Tag: Career

U of Utah Plans to Ax 81 Offerings, Citing New State Law

The University of Utah is cutting 81 offerings in response to state budget reductions and a new law.

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The University of Utah plans to eliminate 81 academic programs and minors—a step that administrators attribute to a new state law that called for “strategic reinvestment” after lawmakers slashed funding to public colleges and universities.

The Republican-controlled Utah Legislature passed House Bill 265 this spring. Lawmakers cut 10 percent of institutions’ state-funded instructional budgets, but the law said they could earn back the money by cutting programs and positions and instead funding “strategic reinvestment.” Institutions’ reinvestment plans must be based on enrollment, completion rates, job placement, wages, program-level costs and local and statewide workforce demands.

Other Utah universities detailed their planned cuts in the spring, but this is the first glimpse at how the state’s flagship will respond to the new law.

The planned cuts at the University of Utah include Ph.D.s in chemical physics, physiology, experimental pathology and in theater; master’s degrees in ballet, modern dance, marketing, audiology and applied mechanics; bachelor’s degrees in chemistry teaching, Russian teaching and German teaching; certificates in public administration, veterans’ studies and computational bioimaging; various minors; and more.

Richard Preiss, president of the university’s Academic Senate, said his body’s Executive Committee reviewed the list of programs. He said that, except for one that the committee persuaded the administration to remove from the list, none had graduated more than one student in the past eight years, according to the university’s data. But a university spokesperson said that “some had zero or one, but some had up to a dozen students. Our threshold to identify inactive or low-enrollment courses was 15.”

Preiss said that while the selection process was accelerated, faculty had enough time to give meaningful input.

“These were relatively easy cuts to make and they were relatively painless,” Preiss said. “I anticipate that more painful ones are on the horizon.”

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August 7, 2025
UC Will “Dialogue” With Feds Over Civil Rights Investigation

The UC system says it will “engage in dialogue with the federal administration” over grant cuts.

Juliana Yamada/Los Angeles Times/Getty Images

The University of California system announced Wednesday that it would negotiate with the federal government. The response comes a day after the Department of Justice’s deadline for the institution to express its interest in finding a “voluntary resolution agreement” to the agency’s investigation into antisemitism on the University of California, Los Angeles, campus.

On the line is—according to a UC estimate—$584 million in funding that at least three different federal agencies announced they were suspending in the week between the DOJ’s July 29 letter to system officials and its Aug. 5 deadline for them to respond.

If the UC system comes to a resolution with the Trump administration, UCLA would become the first public university to openly make a deal with the federal government to restore grant funding. In the past month, Columbia and Brown Universities have agreed to collectively pay hundreds of millions of dollars to get their funding back.

In the two-paragraph statement, UC system president James B. Milliken said, “Our immediate goal is to see the $584 million in suspended and at-risk federal funding restored to the university as soon as possible,” but he argued that the “cuts do nothing to address antisemitism.”

“The extensive work that UCLA and the entire University of California have taken to combat antisemitism has apparently been ignored,” he said. “The announced cuts would be a death knell for innovative work that saves lives, grows our economy, and fortifies our national security. It is in our country’s best interest that funding be restored.”

The DOJ’s July 29 letter to the system said its months-long investigations, which remain ongoing, have so far found that UCLA violated the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 in its response to a protest encampment on its campus in the spring of 2024.

In a press release about the letter, Attorney General Pam Bondi said, “DOJ will force UCLA to pay a heavy price for putting Jewish Americans at risk and continue our ongoing investigations into other campuses in the UC system.” The agency said in the letter that it is prepared to sue by Sept. 2 “unless there is reasonable certainty that we can reach an agreement.”

But the Trump administration still hasn’t made clear what exactly it wants UCLA to do. Unlike with Columbia and Harvard, the federal government hasn’t listed its overarching demands. And the administration doesn’t appear to only be interested in addressing last year’s encampment at UCLA.

In their own letters to UCLA last week, the National Science Foundation and the Energy Department announced funding suspensions, citing UCLA’s failure “to promote a research environment free of antisemitism and bias” and saying it “endangers women by allowing men in women’s sports and private women-only spaces.” Both agencies also accused UCLA of considering race in admissions.

The Health and Human Services agency, which includes the National Institutes of Health, didn’t provide Inside Higher Ed with NIH’s grant suspension letter, and an HHS spokesperson declined to comment Wednesday. A DOJ spokesperson also declined to comment, and the White House didn’t respond to a request for comment. UC system spokespeople didn’t provide interviews or answer written questions.

UCLA chancellor Julio Frenk said in a separate statement that the institution is doing everything it can “to protect the interests of faculty, students and staff—and to defend our values and principles.”

“We will continue to hold town halls, convene office hours and share information with you, particularly those who are in the most directly affected areas,” Frenk told his employees. “This includes departments that rely on funding from the National Science Foundation, National Institutes of Health and Department of Energy.”

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August 7, 2025
Georgetown Fellow Detained by ICE May Resume Work for Now

The Georgetown fellow, an Indian citizen, was released from detention in May.

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A Georgetown University researcher who was detained by immigration agents in March will be allowed to resume his work, at least for now, according to a court settlement released Tuesday. Politico first reported the development.

The agreement does not guarantee that the postdoctoral fellow, Badar Khan Suri, will be able to stay in U.S. long term, and it doesn’t resolve his claim that the government violated his First Amendment rights by detaining him because of his pro-Palestinian comments and what the government claims are ties to Hamas. Those aspects of the case will be determined by a later ruling.

That said, as litigation continues, Suri will be protected, maintain his status as a student and remain employed.

Suri was first released from detention in May. His wife is a citizen, but her father has been identified as a former Hamas adviser, which likely was a key factor that influenced Suri’s arrest, Politico reported.

Both parties in the case agreed the settlement was a result of “good faith” negotiations, Politico noted, though the State Department and Department of Homeland Security declined to comment.

“We are encouraged that the government agreed to restore Dr. Suri and his children’s status and records,” Eden Heilman, an ACLU lawyer representing Suri, told Politico. “We know Dr. Suri is eager to rejoin the academic community at Georgetown and this will give him the opportunity to do that this fall.”

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August 7, 2025
After DOJ Sues, Okla. Ends In-State Tuition for Noncitizens

The U.S. Department of Justice sued the state of Oklahoma Tuesday over a state law that allows undocumented students to pay in-state tuition rates. Oklahoma is now the fourth state the DOJ has sued for having such a policy.

The state’s Republican attorney general, Gentner Drummond, swiftly sided with the federal government and filed a joint motion in support of quashing the law. He said in a statement that it’s “discriminatory and unlawful” to offer noncitizens lower in-state tuition rates “that are not made available to out-of-state Americans.”

“Today marks the end of a longstanding exploitation of Oklahoma taxpayers, who for many years have subsidized colleges and universities as they provide unlawful benefits to illegal immigrants in the form of in-state tuition,” Drummond said.

Now the state and the DOJ await a ruling from the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Oklahoma.

Oklahoma’s quick support for the legal challenge is reminiscent of what happened in Texas when the DOJ sued the state in June: Within hours of the lawsuit, Texas sided with the Justice Department and a judge ruled in favor of a permanent injunction, ending in-state tuition for noncitizens. The DOJ then filed similar lawsuits against Kentucky and Minnesota, though those legal fights are still ongoing.

The lawsuits follow an executive order issued by President Donald Trump in April calling for a crackdown on so-called sanctuary cities and state laws unlawfully “favoring aliens over any groups of American citizens,” citing in-state tuition benefits for noncitizens as an example.

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August 6, 2025
New Survey Measures Student Academic Flourishing in College

A new survey will collect data on academic flourishing among students enrolled in colleges and universities.

Joseph Prezioso/AFP/Getty Images

For prospective students looking to enroll in higher education, there are a variety of institutional factors to consider, among them location, course of study, cost of tuition and campus culture. Various sets of rankings provide additional information that might matter to students, such as spending on research or socioeconomic mobility for graduates.

But one key outcome of higher education remains underappraised, according to Tyler VanderWeele, a professor of epidemiology and biostatistics at Harvard University and director of the Human Flourishing Program: a student’s personal growth.

Many institutions publish lofty mission statements that connect the learning experience to students’ personal growth, leadership skills, vocation and sense of purpose upon graduation. But beyond anecdotal testimony, there are few measures to understand the influence of colleges and universities on student flourishing.

Next spring, Harvard University and Wanderweele are launching a new assessment tool as part of the Human Flourishing Program. The Flourishing Data Collaborative survey asks students to reflect on their college experience and provide their home institution with feedback as to what’s working and what needs additional intervention to affect student thriving.

What’s the need: Researchers created the survey in part to encourage colleges and universities to consider flourishing and student development a core function of the institution.

“I really do believe that what we measure shapes what we discuss, what we aim for, what policies are put in place to achieve those aims,” VanderWeele said. “So the very act of measurement, in some sense, itself constitutes an intervention and might help colleges and universities better pursue this.”

The assessment is not designed as a replacement for other measures of student success, including job placement or retention rates, Wanderweele noted. But sometimes a focus on ranking metrics can shift institutional priorities in a way that neglects the human-centered mission of postsecondary education, he said.

“For example, U.S. News & World Report rankings [have] very much shaped higher education, and people pay a lot of attention to this, but I think it’s also reoriented colleges and universities to specific metrics and ends that will help them go up in those rankings,” VanderWeele said. “Is it really the most important thing how much money has been spent on new student center facilities?”

The program also wants to better understand the role of higher education in promoting student well-being. Large numbers of young people report feeling on edge, lonely, unmoored or directionless, according to a study from Harvard’s Graduate School of Education. To get at this question, the survey asks about a learner’s sense of happiness and meaning and their financial security.

How it works: After promising results from pilot surveys conducted at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Harvard and Campus Bio-Medico University of Rome last year, the annual survey will launch in spring 2026, allowing first-year students to have at least one semester of undergraduate experience under their belts. Learners will respond to 24 questions ranging from “to what extent has university life helped you pursue truth?” to “to what extent has university life helped you to better lead a moral life?”

VanderWeele hopes the survey will serve as a reflection tool for students to consider how education has contributed to their development, but also where they can be self-motivated to improve their well-being.

After data collection is complete, each institution will receive a 50-page report and a dashboard with their survey results, allowing them to filter by specific data points.

What’s next: Presently, the program is recruiting member institutions to participate in the survey and engage in a community of practice, Wanderweele said. The goal is for institutions to gain insight about their current practices, or even assess interventions across several surveys, but also to learn from their peers.

“Our goal with this is not to differentially rank institutions, but to help each of these institutions come together, reflect on their strengths [and] areas for growth and to learn from one another in these different ways,” VanderWeele said.

Institutions will pay an annual $10,000 membership fee to participate, which VanderWeele said is a similar rate to other survey offerings of this kind.

Approximately 20 colleges have indicated interest in membership and another 100 have signed up for an upcoming webinar on Aug. 20 for additional information. VanderWeele said he is hoping a few dozen colleges and universities join the initiative this year.

In addition to providing institution-specific insights and policy recommendations, VanderWeele and his team hope to use survey results to conduct research on human flourishing in higher education in general.

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This article has been updated to correct the spelling of Tyler VanderWeele’s last name.

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August 6, 2025
The Good Enough Manuscript (opinion)

I recently coached a scholar through drafting a proposal for her second book. Her manuscript is almost complete, and our work together involved putting together a strong pitch for a few of the university presses that publish in her field. As she shared the last component of her book proposal with me for feedback, she observed with satisfaction that the proposal was indeed coming together but that the hard part would be working up the nerve to send the project off. If she only knew how many times I’ve seen that “hard part” be the step that kept people from realizing the publishing success they so deserve.

As a professional developmental editor and publishing consultant who has spent the last 10 years helping academics bring their books and articles to print, I’m well-versed in the struggles of the scholarly writer. It’s no small feat to find time to research and write amid other professional obligations (like teaching and service) and personal commitments (like childcare, eldercare and self-care), not to mention national and global turbulence. Those who manage to complete a scholarly manuscript under these conditions should be applauded. But then the writer who has already accomplished so much faces another hurdle: persuading a press or journal to publish the text they’ve written.

A common reaction to this hurdle is to find ways to delay having to confront it. I see writers get stuck in endless rounds of revision, going back and forth about which citations to include, tinkering with sentence structure and word choice, waiting to contact publishers until they’ve landed on the perfect phrasing for their cover letters.

The truth is that the minute details don’t matter as much in the first submission as authors might think, especially at book publishers. You do want to put your best foot forward, to show that you value an editor’s time and that of the peer reviewers who will consider your work for publication. But it’s expected that your manuscript will evolve with the input of peer reviewers and that polishing words and sentences will happen during the final revision and copyediting stages. The writer’s goal when submitting to publishers should therefore not be a perfectly finished text, but a “good enough” manuscript that allows a press or journal to seriously consider whether they want to give a greater platform to the writer’s ideas.

But what constitutes “good enough” in the eyes of scholarly publishers? The first criterion publishers are looking for is a sense of fit with their existing offerings. This actually has little to do with the quality of your writing. It’s more about whether the readership that the press or journal has already cultivated is generally welcoming to the topic, methods and theoretical framework of your piece.

To ensure your manuscript is good enough in the area of fit, do your homework on what your target press or journal has recently published in the last year or two. Get clear on whom you are writing for and find outlets where those readers are already gathering. The risk of rejection goes down exponentially when you send your manuscript to the right place.

Turning to your manuscript itself, before sending it to a publisher, you should evaluate it for what I call the four pillars of scholarly writing: argument, evidence, structure and style. Scholarly manuscripts must have a solid foundation in all four areas to be successful in the publishing process, because each of these fundamental aspects of the text has the potential to make or break the text’s chances of being received well by peer reviewers, getting approved for publication and ultimately reaching readers in the author’s scholarly field and beyond.

Your argument is the main claim that drives your text and that you want readers to accept. Is it clearly stated near the beginning and does it remain present throughout the text? Your evidence backs up the argument for the reader. Do you have sufficient evidence and do you analyze it effectively to guide your reader to the points you want them to accept?

The structure of your manuscript supports the reader in encountering your evidence and absorbing your points in a logical and engaging order. Structural concerns include the way the text is organized into chapters, sections and paragraphs, as well as your use of titles, headings, transitions and other signposts to move your reader along. Have you put thought into why the components of your text are organized the way they are, and have you used appropriate cues to make the structural logic obvious to your reader? By style, I mean the overall presentation of your writing, including how your attitude toward both reader and subject matter shows up on the page. Depending on the publishing venue, the style of a scholarly manuscript may be informal or formal, passionate or detached. Consider what will be most effective with your most important readers and ensure stylistic consistency across your text.

After attending to big-picture matters, you will want to double-check that everything in your text is accurate and that sloppy errors don’t interfere with a reader’s understanding of what you want to say. But resist the temptation to tinker endlessly with superficial details. Everyone’s time, labor and mental fortitude are limited these days, so spend yours where they will get you the greatest return on investment.

Try to reframe the editorial and publication process in your mind, thinking of it not as an adversarial set of gatekeeping encounters—though it can be that at times—but as a process designed to make your work the best it can be before it goes public. Your manuscript doesn’t have to be perfect when entering the process, because you’ll be taking it through several cycles of development before considering it to be finished. There will be multiple opportunities to improve it, and editors, peer reviewers and supportive readers will be alongside to help.

The prospect of hitting “send” on your manuscript can be incredibly nerve-racking, but your ideas can’t reach anyone, let alone do good work in the world, if you don’t put them out there. You must eventually let go of the manuscript so it can go do its work.

Doubts are natural. You may worry that a reader you respect will have reasonable objections or that you’ve missed something important. Perhaps you also worry about exposing yourself to criticism or rejection on the basis of your ideas, identity, background or political beliefs. Such fears are legitimate, especially for those scholars who are already marginalized in the academy. Name these fears and acknowledge that you have a right to feel your anxieties. Then assess whether the actual risks are worth silencing yourself by not putting your work out there at all.

Laura Portwood-Stacer is the author of Make Your Manuscript Work (Princeton University Press, 2025), which offers a practical method to develop scholarly texts for publication, including a list of the most common areas where manuscripts need improvement. She is also the author of The Book Proposal Book (Princeton, 2021) and the Manuscript Works Newsletter, providing weekly guidance for scholarly writers and publishing professionals.

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August 6, 2025
A Framework for Organizing Student Success Efforts (opinion)

From declining enrollments to equity gaps and growing concerns about student belonging, the pressures on colleges and universities—especially those serving first-generation and regional student populations—are intense and unrelenting. We have all read about the enrollment cliffs and seen firsthand how small, regional institutions are being asked to do more with less while still delivering transformational experiences to diverse and increasingly nontraditional learners.

While there is no single solution to these complex and multifaceted challenges, I believe we can and must do better to organize and focus our collective efforts. In my two decades of experience as a mathematics education professor, interim dean, student success leader and first-generation college graduate, I have repeatedly seen the power of synthesizing widely known but often disconnected strategies into coherent, institutionwide models for student success.

That experience led me to develop the ACCESS framework, a holistic and memorable approach that integrates six core pillars essential to supporting students from recruitment through graduation and beyond. These pillars—affinity, community, career, early alert, support and storytelling—are not novel in isolation. However, woven together, they offer a powerful and practical road map for institutions striving to create environments where students not only persist but thrive. Importantly, ACCESS also addresses what I see as a common and costly issue in higher education: fragmentation. Too often, well-intentioned programs exist in silos, failing to produce the sustained, cross-campus impact we seek. ACCESS offers a way to unify these efforts into a clear, student-centered strategy.

Affinity: Fostering Belonging From Day One

Students are more likely to succeed when they feel they belong. This is especially true for first-generation students, underrepresented populations and those navigating higher education in rural or regional settings where campus may feel unfamiliar or disconnected from prior experiences.

Affinity strategies focus on helping students quickly form meaningful connections with peers, faculty and the institution itself. Examples include first-year experience programs, peer mentorship initiatives, themed housing and proactive advising. Institutions that intentionally create these touch points early and often can increase students’ sense of belonging and purpose, which research has shown to be critical predictors of retention and achievement.

Affinity is about more than social engagement—it is about students seeing themselves as valued and capable members of the campus community.

Community: Building Meaningful and Reciprocal Connections

Beyond personal belonging, students benefit from opportunities to engage in shared purpose.

Community-focused strategies emphasize service learning, civic engagement, student organizations and collaborative learning experiences that help students feel connected not only to campus but to broader societal goals. Partnerships with local community and nonprofit organizations create reciprocal value: Students gain real-world experience and social capital while institutions strengthen ties with the communities they serve.

Moreover, community-building activities enhance peer support networks. Students engaged in study groups, cohort models or co-curricular leadership roles often demonstrate higher retention and graduation rates. Creating purposeful, inclusive spaces for students to connect with one another should be viewed as essential, not optional.

Career: Connecting Learning to Life After College

Students increasingly expect—and deserve—a clear connection between their academic experience and future opportunities. Career-connected learning, designed to deepen students’ classroom experiences by connecting skills to real-world occupations, has been shown to increase engagement, motivation, broader sense of purpose and sense of preparedness for employment. But career integration must go far beyond the traditional career center model. It should be infused throughout the student journey.

ACCESS emphasizes career as a core pillar, with a focus on early and ongoing exposure to career pathways, industry partnerships and hands-on learning. Microcredentials, internships, alumni mentoring and project-based courses all help students articulate the value of their degree and build the confidence to pursue their aspirations. When students can see the relevance of their studies to their goals, their motivation, persistence and sense of belonging increase substantially.

Early Alert: Leveraging Data to Intervene and Support

While many institutions have adopted early-alert systems, ACCESS emphasizes the importance of using data in intentional, coordinated ways across campus. A study of more than 16,000 students at a regional university found an early-alert system was effective at identifying students at significantly higher risk of dropping out, even when controlling for academic performance and demographic characteristics. Early-alert systems are not simply about identifying struggling students—they are about creating a culture where faculty, advisers and staff collaborate to proactively support students before issues become crises. Effective systems involve mobilizing cross-campus teams to conduct outreach—through emails, phone calls or in-person check-ins—to improve retention rates and remove barriers ranging from financial hardship to emotional stress.

Early alert requires more than technology. It requires buy-in, training and shared ownership. When done well, it sends a powerful message to students: “You matter, and we are here to help you succeed.”

Support: Providing Comprehensive, Seamless Services

Students’ lives are complex, and so are the challenges they face. ACCESS recognizes that academic success cannot be separated from wellness, financial stability and mental health. Institutions must offer robust, coordinated support systems that meet students where they are and that encompass everything from advising, tutoring and accessibility services to counseling, financial aid navigation and basic needs support. Centralized student success centers, coordinated case management models and wraparound services are all effective ways to ensure that no student falls through the cracks.

Wraparound student support services, especially when delivered through relational, trauma-informed and personalized case management, foster deeper connection and institutional engagement. This in turn supports retention and persistence outcomes. Importantly, support must be framed as a strength, not a deficiency. Normalizing help-seeking behavior and reducing stigma are essential to creating an environment where students feel safe accessing the resources they need.

Storytelling: Creating a Culture of Pride and Narrative

Finally, ACCESS includes a pillar that is often overlooked but profoundly impactful: storytelling. Students are more likely to persist and complete their degrees when they can see themselves as protagonists in their own educational journeys.

Institutions should prioritize sharing student and alumni stories—through social media, newsletters, admissions materials and campus events—to reinforce the value and relevance of the college experience. Equally important is empowering students to reflect on and tell their own stories, helping them make meaning of their experiences and building a sense of pride and ownership. Research suggests that as students reshape their narrative identities, seeing themselves not as outsiders but as capable contributors, they become more engaged and persistent in their academic work.

In my leadership roles, I have seen how storytelling humanizes data and drives institutional momentum. Donors connect emotionally to stories of transformation. Prospective students see possibilities reflected in the experiences of peers. Faculty and staff are reminded of their purpose. Storytelling, when done authentically, becomes a unifying force.

Putting ACCESS Into Action

The ACCESS framework is not prescriptive or rigid. Rather, it is an adaptable model that provides institutions with a common language and conceptual map for aligning efforts across recruitment, retention, student support and advancement.

I am mindful that the individual strategies embedded in ACCESS are not new. What is new—and, I believe, urgently needed—is a simple, memorable framework that helps institutions avoid fragmented initiatives and instead build integrated, student-centered ecosystems.

Importantly, ACCESS should not exist outside of the academic mission. Its greatest potential lies in integration with the curriculum. Faculty play a vital role in fostering belonging, connecting coursework to careers, identifying students in need of support and empowering students to reflect on their learning. When academic and co-curricular strategies align, student success becomes not a separate initiative but a seamless and transformative part of the college experience.

ACCESS can serve as a guide for cabinet-level planning, cross-departmental working groups, strategic enrollment management and assessment. It offers a way to bring together academic affairs, student affairs, advancement and community partners around a shared vision for student success.

As higher education faces unprecedented challenges, we must embrace models that are not only evidence-based but also intuitive and human-centered. I invite my colleagues across higher education to consider how ACCESS—or similar integrative models—might provide clarity, cohesion and inspiration as we work collectively to support the students we serve.

Laura J. Jacobsen is the chair of the Department of Mathematics and Statistics and a professor of mathematics education at Radford University.

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August 6, 2025
Why College Deferred Maintenance Is a Growing Risk

Declining student numbers, funding reductions, rising personnel costs and policy changes at the state and federal level pose the biggest financial risks to institutions, according to Inside Higher Ed’s recent annual survey of chief business officers with Hanover Research. Those issues are consistent with an overall threat to higher education: that federal policy and economic uncertainty are stressing a sector already teetering on enrollment and demand cliffs.

Yet underneath those challenges lies another, less headline-grabbing danger: delayed upkeep and repairs to infrastructure and assets.

More on the Survey

Inside Higher Ed’s 15th annual Survey of College and University Chief Business Officers was conducted by Hanover Research. The survey included 169 chief business officers, mostly from public and private nonprofit institutions, for a margin of error of 7 percent. The response rate was 7 percent. A copy of the free report can be downloaded here.

On Wednesday, Aug. 20, at 2 p.m. Eastern, Inside Higher Ed will present a free webcast to discuss the results of the survey, with experts who can answer your most pressing questions about higher education finance—including how to plan effectively amid the current financial and policy uncertainty. Register here.

One in three surveyed CBOs (36 percent) identified infrastructure/deferred maintenance costs as a top financial risk to their institution, just behind state and/or federal policy changes—and ahead of options such as technology investment requirements, increased market competition (including from alternative credential providers), potential changes to international student enrollment and changes in student athletics revenue and name, image and likeness deals.

Most CBOs also say they’re at least moderately concerned about their institution’s ability to fund deferred maintenance and facility needs, with 11 percent extremely concerned and another quarter (25 percent) very concerned.

How bad is the problem? Just 1 percent of institutions represented were on track to fund no deferred maintenance in the then-current fiscal year (the survey was live in April and May). But another 63 percent were only poised to fund up to a quarter of identified needs. This is consistent across public and private nonprofit institutions.

By institution type, public doctoral university CBOs were most likely to report funding a quarter or less, at 89 percent. Community college CBOs were least likely to report this, at 44 percent. Still, just about a third of community college CBOs expected their institution to fund more than half of identified needs.

Across higher education, deferred maintenance needs span aging HVAC systems, roofs and dorms; buildings in need of rewiring; and more. Technical deferred maintenance, such as addressing choppy Wi-Fi, is another concern. These aren’t the flashy projects that attract donors or drive capital campaigns (exceptions notwithstanding). But they matter in terms of curb appeal and functionality. Prospective students notice the state of facilities. Dingy classrooms and buildings are current students’ learning and living conditions, and employees’ working conditions. Deferred maintenance may translate to safety or accessibility issues (think sidewalks and elevators). And problems only compound over time, meaning deferred maintenance can—and does—escalate to larger, costlier repairs.

Richard G. Mills Jr., president and CEO of United Educators, a liability insurance and risk management services provider, said that underfunding depreciation has “long been in the bag of tools that institutions will turn to in times of financial stress.” It’s never been a “great practice,” he continued, “but I understand why it happens, and there is even an argument that in the past era of growth—in endowments, tuition, philanthropy and student population—it wasn’t an outlandish way to approach what were largely temporary downturns.”

Now all that has changed, said Mills, a former college chief administrative, business and operating officer: “The forward environment is unlikely to be one of growth,” with philanthropy, tuition revenue and student populations “certain to remain flat or decline for some time.”

In this light, using deferred maintenance as a tool is simply delaying an expense whose cost is likely to compound at a significant rate, he added.

Ruth Johnston, vice president of consulting for the National Association of College and University Business Officers, agreed that deferred maintenance “is a very big and growing issue for universities and colleges and has been for many years.”

Public colleges and universities are often hardest hit, Johnston said, as state legislators “prefer to fund new capital projects over providing funds for the less glamorous options of deferred maintenance.” And unless universities and colleges “intentionally create budgets, and consistently add funds to them, they don’t prioritize deferred maintenance and often only pay for emergency needs.”

The shiny-object phenomenon isn’t exclusive to public institutions. Mills recalled, for example, how a dean at a private institution once said he wasn’t worried about underfunding because when major renewal was required, “he would simply run a capital campaign to build a new building.”

In addition to the findings on deferred maintenance, the survey also suggests that some institutions are rethinking their physical campuses amid shifting enrollment and study trends. About two in five respondents (41 percent) report that their institution is retaining its current physical campus footprint but investing in renovations. Another 34 percent report targeted expansion, or moderate growth in specific areas. But relatively few CBOs report either strategic downsizing or significant expansion.

Deferred maintenance expenses can sometimes be bundled into other project budgets. But uncertainty and other factors are slowing or halting even capital spending on many campuses—even if strategic downsizing isn’t yet a major trend.

Seth Odell, founder of Kanahoma, an education marketing agency, underscored the gravity of the deferred maintenance backlog, saying it “feels like it’s a part of a broader death spiral many institutions have found themselves in.”

“We often treat deferred maintenance as a facilities or finance issue, but it’s increasingly a strategic enrollment risk—and one that’s compounding year over year,” he said. “I’ve worked with institutions where students are literally walking past shuttered buildings on campus tours, or sweating through admitted-student events due to outdated HVAC systems. In a competitive enrollment environment, these realities are no longer just aesthetic. They’re affecting yield.”

Compounding Problems, (Radical) Solutions

Even before it downgraded its higher education outlook in March due to federal policy uncertainty, Moody’s Ratings had warned that a “large and growing backlog of capital needs posed a significant credit risk for the higher education sector.” In a report last summer, Moody’s said that $750 billion to $950 billion of spending would be needed over the next decade for just its approximately 500 rated colleges and universities to make “significant headway toward reducing deferred maintenance, upgrading facilities and building the new projects that are critical to strategic positioning.”

“Colleges and universities that are unable to offer updated facilities, advanced technology and an attractive physical environment risk losing competitive standing,” Moody’s said at the time.

Construction cost data firm Gordian documented in its most recent “State of Facilities in Higher Education” report “ongoing curtailment of campus expansions as institutions take stock of what they will really need to own and operate,” plus shortfalls in the funding of needed campus renewal investments of more than 32 percent. It valued the backlog of capital renewal needs at over $140 per gross square foot.

The situation isn’t likely to improve anytime soon. Emily Raimes, associate managing director at Moody’s, told Inside Higher Ed that amid growing economic and policy uncertainty, “many institutions are adopting a more cautious approach to financial planning. This shift in strategy may lead to a deceleration or postponement of capital investment initiatives.”

Shrinking the footprint of a college campus is a real opportunity for colleges and universities to move forward and save money.”

—Consultant John Woell

F. King Alexander, who served as president of Louisiana State University from 2013 to 2020, said that deferred maintenance needs increased $30 million per year at the Baton Rouge campus alone during his tenure. The university “cobbled” together only about $8 to $10 million annually to address emergency issues, he said, so the problem still grew by about $20 million annually “despite what we were able to do.”

“We used a lot of duct tape,” he said.

Louisiana last year passed legislation designed to fund deferred maintenance and capital improvements at state institutions. It will take years and consistent support to tackle the state’s $2 billion backlog.

Alexander, now a professor of educational leadership at Florida Gulf Coast University, is currently involved in an ongoing national study that draws on the insights of chief community college financial officers. Based on that research, completed with colleagues at the University of Alabama’s Education Policy Center, only “marginal” progress has been made in facilities since 2007, as institutions “still have the same needs, the same backlogs, the same increases in maintenance and the same lack of planning,” he said. In 2024, the largest areas of deferred maintenance and facility problems for community colleges included science labs, classroom spaces and computer labs.

“States have consistently shifted their deferred maintenance costs from state government to the public colleges and universities over the last three decades,” Alexander said. “In other words, to student tuition and fees.”

Odell described deferred maintenance as “both a symptom and an accelerant of the bigger financial reckoning” now facing higher education.

For tuition-dependent institutions especially, he added, “it’s a vicious cycle. Declining enrollment leads to reduced revenue, which leads to deferred investments, which in turn erode the very experience that drives enrollment.”

Odell did note some “success stories,” including Southern New Hampshire University, which has been able to work somewhat in reverse, “using surplus generated from online enrollment growth to completely revamp and reimagine their campus experience.”

Among other strategies, the consultancy EAB recommends that campus leaders create maintenance endowments that will support a building’s “true needs” across its life cycle—not just construction.

John Woell, principal at Manitou Passage Consultancy, offered his own suite of suggestions—some of them unconventional: replacing faculty and staff offices with more flexible workspace arrangements, known as “hoteling”; being clear about needs, including how each campus space supports the college’s mission; and ending gifts in perpetuity by pivoting to “sponsorships.”

“If a gift pays to build a space that has a likely useful life span of 50 years, allow renaming at the end of the 50 years.”

Bigger picture, Woell said, “Shrinking the footprint of a college campus is a real opportunity for colleges and universities to move forward and save money.”

Alexander agreed that campus-based solutions such as rethinking physical spaces and even downsizing make sense where enrollment is not growing. But he stressed the importance of public investment in higher education—including more reliable state funding for deferred maintenance expenses at public institutions.

“This is a huge issue that presidents have to deal with that nobody’s talking about.”

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August 6, 2025
FSA Launches Beta Version of FAFSA

The beta version of the financial aid application portal was released Monday, Aug. 4.

Photo illustration by Justin Morrison/Inside Higher Ed | SimoneN/iStock/Getty Images

The Office for Federal Student Aid made history this week, launching the test version of this year’s Free Application for Federal Student Aid earlier than ever before, Aaron Lemon-Strauss, executive director of the FAFSA program, announced in a LinkedIn post Monday.

It marks the beginning of “the next chapter in making higher ed more accessible,” he wrote.

This comes less than two years after the botched rollout of what was supposed to be a simpler FAFSA form for the 2024–25 academic year. The opening of that year’s application platform, which typically occurs in October, was delayed until the very end of the year. And even when it launched in late December 2023, it had a myriad of glitches, significantly delaying financial aid award processing for colleges and students.

For the next FAFSA cycle, the Education Department revamped its planning processing, bringing in an outsider to lead the effort. The launch of the 2025–26 FAFSA was slightly delayed, but the agency spent months testing the form before opening it up to all students. Now, for the 2026–27 FAFSA, the application is set to open on time on Oct. 1.

To meet that deadline, the department kicked off several weeks of selective beta testing this week, starting with a small number of students and families. The plan is for the beta version to become public in early September. By launching ahead of schedule, the department hopes to boost application completion rates, improve troubleshooting tools for financial aid advisers and increase overall speed of the process, Lemon-Strauss explained.

“As we celebrate this milestone, we also push forward,” he said, “building a FAFSA that truly meets the evolving needs of students, families, and schools.”

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August 6, 2025
The Resilience of First-Generation Students

First-generation students face a host of barriers when they go to college. Terms commonly used in higher ed, like “registrar,” “provost” or “credit hours,” can be mystifying. They’re confronted with a hidden curriculum, a set of unspoken expectations for how to succeed. And they don’t always know whom to turn to for help.

But a new book, the first of three volumes on first-generation students, argues that these challenges, while important to study, offer an incomplete picture of who these students are.

The book, How First-Generation Students Navigate Higher Education Through an Embrace of their Multiple Identities (Routledge, 2025), explores in a series of essays how different identities, including class and race, affect the first-generation student experience and how these students bring unique strengths and assets to the classroom. It also offers guidance to different types of institutions about how to support first-generation students better and highlights colleges and universities that have modeled successful reforms and programs. Some of the essays are research-focused and written by scholars, while others are personal narratives authored by first-generation college graduates.

Co-editor Matt Daily, assistant vice president and dean of students at Idaho State University, spoke with Inside Higher Ed about why he’s working to change the discourse around first-generation students, alongside his co-editors, University of Portland professors SimonMary Asese Aihiokhai and Layla Garrigues. The conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Q: A theme throughout this book is the idea that too often first-generation students are studied through a deficit-focused lens that emphasizes their challenges rather than their strengths. Why was it important to you to shift that approach?

A: For a long time, when we’ve talked about first-gen, we’ve come in thinking that they need something, that they are lacking something, and I think for the last five years or so, that narrative has really shifted. It’s shifted from “What are they lacking?” to “What are they contributing?”

As we were doing a lot of research, as we were having a lot of conversations, while that’s something that we’re talking about at our respective institutions and starting to do more across the United States and beyond, it’s still something that we have to keep reminding ourselves is important—to really focus on the assets or the strengths that students bring.

And so, we thought that when we were dreaming up this project—and that’s a fun story, too, about how it came to be—we thought it really needs to be based in the strengths. And it would be so nice for practitioners, scholars, students, that they could find that the real theme and the real foundation and the real thread through it is the strengths of first-gen students, and what it is that they’re really bringing to these college campuses.

Q: What are some of the strengths and assets of first-generation students that you think are too often overlooked?

A: There’s really no one-size-fits-all for first-gen. Each first-gen student is as unique as the experience itself. I think that’s actually one trap we fall into: We really have to take each case as they come in and create that space.

In the introduction, I mention how Tara Yosso talks about her “community cultural wealth” model and cultural capital and talks about this idea of [ties to] family and culture [as] strengths. I think those are strengths that are really important. Laura Rendón also talks about—what Yosso was saying and building on it—this idea of ganas or perseverance, which is that ability to really develop inner strength and becoming self-reliant and determined to succeed.

There’s something about first-gen students where they are just so gritty. They really stick with it, and they are so inspiring. I love the way that they’re able to sort of exist in multiple worlds. I could have my college world, my peers, but also a lot of first-gen students work, so I can have that world, and then my family, and then maybe I’m from a different country. Really understanding how to exist in all those different worlds and being able to do that successfully, I think that is an incredible strength.

My biggest criticism of first-gen students is that they are too humble. They don’t think that their story is worthy enough to share. They don’t think it has worth, and I think they’re dismissive [of themselves], and that is my biggest criticism. Because for the amount of different first-gen students we have, there are an equal amount of stories that come with them. We need to encourage them to really share those and know that they have worth.

Q: Going off of that, you interspersed scholarly research with student narratives in this essay collection. Why was it important to you to include both perspectives?

A: That was really intentional. I think that the student voice gets ignored if we’re just talking about theory. If we’re going to talk about students, we need to hear their voice, right? It needs to be expressed, and we need to really have that authentic perspective. And so that was something we talked about early on in the project … especially in the last chapter, where we wanted to have students themselves or recent graduates share.

And I think that there’s equally as much value in terms of the research as to what the students are expressing, as they’re sort of in the moment, so to speak. I think [it’s important] even just coaching students that their voice matters … that you can go up and talk to senior administrators … and there’s value in that. I think that was one thing we were really hoping with this anthology was that maybe a graduate student or an undergraduate student could read that and feel inspired and go, “Oh, you know, this is something I could see myself doing,” and really get that spark, too. Gosh, if that happened, I would be over the moon.

Q: The book also emphasizes taking an intersectional approach to serving first-generation students. What does that mean to you? And what do you think we miss when we don’t factor in these students’ other identities?

A: I think that’s just so important. And I have to kind of acknowledge my own positionality. I’m a white male. And I am not first-gen. I will never understand a lot of these identities because I don’t identify that way. And so that’s something that’s been a part of my own journey. That was why it was so important with Simon, myself and Layla—we’re just a diverse collection. And then when you get to the other contributors, they do identify in a variety of different ways.

But that being said, identity is so important to the cultural richness of our college campuses. When I talk to college students, we talk about their gender identity, and sometimes that can be fluid; we talk about their racial or ethnic identity. We talk about their sexual identity, even their academic identity—meaning, what does it mean when I go from high school to college? Does that academic identity come into question when I experience different levels of success? But I think a lot of those identities we talk about, they’re visible. A lot of those identities we can see.

First-gen is not one of them. And that’s what’s interesting about being first-gen is you will never see physically if someone is first-gen. And so, it’s sort of this hidden identity. In a lot of my experiences working with first-gen students, I almost feel that I’ve outed them. When I explain to them, “Hey, I think you’re first-generation based on the information you’ve given me,” there’s a variety of different reactions, because it’s sort of a later-emerging identity. It’s not maybe one that’s discussed when a student is in elementary school, [with someone telling them], “Hey, you’re going to be a first-generation college student.” And so, I think what’s interesting is when you talk about this identity with other first-gen students, it’s one of many that intersect. But I think the timing of the intersection is so different for every first-gen student, if that makes sense.

In my previous role in Portland, when I would reach out to say, “I think you’re a first-gen student,” a lot of students would say, “No, I don’t want to be a first-gen student,” because they would think me identifying them in that way is something that’s negative. And part of that was really [making] that shift and going, “I am identifying you based on your mom and dad’s educational history or parent or guardian, and you might be first-gen—and that is so beautiful. Let’s celebrate that.”

I can be first-gen and a male or first-gen and African American male or I can be first-gen and a student athlete. What do those identities mean? Just being able to share what that identity means is so important for why a student is in college.

And I think that they forget that even as they graduate and go on to whatever’s next after college, to share that they’re first-gen is something that graduate schools, employers, what have you—they really value that.

It’s been programmed for so long that this is such a deficit. We’re working really hard at institutions to say, “Yeah, share that out—because of those qualities we talked about, this makes you a valuable part of this community.”

Q: I thought it was interesting that multiple chapters described how first-generation students can feel isolated from campus life, but also that campus life made them feel isolated from their home lives and families. How do you see the role of family and community for first-generation students’ success, and how do you think higher ed institutions can better account for that?

A: We assume that for first-gen students, when they go to college, that their families are behind it 100 percent, and that is not always the case. I think a lot of times the person that’s the most in favor of them going to college is themselves. And there’s a lot of, you know, “Why don’t you just work at the store?” The argument to convince others to go to college sometimes falls on the first-gen student, and we forget that. And so that kind of carries on through the experience, [family] going, “Why do you need to go to these programs?” or “Why do you need to go abroad?” It’s sort of having to be the explainer and the decoder for college life, and that is a lot for one student.

And so, I think that there is some push and pull with families sometimes, because the family wants to be supportive, but they don’t know how to be supportive strategically. In talking to a lot of families, I’ve coached them, saying, “Hey, you can just call your daughter or son and just say, ‘I love you. I support you doing this. I don’t know how I can strategically do that, but I want you to know I support you.’” That type of thing just goes so far.

The thing that’s also interesting, to your point about feeling isolated, we talk about programs and strategies that can really help first-gen students. But also on college campuses, the onus is on the student. You need to go do these things to be successful. And that’s not a first-gen thing, that’s a college thing. And I sort of push back on that. I think it’s on the institution to really create these spaces, to make students feel welcome, that they belong, that they matter, that they feel that they can have some sense of value in these spaces with their peers. And going back to first-gen identity, they’re not going to know who else is first-gen unless we create spaces where the students can find who else among their peer group is. And so, I think you kind of have to shift it a little bit.

They maybe feel isolated from family because we’re asking them to do a lot of things, such as engage with campus community, campus life, but sometimes that might come into conflict with what they’re being asked to do with their families, whether it’s watch my little brother or go to Grandma’s birthday party. That happened one time where a student really had to negotiate why they had to be on campus that first weekend of school for a lot of the programming [when] they were going to miss Grandma’s birthday. It really puts them in this code-switching situation where they feel isolated because they don’t feel anyone really gets what they’re going through.

Q: The book also offers a lot of concrete advice on how to better structure services and support for first-generation students and ensure they’re engaged and able to take advantage of opportunities like internships and study abroad. What do you think are some of the practical action steps you want to see higher ed leaders take away after reading this book?

A: I think high-impact practices are so important.

We talk so much about what student success means—what does it mean to have a sense of belonging, that type of thing—but I think one thing we really don’t talk a lot about is, other than the degree that the students are seeking, what is it that we really want them to take away from the college experience? What type of skills? Do we want them to think critically? Do we want them to be really engaged with the community? I think that we need to be really intentional on our college campuses about talking about what we want the students to take away, besides the degree. That can really help them in their next step. And I hope that maybe this book can talk a little bit about that. Can we really reimagine what we’re trying to do rather than just be very transactional about the degree?

I hope that they realize that it’s important to invest in this, that we need to invest in sustainable programs. Because I think a lot of times, what you have happen is different leaders or champions of first-gen work will leave institutions and then these initiatives really fizzle out. So, how can we think strategically that it’s not about the person, it’s about the program and initiatives. I think some of the things we talk about in here are almost a love letter to higher education institutions to say, “Look, this population is worth investing in, and it’s not just a one-size-fits-all, but if we can all adopt something that’s really creative and sustainable, all these students across the United States and even globally can benefit.”

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August 6, 2025