursuit of freedom
    or open inquiry, nor is it about fostering an education that cultivates
    informed, critically engaged citizens. At its core, this agenda is a
    deliberate attack on education as a public good — one that threatens to
    dismantle not only public institutions, but the very essence of public
    and higher education and its culture of criticism and democracy. The
    urgency of this moment cannot be overstated: The future of education
    itself is at stake.

    In the raging currents of contemporary political and cultural life,
    where fascist ideologies are rising, one of the most insidious and
    all-encompassing forces at play is the violence of forgetting — a plague
    of historical amnesia. This phenomenon, which I have referred to as “organized forgetting,”
    describes the systemic erasure of history and its violent consequences,
    particularly in the public sphere. This is especially evident in the
    current historical moment, when books are banned in
    libraries, public schools and higher education across countries, such
    as the United States, Hungary, India, China and Russia. Ignoring past
    atrocities, historical injustices and uncomfortable truths about a
    society’s foundation is not merely an oversight — it constitutes an
    active form of violence that shapes both our collective consciousness
    and political realities. What we are witnessing here is an assault by
    the far right on memory that is inseparable from what Maximillian
    Alvarez describes as a battle over power — over who is remembered, who
    is erased, who is cast aside and who is forcibly reduced to something
    less than human. This struggle is not just about history; it is about
    whose stories are allowed to shape the present and the future. Alvarez captures this reality with striking clarity and is worth quoting at length:

    Among the prizes at stake in the endless war of politics is history
    itself. The battle for power is always a battle to determine who gets
    remembered, how they will be recalled, where and in what forms their
    memories will be preserved. In this battle, there is no room for neutral
    parties: every history and counter-history must fight and scrap and
    claw and spread and lodge itself in the world, lest it be forgotten or
    forcibly erased. All history, in this sense, is the history of empire — a
    bid for control of that greatest expanse of territory, the past.

    Organized forgetting also helped fuel the resurgence of Donald Trump,
    as truth and reason are being systematically replaced by lies,
    corruption, denial and the weaponization of memory itself. A culture of
    questioning, critique and vision is not simply disappearing in the
    United States — it is actively maligned, disparaged and replaced by a
    darkness that, as Ezra Klein
    observes, is “stupefyingly vast, stretching from self-destructive
    incompetence to muddling incoherence to authoritarian consolidation.”

    This erosion affects institutions of law, civil society and education
    — pillars that rely on memory, informed judgment and evidence to foster
    historical understanding and civic responsibility. The attack on the
    common good goes beyond the distractions of an “attention economy” designed
    to distort reality; it reflects a deliberate effort to sever the ties
    between history and meaning. Time is reduced to fragmented episodes,
    stripped of the shared narratives that connect the past, present and
    future.

    This crisis embodies a profound collapse of memory, history,
    education and democracy itself. A culture of manufactured ignorance —
    rooted in the rejection of history, facts and critical thought — erases
    accountability for electing a leader who incited insurrection and
    branded his opponents as “enemies from within.” Such authoritarian
    politics thrive on historical amnesia, lulling society into passivity,
    eroding collective memory and subverting civic agency. This is
    epitomized by Trump’s declaration
    on “Fox & Friends” that he would punish schools that teach students
    accurate U.S. history, including about slavery and racism in the
    country. The call to silence dangerous memories is inseparable from the
    violence of state terrorism — a force that censors and dehumanizes
    dissent, escalating to the punishment, torture and imprisonment of
    truth-tellers and critics who dare to hold oppressive power accountable.

    At its core, the violence of forgetting operates through the denial
    and distortion of historical events, particularly those that challenge
    the dominant narratives of power. From the colonial atrocities and the
    struggles for civil rights to the history of Palestine-Israel relations,
    many of the most significant chapters of history are either glossed
    over or erased altogether. This strategic omission serves the interests
    of those in power, enabling them to maintain control by silencing
    inconvenient truths. As the historian Timothy Snyder
    reminds us, by refusing to acknowledge the violence of the past,
    society makes it far easier to perpetuate injustices in the present. The
    politics of organized forgetting, the censoring of history and the
    attack on historical consciousness are fundamental to the rise of far
    right voices in the U.S. and across the world.

    With the rise of regressive memory laws, designed to repress what
    authoritarian governments consider dangerous and radical interpretations
    of a country’s past, historical consciousness is transformed into a
    form of historical amnesia. One vivid example of a regressive memory law
    was enacted by Trump during his first term. The 1776 Report,
    which right-wingers defended as a “restoration of American education,”
    was in fact an attempt to eliminate from the teaching of history any
    reference to a legacy of colonialism, slavery and movements which
    highlighted elements of American history that were unconscionable,
    anti-democratic and morally repugnant. Snyder highlights the emergence
    of memory laws in a number of states. He writes in a 2021 New York Times article:

    As of this writing, five states (Idaho, Iowa, Tennessee, Texas and
    Oklahoma) have passed laws that direct and restrict discussions of
    history in classrooms. The Department of Education of a sixth (Florida)
    has passed guidelines with the same effect. Another 12 state
    legislatures are still considering memory laws. The particulars of these
    laws vary. The Idaho law is the most Kafkaesque in its censorship: It
    affirms freedom of speech and then bans divisive speech. The Iowa law
    executes the same totalitarian pirouette. The Tennessee and Texas laws
    go furthest in specifying what teachers may and may not say. In
    Tennessee teachers must not teach that the rule of law is “a series of
    power relationships and struggles among racial or other groups.”… The
    Idaho law mentions Critical Race Theory; the directive from the Florida
    school board bans it in classrooms. The Texas law forbids teachers from
    requiring students to understand the 1619 Project. It is a perverse
    goal: Teachers succeed if students do not understand something.

    A major aspect of this forgetting and erasure of historical memory is the role of ignorance,
    which has become not just widespread but weaponized in modern times.
    Ignorance, particularly in U.S. society, has shifted from being a
    passive lack of knowledge to an active refusal to engage with critical
    issues. This is amplified by the spectacle-driven nature of contemporary
    media and the increasing normalization of a culture of lies and the
    embrace of a language of violence, which not only thrives on distraction
    rather than reflection, but has become a powerful force for spreading
    bigotry, racial hatred and right-wing lies. In addition, the mainstream
    media’s obsession with spectacle — be it political drama, celebrity
    culture or sensationalist stories — often overshadows the more
    important, yet less glamorous, discussions about historical violence and
    systemic injustice.

    This intellectual neglect allows for a dangerous cycle to persist,
    where the erasure of history enables the continuation of violence and
    oppression. Systems of power benefit from this amnesia, as it allows
    them to maintain the status quo without having to answer for past
    wrongs. When society refuses to remember or address past injustices —
    whether it’s slavery, imperialism or economic exploitation — those in
    power can continue to exploit the present without fear of historical
    accountability.

    To strip education of its critical power is to rob democracy of its transformative potential.

    The cultural impact of this organized forgetting is profound. Not
    only does it create a void in public memory, but it also stunts
    collective growth. Without the lessons of the past, it becomes nearly
    impossible to learn from mistakes and address the root causes of social
    inequalities. The failure to remember makes it harder to demand
    meaningful change, while reproducing and legitimating ongoing far right
    assaults on democracy.

    The violence of organized forgetting is not a mere act of neglect; it
    is a deliberate cultural and intellectual assault that undercuts the
    foundations of any meaningful democracy. By erasing the past, society
    implicitly condones the ongoing oppression of marginalized groups and
    perpetuates harmful ideologies that thrive in ignorance. This erasure
    silences the voices of those who have suffered — denying them the space
    to speak their truth and demand justice. It is not limited to historical
    injustices alone; it extends to the present, silencing those who
    courageously criticize contemporary violence, such as Israel’s
    U.S.-backed genocidal war on Gaza, and those brave enough to hold power
    accountable.

    The act of forgetting is not passive; it actively supports systems of
    oppression and censorship, muffling dissent and debate, both of which
    are essential for a healthy democracy.

    Equally dangerous is the form of historical amnesia that has come to
    dominate our contemporary political and cultural landscape. This
    organized forgetting feeds into a pedagogy of manufactured ignorance
    that prioritizes emotion over reason and spectacle over truth. In this
    process, history is fragmented and distorted, making it nearly
    impossible to construct a coherent understanding of the past. As a
    result, public institutions — particularly education — are undermined,
    as critical thinking and social responsibility give way to shallow,
    sensationalized narratives. Higher education, once a bastion for the
    development of civic literacy and the moral imperative of understanding
    our role as both individuals and social agents, is now attacked by
    forces seeking to cleanse public memory of past social and political
    progress. Figures like Trump embody this threat, working to erase the
    memory of strides made in the name of equality, justice and human
    decency. This organized assault on historical memory and intellectual
    rigor strikes at the heart of democracy itself. When we allow the
    erasure of history and the undermining of critical thought, we risk
    suffocating the ideals that democracy promises: justice, equality and
    accountability.

    A democracy cannot thrive in the absence of informed and engaged
    agents that are capable of questioning, challenging and reimagining a
    future different from the present. Without such citizens, the very
    notion of democracy becomes a hollow, disembodied ideal — an illusion of
    freedom without the substance of truth or responsibility. Education, in
    this context, is not merely a tool for transmitting knowledge; it is
    the foundation and bedrock of political consciousness. To be educated,
    to be a citizen, is not a neutral or passive state — it is a vital,
    active political and moral engagement with the world, grounded in
    critical thinking and democratic possibility. It is a recognition that
    the act of learning and the act of being a citizen are inextricable from
    each other. To strip education of its critical power is to rob
    democracy of its transformative potential.

    Confronting the violence of forgetting requires a shift in how we
    engage with history. Intellectuals, educators and activists must take up
    the responsibility of reintroducing the painful truths of the past into
    public discourse. This is not about dwelling in the past for its own
    sake, but about understanding its relevance to the present and future.
    To break the cycles of violence, society must commit to remembering, not
    just for the sake of memory, but as a critical tool for progress.

    Moreover, engaging with history honestly requires recognizing that
    the violence of forgetting is not a one-time event but a continual
    process. Systems of power don’t simply forget; they actively work to
    erase, rewrite and sanitize historical narratives. This means that the
    fight to remember is ongoing and requires constant vigilance. It’s not
    enough to simply uncover historical truths; society must work to ensure
    that these truths are not forgotten again, buried under the weight of
    media spectacles, ideological repression and political theater.

    Ultimately, the violence of forgetting is an obstacle to genuine
    social change. Without confronting the past — acknowledging the violence
    and injustices that have shaped our world — we cannot hope to build a
    more just and informed future. To move forward, any viable democratic
    social order must reckon with its past, break free from the bonds of
    ignorance, and commit to creating a future based on knowledge, justice
    and accountability.

    The task of confronting and dismantling the violent structures shaped
    by the power of forgetting is immense, yet the urgency has never been
    more pronounced. In an era where the scope and power of new pedagogical
    apparatuses such as social media and AI dominate our cultural and
    intellectual landscapes, the challenge becomes even more complex. While
    they hold potential for education and connection, these technologies are
    controlled by a reactionary ruling class of financial elite and
    billionaires, and they are increasingly wielded to perpetuate
    disinformation, fragment history and manipulate public discourse. The
    authoritarian algorithms that drive these platforms increasingly
    prioritize sensationalism over substance, lies over truth, the
    appropriation of power over social responsibility, and in doing so,
    reinforce modes of civic illiteracy, while attacking those fundamental
    institutions which enable critical perspectives and a culture of
    questioning.

    The vital need for collective action and intellectual engagement to
    reclaim and restore historical truth, critical thinking and social
    responsibility is urgent. The present historical moment, both
    unprecedented and alarming, resonates with Antonio Gramsci’s reflection
    on an earlier era marked by the rise of fascism: “The old world is
    dying, and the new world struggles to be born; now is the time of
    monsters.”

    In the face of a deepening crisis of history, memory and agency, any
    meaningful resistance must be collective, disruptive and
    unapologetically unsettling — challenging entrenched orthodoxies and
    dismantling the forces that perpetuate ignorance and injustice. This
    struggle needs to be both radical in its essence and uncompromising in
    its demands for social change, recognizing education as inseparable from
    politics and the tangible challenges people face in their everyday
    lives. In this collective effort lies the power to dismantle the
    barriers to truth, rebuild the foundations of critical thought, and
    shape a future rooted in knowledge, justice and a profound commitment to
    make power accountable. Central to this vision is the capacity to learn
    from history, to nurture a historical consciousness that informs our
    present and to reimagine agency as an essential force in the enduring
    struggle for democracy. This call for a radical imagination cannot be
    confined to classrooms but must emerge as a transformative force
    embedded in a united, multiracial, working-class movement. Only then can
    we confront the urgent crises of our time.

    We’re resisting Trump’s authoritarian pressure.

    As
    the Trump administration moves a mile-a-minute to implement right-wing
    policies and sow confusion, reliable news is an absolute must.

    Truthout
    is working diligently to combat the fear and chaos that pervades the
    political moment. We’re requesting your support at this moment because
    we need it – your monthly gift allows us to publish uncensored,
    nonprofit news that speaks with clarity and truth in a moment when
    confusion and misinformation are rampant. As well, we’re looking with
    hope at the material action community activists are taking. We’re
    uplifting mutual aid projects, the life-sustaining work of immigrant and
    labor organizers, and other shows of solidarity that resist the
    authoritarian pressure of the Trump administration.

    As we work to dispel the atmosphere of political despair, we ask that you contribute to our journalism. Over 80 percent of Truthout’s
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    This article is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), and you are free to share and republish under the terms of the license. 

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  • 25 Evaluative Thesis Examples (2025)

    25 Evaluative Thesis Examples (2025)

    An evaluative thesis makes a judgment about the quality, importance, or effectiveness of something based on specific criteria.

    Here’s its structure:

    [Subject] + [Judgment based on criteria] + [Criteria/Standards]

    And here’s a simple example:

    “The Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Black Panther succeeds as a culturally significant film through its authentic representation of African culture, complex character development, and thoughtful exploration of colonialism.”

    You’ll notice the necessary elements in that statement that make it specifically an evaluative thesis statement:

    • It states what is being evaluated (Black Panther)
    • It makes a value judgment (succeeds)
    • It provides specific criteria for the evaluation (representation, character development, themes)

    Makes sense? Let’s explore some more examples.

    Evaluative Thesis Examples

    #25. The Finnish Education System

    “The Finnish education system stands as the most effective model of public education among developed nations, demonstrated by its student-centered learning approach, high teacher qualification standards, and emphasis on equity over standardized testing.”

    • Subject: Finnish education system
    • Judgment: most effective model
    • Criteria: student-centered learning, teacher qualifications, equity focus

    #24. Social Media and Youth Health

    “Social media platform Instagram proves particularly detrimental to adolescent mental health due to its emphasis on physical appearance, promotion of social comparison, and algorithmic amplification of unrealistic lifestyle content.”

    • Subject: Instagram’s impact on adolescent mental health
    • Judgment: particularly detrimental
    • Criteria: appearance focus, social comparison, algorithmic amplification

    #23. Nordic Welfare State

    “The Nordic welfare state model demonstrates superior effectiveness in reducing income inequality through its progressive taxation system, universal social services, and strong labor market protections.”

    • Subject: Nordic welfare state model
    • Judgment: superior effectiveness
    • Criteria: taxation, social services, labor protections

    #22. Urban Gentrification

    “Contemporary urban gentrification policies in major U.S. cities fail to serve community interests based on their displacement of long-term residents, erosion of cultural heritage, and acceleration of economic segregation.”

    • Subject: Urban gentrification policies
    • Judgment: fail to serve community interests
    • Criteria: displacement, cultural preservation, economic integration

    #21. Aging Population

    “Japan’s aging population management strategies excel in addressing demographic challenges through their innovative healthcare delivery, intergenerational community programs, and technology integration for elderly care.”

    • Subject: Japan’s aging population management
    • Judgment: excel in addressing challenges
    • Criteria: healthcare delivery, community programs, technology integration

    #20. Indigenous Reconciliation

    “The Australian reconciliation process with Indigenous peoples remains inadequate due to insufficient land rights recognition, limited political representation, and weak implementation of cultural preservation policies.”

    • Subject: Australian reconciliation process
    • Judgment: remains inadequate
    • Criteria: land rights, political representation, cultural preservation

    #19. German Education System

    “Germany’s dual vocational education system proves highly successful in youth workforce development through its integration of classroom learning, practical training, and industry partnerships.”

    • Subject: German dual vocational education
    • Judgment: highly successful
    • Criteria: classroom learning, practical training, industry partnerships

    #18. Canadian Multiculturalism

    “Canada’s multiculturalism policy emerges as an exemplary model for cultural integration based on its legal framework for equality, support for cultural expression, and inclusive citizenship practices.”

    • Subject: Canadian multiculturalism policy
    • Judgment: exemplary model
    • Criteria: legal framework, cultural support, citizenship practices

    #17. Mental Health Shortcomings

    “South Korea’s mental health services demonstrate critical shortcomings in addressing public needs through their limited accessibility, high stigmatization, and insufficient preventive measures.”

    • Subject: South Korean mental health services
    • Judgment: critical shortcomings
    • Criteria: accessibility, stigma levels, prevention efforts

    #16. Environmental Conservation

    “New Zealand’s environmental conservation strategies show remarkable effectiveness in biodiversity protection through their indigenous knowledge integration, community-based management, and ecosystem-wide approach.”

    • Subject: NZ environmental conservation strategies
    • Judgment: remarkable effectiveness
    • Criteria: indigenous knowledge, community management, ecosystem approach

    #15. Refugee Integration

    “The European Union’s refugee integration programs demonstrate significant inadequacies based on their inconsistent implementation, limited resource allocation, and poor cultural sensitivity training.”

    • Subject: EU refugee integration programs
    • Judgment: significant inadequacies
    • Criteria: implementation consistency, resources, cultural training

    #14. Public Housing System

    “Singapore’s public housing system emerges as an exceptional model of urban planning through its racial integration policies, affordable pricing structures, and community-centered design.”

    • Subject: Singapore’s public housing
    • Judgment: exceptional model
    • Criteria: racial integration, affordability, community design

    #13. Renewable Energy Transition

    “Scotland’s renewable energy transition shows remarkable success in sustainable development through its community ownership schemes, technological innovation, and grid modernization efforts.”

    • Subject: Scotland’s renewable transition
    • Judgment: remarkable success
    • Criteria: community ownership, innovation, grid modernization

    #12. Gender Equality Initiatives

    “Rwanda’s gender equality initiatives stand out as particularly effective in advancing women’s rights through quota systems, economic empowerment programs, and anti-violence legislation.”

    • Subject: Rwanda’s gender equality initiatives
    • Judgment: particularly effective
    • Criteria: quotas, economic programs, legislation

    #11. Digital Democracy

    “Taiwan’s digital democracy tools excel in promoting civic engagement through their transparency mechanisms, participatory budgeting platforms, and citizen feedback systems.”

    • Subject: Taiwan’s digital democracy tools
    • Judgment: excel in promoting engagement
    • Criteria: transparency, participation, feedback systems

    #10. Bike Infrastructure

    “The Netherlands’ bicycle infrastructure proves exemplary in sustainable urban mobility through its comprehensive network design, safety prioritization, and integration with public transit.”

    • Subject: Dutch bicycle infrastructure
    • Judgment: exemplary
    • Criteria: network design, safety, transit integration

    #9. Environmental Education

    “Costa Rica’s environmental education curriculum demonstrates outstanding effectiveness in fostering ecological awareness through its experiential learning approach, local ecosystem focus, and community involvement.”

    • Subject: Costa Rica’s environmental education
    • Judgment: outstanding effectiveness
    • Criteria: experiential learning, ecosystem focus, community involvement

    #8. Elder Care Systems

    “Denmark’s elder care system shows superior quality in supporting aging populations through its home care emphasis, social inclusion programs, and preventive health measures.”

    • Subject: Danish elder care
    • Judgment: superior quality
    • Criteria: home care, social inclusion, preventive health

    #7. E-Governance

    “Estonia’s e-governance platform emerges as a leading model of digital public services through its user-centered design, robust security measures, and comprehensive service integration.”

    • Subject: Estonian e-governance
    • Judgment: leading model
    • Criteria: user design, security, service integration

    #6. Rehabilitation in Norway

    “Norway’s prison rehabilitation system demonstrates exceptional effectiveness in reducing recidivism through its emphasis on education, psychological support, and gradual reintegration programs.”

    • Subject: Norwegian prison rehabilitation
    • Judgment: exceptional effectiveness
    • Criteria: education, psychological support, reintegration

    #5. Urban Policy

    “Barcelona’s urban superblock initiative proves highly successful in improving city livability through its pedestrian prioritization, green space expansion, and local business support.”

    • Subject: Barcelona’s superblock initiative
    • Judgment: highly successful
    • Criteria: pedestrian spaces, green areas, business support

    #4. Truth and Reconciliation

    “South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission shows mixed effectiveness as a transitional justice mechanism based on its victim testimony process, amnesty provisions, and reparation implementation.”

    • Subject: SA Truth and Reconciliation Commission
    • Judgment: mixed effectiveness
    • Criteria: testimony process, amnesty, reparations

    3. Gross National Happiness

    “Bhutan’s Gross National Happiness index emerges as an innovative model for measuring societal progress through its cultural preservation metrics, environmental sustainability indicators, and community vitality assessments.”

    • Subject: Bhutan’s GNH index
    • Judgment: innovative model
    • Criteria: cultural metrics, environmental indicators, community vitality

    #2. Growth Mindsets

    “The widely-adopted ‘growth mindset’ intervention proves ineffective as a universal educational tool due to its oversimplified implementation, lack of cultural context consideration, and overemphasis on individual rather than systemic factors.”

    • Subject: Growth mindset intervention
    • Judgment: ineffective as universal tool
    • Criteria: implementation, cultural context, systemic consideration

    #1. Dopamine Detox

    “Social media’s ‘dopamine detox’ trend emerges as a problematic self-help approach through its misrepresentation of neuroscience, one-size-fits-all recommendations, and neglect of underlying mental health factors.”

    • Subject: Dopamine detox trend
    • Judgment: problematic approach
    • Criteria: scientific accuracy, universal recommendations, mental health consideration


    Chris

    Dr. Chris Drew is the founder of the Helpful Professor. He holds a PhD in education and has published over 20 articles in scholarly journals. He is the former editor of the Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education. [Image Descriptor: Photo of Chris]

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  • 10 Benefits of an Online Admissions and Enrollment System

    10 Benefits of an Online Admissions and Enrollment System

    Reading Time: 8 minutes

    As a school administrator or marketer, you’re likely already familiar with the challenges of traditional admissions processes: manual paperwork, miscommunication, long timelines, and a lack of transparency. 

    Implementing an online enrollment system can revolutionize your institution’s operations. It can help you create a seamless experience for prospective students while significantly easing administrative burdens.

    At Higher Education Marketing, we’ve spent years partnering with institutions to understand their unique needs. Our Student Portal is designed specifically for education providers like you, offering an all-in-one solution to streamline admissions and enhance the student journey. 

    Let’s explore ten benefits of adopting an online admissions and enrollment system and how HEM’s Student Portal can help you transform your processes. You’ll see how much value you can add to your student experience and how a sophisticated CRM can boost enrollment.

    Simplify student management and boost recruitment efficiency!

    Transform your student portal experience. Get a FREE HEM-SP demo today.

    Understanding Online Enrollment Systems

    What does an enrollment system do? An online admissions and enrollment system is a digital platform that streamlines student recruitment, application management, and enrollment. By moving these processes online, institutions can eliminate manual paperwork, reduce processing times, and improve the overall experience for students and staff. 

    These systems typically include customizable application forms, real-time tracking, automated communication tools, and integration with other institutional systems like CRMs and financial platforms. Now, let’s get to the good part–the many benefits of enrollment system tools. 

    Want to know what our Student Portal System can do for your school? Let’s connect! 

    A Brief Overview of the Enrollment Process

    To maximize the benefits of an online admissions and enrollment system, it’s important to understand the enrollment funnel. What is the process for enrollment? It’s a framework that outlines the four key stages prospective students go through when deciding to enroll at your institution. These include awareness, interest, decision, and action. 

    Awareness is the first stage, where students become familiar with your school through marketing efforts, social media, or word-of-mouth. During this phase, you aim to make a positive impression and highlight what sets your institution apart.

    Interest follows as students actively seek more information about your programs and offerings. At this stage, providing detailed program descriptions, virtual tours, and engaging content becomes crucial to capturing their attention.

    Decision is the third stage, where students weigh their options and determine if your institution aligns with their goals. Clear application processes, transparent cost estimates, and personalized communication can help sway their decision.

    Action is the final stage, where students commit by completing their application and enrollment. An intuitive and efficient online system, like HEM’s Student Portal, ensures this final step is seamless and stress-free, setting the tone for a positive student experience.

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    Source: HEM

    1. Simplifying the Application Process

    An online admissions system allows you to simplify and accelerate the application process, providing a smoother experience for prospective students. Instead of requiring students to navigate complex paper forms or disjointed systems, you can offer them a centralized, user-friendly portal where they can complete their applications step-by-step.

    HEM’s Student Portal includes a customizable WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) form builder, allowing you to tailor applications to your institution’s specific requirements. With options for e-signatures, document uploads, and guided prompts, your students can complete their applications quickly and confidently.

    For administrators, this streamlined process means less time spent tracking incomplete applications and more time focusing on strategic initiatives. You can view, manage, and update application statuses in real time, ensuring nothing slips through the cracks.

    Example: The key benefit of online enrollment systems regarding the student journey is convenience. Here, American Public University is the perfect example.

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    At the click of a button, students can begin their applications.

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    They are immediately led to a simple, free application form where they’ll provide vital information needed for the American Public University to determine whether admission into their program will be granted and allow them to track their journey. 

    Source: American Public University 

    2. Enhancing Recruitment Efforts

    With an online system, you can improve how you engage with prospective students from the beginning of their journey. HEM’s Student Portal integrates powerful marketing automation tools, allowing you to nurture leads with personalized communications at every stage of the admissions funnel. You can keep prospective students engaged and informed by sending timely emails, reminders, and updates, increasing their likelihood of completing enrollment.

    Furthermore, the system’s data insights enable you to identify trends in student inquiries, monitor which marketing campaigns are most effective, and adjust your strategies accordingly. This data-driven approach ensures your recruitment efforts are consistently targeted and impactful.

    Example: Once a prospect has filled out a contact form or inquired about a program, they should receive a personalized follow-up message that provides program details and prompts them to follow the next steps.

    Here, the Academy of Learning sends an automated email about its Accelerated PSW Program to a prospect who recently expressed interest. Our Student Portal integrates email and messaging services to facilitate and automate communication with prospects, a key part of the recruitment process.

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    Source: Academy of Learning | Gmail

    3. Reducing Administrative Burden

    One of the most immediate benefits of implementing an online admissions and enrollment system is the reduction in administrative workload. Manual processes can be time-consuming and prone to errors, but with an online platform like HEM’s Student Portal, you can centralize all tasks in one intuitive interface. From managing inquiries to processing payments, every step is organized and automated.

    Staff members across departments can collaborate more effectively, ensuring seamless communication and reducing duplication of efforts. The result? A more efficient admissions team with more time to focus on higher-value tasks, such as building relationships with students and refining institutional strategies.

    4. Offering Real-Time Insights

    Making informed decisions is essential in a competitive education landscape, and real-time insights from your admissions system can give you a critical advantage. HEM’s Student Portal provides robust reporting and tracking tools, giving visibility into key metrics such as completed applications, outstanding payments, and enrollment trends.

    Imagine identifying bottlenecks in your process as they happen, enabling you to resolve issues before they escalate. With this level of visibility, you can forecast enrollment numbers more accurately, allocate resources efficiently, and continuously optimize your processes.

    Example: The Student Portal allows you to create comprehensive, updated CRM reports to track enrollment data. Find out what kind of requests are being made, what desired action has been taken, and what’s next.

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    Source: HEM

    5. Improving Communication and Transparency

    A common frustration for both students and staff in traditional admissions processes is a lack of clarity. With an online system, communication becomes seamless and transparent. Students can log into their portal anytime to check their application status, access important updates, and even chat with a virtual admissions assistant for guidance.

    HEM’s Student Portal goes a step further with its integrated communication tools. From automated notifications to direct messaging capabilities, the platform ensures that every student feels supported and informed throughout their journey. This transparency fosters trust and builds a stronger connection between students and your institution.

    6. Enhancing the Student Experience

    Your admissions process is often the first interaction prospective students have with your institution, making it crucial to leave a positive impression. An online admissions and enrollment system demonstrates that your school values convenience, efficiency, and modern technology, which resonate with today’s tech-savvy students.

    HEM’s Student Portal includes features like virtual admissions assistance and a quote builder, which allows students to estimate program costs upfront. These tools empower students with the information they need to make confident decisions, enhancing their overall experience and reinforcing their trust in your institution.

    Example: The Student Portal prioritizes a seamless experience for students, guiding them from step to step, making it easy to share important files, and providing a full picture of their enrollment journey.

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    Source: HEM

    7. Facilitating Financial Planning

    Financial concerns are one of the most significant barriers prospective students face when considering enrollment. You can address these concerns head-on by incorporating tools like HEM’s quote builder and seamless payment gateway integration. The quote builder provides students and their families with transparent cost estimates for tuition and fees, enabling them to plan their finances effectively.

    The payment gateway integration simplifies the payment process, allowing students to make secure transactions directly through the portal. You can also track real-time payment statuses, ensuring that financial records are always current.

    Example: Accademia Italiana Salerno utilizes our Student Portal’s Quote Builder feature, which provides students with a close estimate of their school expenses. Your students will appreciate being able to plan when making a significant investment in their education.

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    Source: HEM

    8. Supporting Institutional Flexibility

    Every institution is unique, with its own set of requirements and processes. That’s why customization is essential in any online admissions system. HEM’s Student Portal offers a flexible framework that adapts to your needs, whether you’re managing applications for a university, language school, or K-12 provider.

    You can customize application forms, workflows, and communications to align with your institutional goals. This flexibility ensures that the system serves as a seamless extension of your team rather than a one-size-fits-all solution.

    9. Boosting Efficiency with Integrated Tools

    Efficiency is at the heart of any successful admissions process; integrated tools can make a significant difference. HEM’s Student Portal combines essential functionalities like CRM systems, marketing automation, and data analytics into one centralized platform. This integration eliminates the need for multiple disconnected systems, streamlining your operations and improving collaboration across departments.

    For example, marketing teams can use the portal to track campaign effectiveness, admissions staff can manage inquiries and applications, and financial teams can monitor payments—all within the same system. This level of integration enhances productivity and ensures that every team member has access to the information they need.

    10. Preparing for the Future

    As the education sector evolves, embracing technology is no longer optional but essential! Implementing an online admissions and enrollment system positions your institution as a forward-thinking leader ready to adapt to changing student expectations and market demands.

    HEM’s Student Portal is built with the future in mind, incorporating scalable features that grow with your institution. Whether you want to expand your programs, attract international students, or enhance your digital presence, the portal provides the tools you need to succeed.

    Why Choose HEM’s Student Portal?

    At Higher Education Marketing, we consider ourselves your partners in success. Benefit from the advantages of enrollment system technology, from simplifying application management to enhancing communication and providing real-time insights. Our platform empowers you to transform your admissions process. Request a demo today and discover how HEM’s Student Portal can help you achieve your institutional goals while creating a superior experience for students and staff.

    Simplify student management and boost recruitment efficiency!

    Transform your student portal experience. Get a FREE HEM-SP demo today.

    Frequently Asked Questions

    What does an enrollment system do?

    An online admissions and enrollment system is a digital platform that streamlines student recruitment, application management, and enrollment.

    What is the process for enrollment?

    It’s a framework that outlines the four key stages prospective students go through when deciding to enroll at your institution. These include awareness, interest, decision, and action.

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  • FIRE demands Fort Worth police return artwork confiscated from museum

    FIRE demands Fort Worth police return artwork confiscated from museum

    FORT WORTH, Feb. 19, 2025 — A trio of civil liberty organizations are speaking up today to demand the Fort Worth Police Department end its unconstitutional censorship and seizure of several pieces of art that were on display at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth.

    The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, National Coalition Against Censorship, and the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas are joining forces to demand the return of several pieces of art by Sally Mann, a renowned photographer with accolades from the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Guggenheim Foundation.

    In November 2024, the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth began hosting an exhibition called “Diaries from Home,” featuring works that “explore the multilayered concepts of family, community, and home.” Included in the collection were some of the photos from Mann’s 1990 collection “Immediate Family.” Mann’s collection featured an intimate and candid look at her family’s rural life. As she describes it, “I photographed their triumphs, confusion, harmony and isolation, as well as the hardships that tend to befall children — bruises, vomit, bloody noses, wet beds — all of it.”

    Of the 65 photos in Mann’s “Immediate Family,” 13 depicted her children in the nude. The selection of nude photos displayed in the Modern reportedly included depictions of Mann’s daughter jumping onto a picnic table in a ballet pose, Mann’s daughter lying in bed with a stain from a nighttime accident, and Mann’s son with a melted popsicle running down his body.

    “Anyone who’s ever taken a photo of their child or grandchild taking a bath understands that not all photographs of child nudity are malicious, let alone child abuse,” said FIRE Director of Public Advocacy Aaron Terr. “The seizure of Mann’s works is an egregious abuse of power that dishonestly conflates artistic expression with sexual exploitation.”

    The works are not the product of child abuse, and they are neither intended nor designed to excite lust in the viewer. They do what much art does — convey ideas and invite viewers to reflect on the human experience.

    Nor do the works meet the legal definition of “obscenity,” an extremely narrow definition that does not apply to all depictions of child nudity. This should be common sense to anyone familiar with the iconic “Napalm Girl” photograph, National Geographic documentaries, or even major Hollywood films like the 1978 version of “Superman.”

    “Immediate Family” was controversial even at its debut decades ago, but has been showcased in more than a dozen art galleries across the world, including the National Gallery of Art. But its inclusion in the Fort Worth exhibition reignited the debate when local press and politicians denounced the photos as “child pornography.” Fort Worth police seized the artwork last month ostensibly as part of an investigation into “child abuse,” even though all of Mann’s children, as adults, continued to support the collection and their mother and have never once suggested they were abused.

    “Publicity stunts like this one — in which artworks that have been shown and discussed for over 30 years are suddenly the focus of an unfounded ‘investigation’ — do nothing to protect victims of child abuse, and serve only to chill the creative expressions of artists and cultural institutions by subjecting them to the threat of political prosecution and the unconstitutional seizure of artwork,” said Elizabeth Larison, Director of NCAC’s Arts and Culture Advocacy Program.

    “It’s shameful that government officials would use the criminal legal process to censor art and expression,” said Adriana Piñon, legal director of the ACLU of Texas. “This is a clear violation of the First Amendment and of the guardrails against abuse of the criminal justice system. Artistic expression should not be subject to the whim and punishment of government officials’ personal taste.”

    The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to defending and sustaining the individual rights of all Americans to free speech and free thought — the most essential qualities of liberty. FIRE educates Americans about the importance of these inalienable rights, promotes a culture of respect for these rights, and provides the means to preserve them.

    The ACLU of Texas is a nonpartisan nonprofit organization that works with communities, at the State Capitol, and in the courts to protect and advance civil rights and civil liberties for every Texan, no exceptions.

    Since its inception in 1974, the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC) has functioned as a first responder in protecting freedom of expression, a fundamental human right and a keystone of democracy. Representing 60 national education, publishing, and arts organizations, NCAC encourages and facilitates dialogue between diverse voices, perspectives, and audiences.

    CONTACT:

    Alex Griswold, Communications Campaign Manager, FIRE: 215-717-3473; media@thefire.org

    Kristi Gross, Press Strategist, ACLU of Texas, media@aclutx.org

    Alex Finan, Communications Lead, NCAC, alex@ncac.org

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  • Black History Month: African Americans and Labor

    Black History Month: African Americans and Labor

    Reading Time: 3 minutes

    This February 2025, we’re honoring Black History Month. The 2025 theme is “African Americans and Labor,” emphasizing the impact Black Americans have made through various working roles.

    We’d like to recognize the significant contributions of three Black educators who helped shape the future of higher education, breaking down barriers and inspiring generations of learners and educational leaders.

    Mary McLeod Bethune

    Mary McLeod Bethune is regarded as one of the most significant Black educators and civil rights activists of the 20th century. The daughter of formerly enslaved parents, Bethune believed education was key to opening the doors of opportunity for Black Americans. She founded the Daytona Normal and Industrial Institute for Negro Girls in Daytona, Florida, in 1904, serving as president of the school. The school was eventually combined with the Cookman Institute for Men in 1923 (other sources cite 1929), merging to form the Bethune-Cookman College, Bethune becoming the first Black woman to serve as a college president. The college was one of the few institutions where Black students could seek a college degree. And as of fall 2023, Bethune-Cookman University enrolled 2,415 undergraduate students.

    Mary McLeod Bethune, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Photographs and Prints Division, The New York Public Library. (1940 – 1949).

    Kelly Miller

    Kelly Miller was a groundbreaking educator, mathematician and writer, becoming the first Black man to attend Johns Hopkins University for post-graduate study. He would go on to eventually join Howard University’s faculty as a mathematics professor, helping found the American Negro Academy in 1897, the first organization for Black scholars and artists.

    Miller introduced sociology to Howard’s curriculum in 1895, becoming the first person to teach the subject at the university. Eventually becoming dean of Howard’s College of Arts and Sciences in 1907, he worked to add new natural and social science courses, transforming the curriculum. Due to his tireless recruitment efforts across the south, student enrollment tripled during his first four years in that position.

    Kelly Miller.
    Kelly Miller, LL.D. Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Jean Blackwell Hutson Research and Reference Division, The New York Public Library. (1904).

    Mary Jane Patterson

    Becoming the first Black woman to receive a bachelor’s degree when she graduated from Oberlin College in 1862, Mary Jane Patterson quickly established herself as trailblazer. She devoted her career to education, teaching at the Institute of Colored Youth, now known as Cheyney University, eventually becoming the school principal at the Preparatory High School for Colored Youth, the first U.S. public high school for Black Americans. The Mary Jane Patterson Scholarship was established in 2019, which aims to support post-baccalaureate students who are interested in teaching in urban classrooms.

    Mary Jane Patterson
    Mary Jane Patterson, first Black woman to be granted a bachelor’s degree in the U.S. (Oberlin College, 1862). Photo retrieved from Oberlin College Archives.

     

    During this Black History Month 2025, we celebrate the contributions of these three Black educators whose accomplishments continue to ring out throughout higher education today.

    If you’re interested in history content for your course, we encourage you to browse our history catalog.

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  • Next Steps: A Practical Guide for Ensuring Access and Opportunity for All Employees

    Next Steps: A Practical Guide for Ensuring Access and Opportunity for All Employees

    by Julie Burrell | February 19, 2025

    The wave of new executive orders on DEI, immigration and gender identity has already significantly impacted the higher ed workplace. While the pace of change may feel overwhelming, HR departments are taking a leading role — just as they did during the COVID-19 pandemic — in navigating change and making sure all employees feel valued and supported at work.

    As CUPA-HR President and CEO Andy Brantley affirmed in his message about the recent executive orders, higher ed workplaces can still:

    • Promote equitable work and career pathing opportunities and pay for all employees.
    • Cultivate inclusive learning and working communities.
    • Create a workplace culture that embraces respect and civil discourse.
    • Level the playing field for everyone by working to remove bias, reviewing outdated policies, and creating transparency.
    • Reinforce institutional values by ensuring that all employees feel connected and supported.

    As you strategize your response to changes taking place on your campus, here are some considerations for ensuring that you are providing equal access and opportunity for all.

    Conduct an Audit of Your Institution’s DEI Efforts

    If you haven’t started already, conducting an audit of programs, policies and procedures can help identify areas of concern. Design a simple spreadsheet to help you organize and track your findings in areas such as training and development, hiring, performance management, communications and website content. For each item, indicate where it falls on the legal spectrum. Does it violate the law? Is it in compliance but in need of adjustments? Is it in compliance and effective as it stands?

    When reviewing your programs and processes, the central question to ask is, do they provide equal access and opportunity to all employees without giving special advantages to any one person or group?

    Here’s one example. The language of the recent DEI-focused executive orders emphasizes merit. Merit has always been critical to hiring, reviewing performance and making promotion decisions. Do your policies around hiring and promotion reflect that focus on merit? Are hiring and promotion processes fair and transparent? Are hiring and promotion decisions documented, and do they reflect those policies and processes?

    Connect with Campus Partners

    Your institution’s general counsel can help ensure any changes made to policies and procedures are in compliance with the new executive orders and mitigate risk for your institution.

    If you’re undertaking a website audit, consult your chief information officer. Is there AI-enabled software that might help identify noncompliant wording or outdated programs?

    Is your institution a federal contractor or subcontractor? If so, you may face additional oversight, including new contract terms certifying that your institution is following federal antidiscrimination laws. If your status is unclear, first check with the office of research.

    Consider creating a neutral body of campus stakeholders to help suggest, implement and communicate changes in response to the executive orders, but also expect that employees and administrators will have strong opinions and feelings about these changes.

    Reframe Inclusion

    As you review policies and communications to ensure compliance, take the opportunity to make your workplace even more welcoming and accessible.

    Align with your institution’s values. What are your institution’s core values and mission? It’s likely they involve respecting diversity of thought and perspective, creating a welcoming environment, and providing equal access and opportunity to all regardless of identity. Affirming and communicating these values can be an important way to stay focused on what matters during times of change.

    Consider accessibility. When revising programs and processes to be more inclusive, envision accessibility for all. For example, if your goal is to make career development programs accessible to all employees, look for gaps in access across your employee population. Just as holding trainings in non-ADA compliant buildings may limit the ability of some people to participate in career development, so might neglecting the needs of groups like non-exempt employees and working parents and caregivers. Are there more flexible options? Can you support supervisors to make it easier for an employee to take time away from regular duties?

    Ensure clarity and transparency. Equity in compensation, hiring and promotion is an effective way to bolster recruitment and retention. For example, hiring and promotion practices that are not transparent, written down, and consistently followed can negatively affect the workforce. Women are less likely than men to be promoted if clear, fair criteria aren’t used. Neurodivergent candidates are disadvantaged when job interviews rely on indirect measures like succeeding at small talk rather than a skills-based assessment. In both of these instances, vague criteria such as “culture” and “fit” may prevent qualified, highly skilled employees from being hired and from moving up the ladder. Finally, be sure that your institution’s job descriptions and job requirements are up to date and are being used as the basis for decisions related to hiring and pay.

    Focus on purpose. To avoid misinterpretation, your efforts at creating an inclusive workplace should be characterized in ways that are purpose driven. For example:

    • Communities of people with varied backgrounds and life experiences create opportunities for community members to grow personally and professionally. When employees thrive, institutions thrive.
    • Parity and equity, in opportunity and pay, support job satisfaction, recruitment and retention.
    • A safe and welcoming work environment fosters community and collaboration.

    Emphasize outcomes. Lily Zheng, author of the book DEI Deconstructed, encourages those invested in fair and healthy workplaces to strengthen outcomes. Zheng recommends an outcomes-based approach “focusing on measurable results like pay equity, physical and psychological safety, wellness, and promotion rates, rather than … a one-time training, posting on social media, or other behaviors that signal commitment without demonstrating results.”

    Take Steps to Educate Employees

    Review the ways managers and senior leadership are implementing the policies and processes that are in place. Is additional training required? If you have made changes to policies and processes, how will you communicate those to supervisors and other campus leaders?

    Be sure to evaluate anti-harassment and antidiscrimination trainings you have in place. These trainings should continue, although they may need to be adjusted to emphasize even more strongly the importance of opportunity and respect for all.

    Know That You’re Not Alone

    The higher ed HR community has been through challenging times before, most recently as the pandemic reshaped the workplace. If you have resources or ideas to share with other CUPA-HR members regarding ways that you and your HR colleagues are creating and sustaining an inclusive campus community, please email them to communications@cupahr.org. Your submission will be treated as confidential and, if shared, will be described in terms that will not identify your institution.

    Related CUPA-HR Resources

    Recent DEI-Focused Executive Orders: Next Steps for Higher Ed HR — This CUPA-HR webinar, recorded on February 13, offers excellent insights into steps institutions can take to ensure they are in compliance.

    Recent Executive Orders and Higher Ed HR’s Role in Creating and Sustaining an Inclusive Campus Community — A message from CUPA-HR President and CEO Andy Brantley.

    CUPA-HR Data — CUPA-HR is the premier source of higher ed workforce and workplace data.

    Compensation Toolkit — This HR toolkit includes resources to help ensure that compensation plans are fair and transparent.

    Recruitment Toolkit and Interviewing Toolkit — These HR toolkits include resources to help ensure that hiring practices are fair and transparent.

    Performance Management Toolkit — This HR toolkit includes resources to help ensure that performance management practices are fair and transparent.

    Layoffs/RIF/Furloughs Toolkit — This HR toolkit includes valuable resources for managing workforce reductions.

    Resilience in the Workplace — This CUPA-HR webinar, recorded in 2021, was designed to serve as resilience training for attendees, as well as a model that could easily be replicated at your institution for HR teams and other employees.

     



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