For college counseling centers, this change reflects students’ desire for immediate support. “This is not a generation that would call a counseling center and get an appointment two weeks, four weeks later,” said Joy Himmell, director of counseling services for Old Dominion University. “They want help when they want it.”
But it’s important for counseling centers to educate students on the risks of using generative AI tools for well-being support, Himmell said.
The research: While ChatGPT and similar text-generating chat bots are touted as productivity tools that can expedite learning and workflow, some people turn to them for personal and emotional support.
According to a 2024 safety report, OpenAI found that some users experience anthropomorphization—attributing humanlike behaviors and characteristics to nonhuman entities—and form social relationships with the AI. Researchers hypothesized that humanlike socialization with an AI model could affect how individuals interact with other people and hamper building healthy relationship skills.
A 2025 study from MIT Media Lab and Open AI found that high usage of ChatGPT correlates with increased dependency on the AI tool, with heavy users more likely to consider ChatGPT a “friend” and to consider messaging with ChatGPT more comfortable than face-to-face interactions. However, researchers noted that only a small share of ChatGPT users are affected to that extent or report emotional distress from excessive use.
Another study from the same groups found that higher daily usage of ChatGPT correlated with increased loneliness, dependence and problematic use of the tool, as well as lower socialization with other humans.
This research shows that most people, even heavy users of ChatGPT, are not seeking emotional support from the chat bot and do not become dependent on it. Among college students, a minority want AI to provide well-being support, according to a different survey. A study from WGU Labs found that 41 percent of online learners would be comfortable with AI suggesting mental health strategies based on a student’s data, compared to 38 percent who said they would be somewhat or very uncomfortable with such use.
In higher education: On campus, Himmell has seen a growing number of students start counseling for anxiety disorders, depression and a history of trauma. Students are also notably lonelier, she said, and less likely to engage with peers on campus or attend events.
Student mental health is a top retention concern, but few counseling centers have capacity to provide one-on-one support to everyone who needs it. At her center, more students prefer in-person counseling sessions, which Himmell attributes to them wanting to feel more grounded and connected. But many still engage with online or digital interventions as well.
A significant number of colleges have established partnerships with digital mental health service providers to complement in-person services, particularly since the COVID-19 pandemic necessitated remote instruction. Such services could include counseling support or skill-building education to reduce the need for intensive in-person counseling.
Digital mental health resources cannot replace some forms of therapy or risk assessment, Himmell said, but they can augment counseling sessions. “Having automated AI systems with emotional intelligence to be able to convey some of those concepts and work with students, in some ways, it actually frees the counselor in terms of doing that kind of [skill building], so that we can get more into the nitty-gritty of what we need to talk about,” she explained.
AI counseling or online engagement with ChatGPT is not a solution to all problems, Himmell said. For those who use chat bots as companions, “it sets up a system that is not based in reality; it’s a facade,” Himmell said. “Even though that can serve a purpose, in the long run, it really doesn’t bode well for emotional or social skill development.”
Faculty and staff need to learn how to identify students at risk of developing AI dependency. Compared to anxiety or depression, which have more visible cues in the classroom, “the symptomology related to that inner world of AI and not engaging with others in ways that are helpful is much more benign,” Himmell said. Campus stakeholders can watch out for students who are disengaged socially or reluctant to engage in group work to help identify social isolation and possible digital dependency.
AI in the counseling center: Part of addressing student AI dependency is becoming familiar with the tools and helping students learn to use them appropriately, Himmell said. “We need to be able to harness it and use it, not be afraid of it, and embrace it,” she said. She also sees a role for counseling centers and others in higher education to provide additional education on AI in different formats and venues.
Old Dominion partners with TalkCampus, which offers 24-7 peer-based support. The counseling service is not automated, but the platform uses AI to mine the data and identify risk factors that may come up in conversation and provide support if needed.
Dr. Adriel A. HiltonAdriel A. Hilton has been named Vice President of Institutional Strategy and Chief of Staff at Columbia College Chicago. Most recently, he served with Washington State’s Department of Children, Youth, and Families and previously led strategic student affairs and enrollment initiatives at Southern University at New Orleans.
Hilton holds a BA in Business Administration (Finance) from Morehouse College, a Master of Applied Social Science in Public Administration from Florida A&M University, an MBA from Webster University, and a PhD in Higher Education Administration from Morgan State University.
Dr. Mordecai Ian Brownlee The year 2025 has been marked by numerous legislative changes, resulting in a state of legislative whiplash that has directly impacted institutions of higher education nationwide. From executive orders, to the dismantling of the Department of Education, to call of regional accreditation reform, to the discontinuance of federal funds, to the national erosion of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs (and anything that remotely resembles it), higher education have been conditioned to brace daily for the next social media post or breaking news update that can send our colleges and universities into a frenzy. With the passage of H.R.1 by the 119th Congress, known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, the higher education sector will need to work quickly to fully understand the Act’s impact on our institutions, students, and communities as the 2025-2026 school year begins. As we seek understanding, it is essential to distinguish fact from fiction, separate narratives from actualities, and prioritize responsibility over fear.
Leadership in the next era of higher education
Now is the time for leaders serving in this evolving era to make an explicit declaration that, regardless of the circumstances, their respective institutional missions must not and will not fail. The dreams of our students, as well as the livelihoods of our faculty and staff, are at stake. Not to mention, in such a disruptive era, higher education must normalize the assessment of its academic and student support services to determine the relevance and impact of colleges and universities on the broader communities they serve. Far gone are the days of piddling the same old student experiences and academic programs that fail to lead students to livable wages, let alone failing to provide social care for learners seeking to realize brighter futures. Far gone should be the days when institutional legacies prevent institutions from making necessary changes to ensure institutional vitality and sustainability. In addition to addressing wasteful processes and systems that continue to strain the institution’s ability to serve its enrolled students responsibly.
Equitable student success reimagined
It is essential to note that this work must be envisioned, designed, and implemented differently, given the internal and external political realities prevailing within the respective states of our institution. How we lead this work in the state of Colorado, where I serve as a college president, will undoubtedly differ from how it is led in other states. From coast to coast, from metro to rural, from public to private, and from four-year to two-year institutions, the real power for equitable student success lies in our ability to bring our institutional missions to life in new ways that build bridges to fulfill academic rigor and provide opportunities for the disenfranchised. Regardless of the environment, I encourage us, as educators, to recognize the dynamic shift that must occur within our perspectives and approaches.
Our profession doesn’t need any more one-trick ponies – people who can only serve and have an impact if the conditions are ideal or to their liking. What we need are those who deeply understand that the failure of our students and the missions of our institutions is not an option. We need those who understand the power of environmental scanning and program assessment, as well as the ethical responsibility we have to those we serve, to provide transformative and meaningful learning experiences that account for the political and cultural differences present in each community.
It is this educational versatility paired with agility that will ensure our ability to do “the work” despite the times. Yes, our job titles may change, our departments may be reorganized, and our funding may be discontinued. However, I challenge every college president and their respective institutional boards not to become distracted. Instead, cultivate your awareness of the times, re-center yourself around your respective missions, and embrace the changes that our institutions must implement, recognizing that through disruption, genuine innovation can emerge. And while that change may not be ideal, it is indeed necessary.
Dr. Mordecai Ian Brownlee is President of Community College of Aurora.
There will be a short-pause in HEPI blogs as we undertake some work on the website. We look forward to delivering blogs to your inbox again later next week.
This HEPI blog was kindly authored by Justin Woods, Director UK of ApplyBoard
As the UK sector anticipates new policy requirements and tighter scrutiny around post-study pathways, aligning programme offerings with student demand has never been more important. Yet, international students bring a wide range of goals and preferences to their study decisions. How can institutions support under-enrolled programmes while continuing to attract high-quality applicants?
Entrant data from the 2023/24 academic year points to some clear shifts, including a higher proportion of international students enrolling in computing/IT and health and medicine.Examining these enrolment patterns by source market and field can help institutions stay aligned with evolving demand.
Computing and Health Made Up a Larger Share of Entrants to the UK in 2023/24
International student demand in the UK evolves in small but meaningful ways. In 2023/24, more students chose to begin their studies in computing/IT and health and medicine, fields that offer clear links to employment and future skill needs.
The overall field of study mix among international students in the UK has remained fairly stable since the pandemic, but subtle shifts are beginning to take shape. The share of entrants in computing/IT was up three percentage points in 2023/24 compared to 2019/20. While modest, this represents a change of several thousand more students choosing this field of study. Health and medicine also remained strong in 2023/24, accounting for more than 11% of new starters.
UCAS data for the June 30, 2025 deadline shows that 4,700 international undergraduate students applied for a nursing programme, 19% higher than the 2024 deadline.
Which Student Populations are Driving Demand in Computing/IT and Health and Medicine?
While computing/IT and health and medicine made up 10% and 11% of all international entrants in 2023/24, several student populations pursued these fields at significantly higher rates:
Computing/IT is a top study priority for several key student populations. Nearly one-in-five international students from Myanmar entering the UK in 2023/24 pursued a computing/IT field, more than double the all-market average. Other student populations with notably high engagement in this field of study include those from Qatar, Nepal, Sri Lanka, and India, all of which had 14% or more of their new UK entrants choose computing/IT. All told, these trends show a broad pattern of interest among students across South Asia, the Middle East, and Africa.
Some emerging markets (between 500 and 1,000 entrants in 2023/24) with a high proportion of students entering computing/ITinclude Algeria (23%), Uzbekistan (15%), Morocco (14%), and Bahrain (12%).
Health and medicine shows a comparable trend, with a different mix of student populations driving above-average interest:
Health and medicinedraws above-average interest from a globally distributed set of student markets. Students from Ireland, Hong Kong, and Canada were especially likely to enter health and medicine programmes in 2023/24, with one in four entrants from each market choosing this field. Other high-interest markets span the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and Southern Europe, underscoring a wide geographic appeal of health-related fields.
Some emerging markets (between 500 and 1,000 entrants in 2023/24) with a high proportion of students entering health and medicineinclude the Philippines (38%), Zimbabwe (30%), Jordan (19%), and Belgium (19%).
What Fields of Study do the UK’s Largest International Student Populations Pursue?
Field of study preferences don’t just vary by market. They also take on different significance when viewed through the lens of student volume. Looking at the UK’s largest international student populations helps reveal which programmes are driving demand at scale.
Business and law continues to dominate among high-volume source markets, particularly in South Asia. In 2023/24, over half of new students from India and Pakistan entered this field. For China, on the other hand, business and law enrolment has declined steadily. Instead, arts, social sciences, and humanities has become the top choice among students from China, accounting for nearly 38% of entrants in 2023/24.
Engineering and technology, once popular across multiple markets, has seen a notable decline. The field accounted for 12% of international entrants from India in 2019/20 but just 7% in 2023/24. A similar drop occurred among Pakistani students. However, with the UK launching a £54 million recruitment strategy to attract global research talent from the US in June, we expect this field to see somewhat of a rebound over the next couple of years.
Even ashealth and medicine has received increased attention across the UK sector, its performance among the largest student populations remains steady. Indeed, Nigeria and the US remain strong contributors, with 15% of new students entering this field. As institutions prepare for further sectoral reforms and anticipate post-White Paper adjustments, maintaining a steady corridor into healthcare-aligned programmes and post-graduate opportunities could prove especially important in safeguarding both student outcomes and national workforce goals.
Aligning Your Institution With What’s Next
Programme-level shifts in international demand rarely happen all at once, but they matter more than ever in today’s climate of policy change and increasing scrutiny. Institutions that respond early to evolving student priorities will be better positioned to sustain enrolment, diversify their cohorts, and meet labour-aligned goals.
The 18-year-old from Houston was going to start college in the fall at the University of Texas at Tyler, where she had been awarded $10,000 a year in scholarships. That, she hoped, would set her up for her dream: a Ph.D. in chemistry, followed by a career as a professor or researcher.
“And then the change to in-state tuition happened, and that’s when I knew for sure that I had to pivot,” said Ximena, who was born in Mexico but attended schools stateside since kindergarten. (The Hechinger Report is referring to her by only her first name because she fears retaliation for her immigration status.)
In June, the Texas attorney general’s office and the Trump administration worked together to end the provisions in a state law that had offered thousands of undocumented students like her lower in-state tuition rates at Texas public colleges. State and federal officials successfully argued in court that the long-standing policy discriminated against U.S. citizens from other states who paid a higher rate. That rationale has now been replicated in similar lawsuits against Kentucky, Oklahoma and Minnesota — part of a broader offensive against immigrants’ access to public education.
At UT Tyler, in-state tuition and fees for the upcoming academic year total $9,736, compared to more than $25,000 for out-of-state students. Ximena and her family couldn’t afford the higher tuition bill, so she withdrew. Instead, she enrolled at Houston Community College, where out-of-state costs are $227 per semester hour, nearly three times the in-district rate. The school offers only basic college-level chemistry classes, so to set herself up for a doctorate or original research, Ximena will still need to find a way to pay for a four-year university down the line.
Her predicament is exactly what state lawmakers from both political parties had hoped to avoid when they passed the Texas Dream Act, 2001 legislation that not only opened doors to higher education for undocumented students but was also meant to bolster Texas’s economy and its workforce long-term. With that law, Texas became the first of more than two dozen states to implement in-state tuition for undocumented students, and for nearly 24 years, the landmark policy remained intact. Conservative lawmakers repeatedly proposed to repeal it, but despite years of single-party control in the state legislature, not enough Republicans embraced repeal even as recently as this spring, days before the Texas attorney general’s office and the federal Department of Justice moved to end it.
Now, as the fall semester approaches, immigrant students are weighing whether to disenroll from their courses or await clarity on how the consent agreement entered into by the state and DOJ affects them.
Immigration advocates are worried that Texas colleges and universities are boxing out potential attendees who are lawfully present and still qualify for in-state tuition despite the court ruling — including recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, asylum applicants and Temporary Protected Status holders — because university personnel lack immigration expertise and haven’t been given clear guidelines on exactly who needs to pay the higher tuition rate.
At Austin Community College, which serves an area as large as Connecticut, members of the board of trustees are unsure how to accurately implement the ruling. As they await answers, they’ve so far decided against sending letters asking their students for sensitive information in order to determine tuition rates.
“This confusion will inevitably harm students because what we find is that in the absence of information and in the presence of fear and anxiety, students will opt to not continue higher education,” said Manuel Gonzalez, vice chair of the ACC board of trustees.
A billboard promoting Austin Community College in Spanish sits on a highway that leads to Lockhart, Texas. Credit: Sergio Flores for The Hechinger Report
Policy experts, meanwhile, warn that Texas’s workforce could suffer as talented young people, many of whom have spent their entire education in the state’s public school system, will no longer be able to afford the associate’s and bachelor’s degrees that would allow them to pursue careers that would help propel their local economies. Under the Texas Dream Act, beneficiaries were required to commit to applying for lawful permanent residence as soon as possible, giving them the opportunity to hold down jobs related to their degrees. Without resident status, it’s likely they’ll still work — just more in lower-paying, under-the-radar jobs.
“It’s so short-sighted in terms of the welfare of the state of Texas,”said Barbara Hines, a former law school professor who helped legislators craft the Texas Dream Act.
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For retired Army National Guard Maj. Gen. Rick Noriega, a Democrat who served in the Texas Legislature at the time, that reality hit close to home when he learned of a young yard worker in his district who wanted to enroll at the local community college for aviation mechanics but couldn’t afford out-of-state tuition.
Noriega called the school chancellor’s office, which was able to provide funding for the student to attend. But that experience led him to wonder: How many more kids in his district were running up against the same barriers to higher education?
So he worked with a sociologist to poll students at local high schools about the problem, which turned out to be widespread. And Noriega’s district wasn’t an outlier. In a state that has long had one of the nation’s largest unauthorized immigrant populations, politicians across the partisan divide knew affected constituents, friends or family members and wanted to help. Once Noriega decided to propose legislation, a Republican, Fred Hill, asked to serve as a joint author on the bill.
To proponents of the Texas Dream Act, the best argument in support of in-state tuition for undocumented students was an economic one. After the state had already invested in these students during K-12 public schooling, it made sense to continue developing them so they could eventually help meet Texas’ workforce needs.
“We’d spent all this money on these kids, and they’d done everything that we asked them to do — in many instances superstars and valedictorians and the like — and then they hit this wall, which was higher education that was cost prohibitive,” said Noriega.
The legislation easily passed the Texas House of Representatives, which was Democratic-controlled at the time, but the Republican-led Senate was less accommodating.
“I couldn’t even get a hearing,’” said Leticia Van de Putte, the then-state senator who sponsored the legislation in her chamber.
To persuade her Republican colleagues, she added several restrictions, including requiring undocumented students to live in Texas for three years before finishing high school or receiving a GED. (Three years was estimated as the average time it would take a family to pay enough in state taxes to make up the difference between in-state and out-of-state tuition.) She also included the clause mandating that undocumented students who accessed in-state tuition sign an affidavit pledging to pursue green cards as soon as they were able.
Van de Putte also turned to Texas business groups to hammer home the economic case for the bill. And she convinced the business community to pay for buses to bring Latino evangelical conservative pastors from Dallas, San Antonio, Houston and other areas of the state to Austin, so they could knock on doors in support of the legislation and pray with Republican senators and their staff.
After that, the Texas Dream Act overwhelmingly passed the state Senate in May 2001, and then-Gov. Rick Perry, a Republican, signed it into law the following month.
Yet by 2007, even as immigrant rights advocates, faith-based groups and business associations formed a coalition to defend immigrants against harmful state policies, the Texas legislature was starting to introduce a wave of generally anti-immigrant proposals. In 2010, polling suggested Texans overwhelmingly opposed allowing undocumented students to pay in-state tuition rates.
By 2012, a new slew of right-wing politicians was elected to office, many philosophically opposed to the law — and loud about it. Perry’s defense of the policy had come back to haunt him during the 2012 Republican presidential primary, when his campaign was dogged by criticism after he told opponents of tuition equity during a debate, “I don’t think you have a heart.”
Still, none of the many bills introduced over the years to repeal the Texas Dream Act were successful. And even Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican border hawk, at times equivocated on the policy, with his spokesperson saying in 2013 that Abbott believed “the objective” of in-state tuition regardless of immigration status was “noble.”
Legislative observers say that some Republicans in the state continue to support the policy. “It’s a bipartisan issue. There are Republicans in support of in-state tuition,” said Luis Figueroa, senior director of legislative affairs at the public policy research and advocacy nonprofit Every Texan. “They cannot publicly state it.”
Meanwhile, as the topic became more politically charged in Texas, the Texas Dream Act ended up amplifying a larger conversation that eventually led to the creation of DACA, the Obama-era program that has given some undocumented immigrants access to deportation protections and work permits.
Even before DACA, many immigrants worked, and those who remain undocumented often still do, either as independent contractors for employers that turn a blind eye to their immigration status or by starting their own businesses. A study from May 2020 found that unauthorized residents make up 8.2 percent of the state’s workforce, and for every dollar spent toward public services for them, the state of Texas recouped $1.21 in revenue.
But without the immediate legal permission to work, undocumented college graduates who had benefited from the Texas Dream Act found themselves limited despite their degrees. As the fight for tuition equity spread to other states, so did the fight for a legal solution to support the students it benefited.
When these young people — affectionately dubbed Dreamers — took center stage to more publicly advocate for themselves, their plight proved sympathetic. By 2017, the same year Trump began his first term, polling had flipped to show a plurality of Texans in support of in-state tuition for undocumented students. More recently, research has indicated time and time again that Americans support a pathway to legal status for undocumented residents brought to the U.S. as children.
But arguments against in-state tuition regardless of immigration status also grew in popularity: Critics contended that the policy is unfair to U.S. citizens from other states who have to pay higher rates, or that undocumented students are taking spots at competitive schools that could be filled by documented Americans.
The DOJ leaned on similar rhetoric in the lawsuit that killed tuition equity in Texas, saying the state law is superseded by 1996 federal legislation banning undocumented immigrants from getting in-state tuition based on residency. That argument has become a template as the Trump administration has sued to dismantle other states’ in-state tuition policies for undocumented residents.
In Kentucky, state Attorney General Russell Coleman, a Republican, has followed in Texas’ footsteps, recommending that the state council overseeing higher education withdraw its regulation allowing for access to in-state tuition instead of fighting to defend it in court.
At the same time, the Trump administration has found other ways to cut back on higher education opportunities for undocumented students, rescinding a policy that had helped them participate in career, technical and adult education programs and investigating universities for offering them scholarships.
Back in Texas, the sudden policy change regarding in-state tuition is causing chaos. Even the state’s two largest universities, Texas A&M and the University of Texas, are using different guidelines to decide which students must pay out-of-state rates.
Clouds fill the sky behind the tower at the University of Texas. Credit: Sergio Flores for The Washington Post via Getty Images
“Universities, I think, are the ones that are put in this really difficult position,” Figueroa said. “They are not immigration experts. They’ve received very little guidance about how to interpret the consent decree.”
Amid so much confusion, Figueroa predicted, future lawsuits will likely crop up. Already, affected students and organizations have filed motions in court seeking to belatedly defend the Texas Dream Act against the DOJ.
In the meantime, young scholars are facing difficult choices. One student, who asked to remain anonymous because of her undocumented immigration status, was scrolling through the news on her phone before bed when she saw a headline about the outcome of the DOJ court case.
“I burst in tears because, you know, as someone who’s been fighting to get ahead in their education, right now that I’m in higher education, it’s been a complete blessing,” she said. “So the first thing that I just thought of is ‘What am I going to do now? Where is my future heading?’ The plans that I have had going for me, are they going to have to come to a complete halt?’”
The young woman, who has lived in San Antonio since she was 9 months old, had enrolled in six courses for the fall at Texas A&M-San Antonio and wasn’t sure whether to drop them. It would be her final semester before earning her psychology and sociology degrees, but she couldn’t fathom paying for out-of-state tuition.
“I’m in the unknown,” she said, like “many students in this moment.”
Contact editor Caroline Preston at 212-870-8965, via Signal at CarolineP.83 or on email at [email protected].
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Taking place on 16 September 2025 at Torrens University’s Surry Hills Campus in Sydney (17 Foveaux Street), this event brings together key stakeholders – education agents, government officials, providers across higher education, VET, ELICOS, plus service partners – for a critical industry reset.
Amidst two years of sweeping reform in visa policies, compliance and accountability frameworks, and shifting global student demand, SYMPLED 2025 offers education recruiters a place for dialogue and strategy. Drawing from its reputation as one of Australia’s most practical events for admissions, compliance, and student-support experts, the symposium promises actionable insights and collaboration on the issues at hand
The program features a rich array of speakers, including:
Hon Julian Hill, assistant minister for international education
Michal Sestak, founder and migration agent of SIS Consulting Pty Ltd and AustraliaOnline, moderating a panel on “The Dilemma of the Genuine Student” amid a surge in visa refusal appeals—from 2,400 in 2023 to 40,000 in 2025
International student panel onthe future of international student representative bodies
Ian Aird, CEO of English Australia, in a “Call to Action” panel exploring the role of ELICOS in bridging tourism, working holiday, and long-term education sectors
Additional speakers include leaders from tuition protection, international education bodies, compliance, and provider networks:
Melinda Hatton, director of the Tuition Protection Service
Carmen Basilicata, executive director, Integrity, ASQA
Toshi Kawaguchi, director, international education, StudyNSW
Dirk Mulder, founder and CEO of The Koala News
Mark Lucas, senior vice president, HUATONG International (HTI)
Melanie Macfarlane, board member, ISEAA
SYMPLED 2025 is where the international education community can recalibrate and collaborate, unlocking “value” in recruitment and practice for a more resilient future.
For the full lineup, program updates, and registration, visit the official SYMPLED website.
We have spent decades asking what support care leavers need to “catch up” in education. But what if we focused instead on what they already bring?
Thirty years since I left the care system, I reflect on low expectations, persistent awarding gaps, and why higher education needs to reframe the care experience.
Low expectations
“One GCSE is enough, you’re in care”. That’s what I was told as a teenager growing up in the care system. That message stayed with me, if one GCSE was enough for someone like me, then I was not expected to succeed, I was expected to survive.
By the time I was studying for my A levels I was living independently and worked full time. University at 18 was not an option, it was unthinkable. Years later, I found myself on a BTEC in health and social care as part of a role as a children’s rights worker, and that was where I discovered psychology.
Suddenly, everything in my life made sense, my upbringing, my responses, the systems around me. I applied for university in 2002 and completed my first term while pregnant. At 36 I became a lecturer in education and psychology in higher education, teaching education through a psychological lens to education students, many of whom want to become teachers themselves.
A full circle moment
Recently, I hosted an A level psychology student for a placement. On the final day, she revealed that one of her teachers had been one of my undergraduate students. The moment was moving, not because she was care experienced (she wasn’t), or because the teacher was (they weren’t), but because it showed how my journey, rooted in care, had rippled out into the education system in ways I never imagined.
That moment hit me like a wave. It was not just a neat coincidence, it was a full circle moment that challenged everything I had been told about my place in education.
It reminded me that care experienced students are not simply passing through higher education as “at risk” individuals in need of support. Instead, we are contributing to it, we are building it and sometimes we are shaping the success of others in ways that last longer than we realise.
Ditching deficit thinking
What if we stopped asking what care experienced students lack? Too often, care leavers are described as “at risk” of exclusion, poor attainment, and drop-out. We talk about their trauma, instability, or disadvantage.
Those challenges are real and need addressing – but rarely do we ask what strengths they bring with them. We bring resilience, not just as a feel good buzzword, but as a lived practice. We know how to manage under pressure, navigate uncertainty, and stay focused when stability is not guaranteed.
We bring empathy, because we have seen how systems can fail people and we have learned how to listen, observe, and understand beneath the surface. We bring adaptability because when your life has taught you that plans change, support disappears, and people move on, you learn how to adjust quickly, quietly, and effectively and we bring purpose. Many of us enter education not out of expectation, but out of intent because we want to create the kind of impact we once needed. It is that intent that makes us powerful educators, mentors, and role models even for students who do not share our background.
Within the classroom, I sometimes hear mature students described as “assets” because they bring work experience, life experience, and often support other students. Care experienced students who are appropriately nurtured and empowered bring their own strengths to their peers. They also bring different and valuable perspectives – particularly relevant to social sciences disciplines – about social inequity, systemic injustice, and resilience that can open up important conversations about theory and its relevance to the “real world” and prepare the students they learn alongside for work in a world in which they will encounter diverse and disadvantaged others.
My time in care taught me skills that have defined my academic and professional life – I learned independence young and I developed empathy and adaptability not just emotionally, but practically, not as nice extras but as core strengths. They have helped me understand students better and helped shape the kind of lecturer I am.
Care experienced students do not just overcome adversity, they carry rich insight, emotional intelligence, and a deep understanding of social systems and sometimes, like in my case, they help educate the people who go on to teach the next generation.
Having said that, it’s 30 years since I left the care system – is it still the same?
Not enough has changed
In many ways, the system looks different today. Every looked-after child has a Personal Education Plan (PEP), schools appoint designated teachers, virtual school heads oversee progress, and there’s a £2,345 per-child annual Pupil Premium Plus. In principle, care-experienced learners are a priority. Some universities make contextual offers to care leavers in recognition of the challenges they faced on their way through the education system.
Yet the numbers tell a different story:
only 37 per cent of looked-after children reach expected levels at Key Stage 2 (vs 65 per cent of peers)
only 7.2 per cent achieve grade 5+ in English and maths at GCSE (vs 40 per cent)
at age 19, just 13 per cent of care leavers enter higher education (vs 45 per cent of others).
These gaps are not just statistical, they reflect structural inequalities, where expectations remain low and pathways to university feel closed off before they have even begun. For a care experienced student to find their way into higher education is a testament to their determination, resilience, and motivation before they even start.
A fight not a right
My mantra was “education was a fight not a right”. We may no longer say, “one GCSE is enough” out loud – but it is still heard in the subtext of our systems.
We talk about “widening participation” and “belonging,” but too often, care experienced learners are left out of those conversations, or placed into categories of concern rather than capability. Recently, my ten-year-old said something that stopped me in my tracks: “children shouldn’t be judged on academic intelligence but on creative intelligence. School is more about following the rules than finding yourself.”
They are right – the education system has moved from creativity to conformity and in doing so, we do not just risk excluding care experienced learners, we risk losing the individuality, emotional intelligence, and imaginative power that all students bring. The ones who have had to survive the most often bring innovation and creativity. When we centre care experienced voices in policy, in pedagogy, and in professional learning, we begin to close the awarding gap, the one that limits how we (and sometimes they) see their potential.
Higher education did not just change my life. It gave me the chance to change other people’s too – and that is an opportunity we should provide to all our children.
What does it mean to be a mindful academic? Jennifer Askey, PhD asked me about mindful practices when I was a guest on her podcast. While I went to a graduate program for creative writing where that was a focus, the mindful practices I’ve kept are simple. The one I shared with Jennifer? My favorite room spray, a ritual spritz I use just before meetings. Lavender, apple blossom, clover.
It got me thinking how just talking about mindfulness can help us be more intentional with the care we give to ourselves. And, the spaces we create for other people. Not just mindfulness for self-care. When academics are more intentional about their thoughts and actions it makes a difference for all areas of your life.
Join me and executive leadership and mindfulness coach, Dr. Jennifer Askey in this live conversation.
Bio
Dr. Jennifer Askey is an executive leadership and mindfulness coach who works with higher education leaders all over North America. She leverages assessments, mindfulness practices, and powerful coaching conversations to help her clients build the career impact they want to see. In her coaching, the client’s own journey of self-awareness comes to the forefront, so that their personal and professional decisions are rooted in their values, their awareness of their skills and assets, and their commitments to community, organization, and family.
Jennifer Askey, PhD, PCC
Jennifer is also a sought-after workshop leader and team alignment facilitator. She works with units to establish a solid connection between their success parameters and their strategic and operational tactics. Her clients appreciate her sense of humour, her dedication to their growth, and her willingness to share resources, ideas, and inspiration with them. She is currently pursuing certification in the Sustained Dialogue methodology and Next-Stage Facilitation.
Dr. Askey hasn’t always been a coach. She came to coaching first as a client in 2016, when she was seeking a career change. In her first career, she was a professor of German literature, language, and culture, specializing in young adult literature in German and comparative literature studies of Holocaust fiction. She holds a PhD in German Studies from Washington University in St Louis, is a Certified Professional Co-Active Coach, a Certified Positive Intelligence Coach, and a Professional Certified Coach through ICF.
If you’re a proper Eurovision Song Contest loser like me, you look forward each year to the crowdsourced fansourced compilation of the season’s Iceberg.
On the surface is the stuff you figure that “normal” casual Saturday night viewers will notice – like the considerable coverage afforded to Malta’s entry this year, which involved its artist Miriana Conte attempting to argue that her song “Serving Kant” really meant “serving song”.
Then several layers below sea level there’s things like the news that Sasha Bognibov – who has entered the Moldovan selection several times with a series of increasingly creepy entries – had died of a heart attack, only to come back alive a few days later.
“Icebergs of ignorance”, as they’re officially known, were originally invented by a Japanese management consultant in the 80s. Sidney Yoshida’s keynote at the 1989 International Quality Symposium in Mexico had described his research on a car manufacturer named Calsonic – where he’d found that senior managers at the firm only saw about 4 percent of the issues, with the bulk hidden at lower levels.
And like an iceberg, most of the danger lies beneath the surface – with supervisors and frontline staff far more aware of the everyday challenges. In theory it all highlights the need for stuff like open communication, feedback loops and genuine staff voice – so decision-makers aren’t steering blind.
Under the surface
I’ve long been fascinated by the way the concept might apply in a university. Plenty of senior leaders might take the view that the cultural (and now regulatory/legal) protection afforded to academic staff saying critical things on social media on everything from workload to the travel booking system means very little is below the surface – but my guess is that that can breed complacency about the things that people don’t say out loud.
From a higher education sector and public perception point of view, we might interpret new research from the Policy Institute at King’s and HEPI in a similar way – an iceberg of misunderstanding where the surface-level chatter obscures the submerged reality.
The public apparently overestimate graduate regret, assumes that nearly half of graduates feel crushed by debt when only 16 per cent say so, and underestimate higher education’s economic heft. And like Yoshida’s managers, the danger isn’t so much ignorance of the big headlines as it is the quiet accumulation of false assumptions beneath the surface – gaps in knowledge that, if unchallenged, steer the national conversation off course.
But it’s the big financial crisis in the sector where I keep thinking most about the Iceberg. Above the surface, to the extent to which the issue is “cutting through”, it’s the prospect of a provider going under that the press seem really keen to report on. Every other day one of us at Team Wonkhe will get a message from journo or other asking us who might be on the brink, presumably because stories like this in the i Paper (“At least six unis at risk of going bust before 2025 freshers finish their degrees”) get clicks.
Just below the surface (for me at least) is what’s happening to student demand (or, more accurately, supply) – a process that seems to be converting “high”, “medium” and “low” tariff group categories into “medium”, “low” and “has a pulse” as each day of Clearing 2025 goes on.
The next level down for me is redundancy rounds and telegraphed cuts. They definitely sound bad – especially if a course closes. But if they result in 24 hour library becoming a 15 hour one, or the optional electives on an undergraduate degree being slashed, they seem be harder to pin down and understand – and often aren’t being picked up and protected by consumer law, complaints or Student “Protection” Plans.
The worst of all of that, at least so far, has been down the bottom end of the league tables – although journos hoping for an actual collapse may find that the realities of processes like endless cost-cutting remain buried at the bottom of the iceberg because of the amount of debt that everyone’s in.
A small provider like Spurgeon’s can fall over because the banks aren’t expecting millions to be repaid on shiny buildings – big universities extended in that way are likely to be able to renegotiate because banks like being paid back, albeit in a way that effectively surrenders the already shaky illusion that the Board of Governors is in control to a shadow board of bankers insisting on deeper and deeper cuts to students with the least social capital and confidence to complain about them.
We need a shrink
What then manifests is the scourge of shrinkflation. You know the idea – when the Quality Street tubs appear in the supermarket in September, you’re only minutes away from a national newspaper pointing out that there’s two fewer toffee pennies in this year’s tub of 525g than last year. I mean have you seen how small a Freddo is these days?
The problem for students is that this stuff is hard to spot and even harder to enforce rights over. It is simply not possible to lose the number of academic staff that the sector has lost over the past two years and for providers to not be in breach of contract – promises have either been broken, or the contract itself gives a university too wide a discretion to vary, or it doesn’t and the risks of not making the cuts are greater than the risks of a handful of students having the energy to complain.
And when the big red flags from the Office for “Students” are about financial sustainability with the odd askance murmur about finding efficiencies in a way that protects the student experience, it’s not as if the regulatory environment is doing anything other than egging on the shrinkflation. You’re only going to get inspected on the provision by OfS if your outcomes are terrible, and it seems to have all but given up doing inspections anyway.
Will a student enrolling onto a three year degree get the course they were promised in two years time? I’ve no idea, and all OfS can offer in protection terms is “let’s hope you paid your fees on a credit card because you might be able to get the credit card company to do a chargeback”.
Every year I get taken in by a fresh promise that OfS will actually enforce the stuff about broken promises. Almost a year ago to the day Director for Fair Access and Participation John Blake turned up at an SU staff conference to declare that he’d heard students worried about being promised one thing and getting another loud and clear. What he didn’t say was that a full year on, its new definitions of “fairness” will only apply to students in newly registered providers – with no sense of when “fairness” might be a thing for everyone else.
Deep down
But the temptation would be to assume that the harms of where we are are exclusively in those layers already mentioned. For me, right down at the bottom of the Iceberg – for the public, regulators and students themselves – is the sharing problem.
I often lament that being in a university library in certain weeks of the year is like being on a short-formed Cross Country train with no air con on a Bank Holiday Monday when the service before it has been cancelled. There’s nowhere to sit, everyone is very tense, and there’s a real sense that an actual fight might break out between two otherwise polite members of the public over a seat reservations issue.
There’s always an idiot with their bag on a seat, the catering trolley can’t get through, and the wheelchair user finds themselves yelling at those with suitcases because they’ve been plonked in the space for chairs at the end of the carriage. It’s carnage.
Over the years, I’ve often skim-read commentary from financial and management consultant types that “one less international PGT means needing to recruit two home students”, as if the only thing that matters is the overall financial target rather than having enough of everything for the students being recruited.
What I (almost certainly naively) never expected is that it pretty much is panning out like that at the top end of the tables – and while there’s debates to be had about acquisition costs, suitability for a course and/or culture, market instability and the loss of “local” options and choice, the thing that worries me most of all is the sharing thing.
Let’s imagine – hopelessly simplistically, I know – that some universities are indeed setting a financial target regardless of the number of students that would involve recruiting. As part of that, let’s imagine that these are universities more likely to recruit students living away from home. If 1 x PGT becomes 2 x UG, are there enough bed spaces in the city?
Enough is enough
Enough books in the library? Enough marking capacity to hit the 2 week turnaround pledge? Enough sockets for laptops when everyone’s in at once? Enough spaces in seminar rooms to avoid students sitting on the floor? Enough counselling staff to cope when that extra intake tips more students into crisis? Enough careers support to avoid queues that make the whole thing feel tokenistic rather than transformative?
Enough quiet corners for those who can’t concentrate in noisy shared flats or packed libraries? Enough placements to go around when professional courses all need them at the same time of year? Enough personal tutor appointments to avoid the system becoming decidedly impersonal? Enough contact with actual academics rather than a carousel of casualised staff? Enough eduroam bandwidth when every lecture, seminar, and social is streaming at once? Enough student housing that isn’t mouldy, miles away, or eye-wateringly expensive?
“Enough” is already pretty subjective – and itself subject to wild differences between subject areas on campus in a way that makes it hard to not always spot someone (probably an international PGT in the Business School) who’s worse off. Even if they knew they could and even if they were minded to, it’s pretty hard for a student to argue that something that is still there and was always shared is being stretched a little too thinly now.
And this sort of thing almost always manifests in conflict between students rather than pinning the blame tail on the university donkey – see our dismal debates about things like NHS access and immigration for a classic example.
It’s not even as if the regulator doesn’t understand. John Blake again, a year ago:
When the 2012 number controls were abolished, there are institutions that literally doubled in size overnight… I don’t know that the answer is us saying, no, you can’t have your students, or you have to do this. But I think there’s definitely scope for us thinking about what the obligation of institutions is to have discussions with their local community about where their students are going to go, because it’s clearly not sustainable for every institution to double itself overnight in small places.
See also everything else about a university experience that, by definition, involves sharing things.
Swear words
It remains the case that it’s almost as bad to sing the uncensored version of Miriana Conte’s Eurovision entry in a church as it is to even gently propose some student number controls. And even though one of the least publicly resisted immigration rules is not a cap but a “if you want more CAS, you have to think about whether you have the capacity” (maybe because it’s never been meaningfully or publicly enforced by UKVI), people even seem to be nervous about suggesting something like that for home students.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again – higher education is an endeavour that is profoundly unsuited to very rapid expansion and very rapid contraction at programme, subject and institutional level. But the biggest mistake of all would be to focus on the end of the league tables where the impacts of contraction are closest to the Iceberg’s surface.
Cramming tens of thousands more students into the cities of the (not so) high tariffs may well be just as damaging, all while the tone of their recruitment relationship – “you’re lucky to be here” – reduces the chances of students doing anything other than the HE equivalent of putting your head down, crouching next to the toilet and staring at your phone for three gruelling hours. Or, in HE’s case, years.
It’s really not hard this one. You want to expand your student numbers by more than 5 per cent in a subject area? Publicly consult on how you’ll do it – including the results of conversations with staff, students, the local community and local providers, and you’re on. Imagine suggesting out loud that doing some planning to ensure more students doesn’t mean a worse experience would represent a regulatory “burden”.
Utah State University will undergo a state audit following an initial review that found “concerns about USU’s governance, leadership, and culture of policy noncompliance.”
At a Tuesday meeting, the state Legislature’s audit subcommittee voted unanimously to conduct a deeper review of the university, which will look at governance and procurement processes, particularly in the president’s office.
The review comes amid reporting that Elizabeth Cantwell, the university’s former president, spent heavily on office remodeling and transportation during her tenure before departing earlier this year.
Dive Insight:
State legislative auditors raised issues with both spending practices and oversight controls at the highest levels of Utah State.
Under the heading of “leadership concerns,” they pointed to institutional purchase card transactions that “significantly increased” during the past two years compared to the preceding half decade.
Those increases occurred during the tenure of Cantwell, who was appointed president in 2023 and stepped down unexpectedly earlier this year to serve as president of Washington State University.
Alan Smith, dean of Utah State’s college of education and human services, is serving as interim president while the institution searches for a permanent leader.
This March, shortly after the announcement of Cantwell’s departure, Cache Valley Daily obtained public records of heavy spending during her tenure. The report noted a $285,000 office remodel that included more than $184,000 in furniture costs, over $800 in spending on mirrors and a $750 bidet toilet.
It also detailed several vehicles Cantwell used for transportation during her time at Utah State, including a new Toyota SUV and a $30,000 electric vehicle.
Auditors flagged purchase card spending during the past two years that “may be concerning due to the nature of the purchases, the dollar amounts involved, and the level of oversight.”
They also noted “issues with the amount spent on presidential motor vehicle assets in the last two years being almost triple the amount for the five years before.”
The review also raised concerns about how Utah State’s leaders acquired goods and services from third parties. Specifically, they found that some executive staff committed the university to contracts over $52,000 — and up to $430,000 — before completing the purchasing process.
Their report recommended a review of procurement policies, controls over open purchase orders, and spending and assets in the Utah State president’s office, as well as an evaluation of whether “governance and leadership at USU have the appropriate structure, tools, processes, culture, structure, and personnel in place to ensure success.”
On Tuesday, state lawmakers on the audit subcommittee called for a deep investigation of the university’s spending.
“I love Utah State. It’s a big part of my district, it employs a lot of people in my district,” one member told audit staff during the meeting. “But I have serious concerns about what is happening at Utah State right now, and so whatever latitude you feel that you need, I like to be part of authorizing that — as deep as you can go.”
Tessa White, chair of the university’s trustee board, voiced support for the state audit at the meeting.
“We welcome the audit,” White said. “There are areas that we are aware of and taking aggressive steps to remedy. We hope that by the time that your audit is done, we will have a whole list of things completed that will give you greater confidence in the school.”
Procurement policies and processes have come under fire at other public institutions as politicians and auditors home in on their spending practices.
Early this year, Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham called for Western New Mexico University’s entire board of regents to resign after an auditing report surfaced spending by leadership that showed “a concerning lack of compliance with established university policies.”
A state audit late last year of the Connecticut State Colleges and Universities system found several financial transactions that violated institutional policies or lacked adequate documentation. That included some $19,000 in spending on food over two years by Chancellor Terrence Cheng.
In 2024, a state audit of University of Maryland Global Campus raised issues with leadership oversight of a spinoff nonprofit, pointing to — among other issues — a $25.7 million IT project that ended without a viable product.
