Tag: Graduate

  • As men stop going to college, women have now overtaken them in graduate and professional degrees

    As men stop going to college, women have now overtaken them in graduate and professional degrees

    by Jon Marcus, The Hechinger Report
    January 20, 2026

    WATERTOWN, Mass. — Amanda Leef remembers thinking for the first time about becoming a veterinarian when she was 4 and found a garter snake in her Michigan backyard.

    “I think every girl goes through a phase of wanting to be a vet,” Leef said.

    For her, it wasn’t just a phase. Now, at 48, she co-owns her own bustling veterinary practice, Heal Veterinary Clinic, in this Boston suburb. 

    All seven veterinarians here are women. So is the large team of vet techs, and the entire rest of the 22-member medical staff.

    “In really broad generalities, I think women are more interested in the emotional and empathetic side of things than men are,” Leef said, sitting on the floor of an examination room with one of her patients, an affectionate, white-furred golden retriever named Cypress.

    For that and other reasons, women studying veterinary medicine now outnumber men by four to one. 

    It’s not just veterinary school. The number of women has surpassed the number of men in law school, medical school, pharmacy school, optometry school and dental school.

    Women in the United States now earn 40 percent more doctoral degrees overall, and nearly twice as many master’s degrees, as men, according to the U.S. Department of Education — a trend transforming high-end work. 

    This is no longer some distant statistical abstraction. Americans can see it when they take their pets to the vet or their kids to the dentist, need a lawyer or an eye exam, see a therapist or pick up a prescription.

    The dramatic shift in who is being trained for these fields is partly because more women are going into them. But it’s also the result of a steady slide in the number of men enrolling in graduate and professional schools. And while that may be elevating women, it’s affecting the nation’s economic competitiveness and even the point at which people get married and have children.

    “Having all students represented and engaged in graduate study ensures that we have healthy communities and families and a vital economy,” said Chevelle Newsome, president of the Council of Graduate Schools.

    Related: Interested in innovations in higher education? Subscribe to our free biweekly higher education newsletter.

    Graduate schools — including the 460 Newsome represents — have their own motive for wanting more men to enroll. They’re facing new threats from declining international enrollment, impending federal borrowing limits for graduate study and a public backlash against the high cost and uneven returns of graduate degrees.

    The main reason women have overtaken men in graduate school, however, is that more women than men are earning the undergraduate degrees required to go on to advanced study. 

    “Women certainly still see education in terms of upward mobility,” said Lisa Greenhill, chief organizational health officer at the American Association of Veterinary Medical Colleges, whose job includes trying to diversify veterinary medicine. “Men have a lot more options. They feel like they don’t have to go to a four-year program or a graduate program.”

    The number of men enrolled as undergraduates in college nationwide has dropped by nearly a quarter of a million, or 4 percent, just since 2020, the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center reports. 

    Women now account for about 60 percent of undergraduate enrollment. Nearly half of women aged 25 to 34 have bachelor’s degrees, compared to 37 percent of men, according to the Pew Research Center.

    “Men aren’t seeing higher education as valuable,” said Newsome. Many go into the trades or take other jobs straight out of high school to begin immediately earning a wage, forgoing the need to spend time in or money on college. Even men who do get undergraduate degrees may not see the value in continuing beyond them, she said.

    The effects of this have been stark and swift.

    The number of women earning law degrees passed the number of men in 2019, figures from the American Bar Association, or ABA, show; while only four of the law schools ranked among the 20 most prestigious by U.S. News & World Report had more women than men in 2016, women now outnumber men at 18 of them, according to the nonprofit law student news site JURIST. 

    Related: Trump’s attacks on DEI may hurt men in college admission

    That’s already having a real-world impact. By 2020, the ABA says, the majority of general lawyers working for the federal government were women, and by 2023, the majority of associates at law firms were.

    In medical schools, the number of women also overtook the number of men in 2019. Today, 55 percent of future doctors are women, up from 48 percent in 2015, according to the Association of American Medical Colleges, or AAMC.

    Women already make up significantly larger proportions of residents in specialties including endocrinology, pediatrics, obstetrics and gynecology, family medicine and psychiatry.

    Women also outnumber men by three to one in doctoral programs in psychology, and by nearly four to one in master’s programs, the American Psychological Association reports. They make up 55 percent of graduates of dental schools, and 72 percent in pediatric dentistry, according to the American Dental Association. 

    More than seven out of 10 students in schools of optometry are women, the Association of Schools and Colleges of Optometry says. And at pharmacy schools, women constitute two-thirds of students working toward master’s degrees and 56 percent of those seeking doctorates, statistics from the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy show.

    There are still more men than women in doctoral and master’s degree programs in business, engineering, math and the physical sciences. But women make up substantial majorities of graduate enrollment in health sciences, public administration, education, social and behavioral sciences and biological and agricultural sciences, according to the Council of Graduate Schools.

    While this represents impressive progress for women, the declining number of men enrolling in graduate programs is bad news for universities and colleges that offer them, for some patients in the health care system and for the economy.

    That’s because the growing number of women going to graduate and professional schools can’t continue forever to outpace the decline in the number of men. Total graduate enrollment at private, nonprofit colleges and universities was already down this fall, the Clearinghouse reports. 

    Related: Football fantasy: Colleges add sports to bring men, but it doesn’t always work

    That’s a problem made worse by visa restrictions and cuts to federal research funding, which have helped reduce the number of international students coming to the United States for graduate study by 12 percent, according to the Institute of International Education. 

    New federal loan limits scheduled to take effect next year are widely expected to further eat into graduate school enrollment. The changes will cap borrowing at $100,000 for graduate students and $200,000 for those in professional programs. That’s much less than the $408,150 the AAMC says it costs to get a medical degree from a private, nonprofit university or the $297,745 from a public one. The association of medical colleges projects a national shortage of as many as 124,000 physicians by 2034.

    The price of getting a graduate degree has more than tripled since 2000, according to the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce. Graduate degrees have become a critical revenue source for universities, which take in about $20 billion a year from master’s programs alone, a separate analysis, by the right-leaning think tank the American Enterprise Institute, calculates.

    Students of all genders are increasingly questioning the return on that investment. Nearly 40 percent of prospective graduate students say graduate programs that cost more than $10,000 a year are too expensive, a new survey by the enrollment management consulting firm EAB finds. Payoffs vary widely, making some graduate degrees “a potentially high-risk investment,” the Georgetown Center on Education and the Workforce has concluded. 

    The proportion of Americans 25 and older with master’s degrees or higher has fallen since 2000, from first in the world to 24th, according to the World Bank, while the percentage of those with doctoral degrees has dropped during that period from first to seventh.

    “That is a huge concern, when you think about where economies are going,” said Claudia Buchmann, an Ohio State University sociologist who studies this issue and is coauthor of the book “The Rise of Women.” “If we’re trying to compete on a global level, the fact that men’s college-going rates are so stagnant means we can’t fix this problem until we get more men.”

    Related: Even as women outpace men in graduating from college, their earnings remain stuck

    Men are, after all, half the nation’s labor force. And while some graduate degrees may not pay off, many of them do, substantially. People with advanced degrees are also much less likely to be unemployed.

    “When you think about global economic competitiveness for the United States — despite the skepticism that’s out there — education and training are still the keys to good jobs,” Buchmann said. Falling behind by that measure “is doing damage to men in this country.”

    But experts worry that the gender shift is self-perpetuating. Men may be put off by what they see as the “feminization” of professions in which they now are the minority, research by the veterinary medical colleges association concluded. 

    “I’m not seeing a national effort to say we need to change this,” Buchmann said. “If anything, the opposite is true.” 

    Graduate school leaders say the most effective efforts at reversing this trend are at the undergraduate level. “A lot of the effort from the graduate community has been to reach down and support those projects,” said Newsome, who was formerly dean of graduate studies at California State University, Sacramento. Universities also are encouraging employers to sponsor graduate education for male employees, she said.

    The effects of this widening gender divide are not just economic. New studies show that growing gender disparities in education can affect relationships. Marriage rates have fallen as levels of education rise, according to research from Iowa State University; each additional year of schooling reduces by about 4 percentage points the likelihood that someone between 25 and 34 is married. The proportion of Americans in that age bracket who are married has declined from 80 percent in 1970 to 38 percent today.

    Related: Universities and colleges search for ways to reverse the decline in the ranks of male students

    “When folks are looking for partners, there’s a desire to find someone economically comparable,” said Greenhill, of the veterinary medical colleges association. Added Buchmann, at Ohio State: “A lot of masculine norms are about being the breadwinner of the family. If the woman is the principal breadwinner, that presents not just economic challenges, but challenges to make marriages work.”

    More-educated women are also more likely to delay or forgo having children, according to separate research from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.

    Back at her veterinary clinic, Amanda Leef makes the rounds, checking in on a dog getting his teeth cleaned and a pair of kittens waiting to be adopted. 

    Only one male veterinarian has ever applied to work there, Leef said. He was hired, but eventually left to go into research.

    “It does change the personality of a clinic” to be made up of only women, she said. “A staff that’s diverse is more accessible to a broader range of people. I just think the world is better with greater gender diversity.”

    Contact writer Jon Marcus at 212-678-7556, [email protected] or jpm.82 on Signal.

    This story about higher education and men was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for our higher education newsletter. Listen to our higher education podcast.

    This <a target=”_blank” href=”https://hechingerreport.org/women-far-outnumber-men-in-law-school-med-school-vet-school-and-other-professional-programs/”>article</a> first appeared on <a target=”_blank” href=”https://hechingerreport.org”>The Hechinger Report</a> and is republished here under a <a target=”_blank” href=”https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/”>Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License</a>.<img src=”https://i0.wp.com/hechingerreport.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/cropped-favicon.jpg?fit=150%2C150&amp;ssl=1″ style=”width:1em;height:1em;margin-left:10px;”>

    <img id=”republication-tracker-tool-source” src=”https://hechingerreport.org/?republication-pixel=true&post=114073&amp;ga4=G-03KPHXDF3H” style=”width:1px;height:1px;”><script> PARSELY = { autotrack: false, onload: function() { PARSELY.beacon.trackPageView({ url: “https://hechingerreport.org/women-far-outnumber-men-in-law-school-med-school-vet-school-and-other-professional-programs/”, urlref: window.location.href }); } } </script> <script id=”parsely-cfg” src=”//cdn.parsely.com/keys/hechingerreport.org/p.js”></script>

    Source link

  • Officials in Connecticut Propose New Graduate Student Loan

    Officials in Connecticut Propose New Graduate Student Loan

    The loan program would need $30 million for its first year, based on calculations of how much Connecticut students take out in Grad PLUS loans.

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

    After President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) overhauled federal student loans, college affordability advocates worried that those changes would severely restrict who has access to higher education—especially graduate programs. Now, lawmakers in Connecticut are taking steps to ensure students in the state can continue to afford those degrees.

    Rep. Gregg Haddad, a Democrat who co-chairs the Connecticut legislature’s Higher Education Committee, announced a plan last week to create a new state-level student loan program to fill in the gap left by the elimination of Grad PLUS loans, a 20-year-old loan program that helped expand graduate education for middle- and low-income students. The program will be open to any student studying at a graduate program in the state.

    Josh Hurlock, deputy director of the Connecticut Higher Education Supplemental Loan Authority (CHESLA), a quasi-public body that administers Connecticut’s state-level student loans, said the organization is hoping to launch the new program in time for students to take out loans for the 2026–2027 academic year.

    “The Grad PLUS program historically has had very little credit check, so it’s been accessible to students of all credit qualities,” Hurlock said. “So, with the program going away … we want to make sure that students and schools have financing options available for their graduate students, and students and schools need to know what’s available sooner rather than later as we approach the fall semester.”

    The program would require $30 million in funding for its first year, based on calculations that students in Connecticut take out between $90 million and $100 million in Grad PLUS loans annually. (Those already receiving the loans will be grandfathered in.) Two-thirds of that would come from a bond that CHESLA will issue, while the remaining $10 million would have to come from state allocations. Haddad said he is hoping the funds can be drawn from a $500 million emergency reserve the state created in November specifically to offset federal cuts.

    Interest rates and borrower fees have not yet been determined, “but we think we can come up with an attractive product and solve this problem for Connecticut students,” Haddad said.

    Eliminating Grad PLUS loans is just one of the restrictions on federal student loans included in the OBBBA. The legislation also placed caps on how much borrowers can take out in federal loans for graduate programs and on Parent PLUS loans for dependent undergraduates. Proponents of the limits argued that uncapped federal loans encouraged universities to increase their tuition fees, creating the student debt crisis. But supporters of federal student loan programs argue they opened the door to graduate education and careers in fields like medicine for students who previously would not have had those opportunities.

    Grad PLUS loans will officially end and the caps for other federal loans will go into effect in July. Administrators at several institutions with a large number of graduate students told Inside Higher Ed that they’re still working to figure out how to close funding gaps for their students.

    Filling in the gap left behind by Grad PLUS loans is especially important because Connecticut, like most U.S. states, struggles with a shortage of workers in certain professions, like nurses and teachers, Haddad said.

    “We have a keen interest in making sure that we have a robust pipeline of people who want to enter those professions,” he said. “And we’d like to remove any roadblocks to having them achieve and complete their degrees so that they can get to work providing the services that people need in Connecticut.”

    Peter Granville, a fellow at the Century Foundation who researches college affordability, said that it’s wise for states to consider how they can support students in the absence of Grad PLUS funding.

    “State leaders know that their economies depend on these students being able to attain degrees in fields like education and nursing,” he said. “States will be worse off if [they] completely depend on private lenders filling gaps that they may or may not be inclined to fill.”

    Haddad said that the proposed loan program has been received extremely well by both the public and his fellow lawmakers, whom he is hopeful will support the proposal once their legislative session begins in February.

    “I was struck when we had our press conference the other day—the room was filled with nurses and social workers, physical therapists and educators from across the state,” he said. “I think it’s an indication that there’s a real problem we need to fix.”

    Source link

  • Connecticut Democrats pitch plan for state-level graduate loan program

    Connecticut Democrats pitch plan for state-level graduate loan program

    This audio is auto-generated. Please let us know if you have feedback.

    Dive Brief:

    • Democratic leaders in Connecticut are proposing a new state graduate student loan program to fill a vacuum created by the federal lending pullback built into Republicans’ massive spending bill. 
    • That plan would expand the reach of the Connecticut Higher Education Supplemental Loan Authority, using up to $20 million of its funds to create the loan program, according to a press release. It also calls for $10 million in state funding. 
    • The program could reach over 2,000 students in its initial phase, a CHESLA official said at a press conference Wednesday. The chairs of the General Assembly’s education committee plan to introduce and push for the proposal in the upcoming session.

    Dive Insight:

    The federal bill set to take effect in July, dubbed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, will bring sweeping changes to the federal student loan system, with the largest impacts landing on graduate students and programs. 

    The new law sunsets the Grad PLUS loan program, which allows graduate students to borrow up to the cost of attendance. When it launched 20 years ago, Grad PLUS was the largest new student aid program in decades. 

    Along with the program’s end, OBBBA sets new caps on annual and total borrowing. Federal loans will max out at $100,000 for graduate students and double that for professional students.

    Just who is considered a graduate or professional student is no small financial matter, and one that regulators are mulling. The U.S. Department of Education plans to propose regulations that would exclude some health professions — including nursing, occupational therapy and physician associates — from the definition of “professional” that carries a higher loan cap. 

    Much uncertainty hangs over the federal loan changes and could put pressure on states to engineer their own solutions, as Connecticut is considering. 

    “We can ensure that students have the ability to become a doctor or scientist or a nurse or an educator and have their career choice determined by their drive and their talent — not the size of their bank account,” Rep. Gregg Haddad, co-chair of the state House’s Higher Education and Employment Advancement Committee, said at a press conference Wednesday. 

    Haddad and others estimate Connecticut graduate students currently receive $90 million in Grad PLUS loans, leaving a large financing gap in the state once the program ends. 

    The plan to create a state-level loan program would use CHESLA’s existing infrastructure and bond authority, while state funding could make loans more affordable, said Josh Hurlock, deputy director of CHESLA, at the press conference. 

    “The plan is not to just replace the Grad PLUS program,” Hurlock said. “The goal is to provide a more affordable financing option for Connecticut graduate students.” 

    Democrats control both chambers of Connecticut’s legislature as well as the state’s executive branch. 

    Where states don’t create their own lending programs, graduate students could be forced into the private lending market to make up shortfalls in federal loans. 

    Currently, private lenders play a “minimal” role in the market, researchers with the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia’s Consumer Finance Institute said in a recent analysis. 

    The study found that 28% of graduate student borrowers in recent years took out loans over the cap levels set by OBBBA. Of those, 38% had either subprime credit scores or no score at all, meaning they would struggle to borrow in the private sector without a co-signer. 

    Those students could also face higher interest rates and less generous terms from private lenders compared to loans from the federal government, the researchers pointed out. 

    Connecticut officials alluded to this possibility when announcing their proposal. 

    “These arbitrary ceilings do not reflect the reality of rising tuition, and they’ll force students to turn to a predatory private market for lenders that will impose higher interest rates with fewer protections,” Haddad said.

    Source link

  • How many graduate borrowers will be impacted by the looming lending limits?

    How many graduate borrowers will be impacted by the looming lending limits?

    Dive Brief:

    • About 28% of graduate borrowers in recent years have borrowed above new federal student loan limits set to go into effect in July, according to a recent analysis by the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia’s Consumer Finance Institute. 
    • Of those graduate students, nearly 40% would potentially fail to secure private loans without a cosigner under existing underwriting standards because of their credit profiles, the study found. 
    • The forthcoming limits were created by Republicans’ big tax and spending bill enacted this past summer. Starting in July, that legislation will also sunset the Grad PLUS loan program that has allowed graduate students to borrow up to the cost of their attendance.

    Dive Insight:

    Researchers with the Consumer Finance Institute set out to provide answers to one of the biggest questions hanging over one of the biggest changes to the federal student aid system of the past two decades: To what extent will private lending fill the gap after Grad PLUS ends and new borrowing limits kick in?

    Specifically, the limits cap total student borrowing at $100,000 for graduate students and $200,000 for professional students — a term that regulators are still defining to carry out the statute. Annually, federal lending will max out at $20,500 for graduate students and $50,000 for professional students.

    “All else equal, the effects of these new caps depend importantly on the extent to which the private sector is willing and able to fill in the gap left by the withdrawal of the U.S. Department of Education as the main financier of graduate education,” the Consumer Finance Institute authors — Tomas Monarrez, Jordan Matsudaira and Dubravka Ritter — said in their analysis. 

    To address the question of private lending, the researchers used a blind match of National Student Clearinghouse program enrollment records with data from credit-tracking firms. They focused on a subset of about 66,000 graduate students who first enrolled in graduate programs between 2015 and 2024. 

    Nearly one in three borrowers surpassed the cap, though researchers found a lot of variance among institutions and program types. For instance, 53% of doctoral students at private nonprofit institutions borrowed above the caps, compared to 13% of master’s students at for-profit colleges. 

    Many graduate and professional students could struggle under new loan caps

    % of borrowers entering graduate programs from 2015 to 2024 who would exceed looming federal student borrowing caps by institution and program

    The field matters as well. Across all programs, doctoral students in the health professions had the highest rate of borrowing over the loan caps, at 61%. 

    Some health profession programs — including nursing, occupational therapy and physician associate programs — could be excluded from the larger “professional” degree caps based on regulatory language the Education Department plans to propose. 

    Overall, of the 28% of borrowers who surpassed the coming caps, 38% had either subprime credit scores or no score at all, meaning they would struggle to borrow in the private sector without a co-signer — which they wouldn’t necessarily need for Grad PLUS loans. 

    As other researchers have noted, the Grad PLUS program has largely replaced a portion of private sector student lending for graduate school — which could explain why Grad PLUS loans had no significant effect on enrollment over its lifetime, according to a 2023 working paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research. 

    But, as that paper’s authors pointed out, much has changed in the private student lending market since Grad PLUS launched in 2006, including the financial crisis of the late aughts that led to tightened lending standards in many sectors. 

    Private lenders today play a “minimal” role in financing grad school, the Consumer Finance Institute authors noted, also writing that, “It is unclear the extent to which they will be willing to extend credit to graduate students affected by the loan caps.” 

    Moreover, students with lower credit scores could see higher interest rates and less generous terms compared to federal student loans, which also come with protections for financially challenged borrowers, the authors noted.

    Source link

  • Graduate careers and employability are now fundamental to institutional success

    Graduate careers and employability are now fundamental to institutional success

    Higher education institutions are navigating one of the most complex operating environments in their history.

    Financial pressure, demographic change, regulatory scrutiny, political scepticism, and shifting student expectations are no longer episodic challenges, they are structural conditions. One function increasingly sits at the centre of institutional success and risk: careers and employability.

    Graduate outcomes are no longer a background metric; they shape league tables, influence recruitment, inform regulatory judgements, and increasingly underpin public and political confidence in higher education. But their significance goes far beyond compliance. Careers and employability are now where strategy, regulation, and student experience collide.

    From bolt-on to backbone

    For many years, professional careers work in higher education was framed – often unconsciously – as a support service operating at the margins of the academic project. Careers services were unfairly characterised as cardigans and chamomile in a cupboard in a quiet corner of campus. Valuable, certainly, but supplementary. That framing could not be further from the truth today.

    Over the last 15 years we have seen a wide range of regulatory changes in HE (particularly in England) including the Teaching Excellence Framework, the tightening of access and participation regulation, the Graduate Outcomes survey, or the debate around fees. In practice, this has shifted careers and employability from the periphery to the core of institutional performance.

    Careers teams are now the heartbeat of access and participation commitments, facilitating and supporting curriculum design and assessment, driving progression outcomes, and at the intersection of institutional risk and reputation.They are shaping the conditions under which universities can evidence quality, value, and legitimacy.

    More than a metric

    It is understandable that the sector has been wary of graduate outcomes being reduced to a blunt proxy for value. But rejecting the importance of outcomes altogether is neither realistic nor desirable. Graduate outcomes matter because graduates matter, and graduate destinations are not just a metric; they are a test of purpose. Every regulatory data point represents a graduate life shaped by institutional choices about curriculum, opportunity, support, and inclusion.

    Careers and employability professionals work in that space every day, translating learning into identity, helping students navigate uncertainty, and addressing structural inequalities that regulation increasingly demands institutions confront.This is skilled, strategic work. It requires data literacy, policy fluency, pedagogical understanding, and deep employer insight.

    One of the clearest lessons of the regulatory environment is that employability cannot be “fixed” by a single team. No careers service, however strong, can alone address continuation risks, differential outcomes, or progression gaps rooted in curriculum design, assessment practice, or institutional culture. Contemporary careers and employability requires academics embedding employability meaningfully into learning, scalable work-based learning opportunities, aligned systems and student support, senior leadership expectation setting and accountability and employers as partners.

    As Lisa-Dionne Morris put it at our Annual Conference last year: “it takes a village to raise a child, and a whole university to make a student employable.” Careers services remain the engine room of this work, but they are most effective when employability is treated as a strategic, institution-wide endeavour, not a delegated function.

    Public confidence, political scrutiny, and the graduate narrative

    Beyond regulation, careers and employability now sit at the heart of a wider reputational challenge for higher education. Public confidence in universities has been strained by debates about value for money, fairness, and relevance. Graduate outcomes, rightly or wrongly, have become a proxy for these concerns.

    This is why the creation and fulfilling of opportunity features so prominently in the current Universities UK work on HE reputation in society. Careers and employability offer one of the most tangible, human responses to scepticism: evidence that higher education enables social mobility, economic participation, and meaningful contribution.

    This is not about reducing education to salary metrics. It is about demonstrating that universities help people build sustainable lives and purposeful futures. These are outcomes that matter to individuals, communities, and policymakers alike. This is why the vast majority of our members got into this line of work, and what motivates them to succeed.

    A moment of change

    Over the past year, the professional community supporting this work has been reflecting deeply on its future. Through a large-scale listening exercise, careers and employability professionals made their views clear: the work has evolved, expectations have risen, and the structures supporting it need to evolve too. That reflection has led to a significant moment of renewal.

    AGCAS (The Association of Graduate Careers Advisory Services) is becoming the Graduate Futures Institute. This change reflects a broader shift in how careers and employability are understood and positioned. The new name signals our holistic focus on graduate futures – not just immediate graduate destinations, an inclusive view of who contributes to graduate success and a commitment to impact, leadership and quality.

    It recognises that careers and employability are not ancillary to university success – they are fundamental to it.

    Careers leadership is institutional leadership

    One of the most striking changes in recent years has been the role of careers leaders themselves. They now operate at the intersection of regulation, pedagogy, strategy, and performance. They advise on risk, shape institutional narratives, and increasingly sit at tables where decisions about quality, investment, and accountability are made. This is why leadership development and collective voice matter so much in this space.

    The Graduate Futures Institute exists to support that leadership; equipping practitioners to engage confidently with policy, influence institutional strategy, and articulate the value of their work in a regulatory environment that demands clarity and evidence.

    Universities are unlikely to see regulatory pressure ease in the near future. If anything, expectations around outcomes, value, and accountability will intensify. In that context, careers and employability are a strategic asset to be invested in, not a reputational risk to be managed.

    Graduate Futures Institute members will make that strategic intent a reality. They connect students to opportunity, institutions to purpose, and regulation to lived experience. If universities are serious about success, then they must be serious about careers and employability.

    Source link

  • Pomona College considers acquiring Claremont Graduate University

    Pomona College considers acquiring Claremont Graduate University

    This audio is auto-generated. Please let us know if you have feedback.

    Dive Brief:

    • Pomona College is considering acquiring Claremont Graduate University after initiating confidential talks in late spring and entering exclusive talks in December. 
    • The private nonprofit institutions, in California, announced their discussions last week and invited their communities to weigh in. They expect to negotiate a definitive agreement over the next six months. 
    • CGU has been exploring teaming up with another institution for over a year. On an FAQ page, the university says it is seeking “a mission-aligned partner that values graduate education and can support CGU’s transformation in response to financial, demographic, and technological change.”

    Dive Insight:

    Pomona and CGU’s agreement to exclusively discuss a transaction is nonbinding, meaning either can walk away from the talks at any point. For its part, CGU said that if it determines that “a partnership is not in its best interest or cannot be structured appropriately, the partnership will not proceed.”

    Although they are still negotiating a detailed agreement, CGU wants a deal that would preserve its “name, mission, graduate identity, and academic autonomy.” The university also said that a transaction would neither result in a single institution nor would its students receive degrees from Pomona. 

    Pomona is an undergraduate liberal arts college offering just under 50 bachelor’s programs in the arts, humanities, natural sciences and social sciences, while CGU offers master’s, doctoral and certificate programs in a wide range of liberal arts and professional areas. 

    On the table is a deal that would turn CGU into a legal subsidiary of Pomona. This would not mean, according to CGU, that Pomona would subsidize its operations. Rather, Pomona would provide strategic guidance while helping it explore options for new financial models, investment management and additional revenue. 

    “CGU and Pomona would remain distinct institutions with separate admissions, academic programs, faculty, and degrees,” CGU said on its FAQ page. “Each school would continue to serve its own students and maintain its own educational mission.”

    Likewise, Pomona President Gabrielle Starr said in a statement Thursday that “Pomona’s liberal arts undergraduate mission must and will not be turned aside by any agreement with CGU.”

    Both institutions are part of the Claremont Colleges consortium, a century-old collaboration among seven independent institutions with adjoining campuses in southern California. It aims to provide “university-scale services and facilities” while individual institutions maintain the small liberal arts college experience, according to its website. 

    In entering talks with CGU, Pomona’s board considered “whether this partnership may, in fact, be essential to protecting and preserving the Consortium,” Starr said. Specifically, the college said in an FAQ that having a role in shaping CGU’s future could ensure the stability of the consortium, whereas an outsider partnering with CGU might not have the same interests in the coalition. 

    A partnership could also create new graduate pathways for Pomona’s students, the college said in the FAQ. 

    The two institutions have similarly sized student bodies, though they’re on different trajectories. Pomona’s fall headcount in 2023 stood at 1,664, up 5.8% from five years prior. CGU had 1,763 students in fall 2023, a decline of 6.3% from 2018. 

    Pomona also has more financial resources, with $3.9 billion in total assets and $424.6 million in liabilities in fiscal 2024 compared to CGU’s $347.4 million in assets and $57.2 million in liabilities. 

    Just under two years ago, CGU, facing an operating deficit, formed a committee to look at new institutional models to ensure its sustainability. Last July, it hired a consultancy, Tyton Partners, which specializes in transactions and partnerships in the education sector. In the early months of this year, the institution reached out to over 100 possible partners and invited them to provide written interest. 

    CGU narrowed the list of prospects down to about a dozen and sought formal indications of interest. It eventually landed on Pomona to hold exclusive talks about a transaction. 

    “This would not be a bailout or merger,” CGU Interim President Michelle Bligh said in a public message Thursday, describing instead a “true alliance” and “opportunity to co-create a new model of graduate education for the 21st century.”

    Source link

  • Pomona In Talks to Acquire Claremont Graduate University

    Pomona In Talks to Acquire Claremont Graduate University

    Pomona College is in talks to acquire Claremont Graduate University as the latter seeks a strategic partner amid financial challenges, according to reports in local and student media.

    The two institutions, both part of California’s seven-institution Claremont Colleges consortium, are reportedly set to strike a preliminary agreement by the end of this week. But so far, neither institution has said much publicly about the potential deal.

    “CGU has entered a process to ensure its long-term viability. We’re aware of that process, and to maintain its fairness, we cannot offer comment at this time,” a Pomona spokesperson wrote in an email to Inside Higher Ed, sharing the same statement sent to other news organizations.

    CGU officials were similarly tight-lipped.

    “Claremont Graduate University continues to explore a range of potential partnerships as part of our long-term strategic planning. These conversations are ongoing and confidential, and we want to ensure that any information we share is accurate and complete,” CGU vice president of strategy Patricia Easton wrote in an emailed statement provided by the university. “Once there are updates appropriate for release, we will share them through our official channels.”

    Claremont Graduate University has been seeking a partner since at least April 2024, when it sought out consulting firms to help with that process, according to an April 2025 announcement.

    “After much debate, we came to a consensus that we do not have the financial resources to continue going it alone as a graduate-only, comprehensive university. It was time to seek out a strategic partner or partners with a strong financial and academic foundation that by joining together would expand our opportunities for the future,” Easton wrote in the April 2025 communiqué about where partnership efforts stood at the time.

    Officials said in that announcement that a consulting firm had contacted more than 100 prospective partners on behalf of the university in January. Arizona State University, Loyola Marymount University and Northeastern University all reportedly considered acquiring CGU. But now it appears that nearby Pomona College has emerged as the top pick.

    The acquisition is reportedly moving ahead despite financial strain for both institutions.

    CGU has operated with a persistent deficit for more than a decade, which is expected to continue in fiscal year 2026; the college anticipates an operating loss of nearly $8.7 million, according to a public filing.

    Pomona, meanwhile, has enacted cost-saving measures in recent years despite its deep pockets: It had an endowment valued at nearly $3 billion in fiscal year 2024. Officials wrote in November that “Pomona has faced financial uncertainty amid changes in federal funding and policy since early 2025,” and it is being squeezed by inflation, tariffs and rising operational costs. Recent challenges follow financial modeling in 2023 that projected expenses were on pace to grow faster than revenues, prompting a five-year “college-wide savings and reallocation program.”

    Any potential merger would still need regulatory approval before it becomes official.

    Source link

  • Cost Is Graduate Enrollment “Gatekeeper”

    Cost Is Graduate Enrollment “Gatekeeper”

    Many graduate programs face funding cuts, enrollment declines and uncertain futures, but a new report describes cost of attendance as the “ultimate gatekeeper” to enrollment.

    Between Aug. 20 and Sept. 8, 2025, the enrollment management consulting firm EAB surveyed 8,106 current and prospective graduate and adult learners about their motivations, financial concerns, program search methods and program preferences.

    The findings, published Thursday in EAB’s 2025 Adult Learner Survey, show that cost ranked as the most important factor in enrollment decisions, surpassing program accreditation, which was last year’s top factor.

    The majority of prospective students (60 percent) said they would eliminate a program from consideration if they perceived it to be “too expensive.” Although data from the National Center for Education Statistics shows that the average annual cost of graduate school is more than $20,000, EAB’s survey found that 39 percent of learners believe anything more than $10,000 is too expensive; 62 percent said they wouldn’t be willing to pay more than $20,000 a year for graduate school.

    “The hopes and expectations of today’s adult learners are colliding with a financial aid system in a period of significant transition,” Val Fox, a senior director and principal in EAB’s adult learner recruitment division, said in a news release. “Federal aid sources are shrinking, and students with low credit scores may not qualify for private loans. This mismatch will make it even harder to sustain enrollment at a time when institutions need domestic adult learners more than ever.”

    Learners’ heightened concerns about cost come as graduate programs also grapple with new federal policies—including caps on graduate student loans, cuts to research funding and visa restrictions for international students—that are making it even harder for institutions to balance their budgets and attract new students.

    At the same time, however, graduate students and adult learners increasingly rely on outside funding. Scholarships were the most commonly cited funding source (52 percent), followed by financial aid, loans or grants, though both categories fell several percentage points compared to last year. Meanwhile, the report found that 25 percent of respondents cited personal or household income as one of their top five funding sources this year, compared to more than 40 percent last year.

    “Success for U.S. graduate schools in 2026 will depend heavily on their ability to adapt recruiting strategies to accommodate policy shifts and evolving student priorities,” Fox said. “Schools need to communicate costs clearly, especially on digital channels, and align their value propositions to individual student interests through hyperpersonalized marketing.”

    Source link

  • States Should Step Up on Graduate School Aid (opinion)

    States Should Step Up on Graduate School Aid (opinion)

    Two decades ago, Uncle Sam offered a helping hand for college graduates who desired careers that required advanced degrees by establishing a loan program known as Grad PLUS. That hand has now been withdrawn. Also known as Direct PLUS loans, this program allowed students to borrow beyond the $20,500 limit available through direct unsubsidized loans to cover their full cost of attendance. With the One Big Beautiful Bill Act signed into law last summer, Grad PLUS loans will no longer be an option for prospective graduate students after July 2026.

    The question of whether colleges and universities raise their tuition prices as the availability of federal aid increases has been a hotly debated topic for more than four decades, with contradictory findings. One recent study found that institutions increased their tuition prices after the creation of Grad PLUS, and determined that the funds did not increase access (or completion) for graduate education in general or for underrepresented groups in particular. These findings echo previous studies that also support a positive relationship between government aid and college prices. In contrast, other studies and analyses at the undergraduate level, as well as for graduate business, medical and law programs, have found little evidence of nonprofit institutions increasing tuition in relation to government subsidies. (The for-profit sector is another story.)

    In any case, the elimination of Grad PLUS is a new reality that incoming graduate students will have to face. Now, students in master’s and doctoral programs will only be able to borrow up to $20,500 annually (with a maximum of $100,000). Students in professional degree programs, like law and medicine, will have a higher cap of $50,000 annually (up to $200,000 total). Additionally, the maximum amount students can borrow from the federal government for their undergraduate and graduate studies combined is $257,500. Students who borrow beyond any of these limits annually will have to turn to private loans to finance the remaining costs, which are less accessible for low-income students (who have less credit) and often come with higher interest rates.

    The specific impact of these new limits on students is not yet known, but if we look at data for borrowers from previous years, we see potential impacts. In 2019–20, approximately 38 percent of all graduate borrowers borrowed beyond these caps, according to an analysis by Jobs for the Future. When disaggregated by degree type, 41 percent of graduate borrowers pursuing master’s degrees, 37 percent pursuing Ph.D. degrees and 25 percent pursuing professional degrees borrowed beyond the loan caps set by OBBBA.

    A recent analysis published by American University’s Postsecondary Education & Economics Research Center shows potential impacts not just by graduate degree type but also by specific field of study. For professional degrees (with the higher loan cap), more than half of borrowers for chiropractic, medicine, osteopathy and dentistry programs borrowed more than $200,000 for their degrees in recent years. Among the master’s programs reviewed, half or more of borrowers in programs including audiology/speech pathology, public health, nursing and school and mental health counseling, to name a few, borrowed beyond the new limits.

    Based on these analyses, it is clear that many prospective graduate students will be impacted by the new loan caps, at least in the short term. The rationale for these loan caps is that graduate programs will lower their costs to make graduate education more affordable, although it is doubtful that colleges will decrease the costs of graduate programs within just a year. It should be noted that many students do not borrow at all to obtain their degrees. In 2019–20, approximately 40 percent of full-time domestic students enrolled in master’s degrees did not borrow.

    For programs that attract students from high-income backgrounds (usually selective elite institutions), what incentive is there to decrease costs if enough students can pay out of pocket? For instance, between 2014 and 2019, medical school matriculants from high-income backgrounds (over $200,000) increased substantially. The number of students attending law schools from wealthy backgrounds has also increased in the past couple of decades, particularly at selective elite institutions. Graduate education, at least at elite schools, has become less accessible for many low-income students.

    Without financial support, options for low-income students will become even more limited. These students will largely be relegated to less selective public universities, and the more elite private schools will become even less economically diverse than they already are. Financial aid offices will become the de facto second admissions office. Using Massachusetts as an example, our analysis found that the annual cost of attendance exceeded the annual loan limit of $50,000 in the case of every accredited law and medical school in the state, with the gap between the cost of attendance and the limit ranging from about $5,600 in the case of the lone public law school (the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth), and $33,000 in the case of the only public medical school option (University of Massachusetts Chan), to as high as $71,000 for Harvard Law School and $64,000 for Harvard Medical School.

    Law School (J.D.) Institution Type 2025 Estimated Cost of Attendance Annual COA Above/ Below Cap
    Boston College Private, nonprofit $99,991 $49,991
    Boston University Private, nonprofit $92,914 $42,914
    Harvard University Private, nonprofit $121,250 $71,250
    New England Law Private, nonprofit $113,279 $63,279
    Northeastern University Private, nonprofit $88,926 $38,926
    Suffolk University Private, nonprofit $96,190 $46,190
    Western New England University Private, nonprofit $74,176 $24,176
    University of Massachusetts Dartmouth Public $55,648 (in-state) $5,648
    Amounts calculated based on current advertised rates for first-time (entering), full-time students enrolled in daytime, nine-month and on-campus programs.
    Medical School (M.D.) Institution Type 2025 Cost of Attendance Annual COA Above/Below Cap
    Boston University Private, nonprofit $100,927 $50,927
    Harvard University Private, nonprofit $113,746 $63,746
    Tufts University Private, nonprofit $99,884 $49,884
    University of Massachusetts Chan Public $83,247 (in-state) $33,247
    Amounts calculated based on advertised rates for first-time (entering), full-time students enrolled in daytime, 10-month and on-campus programs.

    This simple analysis, of course, does not take into account any institutional grants or scholarships students may be awarded, but those funds vary by institutional budgets.

    What happens when a deserving medical school applicant gains admission and a financial aid offer, only to realize that they still have a balance of $40,000 after institutional and federal aid is applied? For students to turn to private lenders, they will likely need either good credit and a substantial income or a cosigner, which may not be an option for many students from underresourced backgrounds. Almost 93 percent of private student loans given last year had a cosigner. Almost 51 percent of individuals from low/moderate incomes have limited or poor to fair credit. Even if they are lucky to be offered loans, the interest rates will likely be much higher.

    With Washington Out, States May Have to Intervene

    With the recent federal cuts to Medicaid likely to lead to decreases in state funding for postsecondary education, states may be hesitant to award funds to support students pursuing graduate education—but there are frameworks to help states determine which graduate programs deserve state funding and which type of funding to provide students. Third Way recently produced a framework that categorizes programs by personal return on investment and social value. One possible solution would be to offer accessible loans and state subsidies based on how a state places certain programs in this model.

    For programs that lead to high ROI and social value—for example, dentistry—states that are facing a shortage of dentists could offer accessible (and lower than market rate) loans in exchange for working in certain geographic areas in that state. Providing low-interest loans instead of grants would make sense for this category because dentists are more likely to have high enough earnings (postresidency) that they can repay their loans. Certain localities have set up zero-interest loans for students pursuing specific industries, such as a San Diego County program for aspiring behavioral health professionals (a type of pay-it-forward program).

    Some states, such as Pennsylvania, do have loan repayment programs for certain health occupations in exchange for working in specific areas of their states. Offering this solution without providing accessible loans will only benefit students who come from wealthier families, as they are more likely to have good enough credit or relationships with creditworthy cosigners to access private loans in the first place.

    For programs that are high in social value but low in personal ROI, such as teaching or social work, if a state determines this is an area of need, they can offer grants to lower the cost of attending these programs and minimize the amount of loans students will have to take out, in exchange for service in these fields for a specific period of time. Offering accessible, low-interest loans to students pursuing these careers could still be an option, but should be secondary, or supplemental to, grants.

    In line with recommendations from a jointly authored report from the American Enterprise Institute, EducationCounsel and the Century Foundation, states can offer grants to graduate students who demonstrate financial need, in addition to targeted grant aid for certain programs. Already, certain states, such as Maryland, New Mexico, Virginia and Washington, offer grant aid to graduate students in specific fields or based on financial need. Massachusetts also offers a tuition waiver to incentivize students to enroll in graduate programs at its public universities.

    Unfortunately, I was unable to find a single repository of state aid specifically for graduate students from various states. The closest I could find was a report released by the National Association of State Student Grant and Aid Programs for the 2023–24 academic year with data on state-funded expenditures for both undergraduate and graduate student aid. The report shows that only a handful of states allocated more than a million dollars to need-based graduate aid (Arizona, Colorado, Maryland, Minnesota, New Jersey, Texas and Virginia), but does not specify for which programs, nor does it detail how aid is awarded and to which institutions.

    The Education Finance Council also maintains a list of nonprofit loan providers in different states that offer lower-interest or more accessible loans, many of which are state-administered, such as the Massachusetts Educational Financing Authority. States that already administer conditional loans, scholarships, grants or loan forgiveness programs at the undergraduate level should consider expanding these programs to high- demand industries that require postbaccalaureate credentials if they have not already.

    What Can Institutions Do?

    Institutions are the closest to students, and they can play a role as well. Beyond offering need-based grants/scholarships to lower the cost of attendance, institutions can also guide students in the lending process, such as by publishing preferred lenders on financial aid websites. These lenders should have a good reputation with borrowers and offer low interest rates. Examples of institutions that advertise preferred lenders include Baylor University, the University of Iowa and the University of Central Missouri.

    Institutions with more financial resources can either directly partner with lenders to offer lower fixed interest rates through risk sharing or provide loans themselves. Harvard Law School makes loans available to graduate students through a partnership with the Harvard Federal Credit Union. Some private loan providers looking to get into the graduate lending space are now in conversations with institutions about developing new risk-sharing models.

    Many occupations that typically require graduate degrees, such as teaching, nursing and medicine, will face steep shortages in the coming years. States should align aid programs with current and future workforce shortages, determine which graduate programs will exceed federal loan caps and by how much, offer targeted grants for high-social-value but low-earning fields where costs exceed caps, and provide below-market or zero-interest (and accessible) loans for high-social-value, high-earning fields.

    Institutions must act urgently by partnering with accessible, ethical lenders; increasing need-based aid for students who need it most; and protecting students from predatory options. At the very least, institutions can advertise the upcoming student loan changes on their websites. With OBBBA loan caps, Washington is stepping back. Will states and institutions be able to step forward and lead the way in preserving access and promoting economic mobility? Only 2026 will tell.

    Josh Farris is research and policy specialist and Derrick Young Jr. is cofounder and executive director at Leadership Brainery, a nonprofit organization focused on improving access to graduate education for students from limited-access backgrounds.

    Source link

  • Penn Graduate Students (GET-UP) Authorize Strike as Contract Talks Falter

    Penn Graduate Students (GET-UP) Authorize Strike as Contract Talks Falter

    Graduate student workers at Penn have overwhelmingly authorized a strike — a decisive move in their fight for fair pay, stronger benefits, and comprehensive protections. The vote reflects not only deep frustration with stalled negotiations but also the growing momentum of graduate-worker organizing nationwide.

    A year of bargaining — and growing frustration

    Since winning union recognition in May 2024, GET‑UP has spent over a year negotiating with Penn administrators on their first collective-bargaining agreement. Despite 35 bargaining sessions and tentative agreements on several non-economic issues, key demands — especially around compensation, benefits, and protections for international students — remain unmet.

    Many observers see the strike authorization as long overdue. “After repeated delays and insulting offers, this was the only way to signal our seriousness,” said a member of the bargaining committee. Support for the strike among graduate workers is overwhelmingly strong, reflecting a shared determination to secure livable wages and protections commensurate with the vital labor they provide.

    Strike authorization: a powerful tool

    From Nov. 18–20, GET‑UP conducted a secret-ballot vote open to roughly 3,400 eligible graduate employees. About two-thirds voted, and 92% of votes cast authorized a strike, giving the union discretion to halt academic work at a moment’s notice.

    Striking graduate workers, many of whom serve as teaching or research assistants, would withhold all academic labor — including teaching, grading, and research — until a contract with acceptable terms is reached. Penn has drafted “continuity plans” for instruction in the event of a strike, which union organizers have criticized as strikebreaking.

    Demands: beyond a stipend increase

    GET‑UP’s contract demands include:

    • A living wage for graduate workers

    • Expanded benefits: health, vision, dental, dependent coverage

    • Childcare support and retirement contributions

    • Protections for international and immigrant students

    • Strong anti-discrimination, harassment, and inclusive-pronoun / gender-neutral restroom protections

    While Penn has agreed to some non-economic protections, many critical provisions remain unresolved. The stakes are high: graduate workers form the backbone of research and teaching at the university, yet many struggle to survive on modest stipends.

    Context: a national wave of UAW wins

    Penn’s graduate workers are part of a broader wave of successful organizing by the United Auto Workers (UAW) and allied graduate unions. Recent years have seen UAW-affiliated graduate-worker locals achieve significant victories at institutions including Cornell, Columbia, Harvard, Northwestern, and across the University of California (UC) system.

    At UC, a massive systemwide strike in 2022–2023 involving tens of thousands of Graduate Student Researchers (GSRs) and Academic Student Employees (ASEs) secured three-year contracts with major gains:

    • Wage increases of 55–80% over prior levels, establishing a livable baseline salary.

    • Expanded health and dependent coverage, childcare subsidies, paid family leave, and fee remission.

    • Stronger protections against harassment, improved disability accommodations, and support for international student workers.

    • Consolidation of bargaining units across ASEs and GSRs, strengthening long-term collective power.

    These gains demonstrate that even large, resource-rich institutions can be compelled to recognize graduate labor as essential, and to provide fair compensation and protections. They also show that coordinated, determined action — including strike authorization — can yield significant, lasting change.

    What’s next

    With strike authorization in hand, GET‑UP holds a powerful bargaining tool. While a strike remains a last resort, the overwhelming support among members signals that the union is prepared to act decisively to secure a fair contract. The UC precedent, along with wins at other UAW graduate-worker locals, suggests that Penn could follow the same path, translating student-worker momentum into meaningful, tangible improvements.

    The outcome could have major implications not just for Penn, but for graduate-worker organizing across the country — reinforcing that organized graduate labor is increasingly a central force in higher education.

    Sources

    Source link