Tag: Education

Probe Into Alleged UMD President Plagiarism Cost Up to $600K

Pines was cleared of misconduct last month.

University of Maryland, College Park

The University System of Maryland and its flagship College Park institution are refusing to release the report of an investigation into whether the flagship’s president committed academic misconduct. That probe cost at least $199,999 and may have cost up to $600,000, The Baltimore Banner reported.

In fall 2024, The Daily Wire, a conservative news outlet, alleged that President Darryll Pines lifted 1,500 words from a tutorial website for a 5,000-word paper he co-authored in 2002 and later reused that same text for a 2006 publication. Pines said the claims were meritless, but Joshua Altmann, who wrote the text Pines was accused of lifting, told Inside Higher Ed, “I do consider it to be plagiarism.”

The investigation, led by a law firm, extended to other articles Pines wrote, and it took more than a year. On Dec. 12, system officials released a statement saying an investigation committee “found no evidence of misconduct on the part of President Pines.”

“The committee did determine that the two works highlighted last year contained select portions of text previously published by another author in the introductory sections,” the statement said. “In a separate text, a discrepancy in assignment of authorship was made. However, President Pines was not found responsible for the inclusion of such text in any of the three works, nor was he found responsible for scholarly misconduct of any kind.”

But neither the system nor College Park released the investigative report. College Park spokesperson Katie Lawson referred Inside Higher Ed’s request for the report to the University System of Maryland. System spokesperson Michael Sandler wrote in an email that, “as a personnel record under the Maryland Public Information Act and per UMD’s Policy on Integrity and Responsible Conduct in Scholarly Work, the report is confidential.”

The Banner, citing documents it received through a public records request, reported that Ropes & Gray, the international law firm hired for the investigation, had a $1,200 hourly billing rate, was paid $199,999 during an “inquiry phase” and received another contract that allowed the total to grow no larger than $600,000.

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January 9, 2026
Punished for Paying Loans Back

This week we paid for The Girl’s last semester at college. Barring catastrophe, I have filled out my last FAFSA. I won’t miss those at all. We managed to get her through college without her (or us) taking out loans, so when she graduates she’ll be in the best position to launch that we could give her.

That’s good in itself, of course, but I also learned recently that it’s good for another reason. A few months ago we paid off The Boy’s student loans. The loans had been in his name, as traditional student loans are. When we paid them off, his credit score took a hit!

I am not making that up.

As a young man starting out his adult career—weighing options for places to live, thinking about medical school(s), grappling seriously with adult choices around locations and relationships—taking a swift kick in the credit score has real impact. He doesn’t have enough spare capital lying around to, say, buy a house for cash. At 24, most people don’t. I certainly didn’t. A new place and/or a new tuition bill will require debt, which is more expensive when your credit score is lower. It’s a sort of poverty tax, except that the proceeds go to banks.

People who take out student loans get criticized for not paying them off, but then also get punished for paying them off. I don’t blame him for being frustrated.

This perverse outcome happened in a close-to-best-case scenario: He finished his degree, got a job in his field and got parental help paying off the loans. Most students would gladly trade scenarios, and yet …

I know it’s culturally double-edged, but it’s still true that minimizing student loan debt is a great argument for starting at a community college. Intro to Psychology doesn’t vary that much from one college to another; why go into debt to pay double or triple what you could have paid? My own kids proved stubbornly immune to that argument—they knew what they wanted, and they are their own people—but it’s still true.

At least The Girl has managed to get through without loans, so she’ll be spared the no-win choice he faced. She’ll have her own challenges, but not that particular one.

Of course, the right policy way to address scenarios like these is to recognize that they’re structural and therefore the correct response is structural. Giving public colleges and universities the funding they need to do their jobs without annual tuition increases would obviate much of the need for loans in the first place; add support for student basic needs, and the space for loans would get even smaller. Making loans moot would get around the double bind of either paying back or not paying back and would do so regardless of whether students have parents who can afford to help. On a broader level, working toward a more equitable economy—one in which young people just starting out could afford homes, say—would do a world of good. In the meantime, moving to interest-free loans would offer much more bang for the buck without violating any major cultural norms.

In the meantime, though, can we at least agree to stop punishing people who actually pay off their loans? What would we rather have people do?

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January 9, 2026
West Florida Finalizes Hire of Former GOP Lawmaker

The University of West Florida approved the hire of former Republican lawmaker Manny Diaz Jr. Thursday, seven months after he was appointed interim following a search critics saw as flawed.

Diaz was the only candidate to emerge from a group of 84 applicants, according to past board statements. His elevation prompted faculty questions about why a more robust pool was not considered and whether Diaz could be properly evaluated for the job when there were no other finalists to weigh him against. Diaz, who has split his career between education and politics, must still be approved by the Florida Board of Governors, a body he served on for three years in his role as state education commissioner from 2022 to 2025. Before taking on that job, Diaz was a member of the State Legislature from 2012 to 2022.

Between his base salary and other perks, he’ll earn nearly $1 million a year.

Diaz joins a slew of other Republican politicians who have ascended to a top job at one of Florida’s 40 public institutions. Among the 12 institutions in the State University System of Florida, seven are led by former GOP lawmakers or others with ties to Republican governor Ron DeSantis. Multiple institutions in the 28-member Florida College System are also led by ex-politicos.

Process Concerns

The UWF Board of Trustees formally signed off on hiring Diaz on Thursday in a meeting that began with a statement of concern from a faculty member during the public comment section.

Faculty Senate vice president Amy Mitchell-Cook told the board she had heard concerns from faculty, staff, students and community members about the legitimacy of the search effort.

“I have served on and/or chaired several academic searches. If the committee in any of those searches thought that only one candidate was qualified, the search would have been reopened and expanded,” Mitchell-Cook told trustees. “If the search truly produced only one worthy candidate to bring on campus, then this should be considered a failed search. If, however, there were other worthy candidates, then the perception is that this search was predetermined or flawed.”

Mitchell-Cook also questioned whether the search complied with Florida Board of Governors policies and argued that the unusual nature of the search created doubts about the legitimacy of the effort.

Faculty Senate president Heather Riddell, a voting member of the UWF Board of Trustees, expressed similar concerns. Riddell was the lone vote against hiring Diaz at Thursday’s meeting, noting that her dissent was not aimed at the candidate but rather a questionable search process.

“As a public institution, we are accountable to taxpayers and our community,” Riddell said.

She pointed to a FLBOG regulation that stipulates a university must advance three applicants, unless there are extenuating circumstances, which she said there did not appear to be. Ultimately, she said, “Stakeholders are left without a clear understanding of the decision.”

But Riddell was outnumbered by trustees supportive of Diaz, including some who have worked for Diaz in the political arena. Trustee Ashley Ross, for instance, was a contracted fundraiser for Diaz from 2018 to 2022, a fact she acknowledged in an email to Inside Higher Ed and at the meeting.

“Since that time, I have had no business or employment relationships with him. I have consulted legal counsel, and it has been determined that I have no voting conflicts,” she wrote by email.

Public records show that Diaz spent tens of thousands of dollars with the trustee’s firm, Ross Consulting. Diaz also appointed her husband, Scott Ross, to the Florida Education Foundation Board of Directors in 2022, along with current UWF board chair Rebecca Matthews, who also voted to hire him Thursday.

Conflict of Interest Concerns

The hiring process wasn’t the only concern that critics raised about Diaz.

On Monday someone using the pseudonym ConcernedArgonaut—the UWF athletics moniker—wrote to state officials to express concerns about Diaz’s leadership as state education commissioner, as well as a potential charter school project under discussion at UWF.

The writer pointed out a recent financial debacle at the Florida Department of Education, noting that an audit found that the state mismanaged its school voucher system under Diaz—Florida lost track of 30,000 students and the voucher program cost $398 million more than planned under Diaz’s leadership. The writer also referenced Diaz’s personal bankruptcy in 2012 and questioned whether the new president was capable of managing UWF’s budget.

ConcernedArgonaut also noted “Diaz’s deep connections to the Florida charter school industry.” The letter pointed out that Diaz once worked for Doral College, which is connected to Academica, a large education company that provides services to more than 200 charter schools. Shortly after Diaz announced that a prospective charter school could be coming to the UWF campus, a website for Somerset University Preparatory Academy surfaced, advertising “A Private Elementary School located on the Beautiful University of West Florida Campus.”

The address listed on the website is the same as UWF’s School of Education.

The board did not ask Diaz about financial mismanagement concerns in a Thursday interview preceding the vote but offered him a chance to address the charter school discussions.

Diaz dismissed the charter school concerns as “completely erroneous,” telling the board that discussions about establishing a school preceded his time there. He also said UWF would need approval from both trustees and the state before it could open a charter school on its campus.

Independent journalist Kevin Danko, who writes the Higher Ed Heist newsletter, also flagged a potential conflict of interest in Diaz’s recent involvement with a new company called MDJ Consulting Group. The company was opened several months after Diaz was hired as interim, following the resignation of UWF president Martha Saunders, who stepped down in May amid tensions with trustees.

A UWF spokesperson told Danko that the company “is Manny’s wife’s LLC” and was established “for special education consulting services.” Diaz, however, is also on the business filing. UWF spokesperson Brittany Sherwood told Inside Higher Ed by email the “LLC is for outside activity, allowed within the terms of his contract,” such as “consulting, speaking engagement, etc.”

She added that work with the consulting firm is “separate from any University affairs.”

Danko also shared records with Inside Higher Ed that show Diaz was already picking out office furniture in September. Those records show furniture package options ranging from $49,379 to $54,216.

Sherwood wrote that standard practice at UWF is that “when a departing president returns to faculty, existing office furniture moves with them, leaving the space unfurnished. As a result, new furniture was required regardless of who serves as the next president.”

“Furnishings were purchased with the intent of creating a long-term legacy office that will remain in place for many years and serve future University leadership,” she added. “The timing of the purchase does not reflect a predetermined outcome of the presidential search, which was conducted in accordance with Board of Governors regulations and Florida statute.”

But Danko believes the UWF presidential search was a rigged game all along.

“It’s clear that this is done according to an established plan, a template they’ve worked to perfect for installing state university system presidents,” he wrote by email. “Stack the board of trustees so they can install an unqualified non-academic with political connections as interim president of the school, using the interim period to graft credentials onto the candidate that can give a minimal appearance of legitimacy. Wait 6 months, pretend it wasn’t the plan all along, [and] hold an expensive, sham search process revealing the interim president as the best candidate all along.”

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January 9, 2026
Parenting Students Bear the Brunt of Federal Cuts

Student parents are facing the ripple effects of a volatile federal policy landscape.

Photo illustration by Justin Morrison/Inside Higher Ed | RichVintage/E+/Getty Images

Cuts to federal funding that supported students of color and undocumented students dominated headlines in the first year of the Trump administration. But advocates for student parents say the administration has gutted benefit programs these students rely on, leaving a fifth of the country’s college students vulnerable to financial hardship or even at risk of stopping out.

Federal funds for programs providing a critical element of support for student parents, childcare, could be frozen or canceled. In a recent example, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services froze billions of dollars in childcare and family assistance funds to five Democrat-led states, citing fraud concerns. About $2.4 billion in Childcare and Development Fund grants and $7.35 billion in Temporary Assistance for Needy Families funds are on the line.

The Education Department also nixed grants for on-campus childcare at more than a dozen colleges this summer; ED officials claimed the institutions didn’t hire childcare staff based on merit or hired staff who taught gender identity and racial justice to children. Funding for the federal grant program Child Care Access Means Parents in School (CCAMPIS) was already uncertain after Trump recommended axing it in his proposed budget for 2026.

Childcare “is a lifeline for parenting college students,” said Nicole Lynn Lewis, a former parenting student and founder and CEO of Generation Hope, a nonprofit that supports student parents. “To have that support significantly reduced, frozen, taken away, attacked, threatened—that is a major blow to families’ ability to excel and to be able to experience economic mobility.”

In their efforts to close the Department of Education, officials also shuffled responsibility for CCAMPIS over to HHS. The move risks adding new layers of confusion and bureaucracy to a program that already only reaches a small fraction of parenting students, Lewis said. Parents make up a fifth of the tens of millions of college students across the country, and CCAMPIS serves about 11,000 of them.

But childcare isn’t the only worry. Advocates say recent cuts to public benefits are also a major concern for parenting students.

The One Big Beautiful Bill Act will reduce funding to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, by about $186 billion over 10 years. The legislation also made some of SNAP’s work requirements more restrictive. While parents with dependent children are still exempt from certain work requirements, a dependent is now defined as below age 14, instead of 18, meaning more parents will now need to work 80 hours per month to qualify for benefits long term. OBBBA will also slash $990 billion from Medicaid over the course of a decade and make its requirements more restrictive.

Mark Huelsman, director of policy and advocacy at the Hope Center for Student Basic Needs, emphasized that parenting students are more likely than other students to participate in these public benefit programs because of financial hardship and because parenting young children or participating in TANF helps them gain SNAP eligibility. About 30 percent of parenting students are estimated to be on Medicaid or SNAP. But that also means these students are bound to be disproportionately affected when public benefits take a beating.

“I think the goal of any administration or policymakers that care about student success should be to provide as comprehensive supports as possible for this population,” Huelsman said, noting parents already face barriers to graduating. “I think we’ve seen the exact opposite over the past year.”

State higher education budgets might also take a hit as states try to make up for cuts to Medicaid, leaving institutions with fewer resources to support parenting students, said Carrie Welton, a former parenting student and senior policy strategist at Trellis Strategies, an education consulting firm.

“When states are looking for ways to cut costs, [higher ed] is one of the first things on the chopping block,” Welton said.

She also worries that a general sense of political and economic uncertainty may drive parents to disenroll.

“Even though their economic circumstances may not have changed drastically with the new administration, people feel more uncertain and …less confident about the economy and about their future,” she said. “We’ve seen that affect consumer spending, and I think that’s going to affect people’s perspectives about enrolling and persisting in a college credential program,” Welton said. Especially when they have children to worry about, parents’ instinct might be to “hunker down” and save their money.

The Trump administration’s proposed limits on graduate student borrowing for programs not classified as “professional” could also hurt parenting students’ career aspirations, Lewis, of Generation Hope, said. Of the roughly 200 students with children in her organization’s Hope Scholars program, two-thirds of them are studying in fields that don’t qualify for higher professional loan caps, such as nursing, social work and teaching.

Those students now face an extra barrier to “unlock the earning potential that comes with an advanced degree, unlock the promotion potential that comes with being able to pursue graduate school,” Lewis said.

Former parenting students and advocates say one of the ways colleges can help parenting students is by ensuring they have accurate information about recent policy changes.

Huelsman said parenting students’ confusion around policy changes is understandable given the speed of the change and misinformation online.

“Someone might see a headline that federal childcare funding has been frozen, but it might not apply to their state or their school. They might see that the administration is proposing zeroing out funding for something, but they haven’t done it yet,” Huelsman said. “Outreach is genuinely vital, probably now more than ever.”

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January 9, 2026
Lender Presses Saint Augustine’s to Oust Trustees

Two trustees appear to be out at Saint Augustine’s University after a lender offered the cash-strapped institution a financial lifeline contingent on the removal of certain board members.

Self-Help Ventures agreed to take on at least $7 million in debt owed to another company and consider providing up to $20 million in desperately needed financing for the cash-strapped university in the future, WRAL reported. But Self-Help wanted the historically Black university to remove Brian Boulware and James Perry, both former board chairmen who have been criticized for SAU’s struggles as the private institution in North Carolina has teetered on the brink of closure since late 2023.

Perry told WRAL that his term had expired. Boulware has been removed from the board roster on the SAU website but told the TV station that he had not been informed of any changes. Current board leadership, however, appeared to sign off on the terms of the deal, according to emails obtained by WRAL in which Chair Sophie Gibson signaled support.

“History will record what this board did—or failed to do—at this moment,” she wrote.

Critics had been calling for Boulware and Perry to step down or be removed for more than a year, accusing them of failing in their fiduciary duties as SAU has struggled to remain open. At the same time, the university has been on an accreditation roller coaster. Since December 2023, SAU has been stripped of accreditation twice, only to regain it via the courts on both occasions.

SAU currently remains accredited after a legal reprieve in August.

Despite its financial challenges, the university has expressed interest in the Trump administration’s proposed “Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education.” The proposed compact would give signatories an advantage in attracting federal research funding but come with sweeping restrictions on academic freedom and institutional autonomy.

SAU officials did not respond to a request for comment from Inside Higher Ed.

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January 9, 2026
Temple Research Lab Improves Student Athlete Support

As the landscape of college athletics continues to shift, Temple University is experimenting with a new initiative that embeds academic research into the day-to-day operations of its athletics department.

Launched last month, the Athletic Innovation, Research and Education Lab formalizes a partnership between the School of Sport, Tourism and Hospitality Management (STHM) and Temple Athletics.

The AIRE Lab functions as both a research center and a practical hub, aiming to improve program management and student athletes’ development through evidence-based solutions.

Jonathan Howe, an assistant professor at STHM and AIRE Lab co-director, said supporting the student-athlete experience is especially important at an institution like Temple University, which has fewer resources for name, image and likeness and revenue sharing than larger schools.

“We’re able to engage in research and leverage university resources in a way that the athletics department may not traditionally be able to do,” Howe said.

Elizabeth Taylor, an associate professor at STHM and AIRE Lab co-director, emphasized the importance of data-driven decision-making.

“The folks who work in student athlete development may not have the capacity to do their full-time jobs while also staying up-to-date on the literature or evaluating the impact and effectiveness of the programs they offer,” Taylor said.

She added that the goal is to “connect with people on campus who are already doing this work and share resources instead of recreating the wheel or paying someone from outside the university.”

State of play: The launch of the AIRE Lab comes amid rapid changes in college athletics, including the rise of NIL compensation, evolving transfer rules and ongoing debates over athlete eligibility and governance. Taylor and Howe said these shifts have increased the need for institutions to understand how policy, culture and organizational decisions affect student athletes.

“The additional opportunities through NIL and revenue-sharing create more time demands on student athletes,” Taylor said, noting that potential brand deals can complicate efforts to balance practices and competitions with classes, extracurriculars and internships.

“What the research shows us is that they’re already strapped for time and what comes with that is stress, anxiety and mental health challenges,” she added.

Transfer rules can further complicate the student athlete experience, particularly for athletes arriving from other institutions, Howe said. “Navigating the academic setting is a lot for athletes who may be transferring in or may have a lucrative NIL deal, so academics may be put on the back burner,” he said.

To bridge the gap between research and daily operations, the athletics department appointed two staff members as lab practitioners to help translate research into practice.

“Everything is changing by the second, and student athletes are having to navigate these changes,” Howe said. “So how can we provide a system that identifies the most beneficial programming to help athletes be as successful as possible in their professional pursuits once they leave campus?”

In practice: One of the lab’s first initiatives was a cooking demonstration held at Temple University’s public health school. The session was designed to help student athletes learn how to prepare simple, nutritious meals.

Taylor said the goal was to encourage student athletes to make practical, healthy choices and develop skills they can use outside of structured team meals.

“The idea behind the cooking demonstration came from a research article on the experiences of college athletes, and one of the things that the athletes talked about is how so much of their life is planned out for them,” said Taylor. She added that while what student athletes eat and how they work out is often prescribed, they aren’t necessarily taught why they’re eating certain foods or doing specific workouts in the weight room.

“It was a great experience for them to learn more about cooking safely and making healthy meals,” she added, noting that over 20 student athletes participated in the session.

What’s next: Looking ahead, Howe said he hopes the lab will serve as a model for other institutions seeking to better integrate research, student athlete well-being and athletics administration.

“We want to continue leveraging institutional, federal and state resources to provide athletes with opportunities they normally wouldn’t get, especially at a time when higher education budgets are being cut,” Howe said.

“For me, the AIRE Lab allows us to break down some of the long-standing barriers we’ve had at the higher education level. Just because the budget is cut doesn’t mean we have to eliminate programs,” he said.

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January 9, 2026
South Dakota Adopts Post-Tenure Review

Faculty in South Dakota could lose their tenure status if they don’t meet expectations, per a new policy the South Dakota Board of Regents approved in December.

It requires tenured faculty at the state’s six public higher learning institutions to undergo a performance review every five years, beginning during the 2026–27 academic year. While all faculty members already receive an annual performance evaluation by their immediate supervisor, the new policy adds another layer of review and considers five years’ worth of those evaluations to rank a professor’s performance.

Approval of the policy makes South Dakota the latest state to enact a post-tenure review policy. Since 2020, numerous other states—including Florida, Georgia, Kentucky and Ohio—have done the same, whereas many others have weakened tenure through various other means. Indiana, for example, passed a law in 2024 that requires colleges to conduct post-tenure reviews every five years and deny tenure to faculty unlikely to foster “intellectual diversity.”

South Dakota’s new tenure-review policy is part of the board’s response to the “immense pressure, from both internal and external forces,” on the national higher education landscape, according to an October board document. “These pressures include accountability (accreditors, state legislatures, and federal government), educational demand and market change, resource constraints, continuous improvement, incentivizing quality instruction, research, and service, etc.”

Under the policy, if a faculty member received an annual performance rating of “does not meet expectations” or was placed on a faculty improvement plan in the previous five years, “tenure will be non-renewed, and the faculty member will be issued a one-year term contract for the following academic year.” The policy notes that the employee would still be eligible to apply for nontenurable positions within the system.

“[The policy] really reinforces our commitment to excellence when it comes to our faculty, the work that they do in education, teaching, service and research, while also reinforcing our commitment to continued accountability and closing the loop,” Pam Carriveau, provost and vice president for academic affairs of Black Hills State University, told the board before it approved the measure. “When we have faculty that are performing well and continue to perform well even past receiving tenure, this process allows us to recognize and reinforce that.”

‘End of Tenure’ in South Dakota

But as Mark Criley, a senior program officer for the department of academic freedom, tenure and governance at the American Association of University Professors, interprets the policy, professors who don’t pass the post-tenure review don’t get a hearing in front of a panel of their peers, in opposition to the AAUP’s recommended regulations. (The board did not respond to a request for clarification about that interpretation, though the policy makes no mention of a hearing.)

“If [tenured faculty can be dismissed] without a hearing at which the administration has to make the case before an elected body of peers, then that’s effectively the end of tenure in South Dakota,” Criley told Inside Higher Ed Thursday. “Post-tenure reviews are becoming increasingly common, and for the most part, they’re redundant. Faculty are already reviewed. Being tenured doesn’t mean you can’t be fired. There is accountability, but there needs to be those types of due process protections.”

The erosion of tenure protections was on display this fall when universities across the country, including the University of South Dakota, suspended or fired dozens of professors who made public comments about far-right podcaster Charlie Kirk in the wake of his shooting.

However, the board was considering post-tenure review prior to Kirk’s death as part of a broader plan to help “align institutional compensation practices with higher education market standards and evolving best practices,” according to board documents. Last summer, it charged an advisory committee—composed of one faculty member and 11 administrators—with developing procedures aimed at “incentivizing quality faculty, while providing the accountability and assurances necessary to safeguard tenure,” which resulted in the post-tenure review policy.

While the policy does not specify the makeup of the review committee, noting that “composition and size may vary by institution,” it requires that a review committee “not be composed solely of academic administration” that completes annual performance evaluations. The rating scale for the post-tenure review includes three categories—exceeds expectations, meets expectations and does not meet expectations—though individual institutions are responsible for developing them within certain guidelines outlined by the policy.

Randy Frederick, board secretary, said the last part is designed to mitigate government overreach, acknowledging that different institutions and departments have varied expectations that the board doesn’t have expertise on.

“Make no mistake, this is government regulation, and over–government regulation is a waste and it is profligacy,” Frederick said at the December meeting. That’s why, he added “all the blanks of the review will be filled in by the individual institutions.”

Making sure the review metrics are specific and clear is also key to preserving academic freedom, Michael Card, a political science professor emeritus at USD, told South Dakota Public Broadcasting.

“The three categories or buckets of our responsibilities are, the obvious one, teaching, but we are also to do research and then the other one is service to the institution and or your profession,” Card said. “Those could be spelled out more, even on an annual basis, and they’re often not.”

But even with those details in place, the policy alone has the potential to incite fear and cheapen the learning environment at South Dakota’s colleges and universities, said Criley of the AAUP.

“Teachers’ working conditions are students’ learning conditions,” he said. “When you have perpetually probationary faculty without security constantly looking over their shoulders, fearful of teaching controversial subjects, doing controversial research or expressing unfavorable views about institutional governance, students are not well served.”

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January 9, 2026
ED Panel Divided Over New Earnings Test Rules

With just one more meeting to go, the Department of Education and an advisory committee tasked with ironing out the details of how to hold college programs accountable appear far from reaching consensus.

The 13-member panel, comprised largely of state officials, think tank researchers and higher ed lawyers, spent the last four days negotiating the rules of a new college earnings test called Do No Harm—which applies to all degree programs—as well as changes to the existing gainful-employment rule, an accountability metric that only applies to certificate programs and for-profits.

The department’s proposal, which aligns the two accountability metrics and holds all programs to the Do No Harm’s standards, has gone largely unchanged in the first four days of negotiation.

Under Do No Harm, all college programs, except undergraduate certificates, that fail to prove their students earn more than someone with only a high school diploma could lose access to federal loans, whereas the current version of gainful employment requires programs to show their graduates pass the earnings test and can reasonably pay off their debt. Programs that fail either test are cut off from all federal student aid.

Although officials have agreed to a series of smaller changes and said they were open to considering larger ones, none made so far address the key issues that are dividing the committee—axing the debt-to-earnings ratio and the Pell Grant penalty.

If the committee doesn’t reach consensus, the department is free to propose any changes to the regulation it wants, which could include scrapping gainful employment entirely. The department met with different committee members in private meetings Thursday, but it’s unclear if those talks will lead to compromises or flip votes.

“Consensus seems pretty unlikely at this point, since negotiators are still disagreeing on key provisions of the department’s drafted text,” said Emily Rounds, an education policy adviser at Third Way, a left-of-center think tank. “Anything is possible, and these caucuses could be productive, but I would be surprised if they reached consensus.”

Institutional representatives on the committee generally back the overall plan, while consumer protection advocates have taken issue with the department’s changes to gainful employment.

Reaching consensus at this point would likely require ED to significantly rework its original proposal.

“We have moved well into the vote-tallying stage,” one committee member said on the condition of anonymity to maintain good faith in the negotiation process. “The question is, does ED think it can get certain negotiators on board without caving on their original proposal to integrate gainful employment and Do No Harm.”

Department officials acknowledged the differences of opinion but said they would work to bring committee members together.

“The department is going to work on some language overnight based on the things that we’ve talked about today in our various caucuses,” Dave Musser, ED’s negotiator, said at the end of Thursday’s meeting. “We plan to come back in the morning prepared to share some of that language, recognizing that it may not be enough alone to get us to consensus. However, we want to show that we are doing everything that we can to get to a place where everyone can get to an agreement.”

2 Key Issues, 2 Key Sides

The Education Department and institutional representatives said the proposal plan creates a level playing field, calling it a more fair and simple means of accountability. State higher education officials and employers also joined in at times, agreeing that this plan would be the most legally sound and could end years of political ping-pong over higher ed accountability.

But committee members representing taxpayers and legal aid organizations as well as left-leaning research groups and consumer protection advocates argue that the department’s plan waters down existing standards, could put students at risk and may lead to legal challenges.

Although negotiators representing students who receive Title IV aid and students who are veterans have also expressed concerns about the changes to gainful employment, Tamar Hoffman, the committee member representing legal aid organizations, was the most outspoken throughout the week, saying there were “inherent issues” with the department’s current proposal.

“It does not make sense that we would allow the most economically disadvantaged students to use up very precious resources that they have in their lifetime Pell eligibility on programs that the department has deemed to be inadequate to receive loans,” she said at the close of Thursday’s meeting.

Ideally, Hoffman and others would like to see the debt-to-earnings test reinstated as well, though Pell appears to be the top priority.

Preston Cooper, the committee member representing taxpayers and the public interest, voiced more opposition at the beginning of the week as he highlighted his analysis of department data that showed ED’s plan would disburse an estimated $1.2 billion in Pell dollars annually to programs that failed the earnings test.

By Thursday, however, multiple of Cooper’s smaller concerns had been addressed through amendments, and he appeared poised to support the department’s proposal. The changes included added clarity about the ability to separate gainful employment and Do No Harm if courts strike down either test and that failed programs must pass the earnings test for at least two years before regaining loan eligibility.

Some Changes Made

Despite their overall support for the department’s plan, institutional advocates—particularly Jeff Arthur, the negotiator representing for-profit institutions, and Aaron Lacey, who represented nonprofit institutions—did try to change parts of the earnings test that they argued were unfair, like the age and work experience of high school graduates that college students were compared to, or the way rural institutions were held to the same standard as urban ones. So far, they haven’t been successful.

They had better success with an amendment that allowed existing students in failing programs to maintain the loan access needed to complete their degree. The department agreed to the change under a few conditions: The program will have to voluntarily agree to shut itself down after the first year of failure, terminate all enrollment for new students and enter a formal teach-out plan for those who remain.

Hoffman, however, said the change would only further water down existing accountability standards.

“To me, this seems like a giant loophole for institutions to try to maintain eligibility for Title IV funds when they aren’t actually delivering adequate services to students,” she said. “There isn’t anything here that prevents institutions from ceasing new enrollment in a failing program [while] at the same time standing up a [new] substantially similar program within the same institution.” (Title IV of the Higher Education Act authorizes federal financial aid programs such as the Pell Grant.)

The regulations do include some restrictions on starting new programs, but Hoffman and other student advocates from think tanks don’t believe they are strong enough to prevent institutions from developing other similarly poor-performing certificates and degrees.

By the end of Thursday’s meeting, the department had not yet publicly proposed any concessions to address Hoffman’s concerns on the teach-out plan or the core changes to gainful employment.

But talks appeared to continue after the meeting ended. One department official told Hoffman he’d be amenable to talking over happy hour about what changes would be needed to get her on board.

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January 9, 2026
Is higher education ready for generation alpha?

Higher education has always been a multigenerational co-op. A space where different worldviews, values and learning habits collide and evolve together. Right now, universities are still learning how to teach and support Gen Z, students who have redefined expectations around flexibility, purpose and wellbeing.

But just as the sector starts to feel comfortable with these adjustments, the next generation is already forming behind them. “Gen Alpha” – those born from 2010 onwards – will start arriving within the next five years and their presence will make the intergenerational mix even more fascinating, and far more challenging to work with.

Universities are used to responding to disruption when it is forced upon them, whether through policy reform, funding shifts or sudden global shocks. But this time, the change is visible on the horizon. Higher education can see one of its next major disruptions coming years in advance. The question is not whether Gen Alpha will alter how we teach, learn or engage. They will. The question is whether the sector can prepare in time, drawing lessons from what’s already happening with today’s learners.

By 2030, higher education will become an even more complex multi-generational co-op. Gen Alpha students will be learning alongside the tail of Gen Z and quite a few millennials and Generation X. They will be taught by academics largely from the Millennials and Generation X age groups. Each group will bring different digital literacies, communication norms and values into the same ecosystem.

The challenge, and opportunity, will be in creating environments flexible enough to bridge these perspectives while sustaining academic rigour. Understanding Gen Alpha, then, is not about predicting a single generation’s quirks. It’s about preparing universities for a shared future where several generations will need to coexist, collaborate and learn from each other.

No off switch

Much of what will define Gen Alpha is already visible in classrooms now. Current higher education students are demanding immediacy, connection and relevance; expectations born in a digital ecosystem that never switches off. Yet Gen Alpha will take these habits to another level. They are growing up with technology not as a tool but as the background hum of existence; seamless, intuitive and always present. They have learned to read, count and solve problems through interactive and gamified environments long before they stepped into a school.

There is a high chance that because of or – depending on your vantage point – thanks to these habits Gen Alpha will be the most self-directed learners higher education has ever seen – but also the least patient with systems that feel slow, static or disconnected from their lived reality. Long feedback cycles, rigid timetables or outdated online platforms won’t just frustrate them; they will feel illogical. The idea of sitting through a two-hour lecture (even online) may seem not just boring but absurd.

The early evidence is already visible in schools. Teachers across the UK talk about declining engagement and rising frustration when lessons are delivered in traditional ways. In the US, teachers describe pupils who question why they are being taught a certain way and struggle to engage with methods that feel prescriptive or irrelevant. In Australia, schools experimenting with more adaptive and project-based models such as NSWEduChat report that students are more motivated when given freedom, agency and connection to real-world issues. This is the mindset that will soon walk through our university doors.

Cultural readiness

Gen Alpha’s world is also more emotionally complex than that of previous generations. They are growing up surrounded by climate anxiety, social awareness and global instability. Unlike many other generations, their exposure to world events is constant and their access to information is, many times, dangerously unfiltered. They form strong opinions early and are not afraid to express them. They value authenticity and expect institutions they interact with to demonstrate values that align with their own. I am rather certain that if higher education speaks in jargon, hides behind hierarchy, or treats them as passive recipients, Gen Alpha will tune out.

This is a generation that has been encouraged to ask questions, to expect answers quickly and to always be heard. They are unlikely to respond well to ecosystems that require silent compliance or delayed gratification considering they are growing up with feedback loops built into everything they do, from online games to learning apps. They are more likely to engage with learning that is immediate, collaborative and visually rich instead of linear or text heavy.

Culturally, Gen Alpha is also more diverse, more inclusive and more globally connected than any generation before them. Many grow up in multilingual homes and navigate multiple cultural identities. Their sense of belonging is not bound by geography but by shared values and interests – imagine the extraordinary opportunities this will bring for HE. But universities need to create environments that feel inclusive, authentic and flexible enough to truly accommodate that diversity.

The challenge then is not simply technological development but cultural readiness. Universities must ask whether the way they structure courses, deliver teaching and define success reflects the world these students live in. Long assessment cycles and stale teaching methods will become relics of an age that made sense when information was scarce and time moved slower.

Foresight

The first wave of Gen Alpha will enter UK universities in 2029 or thereabouts. That is closer to us today than the first pandemic lockdowns are behind us (and 23 March 2020 still feels like yesterday). The window to act is narrow and the sector is already under strain.

The solution is not to rip everything up or abandon academic rigour, but to start prototyping now: testing interactive teaching models, embedding AI into learning processes, creating more authentic and timely assessments, and developing staff confidence to deliver education that resonates with digital native learners. Universities that take these steps will be positioned not just to survive the arrival of Gen Alpha but to thrive with them.

The disruption ahead is unusual in one crucial way – we can see it coming. There will be no excuse for surprise. The next generation of students is telling us (those who listen), every day, what they expect learning to feel like. The question is whether higher education will have the courage, creativity, foresight and capacity to listen – before Gen Alpha decides it no longer needs us.

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January 9, 2026
Higher education postcard: University College Stockton

A significant book in political science is Pressman and Wildavsky’s wonderfully titled Implementation: how great expectations in Washington are dashed in Oakland; or, why it’s amazing that federal programs work at all, this being a saga of the economic development administration as told by two sympathetic observers who seek to build morals on a foundation of ruined hopes.

Let’s see how different things were in County Durham.

The Middlesbrough Herald and Post, 14 October 1992, could hardly have been more excited. Hailing the opening of the University College Stockton, a joint venture between Durham and Teesside universities, it noted that it was “the most important higher education development in Britain for 25 years” (the transmogrification of polytechnics to universities was clearly just a footnote).

The principal, Professor Bob Parfitt, who had joined from the University of Western Australia, expressed the view that the college would have a bright future in 20 years’ time:

I would hope that we are an international institution which is a clear part of the local community. We will be meeting the needs of the local market in our degrees and short courses, but I also hope we shall play a leading role in the industrial and urban regeneration of the area.

Fast forward to 1995 and the first students were graduating. The Stockton and District Herald and Post on 28 June 1995 reports that Catherine Barker was the first to receive a joint degree from Durham and Teesside, gaining a first in European Studies (French). Environmentalist David Bellamy and local environmental activist Angela Cooper received honorary degrees at the same ceremony.

But it wasn’t to last. John Hayward’s account of the first ten years of the college tells a tale of insufficient capital, changing government policy which slowed expansion of student numbers, and the complexities of operating a college jointly between two universities. It had been only by the skin of its teeth that the new college had got off the ground at all; and in 1994 the two universities agreed that it would continue under the tutelage of just one of them – Durham University.

Over the next few years the university college fought to establish a sustainable basis for operations, trying different subjects and seeking funding from many sources for buildings and equipment. By the late 1990s it was no longer operating in deficit, and in the early 2000s, in order to bring it more into line with norms elsewhere in Durham University, two colleges were created at the Stockton Campus – Stephenson College and John Snow College.

The colleges have since moved, physically, to Durham, and the campus is now known as the Queen’s Campus, Stockton. It hosts the university’s International Study Centre, so in this respect Professor Parfitt’s hope that it would be an international institution has been borne out. But not in a way he would ever have imagined.

John Hayward’s account is worth a read. There’s a story – hidden behind the institutional politics and the minutiae of council and senate meetings – of the practical difficulties in getting something new off the ground. And of the difficulties in multi-institutional working. Which in these days of radical new governance models is a lesson worth remembering.

Here’s a jigsaw of the postcard – it wasn’t posted, but must date from the early 1990s. It was sold in aid of the Butterwick Hospice, and slight perforation marks at the top suggest that it was one of a concertina strip of cards.

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January 9, 2026