Northwestern University is stepping in to fund ongoing research projects after the private institution received stop-work orders on nearly 100 federal grants, CBS News Chicago reported.
Northwestern, like others on the list, had a pro-Palestinian encampment protest on campus last spring, which prompted Congress to bring its president in for a hearing on antisemitism in May.
Northwestern president Michael Schill and Board of Trustees chair Peter Barris told the university community in an email obtained by CBS News Chicago that the university still had not received formal notice that federal research funding had been pulled, but the university has received stop-work orders. They noted the university will continue funding on projects that received stop-work orders as well as other research threatened by the Trump administration.
“The work we do is essential to our community, to the nation and to the world. Enabling this vital research to continue is among our most important priorities, and supporting our researchers in this moment is a responsibility we take seriously,” Schill and Barris wrote in the Thursday email.
Northwestern is among the nation’s wealthiest universities, with an endowment recently valued at $14.2 billion. However, financial experts have cautioned against leveraging endowments to plug budget holes, prompting some wealthy institutions targeted by the administration to issue bonds or take out private loans.
Transformative. Disruptive. Game-changing. That’s how many experts continue to refer, without hyperbole, to generative AI’s impact on higher education. Yet more than two years after generative AI went mainstream, half of chief technology officers report that their college or university isn’t granting students institutional access to generative AI tools, which are often gratis and more sophisticated and secure than what’s otherwise available to students. That’s according to Inside Higher Ed’s forthcoming annual Survey of Campus Chief Technology/Information Officers with Hanover Research.
There remains some significant—and important—skepticism in academe about generative AI’s potential for pedagogical (and societal) good. But with a growing number of institutions launching key AI initiatives underpinned by student access to generative AI tools, and increasing student and employer expectations around AI literacy, student generative AI access has mounting implications for digital equity and workforce readiness. And according to Inside Higher Ed’s survey, cost is the No. 1 barrier to granting access, ahead of lack of need and even ethical concerns.
Ravi Pendse, who reviewed the findings for Inside Higher Ed and serves as vice president for information technology and chief information officer at the University of Michigan, a leader in granting students access to generative AI tools, wasn’t surprised by the results. But he noted that AI prompting costs, typically measured in units called tokens, have fallen sharply over time. Generative AI models, including open-source large language models, have proliferated over the same period, meaning that institutions have increasing—and increasingly less expensive—options for providing students access to tools.
‘Paralyzed’ by Costs
“Sometimes we get paralyzed by, ‘I don’t have resources, or there’s no way I can do this,’ and that’s where people need to just lean in,” Pendse said. “I want to implore all leaders and colleagues to step up and focus on what’s possible, and let human creativity get us there.”
According to the survey—which asked 108 CTOs at two- and four-year colleges, public and private nonprofit, much more about AI, digital transformation, online learning and other key topics—institutional approaches to student generative AI access vary. (The full survey findings will be released next month.)
Some 27 percent of CTOs said their college or university offers students generative AI access through an institutionwide license, with CTOs at public nonprofit institutions especially likely to say this. Another 13 percent of all CTOs reported student access to generative AI tools is limited to specific programs or departments, with this subgroup made up entirely of private nonprofit CTOs. And 5 percent of the sample reported that students at their institution have access to a custom-built generative AI tool.
Among community college CTOs specifically (n=22), 36 percent said that students have access to generative AI tools, all through an institutionwide license.
Roughly half of institutions represented do not offer student access to generative AI tools. Some 36 percent of CTOs reported that their college doesn’t offer access but is considering doing so, while 15 percent said that their institution doesn’t offer access and is not considering it.
Of those CTOs who reported some kind of student access to generative AI and answered a corresponding question about how they pay for it (n=45), half said associated costs are covered by their central IT budget; most of these are public institution CTOs. Another quarter said there are no associated costs. Most of the rest of this group indicated that funding comes from individual departments. Almost no one said costs are passed on to students, such as through fees.
Among CTOs from institutions that don’t provide student access who responded to a corresponding question about why not (n=51), the top-cited barrier from a list of possibilities was costs. Ethical concerns, such as those around potential misuse and academic integrity, factored in, as well, followed by concerns about data privacy and/or security. Fewer said there is no need or insufficient technical expertise to manage implementation.
“I very, very strongly feel that every student that graduates from any institution of higher education must have at least one core course in AI, or significant exposure to these tools. And if we’re not doing that, I believe that we are doing a disservice to our students,” Pendse said. “As a nation we need to be prepared, which means we as educators have a responsibility. We need to step up and not get bogged down by cost, because there are always solutions available. Michigan welcomes the opportunity to partner with any institution out there and provide them guidance, all our lessons learned.”
The Case for Institutional Access
But do students really need their institutions to provide access to generative AI tools, given that rapid advances in AI technology also have led to fewer limitations on free, individual-level access to products such as ChatGPT, which many students have and can continue to use on their own?
Experts such as Sidney Fernandes, vice president and CIO of the University of South Florida, which offers all students, faculty and staff access to Microsoft Copilot, say yes. One reason: privacy and security concerns. USF users of Copilot Chat use the tool in a secure, encrypted environment to maintain data privacy. And the data users share within USF’s Copilot enterprise functions—which support workflows and innovation—also remains within the institution and is not used to train AI models.
There’s no guarantee, of course, that students with secure, institutional generative AI accounts will use only them. But at USF and beyond, account rollouts are typically accompanied by basic training efforts—another plus for AI literacy and engagement.
“When we offer guidance on how to use the profiles, we’ve said, ‘If you’re using the commercially available chat bots, those are the equivalent of being on social media. Anything you post there could be used for whatever reason, so be very careful,” Fernandes told Inside Higher Ed.
In Inside Higher Ed’s survey, CTOs who reported student access to generative AI tools by some means were no more likely than the group over all to feel highly confident in their institution’s cybersecurity practices—although CTOs as a group may have reason to worry about students and cybersecurity generally: Just 26 percent reported their institution requires student training in cybersecurity.
Colleges can also grant students access to tools that are much more powerful than freely available and otherwise prompt-limited chat bots, as well as tools that are more integrated into other university platforms and resources. Michigan, for instance, offers students access to an AI assistant and another conversational AI tool, plus a separate tool that can be trained on a custom dataset. Access to a more advanced and flexible tool kit for those who require full control over their AI environments and models is available by request.
Responsive AI and the Role of Big Tech
Another reason for institutions to lead on student access to generative AI tools is cultural responsiveness, as AI tools reflect the data they’re trained on, and human biases often are baked into that data. Muhsinah Morris, director of Metaverse programs at Morehouse College, which has various culturally responsive AI initiatives—such as those involving AI tutors that look like professors—said it “makes a lot of sense to not put your eggs in one basket and say that basket is going to be the one that you carry … But at the end of the day, it’s all about student wellness, 24-7, personalized support, making sure that students feel seen and heard in this landscape and developing skills in real time that are going to make them better.”
The stakes of generative AI in education, for digital equity and beyond, also implicate big tech companies whose generative AI models and bottom lines benefit from the knowledge flowing from colleges and universities. Big tech could therefore be doing much more to partner on free generative AI access with colleges and universities, and not just on the “2.0” and “3.0” models, Morris said.
“They have a responsibility to also pour back into the world,” she added. “They are not off the hook. As a matter of fact, I’m calling them to the carpet.”
Jenay Robert, senior researcher at Educause, noted that the organization’s 2025 AI Landscape Study: Into the Digital AI Divide found that more institutions are licensing AI tools than creating their own, across a variety of capabilities. She said digital equity is “certainly one of the biggest concerns when it comes to students’ access to generative AI tools.” Some 83 percent of respondents in that study said they were concerned about widening the digital divide as an AI-related risk. Yet most respondents were also optimistic about AI improving access to and accessibility of educational materials.
Of course, Robert added, “AI tools won’t contribute to any of these improvements if students can’t access the tools.” Respondents to the Educause landscape study from larger institutions were more likely those from smaller ones to report that their AI-related strategic planning includes increasing access to AI tools.
Inside Higher Ed’s survey also reveals a link between institution size and access, with student access to generative AI tools through an institutionwide license, especially, increasing with student population. But just 11 percent of CTOs reported that their institution has a comprehensive AI strategy.
Still, Robert cautioned that “access is only part of the equation here. If we want to avoid widening the digital equity divide, we also have to help students learn how to use the tools they have access to.”
In a telling data point from Educause’s 2025 Students and Technology Report, more than half of students reported that most or all of their instructors prohibit the use of generative AI.
Arizona State University, like Michigan, collaborated early on with OpenAI, but it has multiple vendor partners and grants student access to generative AI tools through an institutionwide license, through certain programs and custom-built tools. ASU closely follows generative AI consumption in a way that allows it to meet varied needs across the university in a cost-effective manner, as “the cost of one [generative AI] model versus another can vary dramatically,” said Kyle Bowen, deputy CIO.
“A large percentage of students make use of a moderate level of capability, but some students and faculty make use of more advanced capability,” he said. “So everybody having everything may not make sense. It may not be very cost-sustainable. Part of what we have to look at is what we would describe as consumption-based modeling—meaning we are putting in place the things that people need and will consume, not trying to speculate what the future will look like.”
That’s what even institutions with established student access are “wrestling with,” Bowen continued. “How do we provide that universal level of AI capability today while recognizing that that will evolve and change, and we have to be ready to have technology for the future, as well, right?”
Colleges and universities are home to an array of resources to help students thrive and succeed, but many students don’t know about them. Just over half (56 percent) of college students say they’re aware of tutoring and academic supports on campus, compared to 94 percent of college employees who say their campus offers the resources.
At the University of South Florida, the Academic Success Center is a central office in the library that houses tutoring, the writing lab, peer mentoring and supplemental instruction, among other academic support offerings for undergraduates.
Zoraya Betancourt became director of the center in 2020 during a challenging time, she said—in part because the center had to reintroduce itself to incoming students who had never been on campus and those who had their college experience disrupted by COVID-19.
National data shows that students at large public institutions are spending less time studying outside of class now compared to during the 2018–19 academic year, and they are less likely to participate in a study group with their peers.
“For me, it was like, OK, we are going to have to be very different. We can’t go back to who we were,” Betancourt said.
Spurred by student data and feedback, Betancourt and her team led a remodel of the center to be more responsive to student needs and meet them where they are.
Data-based decisions: To start, Betancourt partnered with Steve Johnson, a data scientist on the university’s Predictive Analytics Research for Student Success team, to build a dashboard of student data.
“For many years the only data we had was how many students come and use the services how many times,” as well as some student identification data, Betancourt said. “I always thought we need more than that—we need to know more than that.”
Now, Betancourt has access to student majors, colleges and the types of services they utilize to identify high-demand subjects and create responsive learning support schedules. The dashboard also connects the way services are tied to student retention and outcome goals.
In addition to automating some work, the dashboard allows staff to engage students more directly. Each week, the system generates a report of new visitors to the center, which staff use to reach out and personally welcome students to the center and its services.
A care-centered model: One trend that became clear in student interactions was the prevalence of stress in the student experience, Betancourt said. “Our tutors are coming to us and saying, ‘I have a student … and I don’t know how to help them.’”
In response, the office adopted a care model for referrals that quickly connects support staff with other departments, reducing opportunities for students to fall through the cracks.
“Within this referral system, we can go in and see if a student who is using our services says, ‘I really need to change my major and I don’t know what to do, I’m really stressing out over it,’” Betancourt said. “We’re able to go into the system and refer them directly to an adviser.”
Larry Billue Jr. serves as the Academic Success Center point person for care management, guiding students to counseling support, financial aid, basic needs support and academic advisers or just sitting with the student to discuss how they’re feeling.
Increased peer engagement: Another new feature of the ACS was supplemental instruction. While the academic intervention has been around for decades, it was new to the university and created opportunities for increased collaboration between staff and faculty to promote academic success, as well as create jobs for student employees.
“That became more evident because we were hearing from students, ‘I need more than just tutoring. I like working with my peers,’” Betancourt said.
At USF, supplemental instruction is called PASS, short for peer-assisted study sessions. The ACS is tracking student participation in PASS to gauge use.
Students can also sign up to receive remote tutoring in select courses through the PORTAL (peer online resources for tutoring and learning), to supplement in-person opportunities when the office may be closed.
The impact: Over the past year, the center has seen a 75 percent year-over-year increase in student use.
Having a care team member on board has also been successful; Billue Jr. can physically walk a student across campus to the relevant office and make introductions as needed.
“It’s been well received by students; they take him up on the offer and they’ll walk with him,” Betancourt said.
The center has also expanded training for academic peer mentors to address not only study strategies and effective learning practices, but also how to make referrals to other offices.
The biggest lesson Betancourt has learned: There are a range of opportunities to engage students and connect with them, understanding those opportunities just requires a deeper look at what students need.
“We serve to engage students on campus, to engage students with each other, to engage students with faculty and with staff, and it’s looking at that a little bit closer to improve our services and how we can build on that,” Betancourt said.
Do you have an academic intervention that might help others improve student success? Tell us about it.
In sociology, the term ‘male flight’ refers to men abandoning fields, activities, or professions when they are perceived as becoming too ‘feminine’ or associated with women. Lisa Wade argues that this is ‘bad long-term strategy for maintaining dominance.’ Education, especially in recent years, has become a battleground for cultural and political struggles, particularly in the wake of growing far-right influence in both Europe and the United States. But is the shift away from higher education by young men simply a cultural power struggle, or are we failing to meet their needs and expectations?
The Impact of Gender Dynamics on Higher Education Participation
Men are increasingly opting out of higher education. The widening gender gap in college enrolment reveals a troubling trend: higher education is now facing what can be described as male flight. In the United States, this gap has expanded dramatically. In 1979, only 200,000 more women attended college than men; by 2021, that number had surged to 3.1 million more women than men. While the COVID-19 pandemic significantly impacted enrollment figures in 2021, this shift underscores a broader trend in gender and education that warrants serious consideration.
A similar pattern is unfolding in the UK. In 2020/21, there were 2.75 million students enrolled in higher education, with women making up 57% of the student body. The undergraduate sector exhibits the largest gender gap. This growth, however, raises critical questions about the future of male participation in higher education.
The Retreat of Men from Higher Education: A Closer Look
The trend of male flight from higher education is unlikely to reverse without targeted intervention. A study by King’s College London highlights that young men today are particularly concerned about the challenges they face in society. Unlike their older counterparts, younger men and women hold vastly different views on education, social issues, and political ideologies. According to a survey of over 3,500 young people aged 16+, young men tend to be less supportive of gender equality initiatives and are increasingly aligning with right-wing political views. Within this context, right-wing political groups, such as Reform UK, advocate for a ‘no-nonsense’ approach to education, emphasizing a patriotic curriculum that they argue better addresses concerns about social equality. Their proposals often reflect a growing sentiment among some groups, particularly white men, who feel that their experiences and challenges do not align with current gender equality initiatives.
While the political rhetoric surrounding this issue is highly charged, it demands serious attention. The key question now is: How can we rebuild young men’s confidence in higher education? This is particularly pressing when considering young men from low-income or disadvantaged backgrounds. Research shows that white working-class men are disproportionately likely to cite the high cost of higher education as a barrier to entry.
Fees and student loans are the biggest concern of young people as they look ahead onto the HE landscape, with over 25% of young Britons thinking that university is not worth it. Alongside this sector-wide issue, young men are retreating from HE in much higher numbers than any of their female or BAME counterparts. This is something that should not be ignored if we want truly inclusive HE.
What Can We Do? Policies to Address Inclusive Education and Rebuild Trust Among Disadvantaged White Men
Many of these issues must be addressed by universities themselves. Male students often feel that higher education fails to cater to their unique needs. Young men are less likely to engage in extracurricular activities – such as sports or student unions – that are integral to the student experience. Neil Raven’s contribution to this blog last year highlights young men feeling unsupported and disengaged, and as with everything in this sector, the solution to this question is not straightforward. To truly address the challenges young men face in education, universities must acknowledge that their needs and experiences are distinct and deserve to be supported in meaningful and effective ways.
When we talk about the financial red flags facing disadvantaged young white men, we’re really addressing the prospect of being burdened with debt—especially when they are just one choice away from avoiding it altogether. Adopting Tim Leunig’s recommendation to shorten the student loan repayment term from 40 years to 20 would give students greater confidence that they can achieve financial freedom by mid-life.
Furthermore, research conducted by the Institute for Fiscal Studies commissioned by the Department for Education (DfE) found that only 1 in 5 students would not be financially better off by going to university. This is reason enough to incentivise young white men back into the warm embrace of higher education.
A shorter repayment term would not only alleviate long-term financial anxiety but also encourage people from all backgrounds to pursue higher education without the fear of being shackled by debt for life. The Higher Education Policy Institute’s own research, despite indicating young women being more debt-averse than men (even with men paying more of the debt due to higher salaries in the longer term), shows that most of our young people are opposed to the Labour government’s tuition fee increase. A shorter repayment term will perhaps not only restore the confidence of our young women – who are already sceptical of the lower salaries they will receive throughout their careers – but reassure all of our young people that student loans are not a lifelong burden, and that we have a system that rewards ambition rather than punishing those who take the leap.
Moreover, this shift could help restore confidence in the value of a degree, particularly for those who currently see university as a risky financial gamble rather than a stepping stone to social mobility. This is, as Mr Raven identifies, especially important as men doubt and call into question graduate outcomes in the long term.
HEPI’s research also indicates that a tuition fee hike is made more palatable if accompanied by an increase in maintenance support. In a piece I wrote for the Sixteenth Council, I referred to the Institute for Fiscal Studies’s proposals regarding maintenance support. One of these was restoring the generosity of maintenance support to 2020 levels, which represents a 16% increase for the 23/24 intake. Yes, this means issuing £1.5bn in maintenance loans, but repayment levels would mean that the cost to the government and the taxpayer would fall to £0.4bn.
Therefore, making HE more attractive for young people – especially those white, working-class young men who are lacking that engagement with education – involves reducing the repayment term for tuition fees down to 20 years and restoring maintenance support to pre-COVID levels. Ultimately, this would, as HEPI’s research indicates, make the recent tuition fee rise more palatable and, in turn, set young minds at ease.
Another way of addressing these practical problems is spearheading a secondary school library-building scheme. The National Literacy Trust identified a strong link between school library use and reading attainment, which is especially important as low reading abilities help to ‘entrench’ education inequality in the UK. The provision and accessibility of school libraries from a young age can help boost attainment in early years and beyond, setting young men on a course that permits more positive thinking about further and then higher education.
The National Literacy Trust’s report also notes that library users receiving free school meals showed higher reading enjoyment and increased reading and writing for pleasure. They tended to read and write a greater variety of material relative to non-library users. In 2021, the Commons Education Committee found that white working class students were ‘by far the largest group of disadvantaged pupils’ with just under a million eligible for free school meals in 2020. Accessible libraries and reading spaces may be the next big step we can take to help disadvantaged pupils. The National Literacy Trust’s report reveals that white working-class boys receiving free school meals are particularly poised to benefit from a campaign of boosting libraries and reading spaces in educational settings, which may help improve their engagement with education as a whole.
A few months ago, I attended the Publishers’ Association’s parliamentary drop-in event, where I learnt a lot about the importance of the relationship between school libraries, reading attainment, and the publishing industry as a whole. I enjoyed reading in my primary school’s small library space, and throughout my time at secondary school, I made use of both the school’s reading spaces and our local community library. Unfortunately, I must recognise that this was an enormous privilege for a white working-class student when it should just be a permanent feature of our outstanding education system.
This is extremely relevant now as I look out on the educational landscape. Young men are falling behind women in education, a significant issue which goes way back to before primary school. According to the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ), ‘From the day they start primary school, to the day they leave higher education, the progress of boys lags behind girls’.
Ultimately, the success of higher education in the 21st century will depend on how effectively universities can adapt to the evolving needs of all students. In the case of young men, this means recognizing their unique challenges and addressing them with targeted, thoughtful solutions. Only by doing so can we create a higher education system that truly serves everyone, regardless of gender.
As Mr Raven notes in his blog contribution, it is certainly ‘our problem, not theirs’.
Could you run 100 miles? Or climb Mount Everest? Or pass college algebra online? These tasks might seem overwhelming and possibly insurmountable, yet with components of social interaction and fun distractions, more can be accomplished. For any task that feels impossible, adding pieces of social engagement and active learning can be a significant variable toward success.
For many university students, participating in an online math course brings about the distressing emotions of a monumental chore. Within the Purdue Global’s Math Department within the School of Multidisciplinary and Professional Studies, many innovative and inspiring ideas are combined with active learning tactics to promote high-presence teaching in the online classroom.
1. Anything but Text
Personalize your communication with avatars, emojis, Animojis, Memojis, Bitmojis, whatever it takes. If there is a way to convey a message using something other than text – try it out! The variety of media will likely hold attention and engagement more than any text string of characters could.
bitmoji.com – Create your own personal emoji with expressive cartoon-like poses and sayings. They are easily integrated as a Chrome extension and with mobile and desktop Gmail. Images can be saved and then used in any number of other contexts such as announcements or DB posts.
emojicopy.com – A searchable way to copy/paste emojis easily accessed via Chrome extension or website. Their emoji library includes a range of accessible-related emojis as well as embedded alt text making them Unicode ADA compliant.
Animated Memojis – (Apple devices only) – Create and save short memoji video messages, called clips. Short phrases such as “Great job.”, “Thanks for your hard work!”, “Good effort.”, can be recorded and saved for easy distribution via messages, emails and course announcements. More details at https://support.apple.com/en-gb/111115
Genmoji (iOS 18.2 only) – The latest and greatest of the emoji world. Now, you are able to create your own emoji based on a description – the sky’s the limit. As they say…Imagine it. Genmoji it.
2. Bring on the Game
Everyone likes to play games. There are many ways to mix up the monotony of skills practice using games. Many websites have free online game makers/templates.
Bingobaker.com – Create a bingo game using your own pictures, and formulas, (even bitmojis!) to review terminology, concepts or even make it a formative assessment quiz.
roomescapemaker.com – Create point-and-click games with puzzles, riddles, and clues. A fun escape room experience for an online course of any subject.
triviamaker.com – Create games of jeopardy, trivia, wheel of fortune or tic-tac-toe. Easy way to grab your students’ attention during live seminars
3. Chat it up
It is imperative to meet your online students where they are at, reaching out to them through communication channels that are currently used rather than requiring them to… well, check their email (specifically their university-assigned student email!)
Google Voice is a great way to connect with students through a phone number whether it is a phone call or text message. Google Voice allows you to share a professional phone number that will be routed through your personal device (thus hiding your personal info from students.) Since students are more apt to reach out with questions using their mobile devices, the messaging option is important. Google Voice additionally has a desktop interface (great for typing – or copy/pasting – longer text messages!)
Google Spaces (Gmail users only): This is a fantastic group chat that can be used as a study chat with file sharing and easy photo/video sharing, whereby the whole class can benefit from questions and answers. Instructors can monitor the chat but allow a student-driven community to converse and share. Furthermore, given Spaces is accessible outside of learning management systems (included in the Gmail interface), it may seem more visible to the – creating an informal space of class community.
4. Make it Mobile
Mobile devices may not be optimal (or encouraged) for completing every assignment in a course, but there are benefits to matching course activities to mobile use. Given that 85% of Blacks and Hispanics own smartphones as opposed to only 69%/67% (respectively) owning a desktop or laptop (Pew Research Center, 2021), non-traditional students are more apt to access their courses via mobile devices (Galanek et al. 2018). Mobile learning is best for:
Delivering microlearning content such as short videos/animations, how-to-guides, games, and low-stakes tasks (i.e. checklists, calendars, exit polls, or pulse check quizzes.)
Social learning / human interaction pieces such as discussion forums, social networks, or interviews with experts in the field.
Any task that is conducive to time efficiency. Allowing students to be productive by taking advantage of small learning moments whereby they can “sneak in” learning tasks during a busy day.
“Research has shown that we learn more (and retain it better) when we study in short, focused bursts than when we’re forced to sit through hour long classes — but of course your younger self that was bored to tears at school knew that already.” (Andriotis, 2015)
5. Collaborate, Collaborate, Collaborate
Online learning is inherently isolating, so whatever can be done to build community and help students make connections will be worthwhile.
Small group discussions – Many learning management systems allow for groups/teams to be built within the discussion. Making use of small group (5-8 students) vs. whole class (30 students) discussions has the opportunity to close the geographically-isolating quality of online education.
Collaborative software – Many websites/apps allow for multiple parties to work together at the same time. The simplest (for Gmail users) is probably any within the Google Suite – Doc, Sheets, or Slides, since most students are familiar with the interface and functionality. Additional sites include collaborative whiteboards such as FigJam (figma.com/figjam/), padlet.com, and mathwhiteboard.com.
These suggestions provide a superficially simple, yet practical approach to learning where the social and interactive components are important engagement tactics and inhibitors to learning difficult math concepts and skills. Let the fun begin!
Credit – Many thanks go to contributing members of Purdue Global’s Math Department within the School of Multidisciplinary and Professional Studies including, but not limited to, Leslie Johnson, Peg Hohensee, Nancy Reck, Nikki Williams, Michael Heeren, Rebecca Calahan, Tiffany Eaton, Nicolae Borota, and many College Algebra Instructors.
Kirsten K. Meymaris earned her MS in Mathematics with an emphasis on Educational Technology from the University of Colorado at Boulder. She earned a BS in Mathematics and BS in Computer Science from the University of Minnesota Institute of Technology. These degrees provide Kirsten with the foundation for experience across the entire spectrum of online education including content development, management and maintenance of online courseware and direct course facilitation. She joined Purdue University Global (PG) in 2009 as an adjunct, and in 2014, became full time for the Mathematics Department within the School of Multidisciplinary and Professional Studies. Kirsten has been recognized numerous times for her high standards and teaching practices at Purdue Global including 2024 nominee for Outstanding Fulltime Faculty and 2018 Curriculum Revision/Innovator. She has published works in scientific journals for innovative citizen science work and a contributor to recent mathematics and educational texts. At Purdue Global, Kirsten teaches many of the undergraduate courses from Survey of Mathematics to Business Statistics and Quantitative Analysis. Specifically, she manages the high-enrollment course College Algebra, emphasizing the integration of technology and active learning tactics for accessible mathematical understanding in the online world.
Ben-Eliyahu, A., Moore, D., Dorph, R., & Schunn, C. D. (2018). Investigating the multidimensionality of engagement: Affective, behavioral, and cognitive engagement across science activities and contexts. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 53, 87– 105. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cedpsych.2018.01.002
Borup, J., Graham, C. R., West, R. E., Archambault, L., & Spring, K. J. (2020). Academic communities of engagement: An expansive lens for examining support structures in blended and online learning. Educational Technology Research and Development, 68(2), 807–832. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11423-020-09744-x
Gardner, K., & Leary, H. (2023). Online learning for first-generation and underrepresented minoritized students: A literature review using a model of student engagement. Online Learning, 27(1), 263-291. DOI: 10.24059/olj.v27i1.3392
Could you run 100 miles? Or climb Mount Everest? Or pass college algebra online? These tasks might seem overwhelming and possibly insurmountable, yet with components of social interaction and fun distractions, more can be accomplished. For any task that feels impossible, adding pieces of social engagement and active learning can be a significant variable toward success.
For many university students, participating in an online math course brings about the distressing emotions of a monumental chore. Within the Purdue Global’s Math Department within the School of Multidisciplinary and Professional Studies, many innovative and inspiring ideas are combined with active learning tactics to promote high-presence teaching in the online classroom.
1. Anything but Text
Personalize your communication with avatars, emojis, Animojis, Memojis, Bitmojis, whatever it takes. If there is a way to convey a message using something other than text – try it out! The variety of media will likely hold attention and engagement more than any text string of characters could.
bitmoji.com – Create your own personal emoji with expressive cartoon-like poses and sayings. They are easily integrated as a Chrome extension and with mobile and desktop Gmail. Images can be saved and then used in any number of other contexts such as announcements or DB posts.
emojicopy.com – A searchable way to copy/paste emojis easily accessed via Chrome extension or website. Their emoji library includes a range of accessible-related emojis as well as embedded alt text making them Unicode ADA compliant.
Animated Memojis – (Apple devices only) – Create and save short memoji video messages, called clips. Short phrases such as “Great job.”, “Thanks for your hard work!”, “Good effort.”, can be recorded and saved for easy distribution via messages, emails and course announcements. More details at https://support.apple.com/en-gb/111115
Genmoji (iOS 18.2 only) – The latest and greatest of the emoji world. Now, you are able to create your own emoji based on a description – the sky’s the limit. As they say…Imagine it. Genmoji it.
2. Bring on the Game
Everyone likes to play games. There are many ways to mix up the monotony of skills practice using games. Many websites have free online game makers/templates.
Bingobaker.com – Create a bingo game using your own pictures, and formulas, (even bitmojis!) to review terminology, concepts or even make it a formative assessment quiz.
roomescapemaker.com – Create point-and-click games with puzzles, riddles, and clues. A fun escape room experience for an online course of any subject.
triviamaker.com – Create games of jeopardy, trivia, wheel of fortune or tic-tac-toe. Easy way to grab your students’ attention during live seminars
3. Chat it up
It is imperative to meet your online students where they are at, reaching out to them through communication channels that are currently used rather than requiring them to… well, check their email (specifically their university-assigned student email!)
Google Voice is a great way to connect with students through a phone number whether it is a phone call or text message. Google Voice allows you to share a professional phone number that will be routed through your personal device (thus hiding your personal info from students.) Since students are more apt to reach out with questions using their mobile devices, the messaging option is important. Google Voice additionally has a desktop interface (great for typing – or copy/pasting – longer text messages!)
Google Spaces (Gmail users only): This is a fantastic group chat that can be used as a study chat with file sharing and easy photo/video sharing, whereby the whole class can benefit from questions and answers. Instructors can monitor the chat but allow a student-driven community to converse and share. Furthermore, given Spaces is accessible outside of learning management systems (included in the Gmail interface), it may seem more visible to the – creating an informal space of class community.
4. Make it Mobile
Mobile devices may not be optimal (or encouraged) for completing every assignment in a course, but there are benefits to matching course activities to mobile use. Given that 85% of Blacks and Hispanics own smartphones as opposed to only 69%/67% (respectively) owning a desktop or laptop (Pew Research Center, 2021), non-traditional students are more apt to access their courses via mobile devices (Galanek et al. 2018). Mobile learning is best for:
Delivering microlearning content such as short videos/animations, how-to-guides, games, and low-stakes tasks (i.e. checklists, calendars, exit polls, or pulse check quizzes.)
Social learning / human interaction pieces such as discussion forums, social networks, or interviews with experts in the field.
Any task that is conducive to time efficiency. Allowing students to be productive by taking advantage of small learning moments whereby they can “sneak in” learning tasks during a busy day.
“Research has shown that we learn more (and retain it better) when we study in short, focused bursts than when we’re forced to sit through hour long classes — but of course your younger self that was bored to tears at school knew that already.” (Andriotis, 2015)
5. Collaborate, Collaborate, Collaborate
Online learning is inherently isolating, so whatever can be done to build community and help students make connections will be worthwhile.
Small group discussions – Many learning management systems allow for groups/teams to be built within the discussion. Making use of small group (5-8 students) vs. whole class (30 students) discussions has the opportunity to close the geographically-isolating quality of online education.
Collaborative software – Many websites/apps allow for multiple parties to work together at the same time. The simplest (for Gmail users) is probably any within the Google Suite – Doc, Sheets, or Slides, since most students are familiar with the interface and functionality. Additional sites include collaborative whiteboards such as FigJam (figma.com/figjam/), padlet.com, and mathwhiteboard.com.
These suggestions provide a superficially simple, yet practical approach to learning where the social and interactive components are important engagement tactics and inhibitors to learning difficult math concepts and skills. Let the fun begin!
Credit – Many thanks go to contributing members of Purdue Global’s Math Department within the School of Multidisciplinary and Professional Studies including, but not limited to, Leslie Johnson, Peg Hohensee, Nancy Reck, Nikki Williams, Michael Heeren, Rebecca Calahan, Tiffany Eaton, Nicolae Borota, and many College Algebra Instructors.
Kirsten K. Meymaris earned her MS in Mathematics with an emphasis on Educational Technology from the University of Colorado at Boulder. She earned a BS in Mathematics and BS in Computer Science from the University of Minnesota Institute of Technology. These degrees provide Kirsten with the foundation for experience across the entire spectrum of online education including content development, management and maintenance of online courseware and direct course facilitation. She joined Purdue University Global (PG) in 2009 as an adjunct, and in 2014, became full time for the Mathematics Department within the School of Multidisciplinary and Professional Studies. Kirsten has been recognized numerous times for her high standards and teaching practices at Purdue Global including 2024 nominee for Outstanding Fulltime Faculty and 2018 Curriculum Revision/Innovator. She has published works in scientific journals for innovative citizen science work and a contributor to recent mathematics and educational texts. At Purdue Global, Kirsten teaches many of the undergraduate courses from Survey of Mathematics to Business Statistics and Quantitative Analysis. Specifically, she manages the high-enrollment course College Algebra, emphasizing the integration of technology and active learning tactics for accessible mathematical understanding in the online world.
Ben-Eliyahu, A., Moore, D., Dorph, R., & Schunn, C. D. (2018). Investigating the multidimensionality of engagement: Affective, behavioral, and cognitive engagement across science activities and contexts. Contemporary Educational Psychology, 53, 87– 105. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cedpsych.2018.01.002
Borup, J., Graham, C. R., West, R. E., Archambault, L., & Spring, K. J. (2020). Academic communities of engagement: An expansive lens for examining support structures in blended and online learning. Educational Technology Research and Development, 68(2), 807–832. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11423-020-09744-x
Gardner, K., & Leary, H. (2023). Online learning for first-generation and underrepresented minoritized students: A literature review using a model of student engagement. Online Learning, 27(1), 263-291. DOI: 10.24059/olj.v27i1.3392
This story was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for their newsletters.
Students tap on their keyboards as a professor lectures at the front of the room. It looks like any other college course, except that it’s taking place at a high school. This year, more than 150,000 California teens are earning college credit in dual enrollment courses.
Dual enrollment offers high schoolers the chance to attend community college, typically for free, often without having to leave their campuses. By helping students tackle the college academic experience, the programs increase the likelihood that students attend college after graduating high school.
About 80% of California’s dual enrolled high school students go on to a community college or university, compared to 66% of California 12th grade students in general, the Public Policy Institute of California found. More than a third of California’s dual enrolled students go on to attend the same community college they attended while in high school after they graduate, according to the Community College Research Center.
Many college and high school administrators have pushed to increase students’ college attainment rates, and the state has invested more than $700 million in dual enrollment, leading to a significant expansion. The number of students in these courses tripled between spring 2015 and spring 2024, according to state data. The Public Policy Institute of California found that about 30% of California’s high school graduating class of 2024 took at least one dual enrollment course.
The growth of high schoolers is a bright spot in overall student totals at the state’s community colleges, which have struggled to fully rebound after enrollment tanked during the pandemic. However, some community college faculty have pushed back against widespread dual enrollment due to concerns about academic rigor and working conditions for educators.
Furthermore, data shows that some of California’s rural students, as well as males and students of color, don’t enroll in and complete these courses at the same rate as others. Some experts and administrators say they’re not just missing out on a couple of college credits, they’re not getting the same opportunities to envision themselves as future college students.
“When high schoolers complete these courses, they are able to fulfill requirements that help them access associate degrees and bachelor’s degrees,” said Daniel Payares-Montoya, a PPIC research associate. “The students benefit, but so do the community colleges, because it helps them enroll more students.”
Rural schools and colleges face dual enrollment hurdles
In Siskiyou County, at the northern tip of California, the only community college serves a sprawling region that covers mountains, forests and rural towns. Although the county has a population of just 43,000, it is the fifth largest county in California by area, meaning that often the hardest part of supporting dual enrolled students isn’t the actual teaching — it’s having the right technology and transportation to reach them in the first place.
“The personal interaction is a challenge, because we have high schools that are two hours away,” said Kim Peacemaker, a counselor and dual enrollment coordinator at College of the Siskiyous. The college currently has about 230 dual enrolled high school students and about 2,390 students total, based on state data.
Peacemaker said the college has worked to make dual enrollment accessible by allowing professors to meet virtually with students in their high school classrooms. However, she added that some students don’t have reliable internet access at home for homework or tutoring. In Siskiyou County, 13.7% of households don’t have broadband internet.
Students walk through one of the main walkways onto Bakersfield College on June 14, 2023. (Larry Valenzuela, CalMatters/CatchLight Local)
California’s rural colleges generally lag behind urban colleges in dual enrollment. Kern Community College District in the southern Central Valley and the Compton Community College District near Los Angeles had the two highest percentages of high school students in 2024, at 41% and 36% respectively, based on state data. In comparison, 9.7% of students at College of the Siskiyous are dual enrolled high schoolers, and this drops to about 5% in some other parts of the state.
Sonya Christian, the chancellor of the California Community College system, previously led the Kern Community College District, spearheading its expansion of dual enrollment. Now, dual enrollment in the district is “one of the most successful models in the state,” Christian said in an emailed statement to CalMatters.
“I prioritized dual enrollment because I saw it as a potential pathway to increase college-going rates, accelerate degree completion and provide students — especially those in rural and low-income communities — with early exposure to college-level coursework,” Christian said in the statement.
For many high school students in the small city of Blythe, which sits along California’s border with Arizona, the only people they know with bachelor’s degrees are their teachers. That’s why Clint Cowden, the vice president of instruction and student services at Palo Verde College, said the exposure to college that dual enrollment provides these students can be transformative.
“It’s really a win-win for the community,” Cowden said.
A recent alumnus of Palo Verde College’s dual enrollment program, Manuel Milke earned his high school diploma and his associate degree simultaneously, while juggling varsity soccer and football. Now Milke, who is 19, is set to graduate in the fall from San Diego State with a bachelor’s degree in kinesiology. Milke said he chose to attend San Diego State to stay close to his family in Blythe, and aspires to work as a physical therapist somewhere nearby.
“Everyone should do dual enrollment,” said Milke. “It saved me time, it saved me money and it made me feel more prepared for college.”
Student gaps remain in dual enrollment
As a Latino male, Milke is in the minority for dual enrollment. Based on state data, Black and Latino students are both underrepresented in dual enrollment courses. In the spring 2024 semester, 41% of dual enrollment students were male, while 56% were female. According to Payares-Montoya, these gaps in access to dual enrollment can make it so Black, Latino and male students are less likely to see higher education as an option, compared to their dual enrolled peers.
For Jesse Medrano, an 18-year-old senior at Daniel Pearl Magnet High School in the Los Angeles Unified School District, dual enrollment has provided “a good outline of what college is like.” His high school first placed him in dual enrollment in ninth grade, and since then he has taken five classes, covering topics including economics and political science.
“I didn’t have the drive to seek these courses out, so the fact that they put me in them set this standard for me, and now I’m meeting it,” said Medrano, who is Latino and plans to study accounting at Cal State Northridge. “I didn’t have the motivation, but now I do, and I’m able to succeed.”
At Compton College more than a third of the current students are still in high school, according to state data. Latino and Black students comprise 75% and 9% of dual enrollees, respectively, which are significantly higher than state averages. Keith Curry, the college’s president, said that when students of color complete dual enrollment courses, this gets them comfortable with college academics and leads to better representation at colleges and universities.
Some faculty push back against expansion
Some community college faculty have raised concerns about the process by which dual enrollment partnerships are established, the level of readiness of high school students for college courses, and who teaches these classes. In many districts across the state, some dual enrollment courses are not taught by community college faculty, but by existing high school teachers who hold the credentials required to teach at a college level. In the Kern Community College District, about 60% of dual enrollment courses held on high school campuses are taught by high school teachers who meet the college qualifications, according to district spokesperson Norma Rojas.
Tim Maxwell, an English professor at College of San Mateo, is a “conscientious objector” to California’s expansion of dual enrollment. Maxwell said he is concerned about what he sees as a focus to get as many students to graduate and earn college credits as quickly as possible, sacrificing college-level rigor and evaluation.
“Completion is important, but our primary responsibility is for students to learn something along the way,” said Maxwell, who has taught community college courses for about 30 years.
Maxwell has taught creative writing courses on his college campus with several dual enrolled students, one as young as 15 years old, and he said these students are “phenomenal.” But, he added, there’s a difference between a handful of proactive high schoolers going to a community college campus and a high school classroom that “switches to a college class during fifth period.” He said he is concerned about poor working conditions for professors, primarily adjunct faculty, who have to travel to high schools and teach without the proper background or support.
“We need to resist this, and we need lawmakers who understand something about education and not just spreadsheets,” Maxwell said.
Wendy Brill-Wynkoop, the president of the Faculty Association of California Community Colleges, said dual enrollment is beneficial for students, but that she has “heard grumblings” about a need for faculty to have a more active role in setting standards and policies for dual enrollment.
Students walk near Hepner Hall at San Diego State University in San Diego on Oct. 10, 2024. (Adriana Heldiz/CalMatters)
While in high school in Blythe, Milke said his dual enrollment courses were generally easier than the courses he takes at San Diego State. But they still challenged him and prepared him for a college-level workload, he said.
Lawmakers work to continue growth
Several state laws have been enacted in the past decade to expand dual enrollment in California. In 2015, Assembly Bill 288 established the College and Career Access Pathways program, allowing community colleges and high schools to enter into dual enrollment partnerships. These institutions bring the courses to students, as opposed to those students having to seek them out. The state streamlined the pathways program with the passage of Assembly Bill 30 in 2019, allowing students to submit fewer forms to enroll. Assembly Bill 731, which is currently in committee, would, among other changes, increase the number of units that students in the program can take.
Based on PPIC research, students in the College and Career Access Pathways program now account for about 37% of dual enrollees. This program has a higher percentage of underrepresented students compared to other dual enrollment programs, in part because it eliminates some of the restrictions that can make it hard for schools to offer broad and barrier-free dual enrollment.
As dual enrollment continues to expand, it increases costs to California beyond the more than $700 million that the state has already invested. That’s because both community colleges and high school districts are typically both able to receive state funding for dual enrolled students, according to the Legislative Analyst’s Office.
According to the statement from Christian, state leaders are working to increase dual enrollment access by expanding partnerships between high schools and colleges.
“My vision is to make dual enrollment a standard opportunity for all California students, not just an option for a select few, increasing equitable access to higher education and workforce-aligned learning,” Christian said in the statement.
Alana Althaus-Cressman, who runs the dual enrollment program at Golden Eagle Charter School, a K-12 school in Siskiyou County, markets the program to all students, not just those who already have a record of high achievement. She studied dual enrollment access for rural students for her graduate school dissertation at Sacramento State University, and started the early college high school program at Golden Eagle Charter in 2024. Students in the program take dual enrollment courses for part of the school day, and high school courses for the rest.
Althaus-Cressman said that because dual enrollment offers students a glimpse of college, it’s important that the classes aren’t only filled with students who already plan to attend college. Some high schools require minimum grade point averages or have other barriers to entry for dual enrollment, which Althaus-Cressman said can perpetuate inequalities.
The early college high school program enrolls about a third of Golden Eagle Charter’s ninth graders. Althaus-Cressman attributes this level of participation to extensive outreach, which included working with school staff to call the families of every incoming high school student to invite them to a dual enrollment orientation.
“We don’t want students to think that they aren’t the type of student for this program,” Althaus-Cressman said. “It’s for everybody.”
Early this month, the U.S. Department of Education issued an ultimatum to K-12 public schools and state education agencies: Certify that you are not engaging in discrimination under the banner of diversity, equity and inclusion, or risk losing federal funding — including billions in support for low-income students.
The backlash was immediate. Some states with Democratic governors refused to comply, arguing that the directive lacks legal basis, fails to clearly define what constitutes “illegal DEI practices,” and threatens vital equity-based initiatives in their schools.
After lawsuits from the National Education Association teachers union and the American Civil Liberties Union, the Department of Education agreed to delay enforcement until after April 24.
But states across the country, both liberal- and conservative-led, are worried about losing other aid: the pandemic-era money that in some cases they’ve already spent or committed to spending.
The Department of Education has long played a critical role in distributing federal funds to states for K-12 education, including Title I grants to boost staffing in schools with high percentages of low-income students, and emergency relief like that provided during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Conservative-led states — particularly Mississippi, South Dakota and Arkansas — rely the most heavily on these funds to sustain services in high-need districts.
The 15 states with the highest percentage of their K-12 budget coming from federal funding in fiscal year 2022 — the latest year with data available from the National Center for Education Statistics — voted for Trump in the 2024 presidential election. Similarly, 10 of the 15 states receiving the highest amounts of Title I funding in fiscal year 2024 also voted for Trump.
Mississippi and Kentucky have sent letters to the Department of Education expressing concern over halted pandemic aid.
The clash over federal funding comes even as the future of the Department of Education is murky, given President Donald Trump’s pledge to dismantle the department.
DEI-related cuts
In letters to the Department of Education, state officials and superintendents in Illinois, New York and Wisconsin pushed back against the DEI directive.
New York officials said they would not provide additional certification beyond what the state already has done, asserting that there “are no federal or State laws prohibiting the principles of DEI.” Illinois Superintendent Tony Sanders wrote that he was concerned that the Department of Education was changing the conditions of federal funding without a formal administrative process. Wisconsin Superintendent Jill Underly questioned the legality of the order.
New York State Department of Education Counsel and Deputy Commissioner Daniel Morton-Bentley noted that the federal department’s current stance on DEI starkly contrasts with its position during Trump’s first term, when then-Education Secretary Betsy DeVos supported such efforts.
Colorado and California also confirmed they would not comply with the Department of Education’s order.
While some states with liberal leaders are gearing up for legal battles and possible revocation of funding, conservative-led states such as Florida have embraced the federal directive as part of a broader push to reshape public education.
In March, the Department of Education abruptly rescinded previously approved extensions of pandemic-era aid, ending access to funds months ahead of the original March 2026 deadline.
When the Massachusetts governor’s office voiced concern over that decision, the federal department’s reply on social media was blunt: “COVID is over.”
Sixteen mostly Democratic-led states and the District of Columbia filed a federal lawsuit against the Department of Education and Secretary Linda McMahon, challenging the abrupt rescission of previously approved extensions for spending COVID-19 education relief funds.
But backlash against abrupt federal cuts to education has not been limited to blue states.
Mississippi’s Department of Education warned the cuts would jeopardize more than $137 million in already obligated funds, slated for literacy initiatives, mental health services and infrastructure repairs. “The impact of this sudden reversal is detrimental to Mississippi students,” state Superintendent Lance Evans wrote in a letter to McMahon.
The letter also outlines the state’s repeated — but unsuccessful — efforts to draw down millions in approved funds since February.
Shanderia Minor, a spokesperson for the Mississippi education department, told Stateline the agency is awaiting next steps and direction about the funds and federal directives.
In Kentucky, state Education Commissioner Robbie Fletcher told districts — which stand to lose tens of millions in pandemic aid — that abrupt federal changes leave them “in a difficult position,” with schools already having committed funds to teacher training and facility upgrades.
According to Kentucky Department of Education spokesperson Jennifer Ginn, the state has about $18 million in unspent pandemic aid funds left to distribute to districts. And districts have about $38 million in unspent funds, for a total $56 million that could be lost.
Lauren Farrow, a former Florida public school teacher, told Stateline that schools that receive Title I money are already underfunded — and the federal threat only widens the gap.
“Florida is pouring billions into education — but where is it going? Because we’re not seeing it in schools, especially not in Title I schools,” said Farrow. “I taught five minutes away from a wealthier school, and we didn’t even have pencils. Teachers were buying shoes for students. Why is that still happening?”
Effects in the classroom
Tafshier Cosby, senior director of the Center for Organizing and Partnerships at the National Parents Union, a parents advocacy group, told Stateline that while most families don’t fully understand the various school funding systems, they feel the impact of cuts in the classroom.
Cosby said parents are worried about the loss of support services for students with disabilities, Title I impacts, and how debates about DEI may deflect from more urgent needs like literacy and teacher support.
“We’ve been clear: DEI isn’t the federal government’s role — it’s up to states,” she said. “But the confusion is real. And the impact could be devastating.”
Today, as a consultant working with teachers across Florida’s Orange County Public Schools — one of the largest districts in the country — Farrow says many educators are fearful and confused about how to support their students under changing DEI laws.
“Teachers are asking, ‘Does this mean I can’t seat a student with glasses at the front of the room anymore?’ There’s so much fear around what we’re allowed to do now.”
“There’s no one giving teachers guidance or even basic acknowledgment. We’re just left wondering what we’re allowed to say or do — and that’s dangerous.”
Amanda Hernández contributed to this report. Stateline reporter Robbie Sequeira can be reached at [email protected].
Stateline is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Stateline maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Scott S. Greenberger for questions: [email protected].
When it comes to fighting the current authoritarian threats coming out of the Trump administration, it’s important to remember that the symbol is the substance.
Frankly, this is always true of politics generally, but it’s more true and more important than ever in this moment.
We have an object example of this principle at work presently in the different responses from Harvard and Columbia when it comes to the threats to funding and demand for control by the Trump administration.
Columbia appeared to capitulate, forging an “agreement” to take steps sought by Trump, ostensibly to address antisemitism on campus, but this fig leaf was unconvincing, and Trump himself quickly dropped the pretense, as we all understand he has no interest in combating antisemitism and every interest in sending signals of domination and stoking fear that turns into pre-emptive compliance from other institutions.
Columbia looked unprincipled and weak in the face of the authoritarian threat, and the internal and external backlash against Columbia has been significant.
In contrast, once Harvard received the Trump administration demands, it crafted a careful public response, producing multiple public-facing communications meant to speak to different audiences (press, public, students, faculty, alumni) with different needs, including a letter from Harvard president Alan Garber to the university community that invoked a shared responsibility to defend the core values of the institution specifically and higher education in general.
To be fair, the call was much easier for Harvard than Columbia for several reasons. For one, Harvard had seen what happened to Columbia, where what looked like capitulation to outsiders still proved insufficient, because, again, Trump is interested in subservience, not reaching a mutual agreement. When Trump-world figures like JD Vance and Chris Rufo say they intend to destroy higher education, we should take them seriously.
The Trump administration demands of Harvard were also so extreme—amounting essentially to a takeover of the university—that it had no choice but to resist and take every possible step to rally others to the fight. The public thirst for an institutional response to Trump’s lawless power grabs has been so great that even the New York Times editorial board has weighed in with its approval of Harvard’s actions and the university’s explicit pledge to stand against violations of the rule of law.
An interesting bit of information in the form of an op-ed by Columbia history professor Matthew Connelly has come out that perhaps sheds additional light on Columbia’s actions. Writing at The New York Times, Connelly laments the hapless situation his institution finds itself in, first receiving blows from Trump and then being subjected to the “circular firing squad” of those who oppose Trump signing on to a collective boycott of Columbia.
Connelly argues that we should not view Columbia as “capitulating” to Trump because, “In fact, many of the actions the Columbia administration announced on March 21 are similar to those originally proposed last August by more than 200 faculty members.”
In other words, in agreeing with Trump, Columbia is only doing what it was possibly going to do anyway. Connelly goes on to argue that Columbia would never give in on key principles of institutional operations, and acting Columbia University president Claire Shipman has subsequently declared that Columbia would not sign any agreement that would “require us to relinquish our independence and autonomy as an educational institution.”
Columbia’s actions look similar to those taken by some of the big law firms that have reached vaguely worded “agreements” with Trump that have them pledging not to do “illegal DEI hiring” and to donate tens or hundreds of millions of dollars to pro bono causes favored by Trump. At Talking Points Memo, Josh Marshall has gone digging into some of these agreements and found that there’s not much of specific substance to be found, the wording often so generalized and vague that it would be easy for firms to fulfill the agreements without doing anything beyond their usual patterns and practices.
I’m not entirely unsympathetic to Connelly’s irritation or the decisions by the big law firms; they thought they could make Trump go away with a little performative minor supplication and get back to their substantive work.
They’ve obviously misread the moment badly. I don’t know what more evidence we need to conclude that Trump intends to govern as an authoritarian. In both the cases of these law firms and Columbia University, the entire battle was over Trump being allowed to claim a symbolic victory over these institutions, to get them to be seen capitulating.
It is strange to say that the symbolic fight is the genuine battle over principles, but this is obviously the case. Trump wants to make others fearful of standing up to his authoritarian aims, so he will simply defy the rule of law until someone forces the victims to fight. There is no choice but to test the administration’s resolve. Trump’s response on Truth Social following Harvard’s action shows a lot of bluster aimed at tearing down Harvard’s reputation with a lot of right-wing tropes, but the rhetoric shows how nonexistent his substantive case is.
Any capitulation, real or even perceived, is a loss. Either choice will come with costs. Trump is going after Harvard’s funding and nonprofit status, and there will be significant turbulence for the university in the foreseeable future. But turbulence is not the same thing as a plane heading for the ground.
Harvard had its legal strategy prepared before the fight even went public. Law and precedent appear to be on its side, though this is not a guarantee of success. Trump seems determined to hold back whatever money he can in his ongoing attempts at coercion.
What we are learning is that there is no such thing as accommodating or reaching an agreement with an authoritarian project. Harvard’s stand is an important symbolic illustration of this, and because of the symbolism, it is proving to be hugely substantive.
Let’s hope it’s only the first example of how to fight back.
Inside a classroom at the Center for Family Life in Sunset Park on a recent Monday morning, teacher Julian Colón was busy setting out notebooks, folders, pens and crayons on a table. Outside in the hallway, a sign taped to a wall reads “CLASES DE INGLÉS POR ESTE CAMINO” — English classes this way.
It was the first day of the spring semester in this predominantly Latino corner of the Brooklyn neighborhood, where Colón was expecting about 30 students in class.
Julian Colón teaches an English as a Second Language class at the Center for Family Life in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, April 7, 2025. (Ben Fractenberg/THE CITY)
But not everyone who wanted a seat at the table was there. More than 400 students are now on the center’s waitlist, according to Maria Ferreira, its adult employment program director.
“I sit right by the reception, and every single day we get inquiries about ESOL,” Ferreira told THE CITY, using the acronym for English for Speakers of Other Languages. “Every day we’re adding people to the waiting list.”
Demand for English classes has increased with the influx of migrants that began in 2022, according to a new report by United Neighborhood Houses, which represents 46 settlement houses that help serve immigrant populations, even as City Hall has slashed funding.
At Flatbush-based social services giant CAMBA, program manager Jude Pierre said more than 700 prospective students are now waiting to get into one of its 10 city-funded ESL classes, which collectively accommodate about 200 students.
“With the migrant crisis…we ended up getting a lot of individuals coming here to register for classes to the point where we basically had to stop taking registrations,” Pierre told THE CITY. “We got to the point where it didn’t make any more sense to have thousands of people on a waiting list, knowing we would never get to most of them. We started saying, ‘Sorry, we can’t do this, because it’s not fair to you,’ and trying to refer them to other places.”
Last year, the Department of Youth and Community Development reduced funding for literacy classes by nearly 30% to $11.9 million from $16.8 million, the report noted. Many long-time providers in areas where migrant shelters were clustered also lost out on DYCD dollars after the agency adjusted its funding eligibility formula,” as THE CITY previously reported.
An immigrant student takes an English as a Second Language class at the Center for Family Life in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, April 7, 2025. (Ben Fractenberg/THE CITY)
According to the report, many classes now depend entirely on discretionary dollars from the City Council, which increased its funding to $16.5 million in fiscal year 2025 from roughly $6.5 million in recent years to back organizations DYCD left behind.
Several providers, however, told THE CITY that compared to DYCD’s multi-year contracts, Council funding, which requires annual reconsideration, makes it difficult to plan ahead and maximize offerings.
And for some, like CAMBA, Council funding was not enough to cover the losses from DYCD with the group reducing the number of students it serves by 174 and closing its waitlist, Pierre said.
So far, providers say, demand among new arrivals has remained steady even as the Trump administration’s mass deportation efforts have led many new arrivals fearful of working or sending kids to school or even walking the streets.
“Ideally, these programs would be supported by a robust, baselined program managed by DYCD that offered students and providers stability with year-over-year funding,” the report says. “However, until DYCD revisits its unnecessarily restrictive stance…it is crucial that the City Council continue this support to make sure that adult learners continue to have access to quality classes.”
‘I Understand People Now’
While fewer than 3% of the 1.7 million immigrants in need of English classes are able to access it through city-funded programs, according to the report, students who were able to find their way into a class told THE CITY improved English has helped with their daily lives — and their job prospects.
Currently, two-thirds of New Yorkers with limited English proficiency earn less than $25,000 a year, according to American Community Survey data cited in the report.
Rosanie Andre, 42, came to New York City from Haiti in 2023, and said she started taking English classes at CAMBA last year after three months on a waitlist. Since then, she’s been able to get a job serving food at Speedway while also delivering packages for Amazon per diem.
“When I did my interviews, you have to speak in English with the manager. And it helped me a lot because I understand people now,” Andre, a native Haitian Creole and French speaker, said in English.
Learning English has also helped Andre communicate with her 6-year-old — who only started speaking after their move to New York City.
“And she started to speak English — English only. She knows nothing in Creole,” Andre said. “I try to listen to my daughter and speak to her English-only.”
With her English improving, Andre said she is better able to help her daughter with her homework.
“I try to explain her how to do it in English,” Andre said. “If no CAMBA, I have difficulty to understand. Cuz when I come here, I don’t understand nothing. When people speak, I smile because I understand nothing.”
Roodleir Victor, 29, saw English classes as an essential stepping stone in furthering his education. He had completed his college coursework for an economics degree in his native Haiti, he said, though he ultimately fell just short of obtaining a degree because it would have required him to stay in the country’s capital, which has been embroiled in political turmoil and gang violence.
He started taking English classes when he moved to the city in 2023, he said, in hopes of continuing his studies here. For four days a week, he attended English classes in Flatbush from 1 to 4 p.m. before heading to Long Island to work at a pasta factory on a 5 p.m. to 5 a.m. overnight shift.
Victor is now enrolled in a GED class, he said, and hopes to study computer programming after that.
“I would like to study at a university which I can learn technology. But it’s difficult for me, because I don’t have the support I need to go there,” Victor said in English. “But for me personally, I believe in my capacity to adapt.”
‘It’s Not Impossible’
Back in Sunset Park, a 55 year-old asylum seeker was patiently waiting to enter the room half an hour before class started at 9 a.m.
“I’m just eager to learn,” the native of Ecuador said in Spanish. “It’s important because I want to communicate with others for a job.”
The mother of five arrived in New York City three months ago, she said, after seeking asylum at the Mexico-California border then being detained there for three months. She’s cleaning homes to help make ends meet, but hopes to land a job with steadier income soon.
“Whatever I can get I pick up, but those jobs come and go,” she said. “I was in a workforce development program but the curriculum was in English so I started looking for classes.”
Oscar Lima rolled into English class with his e-scooter just after class started at 9:30 a.m. The 34-year-old is now in his second semester of classes, he said, which he makes time for in between catering gigs, food deliveries and a third job as a barback.
Columbian immigrant Oscar Lima says learning English will help him work in the food service industry, April 7, 2025. (Ben Fractenberg/THE CITY)
“My bosses told me, ‘You’re a good worker, but you need to learn English,’” Lima said. “And I decided that I didn’t want to learn English myself.”
Lima and other students now settled into their seats, turning their attention to Colón.
“Everybody, are we ready? Listos?” Colón asked.
“Yes,” the class responded timidly.
Students practice learning the names of colors at an English as a Second Language class in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, April 7, 2025. (Ben Fractenberg/THE CITY)
Colón then began presenting ground rules on a digital whiteboard: Try to arrive within the five-minute grace period after the class start time, and come prepared with books, papers and pencils.
“The most important rule,” Colón continued, before repeating himself in Spanish. “Please don’t be afraid to participate and make mistakes.”
At break time, Lima shared how he, his wife and his two sons had arrived in the city from Colombia about three years ago. While the family had started off at a shelter, Lima said, they’re now able to afford an apartment of their own. His two kids — seven and ten years old — quiz him about names of objects around the house, he said, and often encourages him to learn English alongside with them.
“New York, it poses many challenges. It’s difficult at the beginning, but it’s not impossible,” Lima said in Spanish. “My American Dream is my sons…I want my children to perhaps have what I didn’t have, but at the same time I want to show them how to earn it, and how to work like good people.”
