Tag: Higher

  • Why College Deferred Maintenance Is a Growing Risk

    Why College Deferred Maintenance Is a Growing Risk

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

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

    More on the Survey

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

    Compounding Problems, (Radical) Solutions

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

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

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

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

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

    —Consultant John Woell

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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  • FSA Launches Beta Version of FAFSA

    FSA Launches Beta Version of FAFSA

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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  • The Resilience of First-Generation Students

    The Resilience of First-Generation Students

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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  • Community College Instructor Quits Over Barring Noncitizens From Adult Ed

    Community College Instructor Quits Over Barring Noncitizens From Adult Ed

    In response to federal guidance, Johnson County Community College no longer allows undocumented students to take adult education courses.

    Matthew Fowler/iStock/Getty Images

    An adult education instructor at Johnson County Community College in Kansas resigned after finding out the college would require proof of immigration status for adult ed programs in response to federal policy shifts, The Kansas City Star first reported.

    Daniel Tyx, previously a middle school Spanish teacher, started teaching English to adults part-time at the college last year. He told the Inside Higher Ed that he took the job because he has a passion for working with immigrant students, and he planned to stay if not for the new policy. He described the college’s English language learner program as thriving, with over 800 students.

    These students “always come to class. They’re always excited to be there. They’re full of questions. It’s just a dream job,” Tyx said.

    But Tyx quit his job last Friday after he was told that he would have to verify students’ immigration statuses.

    “That was not in alignment with my values,” Tyx said. “And I didn’t feel like, as a matter of conscience, that I was going to be able to continue.”

    The college’s decision came after a February executive order demanded “no taxpayer-funded benefits go to unqualified aliens.” The U.S. Department of Education then announced in July that, to comply with the order, it would end Clinton-era guidance that allowed undocumented students to participate in adult and career and technical education programs. The department insisted that institutions receiving federal funds for these programs begin verifying that students are eligible to benefit from them.

    “Under President Trump’s leadership, hardworking American taxpayers will no longer foot the bill for illegal aliens to participate in our career, technical, or adult education programs or activities,” U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon said in the announcement. “The department will ensure that taxpayer funds are reserved for citizens and individuals who have entered our country through legal means who meet federal eligibility criteria.”

    Checking a student’s immigration status is not a typical practice for community colleges, which are now grappling with how to comply with the federal edicts and continue to serve students, and staffers are uncertain how to move forward. Another complication for community colleges and other public institutions is the Trump administration’s crackdown on policies that allow undocumented students to pay in-state tuition if they meet other requirements. After Texas overturned its policy, state officials asked universities to identify undocumented students. At least one Texas institution, the University of Texas at Austin, now requires students to submit proof of immigration status, as well, KVUE reported.

    The department’s guidance to bar undocumented students was the second blow to adult education programs after the Trump administration held up about $716 million in federal funds to these programs as part of a wider review of education-related grants in early July. The funds have since been released.

    Johnson County Community College now has a message on its website saying that, starting in late July, students are required to show a Real ID, birth certificate, U.S. passport or their most recent immigration documents when they register for adult education classes.

    Chris Gray, vice president of strategic communications and marketing at JCCC, said in an email to Inside Higher Ed that the college’s “compliance with federal requirements in this matter allows us to continue to serve qualified individuals” in adult education programs.

    Tyx said he felt that college administrators were trying to get ahead of the federal guidance, which he considers “cruel and unjust.” He’s worried for his students, who have been peppering him with questions about whether their documents will suffice.

    “My students make such sacrifices to come to class,” he said. “They have so many different reasons to want to learn English, and they’re all good ones. My students want to be able to connect better with their children or their children’s schools. They want to be able to employ the skills that they already have at work and progress in their work lives … It’s very weird that would be something that would be considered to be not desirable by our government.”

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  • New Survey Measures Student Academic Flourishing in College

    New Survey Measures Student Academic Flourishing in College

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

    Joseph Prezioso/AFP/Getty Images

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

    Get more content like this directly to your inbox. Subscribe to the Student Success newsletter here.

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

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  • Stanford Plans to Cut 363 Jobs

    Stanford Plans to Cut 363 Jobs

    Stanford is the latest university to announce layoffs in the wake of federal policy changes.

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    Stanford University plans to cut 363 jobs this fall, starting at the end of September, due to financial challenges driven by federal policy changes, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

    The university previously announced a hiring freeze in February.

    Stanford president Jon Levin and provost Jenny Martinez noted in a letter to campus that the cuts were part of an effort announced last month to reduce $140 million in the general funds budget. They called the layoffs, reported Tuesday, “the product of a challenging fiscal environment shaped in large part by federal policy changes affecting higher education.”

    University officials provided more information in a letter filed with the California Employment Development Department that accompanied the layoff notice. They cited “anticipated changes in federal policy—such as reductions in federal research funding and an increase in the excise tax on investment income” as significant factors driving the reduction of Stanford’s workforce.

    Neither letter provided more specifics on who would be affected by the job cuts.

    Stanford has been in the crosshairs of the Trump administration in recent months, with the Department of Justice launching an investigation into admissions practices at the private university, accusing it and several other institutions of skirting a ban on affirmative action.

    Stanford is one of the wealthiest institutions in the U.S., with an endowment valued at $37.6 billion earlier this year; only two other institutions and a system had larger endowments.

    Now Stanford joins other wealthy peers with multibillion-dollar endowments that have also enacted cuts recently. Last month, Duke University announced that 599 employees had accepted buyouts, and Northwestern University cut 425 jobs as it navigates a federal research funding freeze. While not as well resourced as Stanford, both are among the nation’s wealthiest universities.

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  • Higher ed groups ask Supreme Court to preserve lower court order to restore NIH grants

    Higher ed groups ask Supreme Court to preserve lower court order to restore NIH grants

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    Dive Brief: 

    • The American Council on Education and other major higher education associations are urging the U.S. Supreme Court to preserve a lower court’s ruling that ordered the National Institutes of Health to reinstate funding for hundreds of canceled grants. 
    • In June, a federal judge vacated NIH directives to nix grant funding for research related to diversity, equity and inclusion. The Trump administration quickly appealed the decision and asked the Supreme Court in July to pause the lower court’s order while an appeals court considers the case. 
    • Eight higher ed groups — including ACE, the Association of American Universities and the Association of American Medical Colleges — argued in legal filings Friday that allowing NIH to cancel the grants again would destabilize the nation’s biomedical research and waste government funding on projects forced to stop midstream. 

    Dive Insight: 

    President Donald Trump signed several executive orders shortly after beginning his second term that prompted the NIH cancellations. One ordered federal agencies to terminate all “equity-related” grants “to the maximum extent allowed by law,” and another directed them to end federal funding for “gender ideology,” which the administration defined as the idea that gender exists on a spectrum. 

    Civil rights groups have noted that anti-LGBT groups use the term “gender ideology” to cast being transgender as a political movement rather than a fundamental identity. And the American Medical Association has said that “trans and non-binary gender identities are normal variations of human identity and expression.”

    The Trump administration canceled vast sums of scientific research funding following those orders. In NIH’s case, the agency often informed researchers of the terminations by saying their work “no longer effectuates agency priorities.”

    The moves quickly drew legal challenges. 

    Researchers and unions argued in an April lawsuit that the move was “a reckless and illegal purge to stamp out NIH-funded research that addresses topics and populations that they disfavor.” A coalition of states also filed a lawsuit that month challenging the terminations. 

    U.S. District Judge William Young agreed with their arguments, ordering NIH in June to restore the plaintiff’s canceled grants. According to a Monday press release from ACE, the order impacted roughly 1,200 grants — though that is only a fraction of the awards that the agency has terminated.

    Since the order only covered the plaintiffs’ grants, ACE and other higher ed groups have also asked NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya, in a July 29 letter, to reinstate the other awards canceled under the anti-DEI directives —  “in the spirit of fairness and consistency.” 

    The Trump administration has appealed Young’s decision. So far, federal officials have asked both Young and the appellate court to block the order to reinstate the grants while the appeals process plays out. Both rejected that request. 

    Then last month, the Trump administration took it to the Supreme Court. 

    The higher education groups noted in their legal filings that grant applications undergo rigorous scientific review before NIH accepts them. 

    “In recent months, however, the Executive Branch has jettisoned NIH’s scientific decisionmaking via agencywide directives that mandated the termination en masse of NIH grants deemed related to disfavored political topics,” their Friday filing argued. 

    If those terminations are allowed to stand during the appeals process, critical medical research into diseases like Alzheimer’s and diabetes will be ground to a halt, they said. The groups noted some researchers have had to abandon projects halfway through and lay off staff and students with knowledge of the work. 

    The Trump administration, meanwhile, has argued to the Supreme Court that Young didn’t have jurisdiction to order NIH to reinstate the grants, arguing instead that the matter should proceed in the Court of Federal Claims. In its emergency request, it pointed to the Supreme Court’s April ruling that allowed the U.S. Department of Education to maintain a freeze on $65 million in canceled grant funding for teacher training. 

    In that ruling, the court’s unsigned majority opinion said the government likely wouldn’t be able to recover the funding once disbursed and added that the grant recipients would not “suffer irreparable harm” if a lower court’s order to reinstate the grants was put on hold during the appeals process. 

    The Trump administration urged the Supreme Court to make a similar ruling in the NIH case.

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  • Recognizing First-Gen Student Athletes

    Recognizing First-Gen Student Athletes

    First-generation students can often feel alone or isolated on their college campuses, but a new initiative at the University of Texas, San Antonio, seeks to put first-generation student athletes in the spotlight.

    Starting this fall, UTSA competitive athletes will be given special patches to place on their uniforms, recognizing their unique identity as a first-gen learner.

    “We’ve been really intentional about telling the stories of our student athletes and sharing their personal stories that extend far beyond the fields and courts of competition,” said Lisa Campos, vice president for intercollegiate athletics and athletic director.

    Approximately 45 percent of UTSA’s student population are the first in their families to attend college, and over one-third of student athletes (or 113 students) are also first-gen learners. So far, a majority of student athletes have opted to wear the patch—which displays the campus mascot, a roadrunner, and the words “first gen”—on their uniforms for the upcoming year, Campos said.

    First gen in context: While NCAA student athletes are more likely to report thriving while in college, according to a study by Gallup, first-generation students are less likely to be engaged and connected on campus.

    A 2023 Student Voice survey by Inside Higher Ed and College Pulse found 37 percent of first-gen students spent zero hours per week engaging in extracurricular activities, while just 25 percent of continuing-generation students reported spending no time participating in activities on campus.

    Navigating institutional processes and the hidden curriculum of higher education can also be barriers to first-generation student success, because these students are less likely to ask for help or use campus resources.

    “First-gen students need a lot of support and a lot of education about what the college experience is like because, unlike other students, there’s not someone in their household who can answer all of the questions they may have,” Campos said.

    Past research shows, when given academic and emotional support, first-generation student athletes feel more driven and capable of graduating from their college or university.

    Students on display: The patch is just one piece of how the university seeks to celebrate first-generation students’ identities. UTSA’s athletic department is in the middle of a campaign that highlights stories of first-generation students, coaches and staff, recognizing their unique experiences. The department is also creating a resource hub on its website for first-gen student athletes.

    As a first-gen student herself, Campos said attending and graduating from college is a major accomplishment for these students because of how new and unfamiliar the experience can be. “It’s important to us to recognize those student athletes who every day are changing the trajectory of their families for generations to come.”

    Many of UTSA’s athletic staff members, including those on the leadership team or senior staff, are also first-generation college graduates, which Campos said provides them a better understanding of how to support student athletes.

    Across the university, first-generation students can participate in a mentorship program and other special programming from the First-Generation and Transfer Student division.

    How does your campus celebrate first-generation student identities? Tell us about it.

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  • Nicholas Kent Sworn In as Under Secretary of Education

    Nicholas Kent Sworn In as Under Secretary of Education

    Nicholas Kent, a career higher education policy expert and now the Department of Education’s under secretary, has made his priorities for American colleges and universities clear—controlling student debt, building public trust and ensuring students experience a positive return on investment.

    “If colleges and other postsecondary institutions merit taxpayer investment, it is because they equip American citizens with the skills and knowledge needed to thrive in this rapidly-evolving economy,” he said in his first letter to the department’s staff. “The ‘higher education industrial complex’ must be shaken up by competition, accountability, and a future-focused mindset.”

    The letter was Kent’s first statement since being confirmed late Friday and sworn in early Monday morning. It is one of few times he has discussed what he plans to prioritize since President Trump nominated him to be the most senior official focused on postsecondary education in February.

    Over all, Kent’s missive elicited praise and caution from higher education experts.

    Some say his years of experience, combined with his resistance to the status quo, make him a prime appointee. Others worry that despite his promises of accountability and workforce development, he will focus more on the vitality of the market and less on consumer protection. Others still are encouraged simply by the fact that he’s focused on constructive regulation, not culture war–focused litigation.

    “I feel a little bit like a broken record, because I keep coming back to it, but it’s so refreshing to be talking about things like accountability, outcomes, value and career-aligned education pathways, compared to what we have been talking about for the last six months with this administration,” said Jon Fansmith, senior vice president for government relations at the American Council on Education. “Hopefully the confirmation of Nicholas Kent will help reorient the Trump administration toward productive policy outcomes.”

    A first-generation college student and Pell Grant recipient, Kent has spent the entirety of his career in higher education. Most recently, he served as deputy education secretary for Virginia governor Glenn Youngkin. But before that he advocated primarily for private institutions, working with both Career Education Colleges and Universities, which represents some for-profit colleges, and Education Affiliates, a for-profit college company that faced public scrutiny in 2013 after a whistleblower accused the company of fraud.

    Critics say Kent’s ties to for-profit colleges, which they see as predatory, should have disqualified him from the job. But Education Secretary Linda McMahon voiced confidence in him.

    His “technical expertise and vast experience in higher education will serve as an invaluable asset to the Department of Education team,” McMahon said in a statement Monday. “Not only will he work to fulfill President Trump’s vision for accreditation, accountability reforms, and more, but he will also be a great benefit to current and aspiring postsecondary students, faculty, and staff.”

    In his letter to department staff, Kent provided little granular detail, though he’s expected to say more at several upcoming rule-making sessions. He did speak generally on a few topics, like increasing access to alternative postsecondary pathways, protecting campus free speech and helping students feel empowered by their postsecondary options.

    “President Trump has entrusted me with a weighty task: to restore the greatness of American higher education and ensure that our taxpayer-supported colleges, universities, vocational schools, and other postsecondary programs are genuinely helping young Americans,” he wrote. “High school graduates should enter college with a clear direction. The taxpayer money spent on their education should have a direct impact on their ability to contribute to the workforce. [And] the federal government should be less focused on making legacy institutions ‘too big to fail’ and making students skilled enough to succeed.”

    Kent also reiterated a point which Trump and McMahon have been making since the earliest days of the chief’s second term in office: The Department of Education and its Office of Federal Student Aid are failing to properly manage student loans.

    “By no means should this Department administer a $1.7 trillion student loan portfolio—the fifth largest financial servicer in the country—that is 25 percent in default,” he said.

    Unlike McMahon and Trump, however, Kent did not explicitly reference moving loan services to a different agency or department, like the Small Business Administration or Treasury. That said, the tone of his letter made it clear he thinks that the current system must change.

    “Colleges should not be increasing their tuition each year, enabled by generous federal loan subsidies, without having to answer for their students’ outcomes,” Kent wrote.

    Some policy experts like Preston Cooper, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank, said they were “thrilled” to see Kent confirmed and characterized his letter as “right on the mark.”

    Others, like Fansmith from ACE, weren’t quite as enthusiastic but still remained hopeful. He noted that while he likely won’t always agree with Kent on how to solve a problem, at least they will start on the same page and agree there is a problem that policy should be used to address.

    “Maybe my expectations are too high,” Fansmith said. But “the letter, in a lot of ways, is a positive sign in terms of what we have repeatedly wanted from this administration—which is engagement and working with the community around matters of policy to reform and improve the higher education system.”

    But Wesley Whistle, a project director for student success and affordability at New America, a left-leaning think tank, called the new under secretary’s view of public doubt in higher ed too narrow, his concerns about free speech unlicensed and his emphasis on accountability just rhetorical.

    “I respect that Mr. Kent brings personal experience as a first-generation Pell recipient. But will that truly guide his approach?” Whistle said. “They’ve gone after Harvard, Columbia and other elite schools and have launched investigations into many public colleges over DEI, but where has their oversight been in terms of protecting students from fraud and poor outcomes?”

    If the Trump administration really cares about improving student outcomes and holding colleges accountable, “they should make sure there is sufficient staff to properly oversee higher education and protect students and taxpayers,” he added. “It’s what students deserve and Americans want.”

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  • Higher Ed Is Morally Injured (opinion)

    Higher Ed Is Morally Injured (opinion)

    For months, I’ve been grappling with the current state of higher education, which seems to be increasingly defined by anxiety, uncertainty and fear. Our budgets are shrinking and our programs are threatened. New federal legislation includes major changes to student aid. The values that have historically undergirded our work are under threat: We operate under a cloud of political interference, limiting academic freedom, diversity initiatives and even the very topics we are permitted to teach. We witness administrators, deans and presidents forced into impossible corners by the choices they have to make that pit their own convictions against their political survival and the financial health of their institutions. I wonder how many leaders have quietly caved to outside pressures because they feel that they have no other choice. And I wonder how many more will.

    Our current moment isn’t the first time educators have faced profound moral dilemmas. During the McCarthy era, for instance, faculty and educators were forced to choose between signing loyalty oaths and risking professional ruin. These dilemmas did not simply fade into history; their echoes resonate powerfully in today’s educational climate, where, once again, many educators confront impossible choices, perhaps reflecting broader societal trends toward authoritarianism, censorship and anti-intellectualism. The recent wave of book bans and legislation restricting DEI initiatives highlights how deeply entangled education has become in national culture wars. These forces don’t just target policies; they directly wound the morale, trust and integrity of our campus communities.

    This ongoing bending to pressures that run counter to our deeply held educational and ethical beliefs makes me wonder if we’re experiencing a collective moral injury in higher education. Moral injury is the profound emotional and psychological wound that occurs when our core values and integrity are betrayed or compromised, often through external pressures or systemic forces beyond our control. Unlike general burnout, which emerges from chronic exhaustion, moral injury arises specifically from the betrayal or violation of deeply held ethical convictions, creating profound psychological and existential distress. In higher education, moral injury manifests when institutional and political demands clash with our educational and human mission—that is, when leaders, faculty and staff are compelled to enact policies or decisions that violate their beliefs about equity, care, academic freedom and justice. It goes beyond burnout and stress; moral injury cuts deep, affecting trust, agency and our very sense of purpose.

    Why should we care? Because moral injury doesn’t simply stay contained within the individual experiencing it. It’s not just private pain; it’s a profoundly social and relational wound. Moral injury has a silent, corrosive effect: When we educators and leaders repeatedly experience a conflict between institutional demands and our ethical convictions, it gradually erodes our trust in ourselves, in others and in the institutions we serve. Left unnamed, it quietly undermines morale, corrodes relationships and weakens the very foundations of our educational communities.

    Moreover, when we leave moral injury unaddressed, we risk allowing it to become normalized. That is, we treat it as just another form of stress or burnout rather than a profound betrayal that calls for careful attention, communal support and systemic change. So, by openly naming moral injury, not only do we validate its seriousness, we also create pathways toward collective acknowledgment, courageous dialogue, healing and, ultimately, transformative action.

    Consider the recent example of Jim Ryan, the ninth president of the University of Virginia, who announced his resignation in late June in a deeply reflective, heartfelt letter to the university community. Ryan faced a difficult choice: fight the federal government on principle, potentially losing the university’s federal funding, causing hundreds of employees to lose their jobs, cutting off vital research support and jeopardizing the educations and visas of countless students—or step aside. Ryan explained that while he believes deeply in fighting for what he values, he simply could not justify risking real and immediate harm to the UVA community. He called this decision “excruciatingly difficult,” a choice made with “a very heavy heart.” His resignation was not a defeat, but rather a stark acknowledgment of the painful moral dilemmas facing higher education leaders today.

    Ryan’s decision underscores precisely what moral injury looks and feels like in our institutions. Higher education leaders are being placed in impossible situations, forced to choose between bad and worse. His decision reveals that moral injury isn’t abstract; it’s profoundly personal and relational, deeply rooted in the values that guided many of our decisions to enter education in the first place. His ordeal, however, is only half the story; the ripples of such decisions roll outward to our classrooms and, most crucially, to our students.

    That’s because moral injury does not only affect leadership. I worry about how these conditions shape our students’ experiences. What lessons do students internalize when their institutions and professors appear forced into moral compromises? When we as educators seem powerless to protect our values or our students’ right to honest inquiry, how does our acquiescence impact their ability to trust, engage deeply and imagine hopeful futures? How does this dynamic undermine the very educational outcomes we strive to achieve?

    These moral dilemmas and compromises aren’t accidental; they’re often embedded in the institutional structures of higher education itself. Consider how our reliance on politically influenced state funding can leave institutions and their leaders little room to maneuver ethically. National research funding, such as from the National Science Foundation, National Institutes of Health or National Endowment for the Humanities, has now been politicized as well. These pressures become structural conditions that not only invite moral injury but almost inevitably enforce it. They leave educators and administrators feeling trapped between their values and institutional survival.

    Yet, for me, Jim Ryan’s resignation provides us an example of moral clarity and moral courage. Ryan’s honest and public acknowledgment of his dilemma defines the harm and injustice of his situation. By openly describing his dilemma, Ryan makes the crucial first step toward us hearing it and allows us to bear witness to his moral wound.

    Ryan’s choice thus compels us not only to recognize moral injury but also to grapple with how we might respond, heal and move forward collectively. When we experience moral injury, the clarity and courage we typically rely upon become distorted; in such moments, it is difficult to rise alone. We need that trusted community to recover our sight, to rekindle our nerve and to ask the hard questions that let healing begin. As educators and leaders, we need to consider the following questions:

    • How can we create spaces to compassionately name the wounds we carry from these morally injurious conditions?
    • What forms of community support might allow us to reclaim our sense of agency and take courageous, authentic action?
    • What new futures might we collectively imagine for higher education, futures rooted in justice, compassion and integrity?

    These questions are critical precisely because moral injuries do not heal on their own; instead, they require intentional, communal responses. Importantly, asking tough questions and naming the wound are only the threshold; authentic healing demands the collective courage to hold one another accountable, to co‑imagine more beautiful possibilities and to cultivate the shared clarity and resolve needed to pursue them. Imagination can help us sketch the future we long for, clarity lights our path toward it and courage supplies our stride: Each feeds the next in a journey that carries us from injury to transcendence.

    Across our campuses, educators at every level (librarians defending banned books, faculty resisting diluted curricula, department chairs shielding vulnerable programs and, yes, the occasional president who chooses conscience over position) are modeling what it means to align clarity, courage and imagination. Each act, whether public or quietly steadfast, reminds us that collective moral injury can become a springboard for systemic renewal. When we discern what truly matters, dare to envision just alternatives and summon the courage to act together, we shift from enduring harm to transcending it. In so doing, we begin to rebuild higher education on the ethical foundations that first called us to teach and learn.

    Mays Imad is an associate professor of biology at Connecticut College. She serves as an AAC&U Senior STEM Fellow as well as a scholar in residence at the Red House at Georgetown University and a research fellow with the Centre for the Study of the Afterlife of Violence and the Reparative Quest at Stellenbosch University. She writes on higher education, effective teaching, stress, learning and the brain.

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