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How Demographics Could Elevate the Political Stakes of Student Loan Debt in 2028 and Beyond

Student loan debt has been a defining economic and political issue in the United States for over a decade. As of 2025, Americans owe nearly $1.8 trillion in student loans, with roughly 42–45 million borrowers carrying federal debt and average balances exceeding $39,000 per borrower. Delinquency rates have surged since repayment reporting resumed, with more than one in five borrowers behind on payments, and millions at risk of default. These financial pressures are now rippling through credit markets and household budgets, especially for younger, middle-aged, and lower-income borrowers. While student debt already garners public attention, shifting demographic trends and mounting economic pressures promise to reshape its political weight in the coming years unless comprehensive changes are enacted.

The largest cohort of student borrowers today consists of Millennials and older members of Generation Z, many aged between 25 and 45. These are prime years for political engagement, as individuals are more likely to vote, form households, buy homes, and shape community priorities. In 2028, this group will be even more politically active, navigating careers, families, and fiscal pressures that student debt directly influences. As borrowers age into life stages where financial stability becomes paramount, their appetite for political solutions — including forgiveness, refinancing, and more manageable repayment structures — is likely to intensify.

Student loan debt also affects communities differently. Black and Latinx borrowers are disproportionately burdened, with Black borrowers often owing more and struggling with repayment longer due to structural inequities in income and wealth. These disparities will continue to grow unless systemic reforms address not just debt levels but the economic systems that compound them over time. Communities of color are projected to constitute a larger share of the eligible electorate by 2030, and when a disproportionate share of voters in a given demographic faces an issue like unsustainable debt, it naturally becomes central to their political priorities and shapes the platforms of candidates seeking their support.

Older Americans are impacted by student loan dynamics not necessarily as borrowers themselves, but as co-signers, parents, or caregivers helping children or grandchildren manage debt. With the U.S. population aging, the 65+ age group is expected to grow as a portion of the electorate, and those over 80 will increasingly drive Medicaid and healthcare costs, adding strain to federal and state budgets. Older voters tend to vote at higher rates than younger voters, and as more families find multigenerational debt obligations weighing on retirement savings, caregiving responsibilities, and healthcare needs, the political urgency around student loan reform may expand beyond traditional “student” demographics and into older voters’ policy concerns.

Geographic and economic shifts also shape the political significance of student debt. States with high education costs, and correspondingly high average debt loads, may see student loan issues become central to local and statewide elections. Migration patterns bringing younger, more diverse populations to new regions — including parts of the South and Midwest — will likely influence electoral alignments and policy debates in competitive districts. Meanwhile, national concerns such as the growing federal debt, ongoing military engagements abroad, and rising costs associated with healthcare for an aging population amplify the stakes, creating competing pressures on policymakers who must balance debt relief against broader fiscal challenges.

Economic inequality further complicates the picture. The concentration of wealth among the richest Americans continues to grow, giving this group greater political influence and shaping policy priorities in ways that often conflict with the needs of student borrowers and middle-class families. As wealth and power accumulate at the top, voters carrying student debt may increasingly perceive systemic unfairness, heightening the political salience of debt relief and broader structural reforms. The interaction of these factors — persistent debt, rising national obligations, ongoing conflict, and economic inequality — suggests that student loans will remain intertwined with larger national debates over fiscal responsibility, social safety nets, and the distribution of economic power.

Student loan debt has already become a wedge issue in national politics, especially within Democratic primaries. The demographic shifts of the late 2020s, rising diversity, coupled economic pressures, and growing awareness of wealth inequality could make it a central concern for a broader slice of the electorate. Policymakers who ignore student debt risk alienating key voter blocs: younger voters whose turnout matters in swing states, communities of color with growing electoral influence, and middle-class families navigating financial strain alongside broader economic and geopolitical uncertainties.

The economic impact of outstanding student loan debt, from delayed homeownership to depressed small business formation, carries demographic implications that feed back into the political sphere. If current trends continue, the cost of inaction will not just be political but economic, affecting national growth rates, tax revenue, social programs, and inequality metrics that in turn shape voter sentiment and policy priorities.

Student Debt and the Shifting Political Landscape

By 2028 and into the 2030s, demographic change is poised to elevate student loan debt from a pressing public concern to a core political battleground unless policymakers act proactively. With more borrowers entering key voting blocs, disproportionate impacts across racial and economic lines, and economic consequences rippling through communities of all ages, student loan debt is more than a financial issue: it is a demographic reality shaping the future of American politics.

Sadly, the Higher Education Inquirer will not be around to cover these developments as they unfold. HEI has made predictions about student debt and its political consequences in the past, and while nothing is set in stone, the combination of rising demographics, persistent economic inequality, the mounting national debt, ongoing war-related obligations, and pressures from an aging population does not paint a promising picture. Without major policy reforms — such as targeted debt relief, changes to repayment systems, or broader higher education financing reforms — the political salience of student debt is likely to intensify, influencing campaigns, elections, and national discourse for years to come.

Sources

Education Data Initiative, “Student Loan Debt Statistics 2025,” educationdata.org
TransUnion, “May 2025 Student Loan Update,” newsroom.transunion.com
Forbes, “Student Loans for 64 Million Borrowers Are Heading Toward a Dangerous Cliff,” forbes.com
College Board, “Trends in College Pricing and Student Aid 2025,” research.collegeboard.org
LendingTree, “Student Loan Debt Statistics by State,” lendingtree.com
NerdWallet, “Student Loan Debt Statistics 2025,” nerdwallet.com

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January 4, 2026
Higher Education Inquirer Resources, Spring 2026

[Editor’s note: Please let us know of any corrections, additions, or broken links. We always welcome your feedback.]

This list traces how U.S. higher education has been reshaped by neoliberal policies, privatization, and data-driven management, producing deepening inequalities across race and class. The works examine the rise of academic capitalism, growing student debt, corporatization, and the influence of private interests—from for-profit colleges to rankings and surveillance systems. Together, they depict a sector drifting away from its public mission and democratic ideals, while highlighting the structural forces that created today’s crises and the reforms needed to reverse them.

Ahn, Ilsup (2023). The Ethics of Educational Healthcare: Student Debt, Neoliberalism, and Justice. Palgrave Macmillan.
Alexander, Bryan (2020). Academia Next: The Futures of Higher Education. Johns Hopkins Press.
Alexander, Bryan (2023). Universities on Fire. Johns Hopkins Press.

Alexander, Bryan (2026). Peak Higher Ed. Johns Hopkins Press.

Angulo, A. (2016). Diploma Mills: How For-profit Colleges Stiffed Students, Taxpayers, and the American Dream. Johns Hopkins University Press.

Apthekar, Bettina (1966). Big Business and the American University. New Outlook Publishers.

Apthekar, Bettina (1969). Higher Education and the Student Rebellion in the United States, 1960–1969: A Bibliography.

Archibald, R. & Feldman, D. (2017). The Road Ahead for America’s Colleges & Universities. Oxford University Press.

Armstrong, E. & Hamilton, L. (2015). Paying for the Party: How College Maintains Inequality. Harvard University Press.

Arum, R. & Roksa, J. (2011). Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses. University of Chicago Press.

Baldwin, Davarian (2021). In the Shadow of the Ivory Tower: How Universities Are Plundering Our Cities. Bold Type Books.

Barr, Andrew & Turner, Sarah (2023). The Labor Market Returns to Higher Education. Oxford University Press.

Bennett, W. & Wilezol, D. (2013). Is College Worth It? Thomas Nelson.

Berg, I. (1970). The Great Training Robbery: Education and Jobs. Praeger.

Berman, Elizabeth P. (2012). Creating the Market University. Princeton University Press.

Berman, Elizabeth Popp & Stevens, Mitchell (eds.) (2019). The University Under Pressure. Emerald Publishing.

Berry, J. (2005). Reclaiming the Ivory Tower: Organizing Adjuncts to Change Higher Education. Monthly Review Press.

Berry, J. and Worthen, H. (2021). Power Despite Precarity: Strategies for the Contingent Faculty Movement in Higher Education. Pluto Books.

Best, J. & Best, E. (2014). The Student Loan Mess. Atkinson Family Foundation.

Bledstein, Burton J. (1976). The Culture of Professionalism. Norton.

Bogue, E. Grady & Aper, Jeffrey (2000). Exploring the Heritage of American Higher Education.

Bok, D. (2003). Universities in the Marketplace. Princeton University Press.

Bousquet, M. (2008). How the University Works. NYU Press.

Brennan, J. & Magness, P. (2019). Cracks in the Ivory Tower. Oxford University Press.

Brint, S. & Karabel, J. (1989). The Diverted Dream. Oxford University Press.

Burawoy, Michael & Mitchell, Katharyne (eds.) (2020). The University, Neoliberalism, and the Politics of Inequality. Routledge.

Burd, Stephen (2024). Lifting the Veil on Enrollment Management: How a Powerful Industry is Limiting Social Mobility in American Higher Education. Harvard Education Press

Cabrera, Nolan L. (2018). White Guys on Campus. Rutgers University Press.

Cabrera, Nolan L. (2024). Whiteness in the Ivory Tower. Teachers College Press.

Cantwell, Brendan & Robertson, Susan (eds.) (2021). Research Handbook on the Politics of Higher Education. Edward Elgar.

Caplan, B. (2018). The Case Against Education. Princeton University Press.

Cappelli, P. (2015). Will College Pay Off? Public Affairs.

Carney, Cary Michael (1999). Native American Higher Education in the United States. Transaction.

Cassuto, Leonard (2015). The Graduate School Mess. Harvard University Press.

Caterine, Christopher (2020). Leaving Academia. Princeton Press.

Childress, H. (2019). The Adjunct Underclass. University of Chicago Press.

Chomsky, Noam (2014). Masters of Mankind. Haymarket Books.

Choudaha, Rahul & de Wit, Hans (eds.) (2019). International Student Recruitment and Mobility. Routledge.

Cohen, Arthur M. (1998). The Shaping of American Higher Education. Jossey-Bass.

Collins, Randall (1979/2019). The Credential Society. Columbia University Press.

Cottom, Tressie McMillan (2016). Lower Ed.

Cottom, Tressie McMillan & Darity, William A. Jr. (eds.) (2018). For-Profit Universities. Routledge.

Domhoff, G. William (2021). Who Rules America? Routledge.

Donoghue, F. (2008). The Last Professors.

Dorn, Charles (2017). For the Common Good. Cornell University Press.

Eaton, Charlie (2022). Bankers in the Ivory Tower. University of Chicago Press.

Eisenmann, Linda (2006). Higher Education for Women in Postwar America. Johns Hopkins Press.

Espenshade, T. & Walton Radford, A. (2009). No Longer Separate, Not Yet Equal. Princeton University Press.

Faragher, John Mack & Howe, Florence (eds.) (1988). Women and Higher Education in American History. Norton.

Farber, Jerry (1972). The University of Tomorrowland. Pocket Books.

Freeman, Richard B. (1976). The Overeducated American. Academic Press.

Gaston, P. (2014). Higher Education Accreditation. Stylus.

Gildersleeve, Ryan Evely & Tierney, William (2017). The Contemporary Landscape of Higher Education. Routledge.

Ginsberg, B. (2013). The Fall of the Faculty. Oxford University Press.

Giroux, Henry (1983). Theory and Resistance in Education. Bergin and Garvey Press.

Giroux, Henry (2014). Neoliberalism’s War on Higher Education. Haymarket Books.

Giroux, Henry (2022). Pedagogy of Resistance. Bloomsbury Academic.

Gleason, Philip (1995). Contending with Modernity. Oxford University Press.

Golden, D. (2006). The Price of Admission.

Goldrick-Rab, S. (2016). Paying the Price.

Graeber, David (2018). Bullshit Jobs. Simon and Schuster.

Groeger, Cristina Viviana (2021). The Education Trap. Harvard Press.

Hamilton, Laura T. & Kelly Nielson (2021). Broke.

Hampel, Robert L. (2017). Fast and Curious. Rowman & Littlefield.

Hirschman, Daniel & Berman, Elizabeth Popp (eds.) (2021). The Sociology of Higher Education.

Johnson, B. et al. (2003). Steal This University.

Kamenetz, Anya (2006). Generation Debt. Riverhead.

Keats, John (1965). The Sheepskin Psychosis. Lippincott.

Kelchen, Robert (2018). Higher Education Accountability. Johns Hopkins University Press.

Kezar, A., DePaola, T., & Scott, D. (2019). The Gig Academy. Johns Hopkins Press.

Kinser, K. (2006). From Main Street to Wall Street.

Kozol, Jonathan (1992). Savage Inequalities. Harper Perennial.

Kozol, Jonathan (2006). The Shame of the Nation. Crown.

Kraus, Neil (2023). The Fantasy Economy: Neoliberalism, Inequality, and the Education Reform Movement. Temple University Press, 2023.

Labaree, David (1997). How to Succeed in School Without Really Learning. Yale University Press.

Labaree, David F. (2017). A Perfect Mess. University of Chicago Press.

Lafer, Gordon (2004). The Job Training Charade. Cornell University Press.

Loehen, James (1995). Lies My Teacher Told Me. The New Press.

Lohse, Andrew (2014). Confessions of an Ivy League Frat Boy. Thomas Dunne Books.

Lucas, C.J. (1994). American Higher Education: A History.

Lukianoff, Greg & Haidt, Jonathan (2018). The Coddling of the American Mind. Penguin Press.

Maire, Quentin (2021). Credential Market. Springer.

Mandery, Evan (2022). Poison Ivy. New Press.

Marginson, Simon (2016). The Dream Is Over. University of California Press.

Marti, Eduardo (2016). America’s Broken Promise. Excelsior College Press.

Mettler, Suzanne (2014). Degrees of Inequality. Basic Books.

Morris, Dan & Targ, Harry (2023). From Upton Sinclair’s ‘Goose Step’ to the Neoliberal University.

Newfeld, C. (2011). Unmaking the Public University.

Newfeld, C. (2016). The Great Mistake.

Newfield, Christopher (2023). Metrics-Driven. Johns Hopkins Press.

O’Neil, Cathy (2016). Weapons of Math Destruction. Crown.

Palfrey, John (2020). Safe Spaces, Brave Spaces. MIT Press.

Paulsen, M. & Smart, J.C. (2001). The Finance of Higher Education. Agathon Press.

Piketty, Thomas (2020). Capital and Ideology. Harvard University Press.

Reynolds, G. (2012). The Higher Education Bubble. Encounter Books.

Rojstaczer, Stuart (1999). Gone for Good. Oxford University Press.

Rosen, A.S. (2011). Change.edu. Kaplan Publishing.

Roth, G. (2019). The Educated Underclass. Pluto Press.

Ruben, Julie (1996). The Making of the Modern University. University of Chicago Press.

Rudolph, F. (1991). The American College and University.

Rushdoony, R. (1972). The Messianic Character of American Education. The Craig Press.

Schrecker, Ellen (2010). The Lost Soul of Higher Education: New Press.

Selingo, J. (2013). College Unbound.

Shelton, Jon (2023). The Education Myth. Cornell University Press.

Simpson, Christopher (1999). Universities and Empire. New Press.

Sinclair, U. (1923). The Goose-Step.

Slaughter, Sheila & Rhoades, Gary (2004). Academic Capitalism and the New Economy. Johns Hopkins University Press.

Smyth, John (2017). The Toxic University. Palgrave Macmillan.

Sperber, Murray (2000). Beer and Circus. Holt.

Stein, Sharon (2022). Unsettling the University. Johns Hopkins Press.

Stevens, Mitchell L. (2009). Creating a Class. Harvard University Press.

Stodghill, R. (2015). Where Everybody Looks Like Me.

Tamanaha, B. (2012). Failing Law Schools. University of Chicago Press.

Tatum, Beverly (1997). Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? Basic Books.

Taylor, Barret J. & Cantwell, Brendan (2019). Unequal Higher Education. Rutgers University Press.

Thelin, John R. (2019). A History of American Higher Education. Johns Hopkins Press.

Tolley, K. (2018). Professors in the Gig Economy. Johns Hopkins University Press.

Trow, Martin (1973). Problems in the Transition from Elite to Mass Higher Education. Carnegie Commission on Higher Education.

Twitchell, James B. (2005). Branded Nation. Simon and Schuster.

Vedder, R. (2004). Going Broke By Degree.

Veysey, Lawrence R. (1965). The Emergence of the American University.

Washburn, J. (2006). University Inc.

Washington, Harriet A. (2008). Medical Apartheid. Anchor.

Whitman, David (2021). The Profits of Failure. Cypress House.

Wilder, C.D. (2013). Ebony and Ivy.

Winks, Robin (1996). Cloak and Gown. Yale University Press.

Woodson, Carter D. (1933). The Mis-Education of the Negro.

Zaloom, Caitlin (2019). Indebted. Princeton University Press.

Zemsky, Robert, Shaman, Susan & Baldridge, Susan Campbell (2020). The College Stress Test. Johns Hopkins University Press.

Zuboff, Shoshana (2019). The Age of Surveillance Capitalism. PublicAffairs.

Activists, Coalitions, Innovators, and Alternative Voices

College Choice and Career Planning Tools

Innovation and Reform

Higher Education Policy

Data Sources

Trade publications

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January 4, 2026
WEEKEND READING: The 2025 Immigration White Paper and its impact on international teacher recruitment and retention in MFL and Physics
This blog was kindly authored by Juliette Claro, Lecturer in Education at St Mary’s University Twickenham and Co-chair of the UCET Special Interest Group in Supporting International Trainee Teachers in Education.

The Immigration White Paper, published in Summer 2025, introduced sweeping reforms that will reshape England’s teacher workforce. One of the most consequential changes is the reduction of the Graduate Visa route from 24 to 18 months, which directly undermines the ability of international trainees to complete their Early Career Teacher (ECT) induction. Ahead of the debate at the House of Lords on the sustainability of Languages teachers and the impact of the immigration policies on the supply of qualified languages educators in schools and universities, this article examines the implications of this policy shift, supported by recent labour market data and the House of Lords paper by Claro and Nkune (2025), and offers recommendations for mitigating its unintended consequences.

The White Paper and the impact on shortage subjects

The National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) Annual Report (2025) confirms that Physics and Modern Foreign Languages (MFL) remain among the most under-recruited secondary subjects. Physics met just 17% of its Initial Teacher Training (ITT) target in 2024/25, while MFL reached 42%. These figures reflect a decade-long struggle to attract and retain qualified teachers International trainees have historically played a vital role in plugging these gaps, particularly in MFL, where EU-trained teachers once formed a significant proportion of the workforce.

Following the significant rise in international applicants for teacher training in shortage subjects such as Physics and MFL, The University Council for the Education of Teacher (UCET) launched in June 2025 a platform for Initial Teacher Education (ITE) providers to discuss the support of international trainee teachers through a Special Interest Group (SIG) composed of 83 members representing ITE providers across England. Members of the SIG shared their concerns towards the immigration reforms and the impact the White Paper may have on the recruitment and retention of teachers in shortage subjects such as Physics or MFL where a strong majority of applicants come from overseas.

Graduate visa reform: a critical barrier

The most contentious element of the 2025 Immigration White Paper is the reduction of the Graduate Visa route from 24 to 18 months, which started on 1 January 2026. The new 18-month limit creates a structural misalignment where international trainees will be forced to leave the UK before completing their two-year Early Career Framework (ECF) induction, unless their school sponsors them early through a Skilled Worker Visa. At this stage, many schools are unwilling or unable to undertake this process due to cost, administrative burden, and the complexity of the process.

UCET SIG members conducted a small-scale research in their settings to understand the barriers with school leaders to sponsor international Early Career Teachers (ECT). Across the sector, the reasons are complex and multilayered, reflecting the lack of financial and administrative support schools have to navigate sponsorship. This is especially true for smaller schools that are not part of a Multiple Academy Trust (MAT).

The changes in the White Paper not only disrupt career progression but also risk wasting public investment. International trainees in shortage subjects are eligible to receive bursaries of up to £29,000 in Physics and £26, 000 in MFL (2025-2026). If they are forced to leave before completing induction, the return on this investment is nullified. Coherence in policies between the Department for Education recruitment targets and the Home Office immigration policies is needed in a fragile education system.

The fragile pipeline of domestic workforce

Providers from the SIG who liaised with their local Members of Parliament and other officials were reminded that the White Paper encourages employers not to rely on immigration to solve shortages of skills. Moreover, the revised shortage occupation list narrows eligibility, excluding MFL and Physics teaching specialisms and requiring schools to demonstrate domestic recruitment efforts before sponsoring.

This adds friction to recruitment as the pipeline of domestic workforce for secondary school teachers in MFL, and Physics is relatively non-existent. The Institute of Physics highlighted in their 2025 report that 700,000 GCSE students do not have a Physics specialist in front of them in class. In MFL, the successive governments and decades of failed government policies to increase Languages students at GCSE and A Level are now showing the signs of a monolingual nation, reluctant to take on languages studies at Higher Education. This has contributed to a shortage of linguists willing to join the teaching profession.

Why do international teachers matter in modern Britain?

While the current political climate refutes the importance of immigration to sustain growth and skills in the economy, the White Paper undermines not only the Department for Education recruitment targets in a sector struggling to recruit and retain teachers in shortage subjects, but it also undermines the Fundamental British Values on which our curriculum and Teachers’ Standards are based on. Through a rhetoric that a domestic workforce is better than a foreign workforce, we both deny our young people the opportunity to be taught by subject specialists, and we refute the possibilities for our schools to promote inclusion in the teaching workforce.

International teachers bring a breadth of experience and expertise. This is being denied to students based on the assumptions that making visas more difficult to obtain and reducing the opportunities for sponsorship will make the economy stronger.

International trainee teachers joining the teacher training courses from Europe and the Global South often come to England with decades of experience teaching in their country. UCET SIG members’ small-scale research suggests that the majority of them want to stay and work in English schools after they qualify. The latest 2025 Government report on international teacher recruitment also highlights the fact that the majority of internationals aspire for careers progression in highly a performing education system in England. These studies suggest that the rhetoric behind the White Paper is not necessarily applicable in Education and needs reviewing.

International teachers show strength and resilience adapting to new curricula and new educational systems. They are role models and aspirations for learners not only sharing their expertise in the classroom but also their resilience and determination to thrive.

Recommendations

The following recommendations would help to address the current issues:
- Restore the Graduate Visa to 24 months for teachers to align with the ECT induction period.
- Introduce automatic Skilled Worker sponsorship for international trainees in shortage subjects who complete Year 1 of induction successfully.
- Provide centralised visa support for schools, including legal guidance and administrative assistance.
- Ring-fence bursary funding to ensure it supports retention, not short-term recruitment.
- Monitor and publish retention data for international teachers to inform future policy.
- To support the sector, Education and Skills England should collaborate with the Industrial Strategy Advisory Council and the Migration Advisory Committee to bring coherence to policies linked with sponsorship and visa waivers for shortage subjects for example in Languages and Physics.
Conclusion

The 2025 White Paper offers ambitious reforms to address England’s teacher shortages, but its immigration provisions risk undermining progress. The reduction of the Graduate Visa route creates a structural barrier to retention, particularly in MFL and Physics, where international trainees are most needed and the domestic workforce is not supplying the pipeline of specialist teachers. Without urgent policy realignment, England risks losing valuable talent and wasting public investment at a time when stability and inclusion should be the priority.
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January 4, 2026
U.S. Abducts Maduro, Trump Says “We Are Going to Run” Oil-Rich Nation (Democracy Now!)

Higher Education Inquirer : Special Report on Venezuela: U.S. Abducts Maduro, Trump Says “We Are Going to Run” Oil-Rich Nation (Democracy Now!)

Special Report on Venezuela: U.S. Abducts Maduro, Trump Says “We Are Going to Run” Oil-Rich Nation (Democracy Now!)

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January 4, 2026
Choosing Rhythms of Consistent, Predictable Joy – Teaching in Higher Ed
These are the drawings from the instructor. Look lower in the post for information about the course she teaches, plus to see my drawings, as they are emerging….

I don’t want to throw any shade on people who enjoy setting goals for yourselves in a new year. Hooray to Taylor Kay Phillips, who took over Lyz Lenz’s Dingus of the Week post this time, and said that she wants New Year’s Resolution Wet Blankets to settle down and let other people have their things. This year, one reflective approach that is resonating with me immensely this time around comes from Robert Talbert, in the form of his My Start/Stop/Continue for 2026 post. CW: He’s a bit down on resolutions in the beginning, but if you’re a big fan of setting them, just skip to his Start section about Going Analog and enjoy seeing what he’s up to…

Start: Creating with Regularity

Through an impulse purchase via Instagram advertising, I bought a year-long membership to the Art Makers Club at the tail end of the year. This all started with our son asking if he could participate in our revised advent plans for the holiday season (my goodness did our first attempt ever fail miserably) by doing digital art, instead of the watercolor the rest of us were doing. He likes using Procreate and mentioned offhand that it was one of those kinds of apps that you buy once (as in I/we already own it), which didn’t become relevant until weeks later, when I considered this purchase.

My Art Makers Club purchase didn’t start with an entire year, but rather a highly structured course. The Kickstart Your Creativity with Procreate got me excited from the premise. I’m a huge fan of being able to track my progress toward goals, so the included progress tracker was super appleaing to me. Wait a second? I get to take 15-20 minute tutorials from an encouraging, down-to-earth, clear communicator and learn to actually use an app I already own instead of continuing to gather virtual dust, like I had been? And I get to save my various drawings in the form of a tracker all along, so I can see how far I’ve come and where I’m going?

That was the hook, but it kept getting better from there. I also got a second Kickstart Your Creativity Course to go with it. But wait. There’s more. A ton of other courses, such as:
- Imaginative Map-Making in Procreate
- Getting Started with Procreate Dreams: Animation for Everyone (ever since seeing Mike Wesch’s very first animation video 10+ years ago: The Sleeper, I’ve dreamed of learning animation)
- Easy, Eye-Catching Animations in Procreate
- Realistic Paper Cut Illustrations in Procreate
There are ~5 other full length courses and then a bunch of previously-recorded live sessions, the opportunity to be a part of a community of people going through the courses, etc. I have now drawn from the orange through the poppy, as of January 3, 2026, not too shabby a result of a person who hasn’t really taken art classes before.

Here is my progress tracker so far for the course… I love how I can so easily see where I’ve been and where I’m headed. Those who know me well will know how excited I am to get to the bird!

Depending on how you define art, of course…

I also had bought one copy of Daily Drawing Prompts: A Year of Sketchbook Inspiration, by Jordan DeWilde for my Mom for Christmas and “accidentally” ordered a second copy for me. 😂😇 It has provided supplemental opportunities for reinforcing some of the skills I’m learning through the more structured courses.

This was the first exercise in the book… to trace your hand and then add in details, like jewelry, etc. My hand does not look this young in real life, but if you look closely, you can tell that I at least tried to draw in the wrinkles.

As excited as I clearly am about these drawing resources, I want to keep my definition of regular creation broad. Alan Levine recently shared his reflections on having achieved an entire year of capturing daily photos throughout 2025. He has previously been such an inspiration for me in those years when we don’t quite check every single box that we had hoped to… as in those years when he didn’t quite get to 365 days/photos. Still, it was fun to see him share stories of what his daily photo habit looked like in 2025 and in years past.

I don’t want to say up front that I’m shooting for a daily goal. My streaks habits seem to be multiplying and I don’t want to put too much pressure on myself. As of today, I’ve used the Bend App to support 280 days of stretching. However, they let you “reset” your streak, once you’ve been consistent with it. So somewhere around 4-5 days, I missed stretching. But the following day was able to restore my streak without resetting the counter. I would love something like that for my daily create goal that is emerging, but I also am not inclined to figure out a whole system at this exact moment.

Stop: Checking Work Email on My Mobile Devices

This is one of those “I should 100% know better” things. I’ve gotta stop checking my work email on my mobile devices. One reason has to do with overall productivity. In The Extended Mind: The Power of Thinking Outside the Brain, Annie Murphy Paul describes the benefits researchers found of working on a large display (versus on a laptop or mobile device):

When using a large display, they engaged in higher-order thinking, arrived at a greater number of discoveries and achieved broader, more integrative insights. Such gains are not a matter of individual differences or preferences, Ball emphasizes; everyone who engages with the larger display finds that their thinking is enhanced.

Before reading The Extended Mind, I always felt like I worked more effectively at either of my two big-screen set ups (home and work offices), but Murphy Paul uncovered a number of researchers exploring this hypothesis much more soundly than my anecdotal evidence. I just feel better and more able to focus in constructive ways when I’m engaging with my work via a large monitor.

Another reason I don’t want to keep doing this in 2026 is just that it tends to get me feeling all the negative feels during a time when I’m not going to proactively going to be able to dig in with problem solving or attempts to communicate about issues. If an email is going to evoke a sense that things aren’t right in a particular context, why not wait until I’m “in the saddle” and ready to “ride” toward a resolution vs stewing in the frustration needlessly. I don’t get that many emails that make me angry, by the way. I’ve got it pretty darn good in that department. But even if it is just an email that is going to require some kind of follow up, I tend to delay taking any steps toward moving forward until such time that I’m back at my computer. Why not just enjoy the time more in whatever context I may have been in when I succumbed to the temptation to just “dip my toe” into my work email to “check in”.

As I prepare to live into this commitment (once again, as I have failed at this in the past), I will revisit Robert Talbert’s Grand Unified Theory of Academic Email: Fixing the Missing Piece of the Clarify Process, as he helps those of us who may have a tendency to over-function to ask ourselves if whatever may have bubbled up in our email is actually ours to do something with… I would probably do well to re-listen to Brené Brown’s Unlocking Us Podcast Episode: On Anxiety, Calm, and Over-/Under-Functioning. And Karen Costa’s conversation with me on Episode 505: How Role Clarity and Boundaries Can Help Us Thrive.

Rinse and repeat. I feel a playlist coming on…

Continue: Finding Times to Go to Jazzercise with My Mom

Speaking of playlists, I’ve been having a bunch of opportunities to find great workout music, since I’ve been driving to Oceanside a number of times each week during this holiday break. If you’ve been listening to Teaching in Higher Ed for more than a couple of years, you may have “met” my Mom back on Episode 462: Teaching Lessons I Learned From Mom. During the episode, I read her a column I wrote for EdSurge about her: Teaching Lessons I Learned from Mom and then reflected with my mom on the death of her sister, Judy.

It takes ~45 minutes to make the drive from where I live to the Oceanside Jazzercise location where my Mom takes classes. The class, itself, is an hour, and then it’s another hour to say my goodbyes and get back home. Yes, that’s three hours anytime I go take a class with her. However, I’ve been telling myself that if I set a goal to take a class with her once or twice a month, during regular work weeks, and then a few times a week when we are on Spring break, that it would quickly add up to a whole lot more joy in my life. I rarely take lunch breaks at work, though I do often go for walks during the day with work friends (and sometimes former students, etc.). I’m having this inner dialog with myself about how much time I would actually “lose” from work if I were to keep this commitment vs what I would “gain” from the experiences.

Lest anyone reading this feel like you want to “fix” my stinkin’ thinking on this front and tell me stories about how much time you wish you still had with someone you’ve lost… you may be somewhat relieved of your duties to know that I’ve already put some things in motion toward this idea. Kerry Mandulak (who has been on Teaching in Higher Ed a couple times before) was down in Oceanside with her family this past week and we hung out together after I went to Jazzercise with my Mom. She raved about the Airbnb where her family was staying. I’ve already booked one in the same complex for Spring Break and blocked out four opportunities to join my Mom for Jazzercise that week.

What a joy is was getting to spend some time with Kerry during her family’s trip to Oceanside.

I’m headed down to the Lilly Conference on Tuesday and will stop and do a class with her on the way down. At this point, I just need to block a few more times in my calendar for Spring 2026 and I’ll have just the structure I need to turn this all into a reality and a bunch of memories with my Mom… That, plus an ever-growing playlist of energizing workout songs…

Related Goals

Robert Talbert mentions how poorly people, in general, tend to do with our resolutions. However, on my goal-setting, I tend to do ok, much of the time. To that end, I plan on continuing a few other things throughout 2026. I commit to:
- Read at least 24 books (connect with me on StoryGraph, if you want to see how that’s going and what I’m reading)
- Keep stretching daily using the Bend App
- Continue closing my Apple Watch rings (currently at an 845 days streak, which kinda scares me a bit, just because I think occasional breaks are ok and even healthy to take)
- Apply to present at a conference at another country with a couple of collaborators and see if we’re successful at getting to share our work in an entirely difference context than I will have ever experienced in my life (and I used to travel a ton for work in my younger days, so that’s saying something)
- Air an episode of Teaching in Higher Ed each week for the entire year, keeping yet-another streak alive… making it 12+ years of consistent conversations about teaching and learning
What are you up to in the new year? Anything you’re committing to stoping, starting, or continuing?

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January 4, 2026
The Poisoning of the American Mind

For more than a decade, Americans have been told that polarization, mistrust, and civic fragmentation are organic byproducts of cultural change. But the scale, speed, and persistence of the damage suggest something more deliberate: a sustained poisoning of the American mind—one that exploits structural weaknesses in education, media, technology, and governance.

This poisoning is not the work of a single actor. It is the cumulative result of foreign influence campaigns, profit-driven global technology platforms, and domestic institutions that have failed to defend democratic literacy. Higher education, once imagined as a firewall against mass manipulation, has proven porous, compromised, and in many cases complicit.

Foreign Influence as Cognitive Warfare

Chinese and Russian influence operations differ in style but converge in purpose: weakening American social cohesion, degrading trust in institutions, and normalizing cynicism.

Russian efforts have focused on chaos. Through state-linked troll farms, bot networks, and disinformation pipelines, Russian actors have amplified racial grievances, cultural resentments, and political extremism on all sides. The objective has not been persuasion so much as exhaustion—flooding the information environment until truth becomes indistinguishable from propaganda and democratic participation feels futile.

Chinese influence efforts, by contrast, have emphasized discipline and control. Through economic leverage, academic partnerships, Confucius Institutes, and pressure campaigns targeting universities and publishers, the Chinese Communist Party has sought to shape what can be discussed, researched, or criticized. While less visibly inflammatory than Russian disinformation, these efforts quietly narrow the boundaries of acceptable discourse—especially within elite institutions that prize funding and global prestige.

Both strategies treat cognition itself as a battlefield. The target is not simply voters, but students, scholars, journalists, and future professionals—anyone involved in shaping narratives or knowledge.

The Role of Global Tech Elites

Foreign influence campaigns would be far less effective without the infrastructure built and defended by global technology elites.

Social media platforms were designed to monetize attention, not to preserve truth. Algorithms reward outrage, tribalism, and repetition. Misinformation is not an accidental byproduct of these systems; it is a predictable outcome of engagement-driven design.

What is often overlooked is how insulated tech leadership has become from the social consequences of its products. Executives who speak fluently about “free expression” and “innovation” operate within gated communities, private schools, and curated information environments. The cognitive pollution affecting the public rarely touches them directly.

At the same time, these platforms have shown inconsistent willingness to confront state-sponsored manipulation. Decisions about content moderation, data access, and platform governance are routinely shaped by geopolitical calculations and market access—particularly when China is involved. The result is a global information ecosystem optimized for profit, vulnerable to manipulation, and hostile to slow, evidence-based thinking.

Higher Education’s Failure of Defense

Universities were supposed to be inoculation centers against mass manipulation. Instead, they have become transmission vectors.

Decades of underfunding public higher education, adjunctification of faculty labor, and administrative bloat have weakened academic independence. Meanwhile, elite institutions increasingly depend on foreign students, donors, and partnerships, creating subtle but powerful incentives to avoid controversy.

Critical thinking is often reduced to branding rather than practice. Students are encouraged to adopt identities and positions rather than interrogate evidence. Media literacy programs, where they exist at all, are thin, optional, and disconnected from the realities of algorithmic persuasion.

Even worse, student debt has turned higher education into a high-stakes compliance system. Indebted graduates are less likely to challenge employers, institutions, or dominant narratives. Economic precarity becomes cognitive precarity.

A Domestic Willingness to Be Deceived

Foreign adversaries and tech elites exploit vulnerabilities, but they did not create them alone. The poisoning of the American mind has been enabled by domestic actors who benefit from confusion, resentment, and distraction.

Political consultants, partisan media ecosystems, and privatized education interests profit from outrage and ignorance. Complex structural problems—healthcare, housing, inequality, climate—are reframed as cultural battles, keeping attention away from systems of power and extraction.

In this environment, truth becomes negotiable, expertise becomes suspect, and education becomes a consumer product rather than a public good.

The Long-Term Consequences

The danger is not simply misinformation. It is the erosion of shared reality.

A society that cannot agree on basic facts cannot govern itself. A population trained to react rather than reflect is easy to manipulate—by foreign states, domestic demagogues, or algorithmic systems optimized for profit.

Higher education sits at the center of this crisis. If universities cannot reclaim their role as defenders of intellectual rigor and civic responsibility, they risk becoming credential factories feeding a cognitively compromised workforce.

Toward Intellectual Self-Defense

Reversing the poisoning of the American mind will require more than fact-checking or content moderation. It demands structural change:

A recommitment to public higher education as a democratic institution, not a revenue stream.

Robust media literacy embedded across curricula, not siloed in electives.

Transparency and accountability for technology platforms that shape public cognition.

Protection of academic freedom from both foreign pressure and domestic political interference.

Relief from student debt as a prerequisite for intellectual independence.

Cognitive sovereignty is national security. Without it, no amount of military or economic power can sustain a democratic society.

The question is not whether the American mind has been poisoned. The question is whether the institutions charged with educating it are willing to admit their failure—and do the hard work of recovery.

Sources

U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, reports on Russian active measures

National Intelligence Council, foreign influence assessments

Department of Justice investigations into Confucius Institutes

Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism

Renée DiResta et al., research on computational propaganda

Higher Education Inquirer reporting on student debt, academic labor, and institutional capture

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January 3, 2026
Artificial Intelligence, Mass Surveillance, and the Quiet Reengineering of Higher Education

The Higher Education Inquirer has approached artificial intelligence not as a speculative future but as a present reality already reshaping higher education. Long before university leaders and consultants embraced Artificial Intelligence (AI) as an abstract promise, HEI was using these tools directly while documenting how they were being embedded into academic institutions. What has become increasingly clear is that AI is not merely an educational technology. It is a structural force accelerating corporatization, automation, and mass surveillance within higher education.

Artificial intelligence enters the university through the language of efficiency and personalization. Administrators speak of innovation, student success, and institutional competitiveness. Yet beneath this language lies a deeper transformation. Teaching, advising, grading, counseling, and evaluation are increasingly reduced to measurable functions rather than human relationships. Once learning is fragmented into functions, it becomes easily automated, monitored, outsourced, and scaled.

This shift has long been visible in for-profit and online institutions, where scripted instruction, learning management systems, predictive analytics, and automated advising have replaced meaningful faculty engagement. What is new is that nonprofit and elite universities are now adopting similar systems, enhanced by powerful AI tools and vast data collection infrastructures. The result is the emergence of the robocollege, an institution optimized for credential production, labor reduction, and data extraction rather than intellectual growth.

Students are told that AI-driven education will prepare them for the future economy. In reality, many are being trained for an economy defined by automation, precarity, and diminished human agency. Rather than empowering students to challenge technological power, institutions increasingly socialize them to adapt to it. Compliance, constant assessment, and algorithmic feedback replace intellectual risk-taking and critical inquiry.

These developments reinforce and intensify inequality. Working-class students, student loan debtors, and marginalized populations are disproportionately enrolled in institutions where AI-mediated education and automated oversight are most aggressively deployed. Meanwhile, elite students continue to receive human mentorship, small seminars, and insulation from constant monitoring. Artificial intelligence thus deepens a two-tier system of higher education, one human and one surveilled.

Mass surveillance is no longer peripheral to higher education. It is central to how AI operates on campus. Predictive analytics flag students as “at risk” before they fail, often without transparency or consent. Proctoring software monitors faces, eye movements, living spaces, and biometric data. Engagement dashboards track clicks, keystrokes, time spent on screens, and behavioral patterns. These systems claim to support learning while normalizing constant observation.

Students are increasingly treated as data subjects rather than citizens in a learning community. Faculty are pressured to comply with opaque systems they did not design and cannot audit. The data harvested through these platforms flows upward to administrators, vendors, private equity-backed education companies, and, in some cases, government and security-linked entities. Higher education becomes a testing ground for surveillance technologies later deployed across workplaces and society at large.

At the top of the academic hierarchy, a small group of elite universities dominates global AI research. These institutions maintain close relationships with Big Tech firms, defense contractors, and venture capital interests. They shape not only innovation but ideology, presenting AI development as inevitable and benevolent while supplying talent and legitimacy to systems of automation, surveillance, and control. Ethics initiatives and AI principles proliferate even as accountability remains elusive.

Cultural warnings about technological obsolescence no longer feel theoretical. Faculty are told to adapt or be replaced by automated systems. Students are told to compete with algorithms while being monitored by them. Administrators frame automation and surveillance as unavoidable. What is absent from these conversations is moral courage. Higher education rarely asks whether it should participate in building systems that render human judgment, privacy, and dignity increasingly expendable.

Artificial intelligence does not have to dehumanize higher education, but resisting that outcome requires choices institutions have largely avoided. It requires valuing human labor over scalability, privacy over control, and education as a public good rather than a data pipeline. It requires democratic governance instead of technocratic management and surveillance by default.

For years, the Higher Education Inquirer has examined artificial intelligence not as a neutral tool or a distant threat, but as a technology shaped by power, profit, and institutional priorities. The future of higher education is not being determined by machines alone. It is being determined by decisions made by university leaders, technology firms, and policymakers who choose surveillance and efficiency over humanity.

The question is no longer whether AI will reshape higher education.

The question is whether higher education will resist becoming a fully surveilled system that trains students to accept a monitored, automated, and diminished future.

Sources

Higher Education Inquirer, Robocolleges, Artificial Intelligence, and the Dehumanization of Higher Education

Higher Education Inquirer, AI-Robot Capitalists Will Destroy the Human Economy (Randall Collins)

Higher Education Inquirer, University of Phoenix: Training Folks for Robowork

Higher Education Inquirer, “The Obsolete Man”: A Twilight Zone Warning for the Trump Era and the Age of AI

Higher Education Inquirer, Stanford, Princeton, and MIT Among Top U.S. Universities Driving Global AI Research (Studocu)

Higher Education Inquirer, Tech Titans, Ideologues, and the Future of American Higher Education — 2026 Update

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January 3, 2026
8 Tiny Japanese Habits That Make a Massive Difference (What’s The Next Level)

Higher Education Inquirer : 8 Tiny Japanese Habits That Make a Massive Difference (What’s The Next Level)

8 Tiny Japanese Habits That Make a Massive Difference (What’s The Next Level)

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January 3, 2026
10 Things To Know Before Going For NYSC
After graduation what Next? NYSC. After Youth Service (NYSC) what next? You can start thinking of getting a good job, doing business, Masters Degree in Nigeria, or Going Abroad to further your Education… It is all left for you to decide. This guide will strictly focus on your NYSC.

Now, there are many things you still need to know as a fresh graduate. One of them is knowing how the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) works and the common terms you will come across before and during service. Remember, it is what you have in your head that takes you ahead.

1. NYSC Mobilization

This is the first stage of the National Youth Service. As the name implies, all qualified graduates across all Schools in Nigeria are mobilized for service. A mobilization timetable is released by NYSC Officials to show various dates and their schedules.

Content Of Mobilization Timetable

An NYSC Mobilization Timetable Contain Dates for the following Activities:
- Pre-Mobilisation Workshop.
- Uploading of Senate Approved Results and Revalidation Lists
- Submission of Senate/Academic Board Approved Results
- Online Registration by Foreign and locally Trained Nigerian Graduates
- Pre-Camp Physical Verification of Credentials of Foreign-Trained Graduates
- Action by ICT Department
- Notification and Printing of Call-up Letters by PCMs
- Commencement of Orientation Course
You can check how NYSC Mobilization Timetable looks here

2. NYSC Senate List

The Senate list is an official list of names and details of graduates who are eligible for NYSC from every institution in the country. This list will be prepared by your Institution and sent to the NYSC Board. The Senate list is uploaded Online so that you can check your name.

How to Check NYSC Senate List:
1. Go to NYSC Senate / Academic Board list portal
2. Select your Institution.
3. Supply your Matriculation Number and Surname in the required columns.
4. Select your date of birth.
5. Finally, click the ”SEARCH’ button to access your mobilization status.
You may want to check the Latest NYSC Senate list here

3. NYSC Registration

From the name, you should already be able to guess what NYSC Registration is all about. Registration is the next step to take after confidently checking your name on the Senate List. The following are requirements for NYSC Registration:
- Valid email account
- Active phone number
- Passport Photograph
- Biometric Verification
- And More (Link Below…)
Recommended: How to do NYSC Online Registration

4. NYSC Call-Up Letter

After NYSC Registration, the next thing is the call-up letter. This is simply a letter that will show your state of deployment and other important information. If you have paid the N3,000, you will be able to print your call-up letter on your dashboard.

You Will Spend Money

Nothing is free… You will have to make payments. For example, during the NYSC registration, you will need to pay N3,000 to print the NYSC Call-up letter from your dashboard when it comes out.

You have two options regarding printing your Call-up letter; You can either pay N3,000 and print it on your dashboard or don’t pay and go to your institution to collect it. In any which way, money must be spent.

Recommended: 15 Ways to make money with your phone

5. NYSC Orientation Camp

I know you are already familiar with this. Right from your hundred level days, I’m sure you always get excited to see corpers in Camp. It is now your turn; how time flies.

How long do corpers spend in orientation camp? You will spend three weeks at Camp doing a lot of programs. The orientation camp is always fun (if not the sweetest part of NYSC).

6. Place Of Primary Assignment (PPA)

On the last day of the Orientation camp, you will collect a letter that will specify the particular place where you will do your service. This is called the Place of Primary Assignment.

Your place of assignment can be a secondary school, an industry, University and even government office. You can change your PPA if you are not satisfied with it.

7. NYSC Allowee

The is the biggest NYSC news right now. If you are serving this year 2023, you are in luck because Allowance has increased from #19,800 to #33,000. You will get a monthly payment of 33k starting from when you are in the orientation camp. The last payment will double (66k).

You will open a new bank account and that is where the NYSC Allowee will be entering. It always comes about 2-3 days before the end of the month. Your allowance can come late some months.

8. CDS Group

CDS Stands for Community Development Service. The NYSC officials will split every Corps members into different CDS Group and they will be meeting once in a week.

CDS is very important as you cannot do your clearance if you did not participate in your CDS group. This is where you brainstorm on how to do something important for the community where you serve.

9. Clearance

NYSC clearance exercise takes place every month end. If you miss a clearance, you will not collect your Allowee for that month and that is automatically an extension. The date for the clearance is always different and it depends on your Local Government schedule.

10. NYSC Passing Out Parade

This is the last ceremony of your Youth SERVICE Scheme. Remember, everything that has a beginning will surely have an end.

No matter how you enjoy your place of assignment, you will end your NYSC after some months and face real life. Then no number seven (allowance) anymore. The passing out parade is always on a low key whereby you will go to your Local Government and collect your NYSC certificate.

Hope you found this guide useful. Feel free to share with your friends using the share buttons below and don’t fail to let me know how you feel using the comment box.
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January 3, 2026
WEEKEND READING: LSST gave me a second chance: policy should protect, not penalise institutions like it

This blog was kindly authored by Ahmed Al-Athwari, PGCert Student and Academic Support Tutor employed at the London School of Science and Technology (LSST).

My name is Ahmed Al-Athwari. I was born in Yemen and raised amid hardship, eventually graduating from Sana’a University with a degree in Oceanography and Environmental Science.

My life changed dramatically in December 1999 when I was forced to flee Yemen. I found myself in a refugee camp in the Netherlands, starting from scratch in a new country, with a new culture and language. Rebuilding my life was not easy, but I succeeded, securing a job with the city council in Heerlen.

In 2012, family reasons brought me to the UK, and once more, I had to adapt to a different culture and environment, starting over.

While living in the Netherlands in 2006, I tried to enrol in an MSc programme. My application to the University was rejected due to limited experience in environmental issues and language requirements. I was advised to start with a BSc, but this application also failed because, at the time, the system didn’t allow students over 30 to access government loans. My dream of higher education, to fulfil the promise I made to myself and make my family in Yemen, and later my children, proud, never left me.

After moving to the UK, I continued my quest. In 2013, I visited Birmingham City University and contacted several higher education providers to explore MSc opportunities in Environmental Sustainability Engineering. In 2016, I finally received an offer. However, at the first meeting, my application was rejected again, citing the long gap since I completed my BSc in Yemen. That was the moment I almost gave up, truly believing the obstacles were insurmountable. It was a moment of certainty that the train had truly passed, and any hope that I would get a second chance to correct the course of my life, which circumstances beyond my control had diverted, vanished.

I still remember September 2019 vividly; I felt as if I were standing on a platform at dusk as the last train approached. My English was uncertain. I was an older student, grey-haired and full of doubt, wondering if it was too late to begin again.

Then, the London School of Science and Technology (LSST) opened the door. What changed everything was the opportunity to study through a franchised programme: Buckinghamshire New University (BNU) offered its degree through a partnership, with BNU as the lead provider and LSST as the local delivery partner. Had recent proposals to restrict franchising been in place, that pathway might not have existed. This highlights why policy matters. Franchised provision is often portrayed as a risk; however, my experience suggests the opposite. When a university designs a rigorous curriculum and assures academic quality, and a dedicated local partner delivers responsive support, the model can widen participation and deliver strong outcomes.

From the very first week, I felt seen. Study-skills sessions were strategic, showing me that progress is a process, not a miracle. I learned to draft summaries, write in focused bursts, and seek feedback early. By my second year, I could argue a point, speak without freezing, and write with purpose.

Returning to education later in life is not the same as going straight from school to university. It means entering a classroom after years away, carrying not just books but a whole life, work, bills, family, and responsibilities that don’t pause for a 9am seminar. I studied on buses, revised in corridors, and wrote essays between school drop-offs. Some weeks were woven from early mornings and late nights, as sleep was traded for progress.

Back in Yemen, the conflict that began in 1994 has only worsened. Family emergencies don’t wait for exam schedules. Calls come at difficult hours. News from home can drain your focus in an instant. In that context, studying is not just an academic pursuit; it is an act of hope.

I chose LSST because it offered access with ambition. The message was clear: if you are willing to work, we are eager to help. I was not looking for easy; I was looking for possible.

I was not seeking the prestige or amenities of a traditional campus. I needed a campus culture that understood mature students, commuters, and migrants, one that offered affordability, flexibility, and personalised support. Had regulation squeezed out providers like LSST, many students, especially those returning to education, would face far fewer choices.

The support at LSST was practical and visible, comprising one-to-one academic advice, workshops on academic skills, access to librarians and digital resources, quiet study spaces, and well-being support when life outside the classroom became overwhelming. Encouragement was not sentimental; it was momentum. Gradually, the platform’s feeling faded. I was no longer chasing the train; I was on it.

Through this route, I completed a BA (Hons) in Business Management with BNU via LSST, then progressed to an MSc in International Business Management at the University of West London. I am now completing a PGCert while preparing for my PhD. The habits I developed outlining, redrafting, critical reading, referencing did more than help me pass assignments; they sharpened my voice. The clarity that earned praise reflects a more profound truth: well-governed franchise partnerships can combine access with quality. The HEPI report “What Is Wrong with Franchise Provision?” explores perceived risks and argues for robust oversight, reporting, and governance to ensure these benefits are realised.

In 2023 I won first prize for an essay on the Metaverse, which was praised by the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change and CNN for its clarity and narrative flow. The essay competition was organised by LSST.

I often wonder what my journey would have looked like without LSST. Honestly, I might still be on that platform, promising myself “next term,” studying alone after long days, writing without a reader, working without a mentor. I would have continued caring and staying busy, but I missed the compound effect of structure, feedback, community, and belief. Franchised provision is not a loophole; it is a lifeline.

Later, I became a Student Ambassador and then a Students’ Union Coordinator, roles that helped new cohorts feel they belonged and allowed me to work with staff to improve the student experience. As an Academic Support, I help students turn feedback into meaningful change.

This pathway, from hesitant mature entrant to aspiring lecturer, was made possible by a policy environment that allowed universities to franchise degrees through trusted partners. Recent regulatory proposals risk painting those partnerships as inherently problematic. However, my experience suggests something different: the right approach is not to strangle the model, but to strengthen it, ensuring quality while maintaining open access.

If you are coming from a non-traditional route, returning after years away, balancing work or caring responsibilities, or studying across borders, know this: you do not need a perfect start. You need the right place, steady habits, and people who will back you.

Higher education policy should also consider this. If regulation makes it harder for providers like LSST to operate, the students who lose out will be those who most need a second chance. The focus should be on transparent quality assurance, risk-based oversight, and supportive partnerships between lead and delivery partners, not on discouraging the model altogether.

Studying at LSST not only gave me degrees; it gave me resilience, confidence, and the belief that nothing is easy, but everything is possible. With the encouragement of my former professors, now my colleagues, I am currently preparing to submit a doctoral proposal.

I began all this on a platform at dusk, afraid the last train would leave without me. It did not. I got on, learned the rhythm, and kept moving. Policy should keep that train running for others.

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January 3, 2026