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Dive Brief:
Nevada higher education officials are considering raising tuition and fees by 12% for public four-year institutions and 9% for two-year colleges amid cost increases and the pending loss of millions in state funding.
The hikes would save the equivalent of 317 full-time jobs, according to a proposal from Nevada System of Higher Education Chancellor Matt McNair and presidents of the system’s colleges.
More modest tuition and fee hikes could lessen student impact but lead institutions to cut 100 to 200 jobs systemwide. NSHE’s board of regents plans to consider the proposals at a Jan. 23 meeting.
Dive Insight:
NSHE is looking to fill a funding gap amounting to tens of millions of dollars across its seven institutions in the coming years.
The proposal before the regents cited, in part, general cost increases in higher ed. That includes a 20.4% cumulative increase in the Higher Education Price Index — a sector-specific measure of inflation calculated every year by the Commonfund Institute — from fiscal 2021 through 2025.
The Nevada higher ed system has specific costs it is trying to fund as well. A briefing from McNair and NSHE presidents pointed to a “significant deferred maintenance backlog,” as well other expenses such as student support services, technology infrastructure, cybersecurity, and a 1% merit increase for faculty salaries.
In 2025, the Legislature passed a more than $57 million bridge funding package to help the system absorb cost increases, but that money will run out in July 2027. The expiration will leave NSHE with a $27.1 million hole in fiscal 2028, including an $11.8 million shortfall at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas and an $11.2 million gap at University of Nevada, Reno.
That loss, plus salary increases in coming years, adds up to a roughly $41.4 million shortfall for the system in fiscal 2029. Officials tied that funding gap to the 317 positions that they may eliminate without more revenue. Most of those losses — 238 jobs — would come from various faculty and academic advisor positions, the rest from classified staff.
The heaviest proposed tuition and fee increases would cover the gap, and then some, by raising an estimated $49.3 million in revenue.
A lower hike of 8% for four-year college tuition and fees and 6% for community colleges would still leave a $9.3 million hole, potentially leading to 102 job cuts. An even lower price increase of 4% at four-year colleges and 3% at two-years would leave a $25.5 million shortfall and might mean 206 job reductions.
Those numbers are representations of the funding gap in terms of jobs. NSHE’s institution leaders described a wider range of measures they may have to take absent tuition increases. Those include program eliminations and consolidation, hiring freezes, larger class sizes, reduced student services and other budget actions.
The briefing said that even the largest tuition spikes would still leave Nevada’s public universities cheaper by thousands of dollars annually compared to the average among their peers in the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education. Meanwhile, staffing at NSHE colleges remains generally below peer levels, according to a board presentation.
“Affordability compared to peers does not negate the reality of individual hardship that may result as cost of attendance rises,” the briefing from McNair and the colleges’ leaders stated. “The Institutions recognize that even comparatively small increases can have meaningful impacts for some students and families.”
I don’t remember much about my experiences at work some forty-odd years ago, but one event I recall vividly is the discussion provoked by a case study at a training event. The case was simple, just a few lines:
Sam was working late one evening, and happened to walk past Pat’s office. The door was closed, but Sam could hear Pat being very abusive to Alex. Some ten minutes later, Sam saw Alex sobbing.
What might Sam do?
What should Sam do?
Quite a few in the group said “nothing”, on the grounds that whatever was going on was none of Sam’s business. Maybe Pat had good grounds to be angry with Alex and if the local culture was, let’s say, harsh, what’s the problem? Nor was there any evidence that Alex’s sobbing was connected with Pat – perhaps something else had happened in the intervening time.
Others thought that the least could Sam do was to ask if Alex was OK, and offer some comfort – a suggestion countered by the “it’s a tough world” brigade.
The central theme of the conversation was then all about culture. Suppose the culture was supportive and caring. Pat’s behaviour would be out of order, even if Pat was angry, and even if Alex had done something Pat had regarded as wrong.
So what might – and indeed should – Sam do?
Should Sam should confront Pat? Or inform Pat’s boss?
What if Sam is Pat’s boss? In that case then, yes, Sam should confront Pat: failure to do so would condone bad behaviour, which in this culture, would be a ‘bad thing’.
But if Sam is not Pat’s boss, things are much more tricky. If Sam is subordinate to Pat, confrontation is hardly possible. And informing Pat’s boss could be interpreted as snitching or trouble-making. Another possibility is that Sam and Pat are peers, giving Sam ‘the right’ to confront Pat – but only if peer-to-peer honesty and mutual pressure is ‘allowed’. Which it might not be, for many, even benign, cultures are in reality networks of mutual ‘non-aggression treaties’, in which ‘peers’ are monarchs in their own realms – so Sam might deliberately choose to turn a blind eye to whatever Pat might be doing, for fear of setting a precedent that would allow Pat, or indeed Ali or Chris, to poke their noses into Sam’s own domain.
And if Sam is in a different part of the organisation – or indeed from another organisation altogether – then maybe Sam’s safest action is back where we started. To do nothing. To walk on by.
Sam is a witness to Pat’s bad behaviour. Does the choice to ‘walk on by’ make Sam complicit too, albeit at arm’s length?
I’ve always thought that this case study, and its implications, are powerful – which is probably why I’ve remembered it over so long a time.
The truth about GCSE, AS and A level grades in England
I mention it here because it is relevant to the main theme of this blog – a theme that, if you read it, makes you a witness too. Not, of course, to ‘Pat’s’ bad behaviour, but to another circumstance which, in my opinion, is a great injustice doing harm to many people – an injustice that ‘Pat’ has got away with for many years now, not only because ‘Pat’s peers’ have turned a blind eye – and a deaf ear too – but also because all others who have known about it have chosen to ‘walk on by’.
The injustice of which I speak is the fact that about one GCSE, AS and A level grade in every four, as awarded in England, is wrong, and has been wrong for years. Not only that: in addition, the rules for appeals do not allow these wrong grades to be discovered and corrected. So the wrong grades last for ever, as does the damage they do.
To make that real, in August 2025, some 6.5 million grades were awarded, of which around 1.6 million were wrong, with no appeal. That’s an average of about one wrong grade ‘awarded’ to every candidate in the land.
Perhaps you already knew all that. But if you didn’t, you do now. As a consequence, like Sam in that case study, you are a witness to wrong-doing.
It’s important, of course, that you trust the evidence. The prime source is Ofqual’s November 2018 report, Marking Consistency Metrics – An update, which presents the results of an extensive research project in which very large numbers of GCSE, AS and A level scripts were in essence marked twice – once by an ‘assistant’ examiner (as happens in ‘ordinary’ marking each year), and again by a subject senior examiner, whose academic judgement is the ultimate authority, and whose mark, and hence grade, is deemed ‘definitive’, the arbiter of ‘right’.
Each script therefore had two marks and two grades, enabling those grades to be compared. If they were the same, then the ‘assistant’ examiner’s grade – the grade that is on the candidate’s certificate – corresponds to the senior examiner’s ‘definitive’ grade, and is therefore ‘right’; if the two grades are different, then the assistant examiner’s grade is necessarily ‘non-definitive’, or, in plain English, wrong.
You might have thought that the number of ‘non-definitive’/wrong grades would be small and randomly distributed across subjects. In fact, the key results are shown on page 21 of Ofqual’s report as Figure 12, reproduced here:
Figure 1: Reproduction of Ofqual’s evidence concerning the reliability of school exam grades
To interpret this chart, I refer to this extract from the report’s Executive Summary:
The probability of receiving the ‘definitive’ qualification grade varies by qualification and subject, from 0.96 (a mathematics qualification) to 0.52 (an English language and literature qualification).
This states that 96% of Maths grades (all varieties, at all levels), as awarded, are ‘definitive’/right, as are 52% of those for Combined English Language and Literature (a subject available only at A level). Accordingly, by implication, 4% of Maths grades, and 48% of English Language and Literature grades, are ‘non-definitive’/wrong. Maths grades, as awarded, can therefore be regarded as 96% reliable; English Language and Literature grades as 52% reliable.
Scrutiny of the chart will show that the heavy black line in the upper blue box for Maths maps onto about 0.96 on the horizontal axis; the equivalent line for English Language and Literature maps onto 0.56. The measures of the reliability of the grades for each of the other subjects are designated similarly. Ofqual’s report does not give any further numbers, but Table 1 shows my estimates from Ofqual’s Figure 12:
Probability of
‘Definitive’ grade
‘Non-definitive’ grade
Maths (all varieties)
96%
4%
Chemistry
92%
8%
Physics
88%
12%
Biology
85%
15%
Psychology
78%
22%
Economics
74%
26%
Religious Studies
66%
34%
Business Studies
66%
34%
Geography
65%
35%
Sociology
63%
37%
English Language
61%
39%
English Literature
58%
42%
History
56%
44%
Combined English Language and Literature (A level only)
52%
48%
Table 1: My estimates of the reliability of school exam grades, as inferred from measurements of Ofqual’s Figure 12.
Ofqual’s report does not present any corresponding information for each of GCSE, AS or A level separately, nor any analysis by exam board. Also absent is a measure of the all-subject overall average. Given, however, the maximum value of 96%, and the minimum of 52%, the average is likely to be somewhere in the middle, say, in the seventies; in fact, if each subject is weighted by its cohort, the resulting average over the 14 subjects shown is about 74%. Furthermore, if other subjects – such as French, Spanish, Computing, Art… – are taken into consideration, the overall average is most unlikely to be greater than 82% or less than 66%, suggesting that an overall average reliability of 75% for all subjects is a reasonable estimate.
That’s the evidence that, across all subjects and levels, about 75% of grades, as awarded, are ‘definitive’/right and 25% – one in four – are ‘non-definitive’/wrong – evidence that has been in the public domain since 2018. But evidence that has been much disputed by those with vested interests.
Ofqual’s results are readily explained. We all know that different examiners can, legitimately, give the same answer (slightly) different marks. As a result, the script’s total mark might lie on different sides of a grade boundary, depending on who did the marking. Only one grade, however, is ‘definitive’.
Importantly, there are no errors in the marking studied by Ofqual – in fact, Ofqual’s report mentions ‘marking error’ just once, and then in a rather different context. All the grading discrepancies measured in Ofqual’s research are therefore attributable solely to legitimate differences in academic opinion. And since the range of legitimate marks is far narrower in subjects such as Maths and Physics, as compared to English Literature and History, then the probability that an ‘assistant’ examiner’s legitimate mark might result in a ‘non-definitive’ grade will be much higher for, say, History as compared to Physics. Hence the sequence of subjects in Ofqual’s Figure 12.
As regards appeals, in 2016, Ofqual – in full knowledge of the results of this research (see paragraph 28 of this Ofqual Board Paper, dated 18 November 2015) – changed the rules, requiring that a grade can be changed only if a ‘review of marking’ discovers a ‘marking error’. To quote an Ofqual ‘news item’ of 26 May 2016:
Exam boards must tell examiners who review results that they should not change marks unless there is a clear marking error.…It is not fair to allow some students to have a second bite of the cherry by giving them a higher mark on review, when the first mark was perfectly appropriate. This undermines the hard work and professionalism of markers, most of whom are teachers themselves. These changes will mean a level-playing field for all students and help to improve public confidence in the marking system.
This assumes that the legitimate marks given by different examiners are all equally “appropriate”, and identical in every way.
This assumption. however, is false: if one of those marks corresponds to the ‘definitive’ grade, and another to a ‘non-definitive’ grade, they are not identical at all. Furthermore, as already mentioned, there is hardly any mention of marking errors in Ofqual’s November 2018 report. All the grade discrepancies they identified can therefore only be attributable to legitimate differences in academic opinion, and so cannot be discovered and corrected by the rules that have been in place since 2016.
Over to you…
So, back to that case study.
Having read this far, like Sam, you have knowledge of wrong-doing – not Pat tearing a strip off Alex, but Ofqual awarding some 1.5 million wrong grades every year. All with no right of appeal.
What are you going to do?
You’re probably thinking something like, “Nothing”, “It’s not my job”, “It’s not my problem”, “I’m in no position to do anything, even if I wanted to”.
All of which I understand. No, it’s certainly not your job. And it’s not your problem directly, in that it’s not you being awarded the wrong grade. But it might be your problem indirectly – if you are involved with admissions, and if grades play a material role, you may be accepting a student who is not fully qualified (in that the grade on the certificate might be too high), or – perhaps worse – rejecting a student who is (in that the grade on the certificate is too low). Just to make that last point real, about one candidate in every six with a certificate showing AAA for A level Physics, Chemistry and Biology in fact truly merited at least one B. If such a candidate took a place at Med School, for example, not only is that candidate under-qualified, but a place has also been denied to a candidate with a certificate showing AAB but who merited AAA.
And although you, as an individual, are indeed not is a position to do anything about it, you, collectively, surely are.
HE is, by far, the largest and most important user of A levels. And relying on a ‘product’ that is only about 75% reliable. HE, collectively, could put significant pressure on Ofqual to fix this, if only by printing “OFQUAL WARNING: THE GRADES ON THIS CERTIFICATE ARE ONLY RELIABLE, AT BEST, TO ONE GRADE EITHER WAY” on every certificate – not my statement, but one made by Ofqual’s then Chief Regulator, Dame Glenys Stacey, in evidence to the 2 September 2020 hearing of the Education Select Committee, and in essence equivalent to the fact that about one grade in four is wrong. That would ensure that everyone is aware of the fact that any decision, based on a grade as shown on a certificate, is intrinsically unsafe.
But this – or some other solution – can happen only if your institution, along with others, were to act accordingly. And that can happen only if you, and your colleagues, band together to influence your department, your faculty, your institution.
Yes, that is a bother. Yes, you do have other urgent things to do.
If you do nothing, nothing will happen.
But if you take action, you can make a difference.
Don’t just walk on by.
Dennis Sherwood is a management consultant with a particular interest in organisational cultures, creativity and systems thinking. Over the last several years, Dennis has also been an active campaigner for the delivery of reliable GCSE, AS and A level grades.If you enjoyed this, you might also like https://srheblog.com/tag/sherwood/.
Establishing branch campuses abroad—often used as a crisis mitigation strategy—could become more important for U.S. universities facing increasing threats at home, but scholars are divided on their likelihood of success.
Research-intensive colleges and universities in the U.S. are faced with “new and profound uncertainties” over future funding and the strength of their endowments under the Trump administration, said Geoff Harkness, formerly postdoctoral teaching fellow at Northwestern and Carnegie Mellon Universities’ Education City campuses.
“This means that R-1 institutions will have to seek alternative sources of revenue, including partnering with nations in the Middle East. For Georgetown, which has a long-established branch campus at Education City, the renewal was a no-brainer in 2025.”
Harkness, now associate professor of sociology at Rhode Island College, said the Israel-Palestine conflict put Qatar in a difficult position but warned that Texas A&M could regret its decision to leave from a fiscal perspective.
“The nation’s vast resources and relative political moderation make it an appealing partner for U.S. colleges and universities, particularly in light of current economic uncertainties.”
“Branch campuses are often used as a crisis mitigation strategy by universities,” she said.
“In this sense, it is no surprise to me that in situations of financial and geopolitical turbulence, branch campuses become more attractive to decision-makers at universities.”
University leaders hope that overseas campuses can contribute financially to the well-being of the overall institution, either through direct transfers from these sites to the main institutions or through accessing a broader pool of students, said Kleibert.
Recent figures show that U.S.-Chinese collaborative campuses have experienced record-breaking application numbers from both domestic and international students over the past few years.
Illinois Tech began planning its Indian outpost long before President Trump’s unprecedented assault on the U.S. higher education system. But Nigel Healey, professor of international higher education at the University of Limerick, said Trump’s culture wars could increase the “push factors” toward overseas expansion in the future.
“In the medium to long term, branch campuses may offer elite U.S. institutions an alternative way of maintaining their internationalization, accessing international talent and maintaining a global profile at a time when Trump is fostering a new national culture of xenophobia and isolationism,” he said.
However, he warned that the risks of being pushed into a strategy by suddenly changing political winds is that poor, reactive decisions might be made.
“The winds may change in the opposite direction, leaving the institution with a branch campus that is suddenly a white elephant.”
Philip Altbach, professor emeritus at Boston College, agreed that there are significant risks in establishing branches overseas and that they are not a high priority for elite universities right now.
“In the current situation of total instability in U.S. higher education due to the Trump administration, U.S. universities will not be thinking much about branch campuses but about their own survival.”
Although partnering with many countries may be politically safe, he said universities are unlikely to want to risk making “controversial political moves in the current environment.”
“Top U.S. universities are more interested in establishing research centers and joint programs overseas that can help their research and be a kind of embassy for recruiting students and researchers for the home campuses.”
And Kevin Kinser, professor of education and head of the department of education policy studies at Pennsylvania State University, said overseas partners are not free from scrutiny from the White House.
“The turmoil in the U.S. also includes scrutinizing foreign donations, contributions, collaborations and investments. Looking overseas does not create a safe haven for current federal attention.”
As a result, he said, Texas A&M may have gotten ahead of the narrative on foreign activities by universities by quitting Education City when it did.
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Dive Brief:
Minnesota’s public colleges could institute substantial tuition spikes in the next academic year, after state officials have so far failed to meet funding requests.
College officials’ latest projections estimate students could see price increases ranging from 4% to 9.9% to offset budget gaps, according to a presentation at a Minnesota State system board of trustees meeting this week.Most colleges and universities are modeling an increase of 8%.
Those proposed increases come as analysis from the Minneapolis Federal Reserve showed enrollment in public Minnesota colleges increased substantially in the 2024-25 academic year — up 12% at two-year institutions and 4% at four-year institutions.
Dive Insight:
Leaders at public institutions in Minnesota are having to grapple with state funding that will likely remain flat while inflation continues lifting costs for college operations.
Minnesota State Board of Trustees, which oversees 33 institutions, requested $465 million in new funding in the state budget covering fiscal 2026 and 2027.
But so far, state executive and House budget proposals include no funding increases for the system, said Bill Maki, vice chancellor of finance and facilities for the Minnesota State system, during Tuesday’s presentation.He noted that the state Senate offered additional funding but only a fraction of what was asked for — $100 million.
The muted proposals from the state — which is facing its own fiscal shortfalls —would leave colleges on their own in filling budget gaps created by increasing costs and financial needs, such as maintenance backlogs.
Modest tuition increases would still leave substantial structural deficits, Maki noted. A system-wide tuition increase of 3.5% would still leave a $65.1 million budget shortfall in fiscal 2026. Even a 9% tuition hike would mean a $23.8 million gap.
“Regardless of what level of tuition increase may be approved by the board, every one of our colleges and universities is going to have to implement budget reallocations and reductions in order to cover inflationary costs,” Maki said.
Complicating things, as the chancellor pointed out, is that institutions have to set tuition rates before they fully know their costs for the year.
To date, the Minnesota State system has remained relatively strong financially. The system’s operating revenues increased in fiscal years 2024 and 2023, according to its latest financial statement. It ended fiscal 2024 with total revenues of $2.3 billion and a surplus of $108.9 million.
Helping the system’s finances is the support it has received from the state. In 2024-25, tuition accounted for about 30% of the Minnesota State system’s revenue, compared to 42% made up by state appropriations.
Minnesota’s enrollment growth brought the state just short of its pre-pandemic levels in 2019, according to the Minneapolis Fed’s analysis.
The state’s enrollment upticks in 2024 and 2023 also break a decade of decline in Minnesota and many of its neighboring states.
In explaining the state’s enrollment growth, the Fed’s analysis pointed in part to Minnesota’s recently implemented North Star Promise. The program offers free tuition to students whose families make under $80,000 — a boon to enrollment and educational access but not necessarily to colleges’ coffers.
Whether it was logging overtime behind laptops before work-from-home boundaries were put in place or turning to mobile phones and tablets for entertainment during lockdowns, many of us recognized the uptick in screen time during the height of the pandemic. Our eyes likely noticed the uptick too by feeling increasingly strained.
March is Workplace Eye Wellness month, so we’re highlighting some tips from Prevent Blindness to help keep screen time in check and lessen eye strain at work and at home.
Screen time: Try to decrease the amount of time spent in front of screens and/or take frequent breaks to give your eyes a rest.
Use the 20-20-20 rule: Every 20 minutes, take a 20-second break and look at something 20 feet away.
Filters: Screen filters are available for smart phones, tablets and computer screens. They decrease the amount of blue light given off from these devices that could reach the retina in the eyes.
Anti-reflective lenses: Anti-reflective lenses reduce glare and increase contrast and also block blue light from the sun and digital devices.
Intraocular lens (IOL): After cataract surgery, the cloudy lens will be replaced with an intraocular lens (IOL). The lens naturally protects the eye from almost all ultraviolet light and some blue light. There are types of IOLs that can protect the eye and retina from blue light.
Visit Prevent Blindness for more information and resources on eye and vision health.
HR Perspective
From the human resources perspective, HR practitioners can help employees who are experiencing vision loss or low vision. Employees experiencing a decrease in vision may have difficulty completing paperwork, reading standard-size print, discerning regular or colored font on computer screens, or locating the cursor, all of which impact productivity at work.
In the Disability in the Workplace toolkit in CUPA-HR’s Knowledge Center, Mississippi State University’s HR guide offers plenty of creative low-tech and high-tech accommodations for employees with low vision:
Low-tech accommodations:
Place tactile dots on controls on equipment, such as the telephone, a copier, the microwave in the breakroom, etc. so that an individual who is blind or visually impaired can determine which buttons perform different functions.
Place a braille sticker on an employee’s mail slot to identify it.
Increase or decrease lighting in an office or cubicle to increase visibility or reduce glare.
Cover a window to reduce glare.
Provide extra floor space in a cubicle to accommodate a guide dog.
High-tech accommodations:
Implement screen reading or screen magnification software to allow an employee who is blind or has low vision to complete computer tasks.
Provide a larger monitor or dual monitors to allow an individual with low vision greater access to visual information.
Implement a braille display paired with the computer or an iPad or used independently to allow vision-impaired employees to take notes and recall information.
Provide a video magnifier to increase the size of print and enhance the contrast of printed materials.
Provide optical character recognition hardware or software to capture print information and translate it to audio output.
To read the full guide and explore other disability inclusion examples from higher ed, visit the Disability in the Workplace toolkit (CUPA-HR members only resource).
