Tag: Higher

Simplicity as strategy: The future of higher ed procurement
Procurement in higher education has come a long way from its back-office roots. Today’s procurement leaders juggle a dizzying array of demands: shrinking budgets, responsible purchasing goals, compliance issues and more — all while navigating persistent supply chain disruptions.

The solution to this mounting complexity isn’t more complexity — it’s thoughtful simplification. Forward-thinking institutions are discovering that streamlined, user-friendly procurement processes aren’t just nice to have; they’re essential in an era where procurement teams are expected to deliver far more than just cost savings.

Simplification as a strategic imperative

Procurement professionals manage competing priorities, endless spreadsheets, documentation hiccups and disconnected technologies that don’t “talk” to each other. It’s like trying to conduct an orchestra where musicians practice in isolation, playing from different sheets of music.

Beyond cost control, today’s procurement teams are expected to simultaneously deliver on quality, speed and responsible purchasing goals, while mitigating risks, innovating and more — often with fewer resources. Despite best intentions, attempts to work around complexity might simplify one step in the short run while adding more steps down the road. Like adding another lane to an already congested highway, workarounds may shift the bottleneck elsewhere.

There’s a better way: To crack procurement complexity, leaders must “bake” user-friendly simplicity into every stage of their workflows, creating processes that feel intuitive rather than burdensome.

What makes a process truly simple? According to KPMG’s research, simple procurement workflows share four traits:
- The job is easier to do with the workflow than without it.
- The workflow is easy to understand and follow.
- There are no gaps or ambiguities in the process.
- The workflow covers even rare scenarios.
Simplification doesn’t mean cutting corners. Rather, it means creating visibility across the entire procurement lifecycle, centralizing information and generating actionable data insights to enable smarter decisions. When done right, simplification enhances control while reducing frustration.

The shift to AI: Making simple feel sophisticated

In a report for Procurement Magazine, Libby Hargreaves, editor of Supply Chain Digital, predicts AI use cases in procurement will explode in the coming months, as past hesitation or playful experimentation gives way to full integration. Thanks to AI advancements, self-service can now feel like full-service, with interactions that are proactive, intelligent, helpful, efficient and frictionless, KPMG writes.

In procurement, emerging automations can range from contract management to supplier discovery, proposal customization, compliance documentation, vendor communications, spend analytics and more. As Forrester describes it, savvy procurement executives will find that investment in AI and automation tools frees up their teams from mundane tasks, prioritizes actions needing closer human attention and optimizes decisions.

Greg Muller, director of strategic sourcing and campus partnerships at UC San Diego, shares that vision. “Basic procurement functions need to be easy and automated for our users. We don’t want a Nobel Laureate wasting time looking for a good pair of gloves when they could be curing cancer,” Muller quips.

Sharon Loosman, director of procurement and business services at North Carolina State University, can relate. With one procurement team serving 12 colleges and 150 departments, Loosman aimed to create systems that would allow colleges to operate independently as experts of their own needs, while making policy-compliant purchases. Notably, Loosman noticed that faculty and staff often sidestepped the university’s official procurement channels to shop on Amazon, drawn by the wider selection, better pricing and faster delivery. Her team then set out to centralize and simplify processes without “breaking anything” or incurring implementation costs, while accessing better reporting.

To make that possible, procurement teams at UC San Diego and North Carolina State have adopted Amazon Business solutions, expanding access for internal customers across the organization. In doing so, the two institutions have integrated purchasing across departments, enabling buyers to access a vast, pre-vetted supplier network and robust functionality: custom approval workflows, deep spend analytics, preferred pricing, enhanced delivery options, Guided Buying policies and more.

Leaning into experimentation, procurement transformation

Looking ahead, procurement teams looking to innovate should embrace experimentation. “My advice is to take the blinders off, get outside your box and explore what else is out there that you haven’t thought about yet,” Loosman advises.

Muller echoes the sentiment: “We’re focused on a broader perspective,” he shares, engaging internal customers to understand their needs beyond one-off transactions and leaning on peers at other institutions to identify strategies already proven successful elsewhere.

“Sometimes we, as procurement leaders, get stuck in the way we’ve always done it,” Loosman concludes. “Let’s raise the bar. Let’s go find solutions and partners who are willing to work with you to make changes that move you forward.”

▷ Learn how Amazon Business can help accelerate your procurement goals: business.amazon.com/education
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May 27, 2025
Supporting their success: Uncovering the underrepresentation of Chinese students in Higher Education
- Baiyu Liu is a BSc Computer Science student studying at King’s College London (KCL). He has been elected President of the King’s College London Students’ Union (KCLSU) in March 2025. His election marks the first time a Chinese student breaks into Student Union leadership in a major London Russell Group university. In this article, Baiyu writes about his thoughts on Chinese representation in student leadership.
I have thoroughly enjoyed my time as an undergraduate student at KCL and I will look back fondly on my experience and the positive imprint the university has left on me. As I leave my undergraduate studies and move on to my new role as President of the KCLSU, I can’t help but reflect on my time. What went well, and what could be improved about university offerings to students, especially Chinese students.

Chinese students form one of the largest international student groups in the UK, yet they are strikingly underrepresented in leadership, governance, and public discourse. Until my election at King’s College London Students’ Union, there was not one East Asian President in its 150 year history. This highlights the stark imbalance of Chinese representation in student leadership at universities in the UK. We believe this underrepresentation must be addressed in order to keep UK universities competitive in attracting Chinese international students, whose tuition fees form a large part of British university income.

At King’s College London, out of the 23,000 international students, over 7,000 are Chinese. However, despite being a third of the international demographic and a fifth of the total student demographic, there is a virtually non-existent Chinese presence in the Students’ Union or senior leadership. Even with the commendable efforts of KCL’s leadership and our renowned Student Union, there is still much more to be done to bridge the gap.

We have identified two major factors that have led to this lack of leadership representation: a lack of existing minority representation and a lack of cross-cultural interaction. In the past, there have been discriminatory beliefs about Chinese students ‘keeping quiet’ or ‘keeping to themselves’. My election is a wake-up call – UK universities’ reliance on Chinese students’ tuition fees and treatment of them as merely consumers must come to an end. I picked up the mantle of leadership not because it was absent among the Chinese community, but because nobody had envisioned that a Chinese student could be an SU President.

Due to the Chinese culture of deference and Confucian principles, which value social harmony above individual agency, many Chinese international students do not believe they are empowered to speak out or stand up for their communities. They have very few role models or trailblazers – they couldn’t see themselves being student leaders.

There is of course also an element of the self-fulfilling prophecy of the bigotry of low expectations. The stereotype of Chinese students as being ‘hardworking but quiet’ rears its ugly head when many previous student leaders have presumed that students will simply accept what they are told and the changes the SU intends to make. They do not expect Chinese students to put up a fight.

As Chinese international students often cluster and stay within their own circles, they are often apathetic to the wider happenings of the Student Union. This effectively creates a distance between them and the policymaking processes in channelling their student voice.

The wider implication of the lack of Chinese representation is that their concerns are not always adequately addressed. One example at KCL is the issue of Digital Graduation Certificates (DGC), wherein the time discrepancy between receiving their degrees and having their physical certificates shipped to them in China leads to graduates missing out on crucial job application windows. For many years, Chinese students at KCL have suffered in silence as they have missed job opportunities due to the lack of DGCs. We do not believe this is an oversight from KCL’s administration, but instead simply that they did not know this was a problem.

Authentic Chinese food is absent in our kitchens, despite the sizable Chinese demographic. Many international students find the whitewashed Asian food disagreeable to their palates, whilst calls for food reform often fall on deaf ears. Similarly, hot drinking water dispensers are still unavailable for Chinese students who are not accustomed to drinking cold water.

These problems, combined with many others, lead to Chinese students questioning whether they ought to study in the UK at all, which already costs far more than Chinese universities. UK universities, it should be noted, are also beginning to fall behind in STEM fields, which Chinese parents are becoming increasingly more aware of. It is thus in the best interests of UK universities to maintain a competitive edge in the Chinese higher education market.

We believe it is imperative that we diversify the Student Unions of UK universities and empower Chinese international student voices. Although KCLSU is a start, it must not be the end. We hope more Chinese students could be emboldened to run for Student Union positions across this country.

KCL is one of the greatest academic institutions in the world, with a great diversity of students from different backgrounds and cultures. The world-class staff of the university and the student union have done great work in enriching and fostering inclusivity. We believe that King’s could serve as a beacon to the rest of the country moving forward, especially in uplifting student voices within the Chinese community. I envision a world where all students, regardless of nationality, can see themselves in top leadership positions and have their voices heard. I hope to see Chinese students not just study in UK universities, but also help to shape them.
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May 27, 2025
Five Science-Backed Ways to Improve Academic Writing (opinion)
I vividly recall when an editor in chief invited me to publish in a well-known journal. Fresh from defending my dissertation, I still grappled with understanding how publishing worked in academia—like whether I should try to imitate the densely written, abstract sentences that appeared in the journal he edited. I thumbed the latest issue and looked at him. “Do you have a house style I should use?”

He shuddered and gave a response I’ve since heard echoed by other editors in chief of similarly well-respected journals: “Please don’t! We publish manuscripts despite how they’re written.”

But this candid advice leaves most graduate students and even seasoned faculty members with another dilemma. If you can’t imitate articles published in the best journals, how do you write up your research so it gets published?

During my early years of teaching writing courses, I discovered that students seldom revised their work significantly, even when they received extensive feedback from both me and their peers. In fact, students failed to revise even when they received feedback and grades from their peers.

All writing students also struggle with the idea that both feedback and grades on their writing are subjective, a reflection of how a particular instructor prefers students to write in a specific course. In addition, English literature and creative writing courses teach students that writing is a combination of mystery and art.

In contrast, researchers in cognitive neuroscience and psycholinguistics identified the features that make sentences easy or difficult to read decades ago. As a result, we can teach students how to make their sentences clear—no matter how complex the subject—by teaching science-based writing methods. And as a graduate student or faculty member, you can improve your own academic writing—and your chances for publication—by focusing on the five basic principles that cause readers to perceive sentences as clear.
1. Active voice makes sentences easier to read.
In studies, researchers have discovered that readers comprehend sentences more rapidly when sentences reflect cause and effect. We can trace this to two factors. First, our brains naturally perceive cause and effect, which evolved as a survival mechanism. Research shows, for instance, that infants as young as 6 months old may identify cause and effect.

Second, English sentence structure reflects causes and effects in its ordering of words: subject-verb-object. As researchers discovered, participants read sentences with active voice at speeds one-third faster than they read sentences in passive voice. Moreover, these same participants misunderstood even simple sentences in passive voice about one-quarter of the time. While many writing instructors require students to use active voice, few alert students to the specific benefits of active sentences that make them easier to read. These sentences are shorter, more efficient and more concrete, while sharpening readers’ sense of cause and effect.

Consider the differences between the first example below, which relies on passive voice, and the second, which uses active voice.

Passive: It has been reported that satiety may be induced by the distention of the gastric antrum due to the release of dissolved gas from carbonated water, which may improve gastric motility, thereby reducing hunger.

Active: Cuomo, Savarese, Sarnelli et al. reported that drinking carbonated water distends the gastric antrum through the release of dissolved gas, inducing satiety and improving gastric motility, all of which reduce hunger.
1. Actors or concrete objects turn sentences into microstories.
Academic writing naturally tackles complex content that can prove challenging even to subject matter experts. However, writers can make even challenging content comprehensible to nonexperts by making cause and effect clear in their sentences by using nouns that readers can easily identify as subjects. When the grammatical subjects in sentences are nouns clearly capable of performing actions, readers process sentences with greater speed and less effort. For actors, use people, organizations or publications—any individual, group or item created with intention that generates impact.

We unconsciously perceive these sentences as easier to read and recall because identifying actors and actions in sentences aids readers in fixing both a word’s meaning and the role it plays in sentence structure. Furthermore, these nouns enhance the efficiency of any sentence by paring down its words. Take these examples below:

Abstract noun as subject: Virginia Woolf’s examination of the social and economic obstacles female writers faced, due to the presumption that women had no place in literary professions and so were instead relegated to the household, particularly resonated with her audience of young women who had struggled to fight for their right to study at their colleges, even after the political successes of the suffragettes.

Actor as subject: In A Room of One’s Own, Virginia Woolf examined social and economic obstacles female writers faced. Despite the political success of the suffragettes, writers like Woolf battled the perception that women had no place in the literary professions. Thus Woolf’s book resonated with her audience, young women who had to fight for the right to study at their colleges.
1. Pronouns send readers backward, but readers make sense of sentences by anticipating what comes next.
If writers imitate the academic writing they see in print, they typically rely on pronouns as the subjects of sentences, especially “this,” “that,” “these,” “those” and “it.” However, pronouns save writers time but cost readers significantly, for two reasons.

First, readers typically assume that pronouns refer to a single noun rather than a cluster of nouns, a phrase or even an entire sentence. Second, when writers use these pronouns without nouns to anchor their meaning, readers slow down and frequently misidentify the meanings of pronouns. Moreover, readers rated writing samples with higher numbers of pronouns as less well-written than sentences that relied on actors as subjects—or even pronouns like “this” anchored by nouns like “outcome.”

Pronoun as subject: Due to the potential confounding detrimental effects of sulfonylureas and insulin in the comparator arms of the trials evaluating anticancer effects of metformin/thiazolidinediones, it is difficult to draw any firm conclusions from prior studies.

Actor as subject: In trials to assess the anticancer effects of metformin/thiazolidinediones, we had difficulty drawing any firm conclusions from prior studies due to potential confounding detrimental effects from sulfonylureas and insulin.
1. Action verbs make sentences more concrete, efficient and memorable.
Open any newspaper or magazine and, even in just-the-facts-ma’am hard news stories, you’ll find action verbs, like “argues,” “reinvents,” “writes” and “remakes.” In contrast, most writers overrely on nonaction verbs. These verbs include “is,” “has been,” “seems,” “appears,” “becomes,” “represents” and that evergreen staple of academic writing, “tends.”

Action verbs enable readers to immediately identify verbs, a process central to comprehending sentence structure and understanding meaning alike. Furthermore, action verbs make sentences more efficient, more concrete and more memorable. In one study of verbs and memory, readers recalled concrete verbs more accurately than nonaction verbs.

When we read action verbs, our brains recruit the sensory-motor system, generating faster reaction times than with abstract or nonaction verbs, which are processed outside that system. Even in patients with dementia, action verbs remain among words patients with advanced disease can identify due to the semantic richness of connections action verbs recruit in the brain.

Nonaction verbs: Claiming the promotion of research “excellence” and priding oneself in the record of “excellence” has become commonplace, but what this excellence is concretely about is unclear.

Action verbs: Research institutions claim to promote faculty on the basis of research “excellence,” but institutions define “excellence” in many ways, with few clear definitions.
1. Place subjects and verbs close together.
When we read, we understand sentences’ meaning based on our predictions of how sentences unfold. We unconsciously make these predictions from our encounters with thousands of sentences. Most important, these predictions rely on our ability to identify grammatical subjects and verbs.

We make these predictions easily when writers place subjects and verbs close together. In contrast, we struggle when writers separate subjects and verbs. With each increase in distance between subjects and verbs, readers exert greater effort, while reading speeds slow down. More strikingly, readers also make more errors in identifying subjects and verbs with increases in the number of words between subjects and verbs—even in relatively short sentences.

For example, in this sentence, readers must stumble through two adjective clauses, noted in orange below, before encountering the verb “decreases,” paired with the underlined subject, “rule”:

Specifically, a rule that indicates a reduction in delay that precedes an aversive consequence decreases procrastination in university students.

But this separation strains working memory, as readers rely on subject-verb-object order to identify sentence structure. Ironically, as academic writers gain sophistication in their subject-matter expertise, they frustrate readers’ mechanisms for comprehension. Your urge to immediately modify the subject of your sentence with phrases and clauses slows reading and increases readers’ sense of conscious effort.

On the other hand, reading speeds increase while effort decreases when subjects and verbs appear close together. Introduce your main point with a subject and verb, then modify them with clauses or phrases:

Specifically, university students decrease procrastination when they face aversive consequences immediately for failure to meet deadlines.

These principles will work in any discipline, enabling writers to control how editors and peer reviewers respond to their manuscripts and proposals. These changes can help make an academic career successful, crucial in today’s competitive environment.

Yellowlees Douglas is a former professor of English at Holy Names University and was a director of five writing programs at universities including the City University of New York and the University of Florida. She is the author, most recently, of Writing for the Reader’s Brain: A Science-Based Guide (Cambridge University Press, 2024).
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May 27, 2025
Harvard Wins Injunction to Protect International Enrollment

International students make up more than one-quarter of Harvard’s student body.

APCortizasJr/iStock Unreleased/Getty Images

Less than a day after having its ability to host international students revoked by the federal government, Harvard University successfully sued the Trump administration to block the move. A judge granted a temporary restraining order late Friday morning.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced Thursday afternoon that the Trump administration had stripped Harvard’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program certification in a letter that vaguely accused Harvard of a “failure to adhere to the law.”

However, the letter did not name any specific violations of the law by Harvard.

On Friday morning, Harvard threw a legal counterpunch, filing a lawsuit challenging the revocation of SEVP certification and seeking a temporary restraining order to halt the action, which could cost Harvard to suddenly lose more than 6,000 students if they are unable to enroll. (International enrollment typically makes up about a quarter of Harvard’s head count.) Beyond blocking new enrollments, the revocation would require current international students to transfer.

Harvard president Alan Garber blasted the SEVP revocation as “unlawful and unwarranted” and said it was a punitive effort by the Trump administration in response to Harvard’s rejection of demands to reform governance, admissions, hiring processes and more following allegations of antisemitism and harassment that stemmed from pro-Palestinian protests last year. (Harvard filed a separate lawsuit pushing back on those demands last month, prompting the Trump administration to retaliate by freezing $2.7 billion in grants and contracts, or about a third of its federal research funding.)

“It imperils the futures of thousands of students and scholars across Harvard and serves as a warning to countless others at colleges and universities throughout the country who have come to America to pursue their education and fulfill their dreams,” Garber wrote in a message to campus.

He added, “We will do everything in our power to support our students and scholars.”

Harvard’s lawsuit echoed Garber’s points in an even sharper tone, accusing the federal government of blatantly violating the First Amendment and Harvard’s due process rights.

“With the stroke of a pen, the government has sought to erase a quarter of Harvard’s student body, international students who contribute significantly to the University and its mission,” lawyers representing Harvard argued in Friday’s early-morning legal filing.

Harvard’s lawsuit named DHS, Noem and other officials within the department as defendants, as well as the U.S. Departments of Justice and State and agency leaders.

Assistant DHS secretary Tricia McLaughlin fired back at Harvard in a response to Inside Higher Ed.

“This lawsuit seeks to kneecap the President’s constitutionally vested powers under Article II. It is a privilege, not a right, for universities to enroll foreign students and benefit from their higher tuition payments to help pad their multibillion-dollar endowments. The Trump administration is committed to restoring common sense to our student visa system; no lawsuit, this or any other, is going to change that. We have the law, the facts, and common sense on our side,” she wrote.

Another Legal Setback

A judge swiftly agreed with Harvard’s argument, signing off on the temporary restraining order to prevent revocation of the university’s SEVP certification within hours of the lawsuit being filed.

In a brief opinion, a district court judge in Massachusetts wrote in response to Harvard’s legal filing that the temporary restraining order was “justified to preserve the status quo.” The judge blocked DHS from stripping SEVP certification, at least temporarily, and granted a hearing.

A date for the hearing was not specified in court documents.

The temporary restraining order is one of multiple legal setbacks the Trump administration has faced recently as it has sought to pull student visas over minor infractions (and for constitutionally protected speech), cap federal research funding reimbursement rates, and slash staff at the Department of Education and other agencies. Many of those efforts face ongoing challenges.

On Thursday, for example, a federal judge barred the Trump administration from firing thousands of Department of Education employees as part of a sweeping reduction of force.

The federal government has already appealed that decision.

‘Do This Everywhere’

The Trump administration’s latest action against Harvard prompted broad condemnation from academics and free speech groups, who argued that the federal government did not follow legal processes for stripping SEVP certification and had ignored the university’s due process rights.

“The administration has clearly targeted Harvard in recent months. In doing so, it has violated not only Harvard’s First Amendment rights, but also the rights of the university’s students and faculty,” the free speech group Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression wrote in a Friday social media post. “We commend Harvard for standing up for itself. Free speech and academic freedom are essential to higher education. They are values worth fighting for.”

Despite widespread concerns from academics and lawyers that stripping Harvard’s SEVP certification is not legal, multiple Republican officials have endorsed Noem’s actions.

Rep. Randy Fine, a Republican who represents Florida and a member of the House Education and the Workforce Committee, cheered on the move in a Friday appearance on FOX Business. Fine, a two-time Harvard graduate, said the Trump administration should “do this everywhere” amid concerns about antisemitic behavior and harassment on college campuses.

Fine also took a dim view of international students exercising their First Amendment rights.

“We should not be bringing people into America to get an education who hate us. They should be coming here to get an education, and frankly they should keep their mouths shut beyond that. I don’t go into someone else’s house and complain about it when I’m there,” Fine said.

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May 23, 2025
Harvard Sues to Protect International Enrollment

International students make up more than one-quarter of Harvard’s student body.

APCortizasJr/iStock Unreleased/Getty Images

Less than a day after having its ability to host international students revoked by the federal government, Harvard University successfully sued the Trump administration to block the move. A judge granted a temporary restraining order late Friday morning.

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem announced Thursday afternoon that the Trump administration had stripped Harvard’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program certification in a letter that vaguely accused Harvard of a “failure to adhere to the law.”

However, the letter did not name any specific violations of the law by Harvard.

On Friday morning, Harvard threw a legal counterpunch, filing a lawsuit challenging the revocation of SEVP certification and seeking a temporary restraining order to halt the action, which could cost Harvard to suddenly lose more than 6,000 students if they are unable to enroll. (International enrollment typically makes up about a quarter of Harvard’s head count.) Beyond blocking new enrollments, the revocation would require current international students to transfer.

Harvard president Alan Garber blasted the SEVP revocation as “unlawful and unwarranted” and said it was a punitive effort by the Trump administration in response to Harvard’s rejection of demands to reform governance, admissions, hiring processes and more following allegations of antisemitism and harassment that stemmed from pro-Palestinian protests last year. (Harvard filed a separate lawsuit pushing back on those demands last month, prompting the Trump administration to retaliate by freezing $2.7 billion in grants and contracts, or about a third of its federal research funding.)

“It imperils the futures of thousands of students and scholars across Harvard and serves as a warning to countless others at colleges and universities throughout the country who have come to America to pursue their education and fulfill their dreams,” Garber wrote in a message to campus.

He added, “We will do everything in our power to support our students and scholars.”

Harvard’s lawsuit echoed Garber’s points in an even sharper tone, accusing the federal government of blatantly violating the First Amendment and Harvard’s due process rights.

“With the stroke of a pen, the government has sought to erase a quarter of Harvard’s student body, international students who contribute significantly to the University and its mission,” lawyers representing Harvard argued in Friday’s early-morning legal filing.

Harvard’s lawsuit named DHS, Noem and other officials within the department as defendants, as well as the U.S. Departments of Justice and State and agency leaders.

Assistant DHS secretary Tricia McLaughlin fired back at Harvard in a response to Inside Higher Ed.

“This lawsuit seeks to kneecap the President’s constitutionally vested powers under Article II. It is a privilege, not a right, for universities to enroll foreign students and benefit from their higher tuition payments to help pad their multibillion-dollar endowments. The Trump administration is committed to restoring common sense to our student visa system; no lawsuit, this or any other, is going to change that. We have the law, the facts, and common sense on our side,” she wrote.

Another Legal Setback

A judge swiftly agreed with Harvard’s argument, signing off on the temporary restraining order to prevent revocation of the university’s SEVP certification within hours of the lawsuit being filed.

In a brief opinion, a district court judge in Massachusetts wrote in response to Harvard’s legal filing that the temporary restraining order was “justified to preserve the status quo.” The judge blocked DHS from stripping SEVP certification, at least temporarily, and granted a hearing.

A date for the hearing was not specified in court documents.

The temporary restraining order is one of multiple legal setbacks the Trump administration has faced recently as it has sought to pull student visas over minor infractions (and for constitutionally protected speech), cap federal research funding reimbursement rates, and slash staff at the Department of Education and other agencies. Many of those efforts face ongoing challenges.

On Thursday, for example, a federal judge barred the Trump administration from firing thousands of Department of Education employees as part of a sweeping reduction of force.

The federal government has already appealed that decision.

‘Do This Everywhere’

The Trump administration’s latest action against Harvard prompted broad condemnation from academics and free speech groups, who argued that the federal government did not follow legal processes for stripping SEVP certification and had ignored the university’s due process rights.

“The administration has clearly targeted Harvard in recent months. In doing so, it has violated not only Harvard’s First Amendment rights, but also the rights of the university’s students and faculty,” the free speech group Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression wrote in a Friday social media post. “We commend Harvard for standing up for itself. Free speech and academic freedom are essential to higher education. They are values worth fighting for.”

Despite widespread concerns from academics and lawyers that stripping Harvard’s SEVP certification is not legal, multiple Republican officials have endorsed Noem’s actions.

Rep. Randy Fine, a Republican who represents Florida and a member of the House Education and the Workforce Committee, cheered on the move in a Friday appearance on FOX Business. Fine, a two-time Harvard graduate, said the Trump administration should “do this everywhere” amid concerns about antisemitic behavior and harassment on college campuses.

Fine also took a dim view of international students exercising their First Amendment rights.

“We should not be bringing people into America to get an education who hate us. They should be coming here to get an education, and frankly they should keep their mouths shut beyond that. I don’t go into someone else’s house and complain about it when I’m there,” Fine said.

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May 23, 2025
Higher Education Inquirer : HEI Investigation: Campus.edu
In a sector under constant strain, Campus.edu is being heralded by some as the future of community college—and by others as a slick repackaging of the troubled for-profit college model. What many don’t realize is that before it became Campus.edu, the company was known as MTI College, a private, for-profit trade school based in Sacramento, California.

Campus.edu rebranded in 2020 under tech entrepreneur Tade Oyerinde, is backed by nearly $100 million in venture capital. Campus now markets itself as a tech-powered alternative to traditional community colleges—and a lifeline for students underserved by conventional higher ed.
The rebranding, however, raises red flags. While Campus.edu pitches a student-first mission with attractive promises—zero-cost tuition, free laptops, elite educators—the model has echoes of the troubled for-profit sector, with privatization, outsourcing, and digital-first delivery taking precedence over public accountability and academic governance.

The Promises: What Campus.edu Offers

Campus.edu markets itself with a clean, six-step path to success. The pitch is aspirational, accessible, and designed to appeal to working-class students, first-generation college-goers, and those shut out of elite institutions. Here’s what the company promises:

Straightforward Application – A simple application process, followed by matching with an admissions advisor who helps identify a student’s purpose and educational fit.

Tech for Those Who Need It – A free laptop and Wi-Fi access for students who lack them, ensuring digital inclusion.

Personal Success Coach – Each student is assigned a personal success coach, offering free tutoring, career advising, and 24/7 access to wellness services.

Elite Educators – Courses are taught live via Zoom by faculty who also teach at top universities like Stanford and Columbia.

Enduring Support – Whether transferring to a four-year college or entering the workforce, Campus promises help with building skills and networks.

More Learning, Less Debt – For Pell Grant-eligible students, Campus markets its programs as costing nothing out-of-pocket, with some students completing degrees debt-free.

It’s a compelling narrative—combining social mobility, digital access, and educational prestige into a neat online package.

Behind the Curtain: MTI College and the For-Profit Legacy

Campus.edu did not rise out of nowhere. It emerged from the bones of MTI College, a long-running, accredited for-profit vocational school. MTI offered hands-on training in legal, IT, cosmetology, and health fields—typical offerings in the for-profit world. The purchase and transformation of MTI into Campus.edu allowed Oyerinde to retain accreditation, avoiding the long and uncertain process of seeking approval for a brand-new college.

This kind of maneuver—buying a for-profit and relaunching it under a new brand—is not new. We’ve seen similar strategies with Kaplan (now Purdue Global), Ashford (now the University of Arizona Global Campus), and Grand Canyon University. What makes Campus.edu unique is the degree to which it blends Silicon Valley aesthetics with the structural DNA of a for-profit college.

Missing Data, Big Promises

Campus.edu boasts high engagement and satisfaction, but as of now, no independent data on student completion, debt outcomes, or long-term career impact is publicly available. The company remains in its early stages, with aggressive growth goals and millions in investor backing—but little regulatory scrutiny.

With investors like Sam Altman (OpenAI), Jason Citron (Discord), and Bloomberg Beta, the pressure to scale is intense. But scale can come at the expense of quality, especially when students are promised the moon.

Marketing Meets Memory

Campus.edu is savvy. Its marketing strikes all the right notes: digital equity, economic mobility, mental health, and student empowerment. It presents itself as the antidote to everything wrong with higher education.

But as its past as MTI College shows, branding can obscure history. And as for-profit operators adapt to a new digital age, it’s essential to distinguish innovation from opportunism. Without transparency, regulation, and democratic oversight, models like Campus.edu could replicate the same old exploitation—with better user interfaces.

The stakes are high. For students already at the margins, a false promise can be more damaging than no promise at all.
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May 23, 2025
Longtime Professor Offers Administrators Advice (opinion)
I read articles constantly in various journals, including this one, on how to be successful in various administrative roles—department chair, dean, provost, president, etc. Most of these are addressed to institutions not at all like mine, and many of the pieces are facile.

I am a senior faculty member bordering 50 years at a small private university of fewer than 900 undergrads and fewer than 500 graduate enrollments. I have held most leadership roles, won just about all the available honors and have had offers from other institutions as dean and vice president, among other roles. I have declined them all because I am at heart a classroom teacher and my dedication to my institution is inviolate.

In my long tenure, I have seen many senior administrators come and go, and I have kept notes on the bad ones. Some left significant damage not easily repaired. Reflecting on a recently departed senior administrator inspired me to articulate some advice and a few rules for success or failure at institutions such as mine.
1. Know the institution that you come to serve. This requires far more than a general overview; it necessitates a deep dive into the culture and nature of the place. Do not invoke the platitude “from my experience at other places, I have concluded …” Very large universities may reflect somewhat similar characteristics, but even that is questionable. However, institutions such as mine differ distinctively in their culture, including history, experiences, individuals and makeup. Learn all that you can about this before arriving, and once on campus devote the necessary time to knowing the individuals who are key players, especially those who through long service have shaped the character of the place.
  New administrators often privilege new members of the community, who, like them, are novices, in hopes that they will be more amenable to reshaping the environment. However, it is those with long history who are embedded in the culture and who have deep connections with many important constituencies, including peers, the Board of Trustees and alumni. A new administrator may believe that they have a mandate to change the culture. But traditions are the lifeblood of small institutions, and they don’t die readily. Supposed mandates can dissipate quickly. First gain trust before venturing into this potential minefield.
2. If the institution is in such despair that immediate drastic action is imperative, ask yourself honestly if you can handle the responsibility of the challenge. Success may be ephemeral, and even if you achieve short-term goals, you may burn bridges that can continue to haunt you. My institution has not experienced existential travail, but some leaders during my tenure have exploited unease and trepidation, taking advantage of fears about salary stagnation, job reductions, benefits suspensions or even, in extreme cases, mentioning other college closings to promote their agendas. Academia today is precarious, and honesty is necessary, but fear is a poor leadership strategy.
1. Put the institution above yourself. When you lose the trust of the community, it is merely a matter of time. No action is more damning for an administrator than résumé-building for the next position. Every action must be in the interests of the institution rather than one’s own benefit. Over 50 years, I have witnessed several leaders whose actions were so patently self-serving that I wished only that they would move away—whether up or down, I didn’t care. This is a character flaw. What one may consider as career enhancement can come at the expense and livelihood of my peers and colleagues.
  In my early days as an ambitious potential climber, my president counseled me, to privilege my personal career as I pursued the next step might be successful or not. But to privilege my institution with all my energy, talent and commitment would lead to a more fulfilling life. I didn’t appreciate the admonishment at the time, but I came to internalize it. I won’t impose this mindset on others, and personally I would be a wealthier man if I had acted differently, but it has provided a personal career satisfaction that far exceeds any material or ego considerations. My mantra is to “devote heart and soul to the institution to the day of departure, and even beyond.”
1. Be honest, transparent, ethical and kind. Administrators often have to make hard decisions that drastically affect individual lives. You must act, but do so with integrity, empathy and kindness. Take responsibility for the decisions that you make; do not blame others or the situation for actions that you administer. Eschew pronouncements (which I have heard more than once) that “these actions are for better positioning the institution for long-term success.” That may be true, but tone-deaf remarks do not offer solace to individuals losing their careers for the institution’s “future well-being,” nor do they generally resonate well for institutional morale.
2. Faculty and staff morale is fragile, particularly at small institutions such as mine. Compromising it is hazardous. Keep steadfast: Sincerity and trust should be your guiding principles. If people trust you, they will bear considerable pain. If they do not trust you, then you will fail no matter what your motives.
The responsibility of leadership in the contemporary environment is a daunting undertaking. It demands skill, fortitude, courage, principles and character. From my long years of observations, many who carry significant titles do not demonstrate the requisite capabilities. One hopes that the few best practices expressed above may point toward some standards.

Joe P. Dunn is the Charles A. Dana Professor and chair of the Department of History and Philosophy at Converse University.
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May 23, 2025
What AI Can’t Read: Ambiguities and Silences (opinion)

A year ago, I saw artificial intelligence as a shortcut to avoid deep thinking. Now, I use it to teach thinking itself.

Like many educators, I initially viewed artificial intelligence as a threat—an easy escape from rigorous analysis. But banning AI outright became a losing battle. This semester, I took a different approach: I brought it into my classroom, not as a crutch, but as an object of study. The results surprised me.

For the first time this spring, my students are not just using AI—they are reflecting on it. AI is not simply a tool; it is a mirror, exposing biases, revealing gaps in knowledge and reshaping students’ interpretive instincts. In the same way a river carves its course through stone—not by force, but by persistence—this deliberate engagement with AI has begun to alter how students approach analysis, nuance and complexity.

Rather than rendering students passive consumers of information, AI—when engaged critically—becomes a tool for sharpening analytical skills. Instead of simply producing answers, it provokes new questions. It exposes biases, forces students to reconsider assumptions and ultimately strengthens their ability to think deeply.

Yet too often, universities are focused on controlling AI rather than understanding it. Policies around AI in higher education often default to detection and enforcement, treating the technology as a problem to be contained. But this framing misses the point. The question in 2025 is not whether to use AI, but how to use it in ways that deepen, rather than dilute, learning.

AI as a Tool for Deep Engagement

This semester I’ve asked students to use AI in my seminar on Holocaust survivor testimony. At first glance, using AI to analyze these deeply human narratives seems contradictory—almost irreverent. Survivor testimony resists coherence. It is shaped by silences, contradictions and emotional truths that defy categorization. How can an AI trained on probabilities and patterns engage with stories shaped by trauma, loss and the fragility of memory?

And yet, that is precisely why I have made AI a central component of the course—not as a shortcut to comprehension, but as a challenge to it. Each week, my students use AI to transcribe, summarize and identify patterns in testimonies. But rather than treating AI’s responses as authoritative, they interrogate them. They see how AI stumbles over inconsistencies, how it misreads hesitation as omission, how it resists the fragmentation that defines survivor accounts. And in observing that resistance, something unexpected happens: students develop a deeper awareness of what it means to listen, to interpret, to bear witness.

AI’s sleek outputs conceal a deeper problem: It is not neutral. Its responses are shaped by the biases embedded in its training data, and by its relentless pursuit of coherence—even at the expense of accuracy. An algorithm will iron out inconsistencies in testimony, not because they are unimportant, but because it is designed to prioritize seamlessness over contradiction, clarity over ambiguity. But testimony is ambiguity. Memory thrives on contradiction. If left unchecked, AI’s tendency to smooth out rough edges risks erasing precisely what makes survivor narratives so powerful: their rawness, their hesitations, their refusal to conform to a clean, digestible version of history.

For educators, the question is not just how to use AI but how to resist its seductions. How do we ensure that students scrutinize AI rather than accept its outputs at face value? How do we teach them to use AI as a lens rather than a crutch? The answer lies in making AI itself an object of inquiry—pushing students to examine its failures, to challenge its confident misreadings. AI does not replace critical thinking; it demands it.

AI as Productive Friction

If AI distorts, misinterprets and overreaches, why use it at all? The easy answer would be to reject it—to bar it from the classroom, to treat it as a contaminant rather than a tool. But that would be a mistake. AI is here to stay, and higher education has a choice: either leave students to navigate its limitations on their own or make those limitations part of their education.

Rather than treating AI’s flaws as a reason for exclusion, I see them as opportunities. In my classroom, AI-generated responses are not definitive answers but objects of critique—imperfect, provisional and open to challenge. By engaging with AI critically, students learn not just from it, but about it. They see how AI struggles with ambiguity, how its summaries can be reductive, how its confidence often exceeds its accuracy. In doing so, they sharpen the very skills AI cannot replicate: skepticism, interpretation and the ability to challenge received knowledge.

This approach aligns with Marc Watkins’s observation that “learning requires friction.” AI can be a force of productive friction in the classroom. Education is not about seamlessness; it is about struggle, revision and resistance.

Teaching history—and especially the history of genocide and mass violence—often feels like standing on a threshold: one foot planted in the past, the other stepping into an uncertain future. In this space, AI does not replace the act of interpretation; it compels us to ask what it means to carry memory forward.

Used thoughtfully, AI does not erode intellectual inquiry—it deepens it. If engaged wisely, it sharpens—rather than replaces—the very skills that make us human.

Jan Burzlaff is a postdoctoral associate in the Jewish Studies program at Cornell University.

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May 23, 2025
What Ruth Simmons Taught Me About Standing for Something

Those who know me are well aware that I have a professional crush on Ruth Simmons. I have talked about how much I admire her career and the bold stances she has taken publicly and taken opportunities to ask others about how she has encouraged and mentored them. When presented with a chance to meet her, I quickly bought an airline ticket and counted down the days.

For those who are unfamiliar with her career, she was the first Black president of an Ivy League institution; holds the title of president emerita of Smith College, Brown University and Prairie View A&M University; and as of this past weekend, has been awarded 41 honorary degrees.

The last of these degrees was conferred by Southern Methodist University, which is where I earned my doctoral degree. Michael Harris, a professor at SMU, was the Faculty Senate president who nominated Simmons to receive the award. As a result, he was invited to the dinner given in her honor, and it was my great fortune his wife was unable to attend. He jokes that only one person references Simmons as often as I do, and he felt obligated to ask if I was interested in attending.

Prior to the dinner, Simmons was the speaker at a campuswide symposium, where signed copies of her book, Up Home, were distributed to attendees. She spoke about her childhood and career, offering advice to all in attendance.

Her final statement felt like a follow on to my last “Call to Action” piece, which encouraged everyone to fight on behalf of higher education:

“It’s in those moments, even when you’re wrong or when people think you’re wrong, that you’re elevated. It’s in those moments that you stand for something and know what is beyond the pale, in the things that you see before you. And so if, like my mother, you see somebody being unfairly treated, how dare you be silent? How dare you if you see someone doing something that trespasses. What should we be doing as human beings? How dare we not say something?

“So the question I get when I do my book events, from students and everyone else, is ‘What should I be doing in this moment?’ Everybody’s question is ‘What should I be doing now?’ I don’t have an answer for everybody, but I do know that at 80 years old, I get up every day ready to do something, and that’s what I always answer. ‘You’ve got to do something.’ It is not a moment to sit on the sidelines and be comfortable and say, ‘Oh, let everybody else worry about that.’ Shame on you if you draw that conclusion right now.”

I couldn’t agree more.

Like Ruth Simmons, I’ve received many questions from people who are unsure how or if they can fight, having read my recent piece. Some colleagues feel they can’t fight because they are in red states, or they worry they could put themselves or their institutions at risk through their actions. Others feel they lack the credibility or the authority to lead a fight. Still others worry they need to take on the fight on behalf of the whole industry and are already exhausted.

Fighting on behalf of higher education isn’t a one-size-fits-all endeavor. I would encourage, as Simmons notes, that this can include addressing mistruths, defending those who are being treated unfairly and speaking out when the moment demands it. I believe that fighting for higher education means that we each defend the academy within our spheres of influence in big and small ways.

For example, arm yourself with facts and be prepared to address misinformation you may hear about the “Big Beautiful Bill,” which was just approved by the House GOP and has been sent to the Senate. As passed by the House, it includes limiting Pell eligibility and eliminating subsidized student loans.

Know what the impact of the House’s proposed endowment tax will be on the institutions that will be impacted. Be versed in how institutions are reeling from the elimination of research grants and how the bill will now further impact them. It is clear to me that these are the first cuts for institutions, but they won’t be the last. The goal is to have fiscal death by a thousand cuts. I would argue it is our responsibility to speak out—to fight— when we hear people discussing the federal budget and grant cuts and explain the impacts these cuts are having on student persistence, on campuses, on research, and on everyday people.

Despite my choice of language and the traditional connotation associated with it, I don’t think of fighting as only a negative concept. Or, at the very least, I was raised in a Hispanic household where the duality of challenge and support was viewed as a given, rather than a negative. A colleague of mine said that he felt my language was solely confrontational. I suggested in response that fighting to me means asserting an alternative, which includes sharing expertise, data and information, and serving as a sense maker. I believe it covers addressing falsehoods and defending the truth. It is up to each of us if we view and live this only as a negative.

It’s possible that Simmons’s advice feels aligned with my thinking because I want so dearly to be aligned with her, but the reality is that there’s something about a fighter that is always aligned with another fighter, and for that reason I hope you’ll see yourself in her words and in mine. Once again, I invite you to fight.

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May 23, 2025
King Misrepresented in Anti-DEI Congressional Hearing

In January 2024, I wrote a Forbes article titled, “How Martin Luther King Would Respond to Today’s Attacks on DEI.” I declared therein that King would be outraged and disgusted by the catastrophic assault on values for which he fought, was arrested 29 times and ultimately died. Were he still alive today, I know for sure that King would call on leaders to demonstrate more courage and integrity as DEI is being recklessly torn down in our nation’s K-12 schools, higher education institutions, government agencies and businesses. He would insist on brave truth telling, nonviolent resistance, larger and more audacious multiracial coalitions, and strategically pulling every possible lever in defense of racial justice. King would not have been okay with colleges and universities closing culture centers and multicultural affairs offices, scrubbing their websites of language pertaining to antiracism and equity, and firing innocent DEI practitioners who broke no laws and did nothing wrong.

Regarding his dream, I insisted the following in the aforementioned Forbes article about King: “Paradoxically, many people who know little about the greatest American civil rights leader of all time at least know he famously spoke these words: ‘I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.’ The part about not judging people by skin color gets weaponized to justify colorblindness.”

Unsurprisingly, this very thing happened this week in a U.S. House of Representatives hearing titled “Restoring Excellence: The Case Against DEI.” I was the lone expert witness for the Democrats, a role I had played twice before on Capitol Hill.

Robert Onder, a Republican congressman representing Missouri, prefaced a question to me by reciting the go-to line from King’s speech. “Let me read to you a quote you may have heard of, maybe you haven’t, it goes something like this …”

Two things ran through my mind at the time. First was “Oh, here we go with the tired, predictable misrepresentation of Martin Luther King’s stance on colorblindness.” Secondly, I thought, “Of course I have heard these words—I have been a Black man in America for nearly 50 years; I am a proud graduate of a historically Black university; I spent a decade as a member of the Africana studies faculty at the University of Pennsylvania; I have delivered numerous Martin Luther King Day keynote addresses for universities and companies across the country (including this one in 2016 at Duke University in which I critiqued the twisting of King’s Dream speech); and I have read dozens of MLK sermons, speeches and letters, including but not limited to those published in A Testament of Hope: The Essential Writings and Speeches—how absurd to even suggest that I may be hearing these words for the first time.” It was the most disgusting moment of the hearing for me, yet I somehow maintained my composure.

I have said it many times before, but it is worth repeating during these dangerous times in higher education and our democracy: King was not a proponent of colorblindness. He hated racism against African Americans and other people of color. He called white supremacy by its name. He called Black people by their names as he fearlessly demanded equity, opportunity and justice for them. The remedies he advocated were extraordinarily race-forward and color-conscious. Any policy or practice in higher education or elsewhere that insists on colorblindness is a misrepresentation of King’s stance.

There is at least one other noteworthy thing about the annoying evocation of King in the congressional hearing: The civil rights icon said judged “by the content of their character,” but Onder and other Republicans kept insisting on narrowly judging applicants by standardized college entrance exams that tell admission professionals more about those prospective students’ ZIP codes, socioeconomic statuses, the ability of their families to pay for expensive test prep courses and tutors, and the abundance of resources in the K-12 schools they attended.

Ironically, DEI opponents often fail to recognize and appreciate the incredibly valuable proxies for character, leadership, creativity and other strong indicators of undeniable potential for greatness in holistic admissions practices.

Those of us who love King and truly value the race-consciousness of the unrealized American dream for which he fought, was repeatedly jailed and died must continue to help our family members, neighbors, colleagues, presidents and governing board members, students, and elected officials understand why wholesale, decontextualized advocacy for colorblindness is wrong, unfair and bad for our democracy.

If we really want to honor King, especially during this time, more of us would demonstrate brave resistance to the enormously consequential dismantling of DEI in educational institutions and our broader society. The civil rights hero is widely known for peace, love and nonviolence—what Cornel West calls the “Santa Clausification” of King.

But to be sure, King would have hated the weaponization of government to dismantle DEI broadly and racial equity efforts specifically right now. He would have put up the biggest fight and demanded that leaders, including those in higher education, stop cowardly surrendering to white supremacy and hate. More of us should do that, too.

Shaun Harper is University Professor and Provost Professor of education, business and public policy at the University of Southern California, where he holds the Clifford and Betty Allen Chair in Urban Leadership.

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May 23, 2025