Tag: Career

More college students report history of suicidal behaviors
Colleges and universities can support students with previous history of suicidal ideation or self-harm with long-term counseling or mental health support.

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Over the past two decades, suicide rates in the U.S. have increased 37 percent, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control. Fifteen percent of all deaths by suicide are among individuals ages 10 to 24 years old, making it the second leading cause of death for this age group.

This heightened risk has pushed colleges and universities to invest in preventative measures to address the complex issues that impact student well-being.

A January report from Pennsylvania State University’s Center for Collegiate Mental Health (CCMH) finds that students with a history of suicidal or self-injurious behaviors report lower levels of distress after engaging with counseling center services, but they remain at higher levels of distress over all compared to their peers.

Methodology

The report includes data from the 2023–24 academic year, beginning July 2023 and closing June 2024. Data was collected from 213 college and university counseling centers, including 173,536 unique students seeking care, 4,954 clinicians and over 1.2 million appointments. The data is not representative of the general student population, only those accessing mental health services.

By the numbers: The number of students reporting previous suicidal or self-injurious behavior (S/SIB) histories jumped four percentage points from 2010–11 to 2023–24, according to CCMH data.

“While counseling centers have historically treated a considerable segment of students with heightened suicide risk, ongoing questions remain about the complexity of co-occurring problems experienced, the scope of services they utilize, and whether gaps in care exist,” according to the report.

Compared to their peers without a history of S/SIB, these learners had higher levels of self-reported distress, particularly in symptoms of generalized anxiety, general distress and depression. They were also more likely to report a history of trauma or past hospitalization.

Students had a higher likelihood of continuing to demonstrate self-injurious thoughts or behaviors, compared to other students, but the overall rates remained low, with only 3.3 percent of students with past S/SIB reporting it during college counseling.

They were 14.3 times more likely to engage in self-injury and 11.6 times more likely to attempt suicide during treatment, and more than five times more likely to be admitted or referred to a hospital for a mental health concern. This, again, constituted a small number of students (around one in 180) but researchers noted the disproportionate likelihood of these critical case events.

Ultimately, students with suicidal or self-injurious behavior history saw similar benefits from accessing services compared to their peers, with data showing less generalized distress or suicidal ideation among all learners between their first and final assessments. However, they still had greater levels of distress, even if slightly lower than initial intake, showing a need for additional resources, according to researchers.

“The data show that students with a history of suicidal or self-injurious behaviors could benefit from access to longer-term and comprehensive care, including psychological treatment, psychiatric services and case management at counseling centers, as well as adjunctive support that contributes to an overall sense of well-being, such as access to disability services and financial aid programs,” said Brett Scofield, executive director for the CCMH, in a Jan. 28 press release.

Future considerations: Researchers made note that while prior history of suicidal behaviors or self-harm are some of the risk factors for suicide, they are not the only ones, and counseling centers should note other behaviors that could point to suicidal ideation, such as substance use or social isolation.

Additionally, some centers had higher rates of students at risk for suicide, ranging from 20 to 50 percent of clients, so examining local data to understand the need and application of data is critical, researchers wrote.

The data also showed a gap in capacity to facilitate longer-term care, such as case management or psychiatric services available, which can place an additional burden on clinicians or require outsourcing for support, diluting overall quality of care at the center. “Therefore, it is imperative that colleges and universities invest in under-resourced counseling centers to ease the burden on counseling center staff and optimize treatment for students with heightened suicide risk,” according to the report.

Investing in on-site psychological treatment or psychiatric care and finding creative solutions to work alongside outside partners can help deliver more holistic care.
Other trends: In addition to exploring how college counseling centers can address suicidality in young people, CCMH researchers built on past data to illustrate some of the growing concerns for on-campus mental health service providers.

Rates of prior counseling and psychotropic medication usage grew year over year and are at the highest level since data was first collected in 2012. A 2023 TimelyCare survey found six in 10 college students had accessed mental health services prior to entering college, and CCMH data echoed this trend, with 63 percent of students entering with prior counseling history.

The number of clients reporting a history of trauma remains elevated, up eight percentage points compared to 2012, though down slightly year over year, at 45.5 percent, compared to last year’s 46.8 percent.

Anxiety is the most common presenting concern, with 64.4 percent of clients having anxiety, as assessed by clinicians.

In-person counseling services have rebounded since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, with 63.7 percent of clients receiving exclusively in-person counseling and 13.5 percent receiving only video care.
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If you or someone you know are in crisis or considering suicide and need help, call the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline by dialing 9-8-8, or contact the Crisis Text Line by texting HOME to 741741.
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February 11, 2025
Three things to know about AI and the future of work (opinion)
Since the public release of ChatGPT in late 2022, artificial intelligence has rocketed from relative obscurity to near ubiquity. The rate of adoption for generative AI tools has outpaced that of personal computers and the internet. There is widespread optimism that, on one hand, AI will generate economic growth, spur innovation and elevate the role of quintessential “human work.” On the other hand, there’s palpable anxiety that AI will disrupt the economy through workforce automation and exacerbate pre-existing inequities.

History shows that education and training are key factors for weathering economic volatility. Yet, it is not entirely clear how postsecondary education providers can equip learners with the resources they need to thrive in an increasingly AI-driven workforce.

Here at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville’s Education Research and Opportunity Center, we are leading a three-year study in partnership with the Tennessee Board of Regents, Advance CTE and the Association for Career and Technical Education to explore this very subject. So far, we have interviewed more than 20 experts in AI, labor economics, career and technical education (CTE), and workforce development. Here are three things you should know.
1. Generative AI is the present, not the future.
First, AI is not new. ChatGPT continues to captivate attention because of its striking ability to reason, write and speak like a human. Yet, the science of developing machines and systems to mimic human functions has existed for decades. Many people are hearing about machine learning for the first time, but it has powered their Netflix recommendations for years. That said, generative AI does represent a leap forward—a big one. Simple machine learning cannot compose a concerto, write and debug computer code, or generate a grocery list for your family. Generative AI can do all of these things and infinitely more. It certainly feels futuristic, but it is not; AI is the present. And the generative AI of the present is not the AI of tomorrow.

Our interviews with experts have made clear that no one knows where AI will be in 15, 10 or even five years, but the consensus predicts the pace of change will be dramatic. How can students, education providers and employers keep up?

First, we cannot get hung up on specific tools, applications or use cases. The solution is not simply to incorporate ChatGPT in the classroom, though this is a fine starting point. We are in a speeding vehicle; our focus out the window needs to be on the surrounding landscape, not the passing objects. We need education policies that promote organizational efficiency, incentivize innovation and strengthen public-private partnerships. We need educational leadership focused on the processes, infrastructure and resources required to rapidly deploy technologies, break down disciplinary silos and guarantee learner safeguards. We need systemic and sustained professional development and training for incumbent faculty, and we need to reimagine how we prepare and hire new faculty. In short, we need to focus on building more agile, more adaptable, less siloed and less reactive institutions and classrooms because generative AI as we know it is not the future; AI is a harbinger of what is to come.
1. Focus on skills, not jobs.
It is exceedingly difficult to predict which individual occupations will be impacted—positively or negatively—by AI. We simply cannot know for certain whether surgeons or meat slaughterers are at greatest risk of AI-driven automation. Not only is it guesswork, but it is also flawed thinking, rooted in a misunderstanding of how technology impacts work. Tasks constitute jobs, jobs constitute occupations and occupations constitute industries. Lessons from prior technological innovations tell us that technologies act on tasks directly, and occupations only indirectly. If, for example, the human skill required to complete a number of job-related tasks can be substituted by smart machines, the skill composition of the occupation will change. An entire occupation can be eliminated if a sufficiently high share of the skills can be automated by machines. That said, it is equally true (and likely) that new technologies can shift the skill composition of an occupation in a way that actually enhances the demand for human workers. Shifts in demands for skills within the labor market can even generate entirely new jobs. The point is that the traditional approach to thinking of education in terms of majors, courses and degrees does learners a disservice.

By contrast, our focus needs to be on the skills learners acquire, regardless of discipline or degree pathway. A predictable response to the rise of AI is to funnel more learners into STEM and other supposed AI-ready majors. But our conversations, along with existing research, suggest learners can benefit equally from majoring in liberal studies or art history so long as they are equipped with in-demand skills that cannot (yet) be substituted by smart machines.

We can no longer allow disciplines to “own” certain skills. Every student, across every area of study, must be equipped with both technical and transferable skills. Technical skills allow learners to perform occupation-specific tasks. Transferable skills—such as critical thinking, adaptability and creativity—transcend occupations and technologies and position learners for the “work of the future.” To nurture this transition, we need innovative approaches to packaging and delivering education and training. Institutional leaders can help by equipping faculty with professional development resources and incentives to break out of disciplinary silos. We also need to reconsider current approaches to institutional- and course-level assessment. Accreditors can help by pushing institutions to think beyond traditional metrics of institutional effectiveness.
1. AI itself is a skill, and one you need to have.
From our conversations with experts, one realization is apparent: There are few corners of the workforce that will be left untouched by AI. Sure, AI is not (yet) able to unclog a drain, take wedding photos, install or repair jet engines, trim trees, or create a nurturing kindergarten classroom environment. But AI will, if it has not already, change the ways in which these jobs are performed. For example, AI-powered software can analyze plumbing system data to predict problems, such as water leaks, before they happen. AI tools can similarly analyze aircraft systems, sensors and maintenance records to predict aircraft maintenance needs before they become hazardous, minimizing aircraft downtime. There is a viable AI use case for every industry now. The key factor for thriving in the AI economy is, therefore, the ability to use AI effectively and critically regardless of one’s occupation or industry.

AI is good, but it is not yet perfect. Jobs still require human oversight. Discerning the quality of sources or synthesizing contradictory viewpoints to make meaningful judgments remain uniquely human skills that cut across all occupations and industries. To thrive in the present and future of work, we must embrace and nurture this skill set while effectively collaborating with AI technology. This effective collaboration itself is a skill.

To usher in this paradigm shift, we need federal- and state-level policymakers to prioritize AI user privacy and safety so tools can be trusted and deployed rapidly to classrooms across the country. It is also imperative that we make a generational investment in applied research in human-AI interaction so we can identify and scale best practices. In the classroom, students need comprehensive exposure to and experience with AI at the beginnings and ends of their programs. It is a valuable skill to work well with others, and in a modern era, it is equally necessary to work well with machines. Paraphrasing Jensen Huang, the CEO of Nvidia: Students are not going to lose their jobs to AI; they will lose their jobs to someone who uses AI.

Cameron Sublett is associate professor and director of the Education Research and Opportunity Center at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Lauren Mason is a senior research associate within the Education Research and Opportunity Center.
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February 11, 2025
Impacts of empowering middle school students through career exploration and experiences

For middle school students in Broken Arrow Public Schools (BAPS) in Oklahoma, career readiness has become more than an abstract idea. A district-wide effort to integrate career exploration into education has yielded promising results, as evidenced by student surveys conducted at the end of the 2022–23 school year. The findings highlight how structured career readiness programs can shape confidence, broaden horizons, and equip students with practical skills for the future.

Cultivating Career Curiosity and Decision-Making Confidence

A survey of 1,250 middle school students—spanning grades six through eight—revealed an inspiring trend: career exploration initiatives sparked curiosity about various professions and bolstered confidence in decision-making about future pathways. When asked if the programs inspired them to explore career paths, 73% of sixth graders and 69% of seventh and eighth graders responded affirmatively. This curiosity extended to understanding the skills and abilities needed for different careers, with 84% of sixth graders and over 70% of seventh and eighth students acknowledging a greater awareness.

Confidence-building was another hallmark of the program. More than two-thirds of sixth graders and over 60% of seventh and eighth graders reported feeling more assured about making career decisions. The data underscores that structured exposure to diverse career options fosters a stronger sense of direction and self-assurance among students navigating their aspirations.

A Journey of Self-Discovery and Skill Development

Beyond inspiring career exploration, the program helped students uncover their strengths and interests. Nearly three-quarters of students across all grades credited the initiative with enhancing their understanding of personal aptitudes and interests. This self-discovery process empowered students to align their career goals with their unique talents.

Students also highlighted the practical skills gained through the program, particularly in areas like financial management and productivity. Activities such as budgeting exercises not only provided hands-on learning but also reinforced essential life skills. For instance, students gained insights into financial planning, patience, and task management—competencies that extend far beyond academic settings.

Broadening Career Horizons

One of the program’s most significant impacts was increasing awareness of diverse career options. Approximately 80% of students across all grades reported learning about new professions, sparking interest in fields they had not previously considered. From nursing and coaching to creative industries and technical roles, students expressed excitement about the vast possibilities their futures could hold.

At Oliver Middle School, localized feedback from students offered further insights. Many praised the program for its user-friendly design and step-by-step guidance, which made career exploration accessible and engaging. Students also appreciated the real-world relevance of projects that connected classroom learning with professional scenarios.

Looking Ahead

These findings affirm the critical role of career readiness initiatives in middle school education. By fostering curiosity, confidence, and self-awareness, these programs lay the foundation for informed decision-making and lifelong learning. As the district continues to refine its approach, incorporating student feedback will be key to ensuring all learners feel represented, supported, and engaged.

For Broken Arrow Public Schools, the success of this initiative underscores the importance of proactive career exploration. Empowering students with the tools and knowledge to navigate their futures not only enriches their educational experience but also prepares them to contribute meaningfully to the world beyond the classroom. By continuing to invest in career readiness, BAPS is setting a standard for how schools can cultivate future-ready graduates.

This is a summary of a Case Study by Defined, “The Impact of Defined Careers on Engaging Middle School Students in Career Readiness”. To read the full Case Study, please click here.

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February 10, 2025
A call for more transparent college pricing (opinion)

Despite frequent media reports about the high cost of college, many students pay much less than the eye-catching sticker price. Students enrolled at four-year institutions living away from their parents face the highest sticker prices. But only around a quarter or fewer of those enrolled at public institutions (for state residents) or private nonprofit four-year institutions pay that sticker price. The remainder receive financial aid. Even most high-income students receive merit-based aid. How are they supposed to know how much they will have to pay?

Here is how colleges and universities could help. They can provide students with tools that lead them through a financial aid “information funnel.” Provide limited financial details (just family income?) and get an instant ballpark estimate at the top of the funnel. Provide a few more details, get a better, but still ballpark estimate. Keep going until you get an actual price. Extreme simplicity at the beginning of the process facilitates entry; the funnel should have a wide mouth. If the result is below sticker price, it can promote further investigation. Along the way, positive reinforcement through favorable results (if they occur) supports students continuing through the funnel.

Courtesy of Phillip Levine

This approach represents a significant advance over past practices, as I detail in a report newly released by the Aspen Economic Strategy Group (AESG). Historically, colleges provided no preliminary estimates. Students filed their financial aid forms (FAFSA and perhaps CSS Profile), applied to a college, and received their admissions decision and financial aid offer (if admitted) at the same time. Who knows how many students didn’t bother to apply because they believed they couldn’t afford it?

This began to change in 2008. The Higher Education Act was amended at that time to require institutions to provide “net price calculators” by 2011 that were intended to provide early cost estimates. Unfortunately, the well-intended policy hasn’t been very effective because these tools often are not user-friendly. They may represent a useful step higher up the funnel relative to the ultimate financial aid offer, but they remain toward its bottom.

Other steps have been taken along the way attempting to provide greater pricing information to prospective students. The government launched new webpages (the College Navigator and the College Scorecard), which provide college-specific details regarding the average “net price” (the amount students pay after factoring in financial aid). But the average net price mainly helps students with average finances determine their net price. Besides, using the median rather than the average would lessen the impact of outliers. It’s a much better statistic to capture the amount a typical student would pay in this context. Additional data on net prices within certain income bands are also available, but they still suffer from the biases introduced by using the average net price as well. What students really want and need is an accurate estimate of what college will cost them.

The most recent advance in college price transparency is the creation of the College Cost Transparency Initiative. This effort represents the response of hundreds of participating institutions to a Government Accountability Office report detailing the inconsistency and lack of clarity in financial aid offer letters. To participate, institutions agreed to certain principles and standards in the offer letters they transmit. It is an improvement relative to past practice, but it also is a bottom-of-the-funnel improvement. It does not provide greater price transparency to prospective students prior to submitting an application.

Institutions have also engaged in other marketing activities designed to facilitate communication of affordability messaging. Some institutions have begun to provide offers of free tuition to students with incomes below some threshold. The success of the Hail Scholarship (now repackaged as the Go Blue Guarantee) at the University of Michigan supports such an approach. Many of these offers, though, do not cover living expenses, which is a particular problem for students living away from their parents. In those instances, such offers may be more misleading than illuminating.

In 2017, I founded MyinTuition Corp. as a nonprofit entity designed to provide pricing information higher up in the financial aid information funnel. Its original tool, now used by dozens of mainly highly endowed private institutions, requires users to provide basic financial inputs and receive a ballpark price estimate. More recently, MyinTuition introduced an instant net price estimator, which is currently operational at Washington University in St. Louis, based solely on family income. Given the limited financial details provided, those estimates include some imprecision; the tool also provides a range of estimates within which the actual price is likely to fall. These tools are an easy entry point into the process, which is what the top of the funnel is designed to accomplish. More such efforts are necessary.

If we could do a better job communicating the availability of financial aid, it would also contribute to better-informed public discussions about college pricing and access. One recent survey found that only 19 percent of adults correctly recognized that lower-income students pay less to attend college than higher-income students. It is a legitimate question to ask whether the price those students pay is low enough. But we cannot even start the discussion with such limited public understanding of how much students across the income distribution pay now. Any step that colleges and universities can take to facilitate that understanding would be helpful. Improving the transparency in their own pricing certainly would be an important step they can take.

Phillip Levine is the Katharine Coman and A. Barton Hepburn Professor of Economics at Wellesley College and the founder and CEO of MyinTuition Corp.

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February 10, 2025
Higher ed leaders warn of dire consequences after NIH cut

In a move that sparked swift outrage from the higher education sector, the National Institutes of Health announced late Friday that it is dramatically cutting funding for grant recipients’ “indirect costs” of conducting medical research at universities, including hazardous waste disposal, utilities and patient safety.

“It is difficult to overstate what a catastrophe this will be for the US research and education systems, (particularly) in biomedical fields,” Carl Bergstrom, a biology professor at the University of Washington, posted on Bluesky. “It is deliberate and wanton devastation entirely out of scale with any concern about DEI activities on campuses. The goal is destroy US universities.”

Effective Monday, the NIH is planning to cap funding of indirect costs at 15 percent of all grants, down from the average of 27 to 28 percent. The change means that colleges and universities are on the hook for millions of dollars. They’ll likely have to cut their budgets or reduce research activities to make up the difference.

Republicans and President Trump have long sought to limit funding for indirect costs. The latest proposal is similar to a recommendation included in Project 2025, a conservative playbook for the second Trump administration that the president has disavowed. Project 2025 authors said the cap would “reduce federal taxpayer subsidization of leftist agendas.”

Last year, $9B of the $35B that the National Institutes of Health (NIH) granted for research was used for administrative overhead, what is known as “indirect costs.” Today, NIH lowered the maximum indirect cost rate research institutions can charge the government to 15%, above… pic.twitter.com/FSUYpEGKsr

— NIH (@NIH) February 7, 2025

Historically, universities have been able to negotiate reimbursement rates for those indirect costs, with institutional reimbursements averaging nearly 28 percent. Some of the nation’s leading research institutions, including Harvard, Yale and Johns Hopkins Universities, receive reimbursements of more than 60 percent. NIH said in a social media post that it expects to save $4 billion from the change; an Inside Higher Ed analysis of fiscal year 2024 grant data shows that colleges would lose about $4.3 billion in NIH reimbursements if indirect costs were capped at 15 percent.

Previously, if a college or university received a $5 million grant, they could also be reimbursed up to $1.4 million to pay for related costs, such as renting space for a lab. Under this new policy, that will be capped at $750,000.

“The United States should have the best medical research in the world,” the NIH said in its announcement. “It is accordingly vital to ensure that as many funds as possible go towards direct scientific research costs rather than administrative overhead.”

While the NIH said it has the authority to cap indirect costs, Senator Patty Murray, a Democrat from Washington, said on social media Friday that the proposal is illegal.

“It will mean shuttering labs across the country, layoffs in red & blue states, & derailing lifesaving research on everything from cancer to opioid addiction,” Murray wrote.

Cuts to ‘Life-Saving’ Research

While the NIH is casting indirect costs as a burden, Association of American Universities President Barbara R. Snyder said in a statement that they are “real and necessary costs of conducting the groundbreaking research that has led to countless breakthroughs in the past decades.”

A $4 billion cut to reimbursements for NIH grants, she added, “is quite simply a cut to the life-saving medical research that helps countless American families.”

NIH has worked feverishly in recent weeks to comply with President Trump’s executive orders to eliminate all support for diversity, equity and inclusion and “gender ideology.” Grant reviews stopped for two weeks, alarming researchers who rely on federal funding, and some scientists worried about the future of their funding under the agency.

But researchers and their advocates say an abrupt $4 billion cut to NIH funding—which has not been approved by Congress—has dire implications for the future of the United State’s scientific research enterprise and will undermine the NIH’s stated goal of producing superior medical research.

“Cuts to reimbursement of these costs are cuts to medical research and represent the federal government stepping back from commitments it has made to world-leading researchers,” Mark Becker, president of the Association of Public Land Grant Universities, said in a statement. “This action will slow advances for millions of patients who desperately need critical breakthroughs and imperil the U.S.’s position as the world leader in biomedical innovation.”

The NIH is the largest federal funding source for research universities, and has supported breakthroughs in medical technology and treatments for diseases like cancer and Alzheimer’s.

Ted Mitchell, president of the American Council on Education, said the decision was “short-sighted, naive, and dangerous.”

“It will be celebrated wildly by our competitors, who will see this for what it is—a surrender of U.S. supremacy in medical research,” Mitchell said. “It is a self-inflicted wound that, if not reversed, will have dire consequences on U.S. jobs, global competitiveness, and the future growth of a skilled workforce.”

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February 8, 2025
DOGE’s access to Education Department data raises concerns

Just last month, Lorena Tule-Romain was encouraging families with mixed citizenship to fill out the Free Application for Federal Student Aid. She and her staff at ImmSchools, a nonprofit dedicated to improving educational access for immigrants in Dallas, walked students and parents through the complicated federal aid process. Along the way, they offered reassurance that information revealing their undocumented status would be securely held by the Department of Education alone.

Two weeks ago, ImmSchools stopped offering those services. And Tule-Romain said they’re no longer recommending families fill out the FAFSA.

That’s because the Department of Government Efficiency, a White House office run by Elon Musk, now has access to Education Department data systems, potentially including sensitive student loan and financial aid information for millions of students, according to sources both outside and within the department who spoke with Inside Higher Ed.

With immigration officers conducting a blitz of deportations over the past few weeks—and the new possibility of ICE raids at public schools and college campuses—Tule-Romain is worried that applying for federal aid could put undocumented families in jeopardy. Instead of answering parents’ questions about the FAFSA contributor form, she’s hosting Know Your Rights workshops to prepare them for ICE raids.

“Before, we were doing all we could to encourage families to apply for federal aid, to empower students to break cycles and go to college,” she said. “Now we are not in a position to give that advice. It’s heartbreaking.”

Student data is technically protected by the Privacy Act of 1974, which prevents departments from sharing personally identifying information unless strict exceptions are met or a law is passed to allow it. The FUTURE Act, for example, gave the IRS access to financial aid data to simplify the FAFSA process.

Karen McCarthy, vice president of public policy and federal relations at the National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators, told Inside Higher Ed that because DOGE has not said why they might be interested in department data or what data they have access to, it’s unclear if they’re acting in accordance with the law.

In the past, that law has been strictly enforced for federal employees. In 2010, nine people were accused of accessing President Barack Obama’s student loan records while employed for an Education Department contractor in Iowa. The charges levied against them in federal court were punishable by up to one year in prison and a fine of up to $100,000, according to the Associated Press.

On Thursday, Democratic Representative Bobby Scott of Virginia wrote to the Government Accountability Office requesting a review of the Education Department’s information technology security and DOGE’s interventions in the department in order to determine their legality and the “potential impact on children.” On Friday, a group of students at the University of California sued department officials for allowing potential privacy act violations.

“The scale of the intrusion into individuals’ privacy is massive, unprecedented, and dangerous,” the plaintiffs wrote.

In recent days, labor unions and other groups have sued to block DOGE”s access to databases at several federal agencies and have secured some wins. Early Saturday morning, a federal judge prohibited DOGE from accessing Treasury Department data, ordering Musk’s team to “immediately destroy any and all copies of material” from the department’s systems.

Concerns about DOGE’s use of private student data come as Musk and his staff take a hacksaw to agencies and departments across the federal government, seeking to cut spending and eliminate large portions of the federal workforce. The Trump administration has singled out the Education Department in particular, threatening to gut its administrative capacity or eliminate the department all together.

Spokespeople for DOGE did not respond to a list of questions from Inside Higher Ed. Madi Biederman, the Education Department’s deputy assistant secretary for communications, wrote in an email that DOGE staff “have the necessary background checks and clearances” to view department data and are “focused on making the department more cost-efficient, effective and accountable to the taxpayers.”

“There is nothing inappropriate or nefarious going on,” she added. She did not respond to questions about what data DOGE has access to or how they plan to use it.

A ‘Gaping Hole’ in Data Security

The Education Department’s student financial aid systems contain unique private information that families submit through FAFSA: not only social security numbers but also addresses of relatives, property taxes, sources of income and more. The National Student Loan Database, which tracks loan borrowers’ repayment history and which DOGE may also have access to, includes a wealth of personally identifying information for many more millions of current and former students.

A current department staffer provided Inside Higher Ed with a screenshot from the department’s email address catalog containing the names of 25 DOGE employees who may have access to student data—including a 19-year-old who, according to a Bloomberg report, was once fired by a cybersecurity firm for allegedly leaking internal data. And the Washington Post reported that DOGE employees fed sensitive education department data through artificial intelligence software.

“It could become a gaping hole in our cybersecurity infrastructure,” a former department official said. “I cannot stress enough how unusual it is to just give people access willy-nilly.”

Two former department officials told Inside Higher Ed it is unclear how the DOGE officials could have legally gained access to department data. McCarthy compared DOGE’s murky activity in the department to a “massive data breach within the federal government.”

“Normally, there’d be a paper trail telling us what they’ve requested access to and why,” she said. “We don’t have that, so there’s a lot of uncertainty and fear.”

A current department official told Inside Higher Ed that DOGE staff have been given access to PartnerConnect, which includes information about college programs that receive federal financial aid funding; and that they have read-only access to a financial system. Neither of those databases contain personally identifying information, but the official wasn’t sure DOGE’s access was limited to those sources—and said department staff are worried sensitive student information could be illegally accessed and disbursed.

“It just creates a kind of shadow over the work that everyone’s doing,” a prior department official said.

Fears of a FAFSA ‘Chilling Effect’

Families with mixed citizenship status were some of the hardest hit by the error-riddled FAFSA rollout last year, with many reporting glitches that prevented them from applying for aid until late last summer.

Tule-Romain said mixed-status families in her community had only just begun to feel comfortable with the federal aid form. In the past few weeks that progress has evaporated, she said, and high school counselors working with ImmSchools report a concerning decline in requests for FAFSA consultations from mixed-status students.

“If they weren’t already hesitant, they are extremely hesitant now,” Tule-Romain said.

It’s not just mixed-status families who could be affected if data is shared or leaked. McCarthy said that concerns about privacy could have a wide-spread “chilling effect” on federal aid applications.

“There have always been parents who are reluctant to share their information and the counterargument we always fall back on are the privacy laws,” she said. “A lot of Pell money could get left on the table, or students could be discouraged from going to college altogether.”

Kim Cook, CEO of the National College Attainment Network, said that after last year’s bungled FAFSA rollout, community organizations and government officials had worked hard to rebuild trust in the system and get completion rates back to normal. She worries that fears about privacy could set back those efforts significantly.

“Chaos and uncertainty won’t give us the FAFSA rebound we need,” she said.

The confusion could also affect current college students who need to renew their FAFSA soon. Tule-Romain said one undocumented parent who filled out her first form with ImmSchools last year came back a few weeks ago asking for advice.

She was torn: on the one hand, she didn’t trust Musk and Trump’s White House not to use the information on the form to deport her. On the other, if her son didn’t receive federal aid, he’d have to drop out of college. Ultimately, she chose to renew the application.

“If you came [to America] for a better life, you cannot let fear stop you from pursuing that,” Tule-Romain said. “Instead, you arm yourself with knowledge and you move forward—maybe with fear, but you move forward anyway.”

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February 8, 2025
Education Department to end internal “gender ideology” programs

The Department of Education is ordering an end to all spending and programs that “promote gender ideology,” according to an internal email sent to all department employees and obtained by Inside Higher Ed.

The email lays out steps the department will take to uphold President Trump’s executive order “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.” Those steps include a “thorough review and subsequent termination of Departmental programs, contracts, policies, outward-facing media, regulations and internal practices that fail to affirm the reality of biological sex.”

The email also prohibits employee resource groups that “promote gender ideology” from meeting on government property or during work hours.

The email appears to be targeted primarily at internal department activities and spending, as opposed to schools and universities that receive federal funding. But the Trump administration has in recent days launched investigations into colleges over the participation of trans athletes in women’s sports, and Trump’s executive order attacking diversity, equity and inclusion could have wide-reaching effects on college programs and curricula.

A spokesperson for the department did not respond to Inside Higher Ed’s request for clarification or comment in time for publication.

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February 8, 2025
Freedom is the bedrock for learning
Two big things, personally, happened this week, and I want to explain how while they may seem different on the surface, they’re sort of inextricable from each other.

One thing that happened was the release of my book More Than Words: How to Think About Writing in the Age of AI. Regular readers of this space will be well familiar with the subjects and themes of the book, but of course a book is a different thing than a blog or column.

I do my best to always make what I share here worth reading, but often the ideas I explore in this forum are in a much earlier stage of gestation. Writing is thinking, and while sufficient thinking has to occur for me to get a post onto the page, posting a column does not end the thinking.

A book is a chance to hone that thinking into an extended argument and experience, seeing those initial individual thoughts join together, and in this joining shift in important ways as I seek greater clarity and more impactful presentation. One of the reasons I don’t really understand people’s enthusiasm for turning their writing over to large language models is that the process of working through my own thoughts is 100 percent necessary to delivering the final product.

There is no shortcut if I want the book to be as good as possible.

Anyway, as I wrote at my personal newsletter in a post celebrating the book’s release, I’m proud of it. It’s good! Or the best I can do at this time, anyway, which is its own form of good. If you’re at all concerned about how tools powered by generative AI are encroaching on our spaces of working, learning and thinking, you might find some value in it.

Kirkus Reviews had this to say:

The other thing that happened this week is the launch of a new newsletter, Academic Freedom on the Line, that I’ll be helping oversee as part of my fellowship for the Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom (CDAF).

CDAF has been organized around a vision statement and a mission statement.

Vision Statement

We believe that teaching, learning, and the pursuit of knowledge are essential to creating and sustaining multi-racial and plurinational societies. For those of us working and studying within institutions of higher education, this means pursuing knowledge wherever it leads, free from intimidation and retaliation. Such freedoms serve as the foundation upon which we educate students, produce and disseminate credible research, nurture artistic expression and foster critical inquiry.
Mission Statement

The Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom is committed to preserving and expanding conditions that make it possible to work, teach, learn, create, and share knowledge in ways that promote the common good. The center serves as a resource and knowledge hub for all people—including faculty, students, campus workers, alumni, administrators, trustees, parents, journalists, policymakers, and business leaders—seeking to build a flourishing higher education system, rooted in institutional autonomy, workplace democracy, and freedom from coercion and external interference.

To work towards these goals we:

create practical resources and build strategic partnerships for those engaged in defending academic freedom,

produce original research that can serve as the evidentiary basis for this work, and

communicate the value of academic freedom and institutional autonomy to wide audiences.
The first newsletter post is an annotated version of these statements, where some of the other fellows comment on different parts of each, and I encourage you to check it out for yourself to see how important individual perspectives are even inside of communication that is meant to reflect group consensus.

I also encourage you to sign up for the newsletter ,since we’ll be sharing more information and research all the time.

A couple of weekends ago, we had an in-person gathering of CDAF, along with some other folks concerned about the attacks on academic freedom (PEN, AAUP, et al. …), and I was struck by how important it is to have all these different perspectives when considering complex and important problems.

Even though it was a gathering of people with a broad base of shared values, there were many different perspectives, and I lost track of the number of times I experienced a moment of, I hadn’t thought of it that way.

Here’s how I see these two different strains of my work as intimately related. At the heart of More Than Words is my belief that humans have a right to their own minds, that part of exercising our freedom is being given the chance to interpret the world and then impress ourselves onto the world around us through communication rooted in our unique intelligences. Writing is a great way to achieve this, as I’ve experienced firsthand, not just because I have some public platforms for my writing, but because the act of writing allows me to know what I think and believe.

The boosters of the syntax-generating technology speak of it in liberatory terms, that the technology frees one up to not have to do difficult and maybe even unrewarding work. But in my view, giving over the work of writing to a probability machine is anti-freedom. The process matters.

The process of academic freedom matters, too, which is why we sometimes (often) have disputes about what academic freedom means or how it can be supported in institutions. As a baseline, we need people to believe that academic freedom matters, that it is more than an abstract idea and it is, in fact, a way to make possible the work we want our institutions to do. This is what is being threatened at this time.

One of the consistent themes of the weekend gathering was that deep down, we’re not just defending academic freedom, a term that we all acknowledge comes with some baggage, but we are trying to preserve important parts of our democracy.

I don’t want to overinflate the importance of this work, either my own with my writing about writing or the efforts of the fellows of CDAF. There are clearly more urgent threats at this moment.

But at the same time, I don’t want to shy away from the fact that there’s a lot at stake, and that what’s being threatened is our ability to self-govern.

It matters. It all matters.
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February 7, 2025
Professors fear DeepSeek “censorship” on students’ work

“Censorship” built into rapidly growing generative artificial intelligence tool DeepSeek could lead to misinformation seeping into students’ work, scholars fear.

The Chinese-developed chat bot has soared to the top of the download charts, upsetting global financial markets by appearing to rival the performance of ChatGPT and other U.S.-designed tools, at a much lower cost.

But with students likely to start using the tool for research and help with assignments, concerns have been raised that it is censoring details about topics that are sensitive in China and pushing Communist Party propaganda.

When asked questions centering on the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, reports claim that the chat bot replies that it is “not sure how to approach this type of question yet,” before adding, “Let’s chat about math, coding and logic problems instead!”

When asked about the status of Taiwan, it replies, “The Chinese government adheres to the One China principle, and any attempts to split the country are doomed to fail.”

Shushma Patel, pro vice chancellor for artificial intelligence at De Montfort University—said to be the first role of its kind in the U.K.—described DeepSeek as a “black box” that could “significantly” complicate universities’ efforts to tackle misinformation spread by AI.

“DeepSeek is probably very good at some facts—science, mathematics, etc.—but it’s that other element, the human judgment element and the tacit aspect, where it isn’t. And that’s where the key difference is,” she said.

Patel said that students need to have “access to factual information, rather than the politicized, censored propaganda information that may exist with DeepSeek versus other tools,” and said that the development heightens the need for universities to ensure AI literacy among their students.

Thomas Lancaster, principal teaching fellow of computing at Imperial College London, said, “From the universities’ side of things, I think we will be very concerned if potentially biased viewpoints were coming through to students and being treated as facts without any alternative sources or critique or knowledge being there to help the student understand why this is presented in this way.

“It may be that instructors start seeing these controversial ideas—from a U.K. or Western viewpoint—appearing in student essays and student work. And in that situation, I think they have to settle this directly with the student to try and find out what’s going on.”

However, Lancaster said, “All AI chat bots are censored in some way,” which can be for “quite legitimate reasons.” This can include censoring material relating to criminal activity, terrorism or self-harm, or even avoiding offensive language.

He agreed that “the bigger concern” highlighted by DeepSeek was “helping students understand how to use these tools productively and in a way that isn’t considered unfair or academic misconduct.”

This has potential wider ramifications outside of higher education, he added. “It doesn’t only mean that students could hand in work that is incorrect, but it also has a knock-on effect on society if biased information gets out there. It’s similar to the concerns we have about things like fake news or deepfake videos,” he said.

Questions have also been raised over the use of data relating to the tool, since China’s national intelligence laws require enterprises to “support, assist and cooperate with national intelligence efforts.” The chat bot is not available on some app stores in Italy due to data-related concerns.

While Patel conceded there were concerns over DeepSeek and “how that data may be manipulated,” she added, “We don’t know how ChatGPT manipulates that data, either.”

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February 7, 2025
The big chill for academic medical centers (opinion)

Recent executive actions by President Trump, most notably a blanket freeze of federal grants and loans, sent chills through higher education. Even though the full funding stoppage was quickly rescinded and subjected to legal challenges, universities probably will continue to face partial pauses on federal funding, as well as questions over the impact of other recent executive actions, like ones aimed at DEI.

While consequential for all of higher education, pending and potential moves by the Trump administration that implicate funding could especially affect what has become an increasingly dominant aspect of multiple universities in terms of budgets and focus—academic medical centers (AMCs). AMCs are major funding recipients from the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation and other federal agencies. AMCs and their health enterprises also are deeply connected to patient care programs like Medicare and Medicaid.

For some higher education institutions, AMCs have come to play a central role in campus life and identity, especially as more AMCs have expanded to become full-fledged health systems. While some raise concerns and others celebrate this trend, the fact remains that some research universities are increasingly shaped by their AMCs. Using our own institution, the University of Kentucky, as one example, its health-care enterprises now account for around $5 billion of an $8.4 billion budget.

Media outlets covered the “confusion and chaos” that beset university presidents, medical center vice presidents, deans and researchers after the initial federal funding freeze. Now that the freeze has been temporarily rescinded, leaders of academic medical centers should move beyond confusion and chaos to focus on public presentations that emphasize their competence, compliance and cooperation with federal reviews. Now is an opportune time to pick up on President Trump’s recent emphasis on “merit” as the key to gaining federal support. University academic medical centers are well positioned to demonstrate and document their case.

To showcase “merit,” for example, a university academic medical center could cite ratings and commentaries about its successful NIH grant proposals, illustrating the talent and competitive advantages of its principal investigators and research teams. And they should emphasize that the NIH-funded research projects are not isolated: They are inseparable from a cooperative network within university health centers and hospitals. Evaluating these complex applied research alliances helps answer external questions about efficiency, effectiveness and significance of projects. The same kinds of questions are continually monitored in analysis of existing and new university degree programs for the education of medical doctors, nurses, physician assistants, pharmacists, medical technicians and health-care administrators. In addition to evaluating the training and preparation of researchers and health-care practitioners, an AMC pays systematic attention to accountability and responsibility for patient care and treatment as part of its daily and annual operations. These stories need to be told.

There are other sources that can be used to document AMC merit and performance. One can look at accreditation reports, specialized degree program reviews and financial balance sheets for the mosaic of health services and programs that are housed under the umbrella of an academic medical center. Institutional data can show that an academic medical center that aligns colleges of medicine and health care with such disciplines as biochemistry, physiology, bioengineering and statistics has evolved into a dynamic institution in which practice and advanced research are intertwined with providing professional services within a community.

A few summary statistics indicate this presence. The top 20 university AMCs each brought in more than $400 million in NIH research grants in fiscal year 2023. Within this group, Johns Hopkins University is first, with $843 million, followed by the University of California, San Francisco, with $789 million, and in third place, the University of Pennsylvania with $703 million. These are the peak of a cluster of 220 university medical centers in which academic programs such as the college of medicine partner with university medical foundations.

The fusion represents a new academic model in which the medical and health programs typically constitute about 60 percent or more of the total university budget. At universities with this structure, the AMC typically is home to a majority of the university faculty positions and student enrollments. The AMC also becomes a major economic force and employer in metropolitan areas and regional communities.

The academic health and medical complexes are economic engines. They often are the largest employer in the metropolitan area or even in the state, such as is the case for the University of Alabama at Birmingham and its health system. Universities in this category are the major provider of health services to large constituencies of patients. This academic health organization includes partnerships with Medicare, Medicaid and private insurance companies. Federal grants for research and service to the university often stimulate state financial support in terms of program grants and capital funding from state legislatures and governors and major gifts from foundations and private donors.

The message for “merit” is that these universities represent a new type of American organization—what might be termed the academic health business model. An abundance of quantitative and qualitative data makes external evaluation and detailed analysis of accountability possible. Sound policy evaluation from several constituencies—the executive branch, Congress, federal and state agencies, university leaders, and patient advocacy groups—calls for thoughtful, informed analysis to review and perhaps renew what has evolved as a distinctive academic enterprise.

A lively dialogue about the promises and benefits of AMCs that includes consideration of recent executive actions and potential future decisions, such as funding levels for Medicaid, is timely. The events of the last two weeks provide a much-needed moment for academic constituencies to reflect on what the expansion of AMCs means for individual research universities and higher education broadly in the future. If a funding freeze causes a chill for AMCs and their health enterprises, does the rest of the campus catch a cold, or even worse?

Recent presidential actions from Washington, D.C., have highlighted how much the budgets and identities of some research universities are more and more defined by their AMCs. In addition to helping AMCs continue to sustain and enhance their vital missions, all higher education groups need to contemplate the implications for universities whose mission and purposes are increasingly characterized and shaped by their academic medical centers.

John R. Thelin is University Research Professor Emeritus at the University of Kentucky. He is the author of several books on the history of higher education.

Neal H. Hutchens is a professor in the Department of Educational Policy Studies and Evaluation at the University of Kentucky. His research focuses on the intersection of higher education law, policy and practice.

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February 7, 2025