Tag: nations

  • A Tumultuous Tenure Leading the Nation’s Diversity Officers

    A Tumultuous Tenure Leading the Nation’s Diversity Officers

    Paulette Granberry Russell is stepping down as president of the National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education after a dramatic and unpredictable five years at the helm.

    She represented campus diversity professionals amid the national racial reckoning that accompanied the Black Lives Matter movement, and then through the dizzying years that followed as anti-DEI laws swept the country. She also spent 22 years as a diversity professional at Michigan State University.

    Granberry Russell told Inside Higher Ed she never planned to stay at NADOHE longer than five years, so she’s ready to move on and facilitate a “smooth transition and handoff.”

    But what a tenure it’s been.

    She spoke with Inside Higher Ed about how she navigated the headwinds facing diversity professionals and the future of diversity, equity and inclusion work on campuses. The conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

    Q: Over the course of your term, from 2020 to 2025, the landscape for diversity professionals in higher education radically shifted. What has it been like for you to represent DEI professionals then and now?

    A: When I came into the role, my goals were to do a few things, which, not only were intended to build on our past successes, but also [to] develop new initiatives that would enhance a few areas, [including] increasing our membership but also providing our support for them. It included, for example, enhancing our industry influence but also sustainability of the organization.

    I came into the role in March of 2020, and what happened in March of 2020? The pandemic, which altered much of what was going on in higher education and how we were doing our work, whether that was remotely, but also with threats in terms of both student experiences but also student support. And then in May of 2020, the murder of George Floyd, and all of the ways in which our institutions were reacting and responding and certain commitments were made to enhance antiracism efforts on our campuses.

    When I think about my first few months, it was something very different than what I anticipated. And I’m certain that’s true for higher education as well. I lived in this state of shifting priorities, having to think about ways to best support members who were having to adjust to significant shifts on their campuses. We were also dealing with significant challenges around freedom of speech and disruption on our campuses prior to these more recent experiences.

    And the politics are very different. When you shift from an environment of enhanced commitment built on an understanding that our campuses had to deal with issues around race and expanding opportunities more broadly across identity to now pushback—it was causing quite a shift in equilibrium. And that’s true for our members as well as the organization. And because of the evolution of diversity, equity and inclusion in higher education historically, as painful as a lot of this was, I believe we were better prepared than we understood ourselves to be.

    Q: You touched on how you started at NADOHE in this moment in 2020, when campuses made commitments and investments in thinking about race and racial inequities, and now campuses are rolling back so much of those efforts in response to anti-DEI legislation. How did these policy shifts change NADOHE’s work and change your work as its leader? How did you have to pivot?

    A: Our successes, I think, resulted in some of the pushback. The pushback was evolving. Expanding on opportunities [created by diversity initiatives] beyond race, so that people understood that diversity was more inclusive than they initially understood it to be—we did not do as good a job as we could have and should have.

    But [we] are beginning to do [it] now, in broadening people’s understanding that diversity is and should be interpreted very broadly. I think that the narrative was hijacked, meaning it was easy to unfortunately define diversity narrowly on the basis of race, gender and sexuality. And others used that narrative to create fear and apprehension that somehow others were being advantaged, versus understanding that we all have benefited from the ways in which we were adjusting our efforts on campus to broaden access, to broaden opportunities, to increase equitable outcomes, understanding that [it’s] not one-size-fits-all, and we had to tailor and adjust our efforts to accommodate the broad range of interests and identities that presented on our campuses and have always presented on our campuses. What we failed to do well was messaging both the communities impacted by our work and the work that was being done to expand opportunities as well.

    Q: How did the backlash shift your priorities, if at all?

    A: When we think about the early challenges, some [opponents] would point to critical race theory. I don’t know that they necessarily understood it very well, and [they] were having a difficult time messaging it. But it was easier to talk about diversity, because for many people, that conjures up issues around race, it harkens back to earlier views of affirmative action and I think it became an easier message to divide higher ed both internally as well as externally.

    It was important for NADOHE to emphasize—whether it was around academic freedom, First Amendment rights and freedom of speech and freedom of expression—that diversity, equity and inclusion are embedded in those. Freedom of expression cannot be sanitized. Our research, for example, or our curriculum is going to touch on issues that may impact communities broadly—and diverse, marginalized, underserved communities. And the work that we do in higher education as diversity leaders requires evidence-based research that informs our work. In the absence of that, you’re guessing at strategies and interventions that will support all students.

    This work is not going to go away. We’re not going to go back to a time when opportunities were constrained, when fairness did not extend to certain communities. That’s unacceptable.”

    —Paulette Granberry Russell

    And so, I don’t know that it was as much a shift in our priorities as much as it was helping higher ed internally, as well as audiences outside of higher ed, to understand that access and opportunity are not limited to any one demographic or a few demographics. If there was a shift in priorities, it was hopefully helping broader audiences understand that there’s nothing to fear, especially in the ways that diversity, equity, inclusion was being demonized. This work is not intended to grant preferential treatment to some and deny others opportunities.

    Q: So, you found yourself having to do a lot of explaining about what’s actually meant when people say “DEI” in a higher ed context.

    A: That’s right. And it’s also saying to folks, don’t use the acronym. Because the acronym, unfortunately, supported a very narrow way of defining efforts.

    Diversity is not defined narrowly. Equity is intended to reduce barriers that may result in differential impact, and those differential impacts are not limited to any one category. Inclusion doesn’t happen just naturally. We know individuals feeling included allows them to be themselves but also allows them to be more successful. If I don’t feel like I belong, what do I do? I tend to retreat, or I don’t access the resources that are there, resources that may benefit me, resources that are accessible to all, with an understanding that, again, we’re not monolithic. It is helping people differently understand, and hopefully better understand, that there are no threats here. Diversity on our campuses is a reality, period. And it’s not going to change, certainly not as long as organizations like NADOHE are here to defend access and opportunities.

    Changes in nomenclature happen. How we define our work, how we label our work, how we tag our work has always changed. If we think historically, going back 20, 30 years, we talked about affirmative action. We talked about multiculturalism. We talked about diversity. We talked about equal opportunity. We talk about fairness. We talk about equity. We talk about belonging. We talk about inclusion. Terminology evolves over time, given how the work itself evolves.

    Q: As campuses close centers associated with DEI and get rid of diversity roles, what do you see as the next phase of the work? How do campus diversity professionals move forward from here? And what does the DEI movement look like now and into the future?

    A: At least for this moment in time, we need to more closely scrutinize the systems that have been designed that have resulted in barriers to success. And how do we redesign, or how do we begin to design systems that differently support our campuses?

    There’s no single office or individual that can do this work alone. Certainly, in my own career at an institution that was a large public land-grant with over 40,000 students at that time and 14,000 faculty and staff, there was no way that a person with two staff was going to be able to dramatically impact change. [Change comes from] working with others and understanding that it’s going to take what I would call a whole institution approach, which means that our leadership, our policies, budget, people, culture have to be aligned. That also means that we have to take a look at the policies, practices, procedures that we have in place that may be having differential impacts, and how do we make adjustments in those? Not to grant preferential treatment, not to discriminate, but to say, can we design systems that work better?

    We’re talking about a systems approach for structural change. When I say a systems approach, this is going to be far more extensive than I think many of us are prepared to do, but I think that it’s the future. [In the past], unfortunately, we didn’t [always] look at connections between the needs of our students, the capacity of faculty to meet those needs, the capacity of staff to meet those needs and connecting our students to potential employers. Things were very siloed. Things are still very siloed. We have to think about the life cycle of a student. And we do that, but it’s not that we are always very deliberate in how we do it.

    When I grew up as a child, the expectation was that I would go to college, but my family by all definitions was very low income. [When] I got to my undergraduate experience, there were no tools in the way that there are now. There were no interventions. There were no programs that I could access that connected me to all of the resources that would allow me to be successful. I was a low-income Black female who arrived on a campus with no prior experience, not knowing how to navigate the space, not knowing where the resources were, not knowing how to fund my education. I was a person with a dream and a family that really wanted me to be successful, but they didn’t have the tools to provide that. It’s a very different world we live in today.

    [The goal is] helping that student understand where the resources are, and then helping faculty understand the differences of those students that come into your classroom, ways that you as faculty can support them, connecting those faculty with the advisory services that those students might need. We have to design [systems] in ways that reduce barriers, that acknowledge the differences that exist and with the goal of those individuals being successful [and] reducing the barriers for faculty to be successful.

    Q: After leaving NADOHE, what’s next for you?

    A: My entire trajectory, my entire life, I have always been this person who believed in fairness. I always believed in opportunities. I’m always that person who fought for not only myself, but for others to be treated fairly, because I grew up in a family where my history included ancestors who were formerly enslaved.

    At 16 years old, I decided I wanted to increase participation in voting. In 12th grade, I remember I had a speech class, and I was that person giving speeches on the slaughtering of baby seals. I was the person who was giving speeches on sexuality and treating people differently based on how they identified. I was that person who gave speeches on the Black Power movement, civil rights, Martin Luther King. And as I reflect now, as I transition, I’m not going to be any different than what I have always been. I will find new ways to [apply] my experiences and my advocacy. Because I have no choice. I realized that about myself.

    My time with NADOHE has been to build on the successes of my predecessors. I believe that I have done that. I achieved the goals that I set out to achieve, both for myself and for the organization, whether that is increasing our membership, our influence within higher ed [and] beyond higher ed. We’ve done that.

    This work is not going to go away. We’re not going to go back to a time when opportunities were constrained, when fairness did not extend to certain communities. We’re not going back to a time when discrimination on the basis of identity was lawful, certainly in the context of race, gender, sexuality, sexual orientation. That’s unacceptable. We’re not going back.

    My next move is, I’m going to breathe. I’m going to take a little bit of time for myself. But I know I will always find my way back to what I have always been committed to, that I want people to be treated fairly. I want people to have opportunities.

    Q: Whoever takes over your position is going to face significant headwinds. What would be your advice to them?

    A: Bring your passion. Bring your commitment. Coming into this role, it’s going to be exhausting, but you have to decide that there’s no other way forward. Too many lives depend on it. This country, our democracy, depends on it.

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  • Nation’s Report Card at risk, researchers say

    Nation’s Report Card at risk, researchers say

    This story was reported by and originally published by APM Reports in connection with its podcast Sold a Story: How Teach Kids to Read Went So Wrong.

    When voters elected Donald Trump in November, most people who worked at the U.S. Department of Education weren’t scared for their jobs. They had been through a Trump presidency before, and they hadn’t seen big changes in their department then. They saw their work as essential, mandated by law, nonpartisan and, as a result, insulated from politics.

    Then, in early February, the Department of Government Efficiency showed up. Led at the time by billionaire CEO Elon Musk, and known by the cheeky acronym DOGE, it gutted the Department of Education’s Institute of Education Sciences, posting on X that the effort would ferret out “waste, fraud and abuse.”

    A post from the Department of Government Efficiency.

    When it was done, DOGE had cut approximately $900 million in research contracts and more than 90 percent of the institute’s workforce had been laid off. (The current value of the contracts was closer to $820 million, data compiled by APM Reports shows, and the actual savings to the government was substantially less, because in some cases large amounts of money had been spent already.)

    Among staff cast aside were those who worked on the National Assessment of Educational Progress — also known as the Nation’s Report Card — which is one of the few federal education initiatives the Trump administration says it sees as valuable and wants to preserve.

    The assessment is a series of tests administered nearly every year to a national sample of more than 10,000 students in grades 4, 8 and 12. The tests regularly measure what students across the country know in reading, math and other subjects. They allow the government to track how well America’s students are learning overall. Researchers can also combine the national data with the results of tests administered by states to draw comparisons between schools and districts in different states.

    The assessment is “something we absolutely need to keep,” Education Secretary Linda McMahon said at an education and technology summit in San Diego earlier this year. “If we don’t, states can be a little manipulative with their own results and their own testing. I think it’s a way that we keep everybody honest.”

    But researchers and former Department of Education employees say they worry that the test will become less and less reliable over time, because the deep cuts will cause its quality to slip — and some already see signs of trouble.

    “The main indication is that there just aren’t the staff,” said Sean Reardon, a Stanford University professor who uses the testing data to research gaps in learning between students of different income levels.

    All but one of the experts who make sure the questions in the assessment are fair and accurate — called psychometricians — have been laid off from the National Center for Education Statistics. These specialists play a key role in updating the test and making sure it accurately measures what students know.

    “These are extremely sophisticated test assessments that required a team of researchers to make them as good as they are,” said Mark Seidenberg, a researcher known for his significant contributions to the science of reading. Seidenberg added that “a half-baked” assessment would undermine public confidence in the results, which he described as “essentially another way of killing” the assessment.

    The Department of Education defended its management of the assessment in an email: “Every member of the team is working toward the same goal of maintaining NAEP’s gold-standard status,” it read in part.

    The National Assessment Governing Board, which sets policies for the national test, said in a statement that it had temporarily assigned “five staff members who have appropriate technical expertise (in psychometrics, assessment operations, and statistics) and federal contract management experience” to work at the National Center for Education Statistics. No one from DOGE responded to a request for comment.

    Harvard education professor Andrew Ho, a former member of the governing board, said the remaining staff are capable, but he’s concerned that there aren’t enough of them to prevent errors.

    “In order to put a good product up, you need a certain number of person-hours, and a certain amount of continuity and experience doing exactly this kind of job, and that’s what we lost,” Ho said.

    The Trump administration has already delayed the release of some testing data following the cutbacks. The Department of Education had previously planned to announce the results of the tests for 8th grade science, 12th grade math and 12th grade reading this summer; now that won’t happen until September. The board voted earlier this year to eliminate more than a dozen tests over the next seven years, including fourth grade science in 2028 and U.S. history for 12th graders in 2030. The governing board has also asked Congress to postpone the 2028 tests to 2029, citing a desire to avoid releasing test results in an election year. 

    “Today’s actions reflect what assessments the Governing Board believes are most valuable to stakeholders and can be best assessed by NAEP at this time, given the imperative for cost efficiencies,” board chair and former North Carolina Gov. Bev Perdue said earlier this year in a press release.

    The National Assessment Governing Board canceled more than a dozen tests when it revised the schedule for the National Assessment of Educational Progress in April. This annotated version of the previous schedule, adopted in 2023, shows which tests were canceled. Topics shown in all caps were scheduled for a potential overhaul; those annotated with a red star are no longer scheduled for such a revision.

    Recent estimates peg the annual cost to keep the national assessment running at about $190 million per year, a fraction of the department’s 2025 budget of approximately $195 billion.

    Adam Gamoran, president of the William T. Grant Foundation, said multiple contracts with private firms — overseen by Department of Education staff with “substantial expertise” — are the backbone of the national test.

    “You need a staff,” said Gamoran, who was nominated last year to lead the Institute of Education Sciences. He was never confirmed by the Senate. “The fact that NCES now only has three employees indicates that they can’t possibly implement NAEP at a high level of quality, because they lack the in-house expertise to oversee that work. So that is deeply troubling.”

    The cutbacks were widespread — and far outside of what most former employees had expected under the new administration.

    “I don’t think any of us imagined this in our worst nightmares,” said a former Education Department employee, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation by the Trump administration. “We weren’t concerned about the utter destruction of this national resource of data.”

    “At what point does it break?” the former employee asked.

    Related: Suddenly sacked

    Every state has its own test for reading, math and other subjects. But state tests vary in difficulty and content, which makes it tricky to compare results in Minnesota to Mississippi or Montana.

    “They’re totally different tests with different scales,” Reardon said. “So NAEP is the Rosetta stone that lets them all be connected.”

    Reardon and his team at Stanford used statistical techniques to combine the federal assessment results with state test scores and other data sets to create the Educational Opportunity Project. The project, first released in 2016 and updated periodically in the years that followed, shows which schools and districts are getting the best results — especially for kids from poor families. Since the project’s release, Reardon said, the data has been downloaded 50,000 times and is used by researchers, teachers, parents, school boards and state education leaders to inform their decisions.

    For instance, the U.S. military used the data to measure school quality when weighing base closures, and superintendents used it to find demographically similar but higher-performing districts to learn from, Reardon said.

    If the quality of the data slips, those comparisons will be more difficult to make.

    “My worry is we just have less-good information on which to base educational decisions at the district, state and school level,” Reardon said. “We would be in the position of trying to improve the education system with no information. Sort of like, ‘Well, let’s hope this works. We won’t know, but it sounds like a good idea.’”

    Seidenberg, the reading researcher, said the national assessment “provided extraordinarily important, reliable information about how we’re doing in terms of teaching kids to read and how literacy is faring in the culture at large.”

    Producing a test without keeping the quality up, Seidenberg said, “would be almost as bad as not collecting the data at all.”

    The Hechinger Report provides in-depth, fact-based, unbiased reporting on education that is free to all readers. But that doesn’t mean it’s free to produce. Our work keeps educators and the public informed about pressing issues at schools and on campuses throughout the country. We tell the whole story, even when the details are inconvenient. Help us keep doing that.

    Join us today.



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  • When nations go too far

    When nations go too far

    When one nation invades another as Russia did with Ukraine, or when one country attacks civilians and then in retaliation for attacks on its citizenry the other country launches disproportional violence, where does international law come in?

    What good is international law if countries continue to violate its basic premises?

    Even though going to war violates most international law, international humanitarian law (IHL) is designed to establish parameters for how wars can be fought.

    So, paradoxically, while war itself is illegal except for under unusual circumstances such as when a country’s very existence is at stake, international humanitarian law establishes the dos and don’ts of what can be done during violent conflicts. (IHL deals with jus in bello, how wars are fought, not jus in bellum, why countries go to war.)

    The basics of international humanitarian law have evolved over time.

    The development of proportional response

    One of the earliest sets of laws came out of ancient Babylon — which is now Iraq — around 1750 BC. The Hammurabi Code, named after Babylonian King Hammurabi, declared “an eye for an eye,” which was a precursor of the concept of proportional response.

    Proportionality means if someone pokes out your eye, you cannot cut off his legs, hands and head and kill all his family and neighbors.

    Most modern laws of war date from the U.S. Civil War and the Napoleonic wars in Europe. During the American Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln asked Columbia University legal scholar Franz Lieber to establish a code for conduct for soldiers during war.

    At about the same time, after observing a particularly horrendous battle of armies fighting Napoleon, the Swiss Henry Dunant and colleagues founded the International Committee of the Red Cross which lay the groundwork for the Geneva Conventions, which govern how civilians and prisoners of war should be treated.

    The basics of modern international humanitarian law can be found in the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 and their Additional Protocol of 1977. The purpose of the Conventions and Protocol is the protection of civilians by distinguishing between combatants and non-combatants and the overall aim of “humanizing” war by assuring the distinction between fighters and civilians.

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  • Top Hat and the First Nations Caring Society Award 2025 Shannen’s Dream Scholarships

    Top Hat and the First Nations Caring Society Award 2025 Shannen’s Dream Scholarships

    TORONTO – August 1, 2025 – Top Hat, the leader in student engagement solutions for higher education, is proud to announce the 2025 recipients of the Shannen’s Dream Scholarship, presented in partnership with the First Nations Child & Family Caring Society. As lead sponsor, Top Hat is funding two $10,000 and two $5,500 scholarships, awarded to First Nations students pursuing post-secondary education in recognition of their academic excellence and outstanding contributions to their communities.

    Scholarship recipients were selected based on outstanding academic performance and a demonstrated track record of promoting health, wellbeing, and equity within their communities. Whether through mentorship, health advocacy, or cultural revitalization, these individuals are already acting as important agents of change.

    “We are deeply inspired by all that these individuals have accomplished so early in their lives. They are community builders, advocates, and future leaders with enormous potential,” said Maggie Leen, CEO of Top Hat. “It’s an honor to play even a small part in helping them achieve their dreams of higher education and go even further.”

    Named in honor of Shannen Koostachin, a courageous youth from Attawapiskat First Nation who led a national campaign for equitable education, the Shannen’s Dream Scholarship celebrates Indigenous students who exemplify resilience, leadership, and a commitment to social change.

    What makes the scholarship unique is its “pay-it-forward” requirement. Each recipient is expected to make a fair and measurable contribution to the Shannen’s Dream campaign or a related First Nations initiative. Previous pay-it-forward campaigns have included creating a guide to help students navigate the medical school application process, hosting talks and workshops on Shannen’s Dreams, and establishing an online database of scholarships for Indigenous youth.

    “Shannen believed in the power of education to change lives and communities. Each of this year’s recipients carries that vision forward, not only through their academic efforts, but through their leadership and service,” said Cindy Blackstock, Executive Director of the First Nations Child & Family Caring Society. “We are proud to celebrate these remarkable students and grateful to Top Hat for helping to make the Shannen’s Dream Scholarship a reality for more First Nations youth.”

    Meet the 2025 Shannen’s Dream Scholarship Recipients

    Zoe Quill, a member of Sapotaweyak Cree Nation with ties to Wuskwi Sipihk First Nation, holds a BSc in Genetics from the University of Manitoba and will be attending the Max Rady College of Medicine for Fall 2025. She is a published researcher and 2024 Manitoba Indigenous Youth Achievement Award recipient, and is committed to advancing Indigenous health and representation in care.

    Mercedes Stemm, a proud Mi’kmaw woman from Natoaganeg First Nation, is a second-year medical student at the University of Manitoba. With a BSc in Neuroscience and minor in Indigenous Studies, she co-created Indigenous admissions pathways and launched a national mentorship program supporting future Indigenous medical students.

    Syndel Thomas Kozar, from One Arrow First Nation, is completing a Double Honours in Indigenous Studies and Women’s and Gender Studies at the University of Saskatchewan. A community advocate, Kozar holds leadership roles in youth and arts organizations, with work focused on cultural reclamation, and empowering Indigenous youth through storytelling.

    Ruby O’Tennadzahe, a Dene woman from Northlands Denesuline First Nation, will begin the Bachelor of Nursing program at Red River College Polytechnic in Fall 2025. A former Health Care Aide, she brings clinical experience and a strong focus on holistic, culturally grounded care for Indigenous youth.

    About Shannen’s Dream Scholarship

    The Shannen’s Dream Scholarship was established to assist First Nations youth with the financial burdens of post-secondary education. The scholarship honors Shannen Koostachin, whose advocacy for safe and comfortable schools for First Nations students ignited a nationwide movement. This scholarship aims to continue her legacy by empowering First Nations students to achieve their educational aspirations. To learn more, please visit www.fncaringsociety.com.

    About Top Hat

    As the leader in student engagement solutions for higher education, Top Hat enables educators to employ evidence-based teaching practices through interactive content, tools, and activities in in-person, online and hybrid classroom environments. Thousands of faculty at more than 900 North American colleges and universities use Top Hat to create meaningful, engaging and accessible learning experiences for students before, during, and after class. To learn more, please visit tophat.com.

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  • Canceling AmeriCorps grants threatens the future of education and workforce pipelines that power our nation’s progress

    Canceling AmeriCorps grants threatens the future of education and workforce pipelines that power our nation’s progress

    The recent decision to cancel $400 million in AmeriCorps grants is nothing short of a crisis. With over 1,000 programs affected and 32,000 AmeriCorps and Senior Corps members pulled from their posts, this move will leave communities across the country without critical services.

    The cuts will dismantle disaster recovery efforts, disrupt educational support for vulnerable students and undermine a powerful workforce development strategy that provides AmeriCorps members with in-demand skills across sectors including education.

    AmeriCorps provides a service-to-workforce pipeline that gives young Americans and returning veterans hands-on training in high-demand industries, such as education, public safety, disaster response and health care. Its nominal front-end investment in human capital fosters economic mobility, enabling those who engage in a national service experience to successfully transition to gainful employment.

    As leaders of Teach For America and City Year, two organizations that are part of the AmeriCorps national service network and whose members receive education stipends that go toward certification costs, student loans or future education pursuits, we are alarmed by how this crisis threatens the future of the education and workforce pipelines that power our nation’s progress, and it is deeply personal. We both started our careers as corps members in the programs we now lead.

    Related: A lot goes on in classrooms from kindergarten to high school. Keep up with our free weekly newsletter on K-12 education.

    Aneesh began his journey as a Teach For America corps member teaching high school English in Minnesota. Jim’s path began with City Year, serving at a Head Start program in Boston. We know firsthand that AmeriCorps programs are transformative and empower young people to drive meaningful change — for themselves and their communities.

    At Teach For America, AmeriCorps grants are essential to recruiting thousands of new teachers every year to effectively lead high-need classrooms across the country. These teachers, who have a consistent and significant positive impact on students’ learning, rely on the AmeriCorps education awards they earn through their two years of service to pay for their own education and professional development, including new teacher certification fees, costs that in some communities exceed $20,000.

    Termination of these grants threatens the pipeline of an estimated 2,500 new teachers preparing to enter classrooms over the summer. At a time when rural and urban communities alike are facing critical teacher shortages, cutting AmeriCorps support risks leaving students without the educators they need and deserve.

    City Year, similarly, relies on AmeriCorps to recruit more than 2,200 young adults annually to serve as student success coaches in K-12 schools across 21 states, 29 cities and 60 school districts.

    These AmeriCorps members serving as City Year student success coaches provide tutoring and mentoring that support students’ academic progress and interpersonal skill development and growth; they partner closely with teachers to boost student achievement, improve attendance and help keep kids on track to graduate. Research shows that schools partnering with City Year are two times more likely to improve their scores on English assessments, and two to three times more likely to improve their scores on math assessments.

    Corps members gain critical workforce skills such as leadership, problem-solving and creative thinking, which align directly with the top skills employers seek; the value of their experience has been reaffirmed through third-party research conducted with our alumni. The City Year experience prepares corps members for success in varied careers, with many going into education.

    AmeriCorps-funded programs like Breakthrough Collaborative and Jumpstart further strengthen this national service-to-workforce pathway, expanding the number of trained tutors and teacher trainees while also preparing corps members for careers that make a difference in all of our lives.

    Those programs’ trained educators ensure all students gain access to excellent educational opportunities that put them on the path to learn, lead and thrive in communities across the country. And the leaders of both organizations, like us, are AmeriCorps alumni, proof of the lasting effect of national service.

    Collectively, our four organizations have hundreds of thousands of alumni whose work as AmeriCorps members has impacted millions of children while shaping their own lives’ work, just as it did ours. Our alumni continue to lead classrooms, schools, districts, communities and organizations in neighborhoods across the country.

    Related: Tracking Trump: His actions to dismantle the Education Department, and more

    The termination of AmeriCorps grants is a direct blow to educators, schools and students. And, at a time when Gen Z is seeking work that aligns with their values and desire for impact, AmeriCorps is an essential on-ramp to public service and civic leadership that benefits not just individuals but entire communities and our country at large.

    For every dollar invested in AmeriCorps, $17 in economic value is generated, proving that national service is not only efficient but also a powerhouse for economic growth. Rather than draining resources, AmeriCorps drives real, measurable results that benefit individual communities and the national economy.

    Moreover, two-thirds of AmeriCorps funding is distributed by governor-appointed state service commissions to community- and faith-based organizations that leverage that funding to meet local needs. By working directly with state and local partners, AmeriCorps provides a more effective solution than top-down government intervention.

    On behalf of the more than 6,500 current AmeriCorps members serving with Teach For America and City Year, and the tens of thousands of alumni who have gone on to become educators, civic leaders and changemakers, we call on Congress to protect AmeriCorps and vital national service opportunities.

    Investing in AmeriCorps is an investment in America’s future, empowering communities, strengthening families and revitalizing economies. Let’s preserve the fabric of our national service infrastructure and ensure that the next generation of leaders, educators and community advocates who want to serve our nation have the ability to do so.

    Aneesh Sohoni is Teach For America’s new CEO. Previously, he was CEO of One Million Degrees and executive director of Teach For America Greater Chicago-Northwest Indiana. He is a proud alum of Teach For America.

    Jim Balfanz, a recognized leader and innovator in the field of education and national service, is CEO and a proud alum of City Year.

    Contact the opinion editor at [email protected].

    This story about AmeriCorps, Teach For America and City Year was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for Hechinger’s weekly newsletter.

    The Hechinger Report provides in-depth, fact-based, unbiased reporting on education that is free to all readers. But that doesn’t mean it’s free to produce. Our work keeps educators and the public informed about pressing issues at schools and on campuses throughout the country. We tell the whole story, even when the details are inconvenient. Help us keep doing that.

    Join us today.

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  • The Nation’s First Conference for Higher Education Podcasters – Edu Alliance Journal

    The Nation’s First Conference for Higher Education Podcasters – Edu Alliance Journal

    May 5, 2025, by Dean Hoke: For years, there have been conversations among many higher education podcasters asking: Why isn’t there a podcasting conference just for us? This question lingered, raised in passing at virtual meetups, in DM threads, and on campuses where faculty and staff were creating podcasts with little external support or collaboration.

    Last winter, a group of us decided it was time to do something about it.

    Joe Sallustio and Elvin Freytes of The EdUp Experience, Dean Hoke of Small College America, and Gregg Oldring and Neil McPhedran of Higher Ed Pods took a leap of faith and began planning a first-time national gathering. We believed there was a clear void. Podcasting in higher education was growing rapidly, but most lacked a community outside of their home institution to network with, share ideas, and be inspired.

    That leap of faith is now a reality. On Saturday, July 12, 2025, we will convene in Chicago for the inaugural HigherEd PodCon—the first conference built by and for higher education podcasters and digital media creators.

    Hosted at the University of Illinois, Chicago

    This one-day event will bring together over 40 presenters, 15 sessions, and 25+ institutions and organizations from across North America. Whether you’re a faculty innovator, student producer, tech strategist, or communications pro, HigherEd PodCon offers an immersive, hands-on experience designed to elevate the impact of campus-based podcasting.

    Sessions run from 8:30 a.m. to 6:00 p.m., which includes networking opportunities and a reception closing out the day. The program is structured across three practical and dynamic tracks:

    • Strategy, Growth & Discovery
    • Content & Production
    • Tech, Tools & Analytics

    The keynote speaker is Matt Abrahams, lecturer in Strategic Communication at Stanford Graduate School of Business and host of Think Fast, Talk Smart. His insights on clarity, message delivery, and audience engagement will set the tone for a day of meaningful exploration.

    A National Cross-Section of Institutions

    HigherEd PodCon showcases participation from institutions of all sizes and types, including:

    • Purdue University
    • Stanford University
    • University of South Carolina Beaufort
    • Lansing Community College
    • Brigham Young University
    • Penn State University

    Whether it’s a faculty-led series, a student-led network, or an advancement-focused production, you’ll hear how campuses are using podcasts to educate, engage, and amplify their stories.

    Session Spotlights

    Here are three sessions you won’t want to miss:

    1. Podcasting, Social Media, and Video: Oh My!
    Kate Young and Maria Welch, Purdue University
    With more than 130 episodes and thousands of monthly downloads, This Is Purdue is among the country’s top university podcasts. In this session, Kate and Maria walk through their formula for success, including social media workflows, video strategy, and content optimization.

    2. Why Podcasts Fail (And How to Make Sure Yours Doesn’t)
    Dave Jackson, Podpage; Podcast Hall of Fame Inductee
    Dave Jackson has helped hundreds of shows succeed—and watched others fall flat. This session offers practical guidance for anyone launching or relaunching a podcast with purpose. Topics include budget-friendly production, YouTube distribution, and sustainable growth.

    3. From 5 to 30: Growing a Podcast Network That Speaks Higher Ed
    Daedalian Lowry and Layne Ingram, Lansing Community College
    What started as five faculty shows grew into a 30+ program podcast network that engages the entire campus and community. Learn how Lansing Community College scaled LCC Connect with collaboration, creativity, and cross-departmental buy-in.

    Why Attend HigherEd PodCon?

    Whether you’re just starting out or looking to take your podcast to the next level, this is the community you’ve been waiting for. Here are three reasons not to miss it:

    • Network with your peers: Build meaningful relationships with fellow higher ed podcasters and digital media innovators.
    • Gain tools and templates you can use immediately: From show planning to promotion, walk away with actionable strategies you can implement on Monday.
    • Stay ahead of the curve: Learn how leading institutions are using podcasts to engage students, alumni, donors, and the public.

    Save the Date

    HigherEd PodCon 2025 is your opportunity to help shape the future of podcasting in higher education—and to find your people in the process.

    Learn more and register at www.higheredpodcon.com. We have room for only 200 attendees in this inaugural event.
    Early bird rate of $249 available until the end of May

    Dean Hoke is Managing Partner of Edu Alliance Group, a higher education consultancy, and a Senior Fellow with the Sagamore Institute. He formerly served as President/CEO of the American Association of University Administrators (AAUA). With decades of experience in higher education leadership, consulting, and institutional strategy, he brings a wealth of knowledge on small colleges’ challenges and opportunities. Dean, along with Kent Barnds, is a co-host for the podcast series Small College America. 

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  • A smaller Nation’s Report Card

    A smaller Nation’s Report Card

    As Education Secretary Linda McMahon was busy dismantling her cabinet department, she vowed to preserve one thing: the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), also known as the Nation’s Report Card. In early April, she told a gathering of ed tech companies and investors that the national exam was “something we absolutely need to keep,” because it’s a “way that we keep everybody honest” about the truth of how much students across the country actually know.  

    That was clearly a promise with an asterisk. 

    Less than two weeks later, on Monday of this week, substantial parts of NAEP came crumbling down when the board that oversees the exam reluctantly voted to kill more than a dozen of the assessments that comprise the Nation’s Report Card over the next seven years. 

    The main reading and math tests, which are required by Congress, were preserved. But to cut costs in an attempt to appease Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency or DOGE, the National Assessment Governing Board (NAGB) scrapped a 2029 administration of the Long-Term Trend NAEP, an exam that has tracked student achievement since the 1970s.* Also cut were fourth grade science in 2028, 12th grade science in 2032 and 12th grade history in 2030. Writing assessments, which had been slated for 2032, were canceled entirely. State and local results were also dropped for an assortment of exams. For example, no state-level results will be reported for 12th grade reading and math in 2028, nor will there be district-level results for eighth grade science that year. 

    Related: Our free weekly newsletter alerts you to what research says about schools and classrooms.

    “These are recommendations that we are making with much pain,” said board chair Beverly Perdue, a former North Carolina governor who was appointed to this leadership role in 2018 during President Donald Trump’s first term. “None of us want to do this.”

    The board didn’t provide an official explanation for its moves. But the vice chair, Martin West, a Harvard professor of education, said in an interview that the cuts were an effort to save the 2026 assessments. “A moment of reckoning came more quickly because of the pressures on the program to reduce expenses in real time,” he said. 

    In other words, the board was effectively cutting off the patient’s appendages to try to save the brain and the heart. Despite the sacrifice, it’s still not clear that the gambit will work.

    Related: Chaos and confusion as the statistics arm of the Education Department is reduced to a skeletal staff of 3

    DOGE has been demanding 50 percent cuts to the $190 million a year testing program. Nearly all the work is handled by outside contractors, such as Westat and ETS, and five-year contracts were awarded at the end of 2024. But instead of paying the vendors annually, DOGE has diced the payments into shorter increments, putting pressure on the contractors to accept sharp cuts, according to several former Education Department employees. At the moment, several of the contracts are scheduled to run out of money in May and June, and DOGE’s approval is needed to restart the flow of money. Indeed, DOGE allowed one NAEP contract to run out of funds entirely on March 31, forcing ETS employees to stop work on writing new questions for future exams. 

    Reading and math tests are scheduled to start being administered in schools in January 2026, and so additional disruptions could derail the main NAEP assessment altogether. NAEP is taken by a sample of 450,000 students who are selected to represent all the fourth and eighth graders in the nation, and each student only takes part of a test. This sampling approach avoids the burden of testing every child in the country, but it requires Education Department contractors to make complicated statistical calculations for the number of test takers and the number of test sections needed to produce valid and reliable results. Contractors must then package the test sections into virtual test booklets for students to take online. The Education Department also must get approval from the federal Office of Management and Budget to begin testing in schools — yet another set of paperwork that is handled by contractors. 

    A DOGE dilemma 

    People familiar with the board’s deliberations were concerned that contractors might be pressured to agree to cuts that could harm the quality and the validity of the exam itself. Significant changes to the exam or its administration could make it impossible to compare student achievement with the 2024 results, potentially undermining the whole purpose of the assessment. 

    Board members were ultimately faced with a dilemma. They could cut corners on the full range of assessments or hope to maintain NAEP’s high quality with a much smaller basket of tests. They chose the latter.

    The cuts were designed to comply with congressional mandates. While the Long-Term Trend assessment is required by Congress, the law does not state how frequently it must be administered, and so the governing board has deferred it until 2033. Many testing experts have questioned whether this exam has become redundant now that the main NAEP has a 35-year history of student performance. The board has discussed scrapping this exam since 2017. “The passage of time raises questions about its continued value,” said West.

    Related: NAEP, the Nation’s Report Card, was supposed to be safe. It’s not

    The writing assessments, originally scheduled for 2032 for grades four, eight and 12, needed an overhaul and that would have been an expensive, difficult process especially with current debates over what it means to teach writing in the age of AI.

    The loss of state- and district-level results for some exams, such as high school reading and math, were some of the more painful cuts. The ability to compare student achievement across state lines has been one of the most valuable aspects of the NAEP tests because the comparison can provide role models for other states and districts. 

    Cost cutting

    “Everyone agrees that NAEP can be more efficient,” said West, who added that the board has been trying to cut costs for many years.  But he said that it is tricky to test changes for future exams without jeopardizing the validity and the quality of the current exam. That dual path can sometimes add costs in the short term. 

    It was unclear how many millions of dollars the governing board saved with its assessment cancellations Monday, but the savings are certainly less than the 50 percent cut that DOGE is demanding. The biggest driver of the costs is the main NAEP test, which is being preserved. The contracts are awarded by task and not by assessment, and so the contractors have to come back with estimates of how much the cancellation of some exams will affect its expenses. For example, now that fourth grade science isn’t being administered in 2028, no questions need to be written for it. But field staff will still need to go to schools that year to administer tests, including reading and math, which haven’t been cut.

    Compare old and new assessment schedules

    Outside observers decried the cuts on social media, with one education commentator saying the cancellations were “starting to cut into the muscle.” Science and history, though not mandated by Congress, are important to many. ”We should care about how our schools are teaching students science,” said Allison Socol, who leads preschool to high school policy at EdTrust, a nonprofit that advocates for equity in education. “Any data point you look at shows that future careers will rely heavily on STEM skills.”

    Socol worries that DOGE will not be satisfied with the board’s cuts and demand more. “It’s just so much easier to destroy things than to build them,” she said. “And it’s very easy, once you’ve taken one thing away, to take another one and another one and another one.”

    On April 17, the Education Department announced that the 2026 NAEP would proceed as planned. But after mass layoffs in March, it remained unclear if the department has the capacity to oversee the process, since only two employees with NAEP experience are left out of almost 30 who used to work on the test. McMahon might need to rehire some employees to pull it off, but new hiring would contradict the spirit of Trump’s executive order to close the department.

    Socol fears that the Trump administration doesn’t really want to measure student achievement. “There is a very clear push from the administration, not just in the education sector, to have a lot less information about how our public institutions are serving the people in this country,” Socol said. “It is a lot easier to ignore inequality if you can’t see it, and that is the point.”

    The Education Department did not respond to my questions about their intentions for NAEP. McMahon has been quite forceful in articulating the value of the assessments, but she might not have the final say since DOGE has to approve the NAEP contracts. “What’s very clear is that the office of the secretary does not completely control the DOGE people,” said a person with knowledge of the dynamics inside the Education Department. “McMahon’s views affect DOGE priorities, but McMahon doesn’t have direct control at all.”

    The ball is now in DOGE’s court.  

    Canceled assessments

    • Long-Term Trend (LTT) assessments in math and reading for 9, 13 and 17 year olds in 2029. (The Education Department previously canceled the 2025 LTT for 17 year olds in February 2025.)
    • Science: Fourth-grade in 2028, 12th grade in 2032
    • History: 12th grade in 2030
    • Writing:  Fourth, eighth and 12th grades in 2032
    • State-level results: 12th grade math and reading in 2028 and 2032, eighth grade history in 2030
    • District-level results: Eighth-grade science in 2028 and 2032

    For more details, refer to the new schedule, adopted in April 2025, and compare with the old, now-defunct schedule from 2023. 

    *Correction: An earlier version of this sentence incorrectly said that two administrations of the Long-Term Trend NAEP had been scrapped by the governing board on April 21. Only the 2029 administration was canceled by the board. The 2025 Long-Term Trend NAEP for 17 year olds was canceled by the Education Department in February. Nine- and 13-year-old students had already taken it by April.

    Contact staff writer Jill Barshay at 212-678-3595, jillbarshay.35 on Signal, or [email protected].

    This story about NAEP cuts was written by Jill Barshay and produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for Proof Points and other Hechinger newsletters.

    The Hechinger Report provides in-depth, fact-based, unbiased reporting on education that is free to all readers. But that doesn’t mean it’s free to produce. Our work keeps educators and the public informed about pressing issues at schools and on campuses throughout the country. We tell the whole story, even when the details are inconvenient. Help us keep doing that.

    Join us today.

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  • What will NCES layoffs mean for the Nation’s Report Card?

    What will NCES layoffs mean for the Nation’s Report Card?

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

    The Trump administration has all but axed the U.S. Department of Education’s statistical research arm — the National Center for Education Statistics — sparing only a handful of employees who are left without department staff needed to analyze education data. 

    “They didn’t just RIF a few people, they deleted the agency for all intents and purposes,” said an NCES employee of more than a decade who was part of the massive March 11 layoffs. 

    The loss of over a hundred Institute of Education Sciences employees — including almost all of the NCES staff — comes as part of sweeping cuts to the Education Department that left the federal agency with only half of its workforce. NCES, which traces its existence to an 1867 law establishing a federal statistical agency to collect, analyze and report education data,  has been tasked with research and analysis on everything from graduation rates and student outcomes to teacher and principal development. 

    Overall, NCES research tracked the condition of education in the nation, including gaps in achievement and resources for underserved students. During the pandemic, the unit closely analyzed trends in school resources and educator and student mental health. 

    Perhaps most notably, NCES oversaw and ensured the quality of the Nation’s Report Card, along with other key student outcome studies. School and college leaders rely on such NCES research to improve student performance, and its findings often help inform federal and state policymakers on funding decisions.

    Now, those caught in the latest wave of the administration’s cuts are warning that their haphazard nature will lead to a decline in the quality of assessments and data overseen by NCES. Longtime NCES employees report being fired at a moment’s notice and abruptly losing access to years — sometimes decades — of work, with no communication from the administration about how to offboard so as to preserve and pass on critical information. 

    “A lot of institutional knowledge is going to be lost,” said another former NCES employee who worked closely on the Nation’s Report Card. This employee and the others who spoke to K-12 Dive asked to remain anonymous for fear that identification could affect their severance terms.

    NAEP and international assessment employees impacted

    Although NCES employees are nearly all gone, many of NCES’ functions they previously carried out are congressionally mandated, meaning they will still need to be done. That includes portions of the National Assessment of Educational Progress, commonly known as the Nation’s Report Card. 

    The required parts include: reading and math assessments in 4th and 8th grade, long-term trend assessments for 9, 13 and 17-years-olds, and 12th grade reading and math assessments. The long-term assessment for 17-year-olds was last administered in 2012, having been canceled during the pandemic, and again for this spring due to what the Education Department cited as funding issues.

    Other portions of the federal test such as science, U.S. history and civics are optional. 

    The federally mandated assessment has often served as a yardstick for student performance in various subjects, most notably reading and math. Following the pandemic, it helped educators understand which subject areas students struggled in the most during and following school closures. 

    “Despite spending hundreds of millions in taxpayer funds annually, IES has failed to effectively fulfill its mandate to identify best practices and new approaches that improve educational outcomes and close achievement gaps for students.”

    Madi Biedermann

    U.S. Department of Education’s Deputy Assistant Secretary for Communications

    Congress also mandates that student performance be compared on an international level, a requirement usually fulfilled by the Program for International Student Assessment, or PISA. 

    The latest round of PISA testing was expected to begin by the end of March. Plus, the main NAEP for grades 4, 8 and 12 was supposed to begin early next year — preparation for which was set to begin this summer, according to former NCES employees. 

    The Education Department, in a March 13 statement emailed to sister publication Higher Ed Dive, said, “IES employees impacted by the reduction in force conducted none of the research related to NAEP, the College Scorecard, and IPEDS.”

    “That work is all done through contracts that are still maintained by the Department,” said Madi Biedermann, deputy assistant secretary for communications at the department, in the statement.

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  • What will NCES layoffs mean for the Nation’s Report Card?

    What will NCES layoffs mean for the Nation’s Report Card?

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

    The Trump administration has all but axed the U.S. Department of Education’s statistical research arm — the National Center for Education Statistics — sparing only a handful of employees who are left without department staff needed to analyze education data. 

    “They didn’t just RIF a few people, they deleted the agency for all intents and purposes,” said an NCES employee of more than a decade who was part of the massive March 11 layoffs. 

    The loss of over a hundred Institute of Education Sciences employees — including almost all of the NCES staff — comes as part of sweeping cuts to the Education Department that left the federal agency with only half of its workforce. NCES, which traces its existence to an 1867 law establishing a federal statistical agency to collect, analyze and report education data,  has been tasked with research and analysis on everything from graduation rates and student outcomes to teacher and principal development. 

    Overall, NCES research tracked the condition of education in the nation, including gaps in achievement and resources for underserved students. During the pandemic, the unit closely analyzed trends in school resources and educator and student mental health. 

    Perhaps most notably, NCES oversaw and ensured the quality of the Nation’s Report Card, along with other key student outcome studies. School and college leaders rely on such NCES research to improve student performance, and its findings often help inform federal and state policymakers on funding decisions.

    Now, those caught in the latest wave of the administration’s cuts are warning that their haphazard nature will lead to a decline in the quality of assessments and data overseen by NCES. Longtime NCES employees report being fired at a moment’s notice and abruptly losing access to years — sometimes decades — of work, with no communication from the administration about how to offboard so as to preserve and pass on critical information. 

    “A lot of institutional knowledge is going to be lost,” said another former NCES employee who worked closely on the Nation’s Report Card. This employee and the others who spoke to K-12 Dive asked to remain anonymous for fear that identification could affect their severance terms.

    NAEP and international assessment employees impacted

    Although NCES employees are nearly all gone, many of NCES’ functions they previously carried out are congressionally mandated, meaning they will still need to be done. That includes portions of the National Assessment of Educational Progress, commonly known as the Nation’s Report Card. 

    The required parts include: reading and math assessments in 4th and 8th grade, long-term trend assessments for 9, 13 and 17-years-olds, and 12th grade reading and math assessments. The long-term assessment for 17-year-olds was last administered in 2012, having been canceled during the pandemic, and again for this spring due to what the Education Department cited as funding issues.

    Other portions of the federal test such as science, U.S. history and civics are optional. 

    The federally mandated assessment has often served as a yardstick for student performance in various subjects, most notably reading and math. Following the pandemic, it helped educators understand which subject areas students struggled in the most during and following school closures. 

    “Despite spending hundreds of millions in taxpayer funds annually, IES has failed to effectively fulfill its mandate to identify best practices and new approaches that improve educational outcomes and close achievement gaps for students.”

    Madi Biedermann

    U.S. Department of Education’s Deputy Assistant Secretary for Communications

    Congress also mandates that student performance be compared on an international level, a requirement usually fulfilled by the Program for International Student Assessment, or PISA. 

    The latest round of PISA testing was expected to begin by the end of March. Plus, the main NAEP for grades 4, 8 and 12 was supposed to begin early next year — preparation for which was set to begin this summer, according to former NCES employees. 

    The Education Department, in a March 13 statement emailed to sister publication Higher Ed Dive, said, “IES employees impacted by the reduction in force conducted none of the research related to NAEP, the College Scorecard, and IPEDS.”

    “That work is all done through contracts that are still maintained by the Department,” said Madi Biedermann, deputy assistant secretary for communications at the department, in the statement.

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  • Haskell Indian Nations U lays off probationary workers

    Haskell Indian Nations U lays off probationary workers

    Haskell Indian Nations University, a small tribal college in Lawrence, Kan., laid off nearly 30 percent of its faculty and staff to comply with the Trump administration’s directive to shrink the size of the federal workforce. 

    An order came through the Office of Personnel Management Feb. 13 to fire all probationary employees who had not yet gained civil service protection.

    Haskell is one of two tribal colleges funded by the Department of the Interior. As of fall 2022, the institution had 727 full-time students and employed 146 faculty and staff. Local news reports that about 40 probationary employees have been laid off.  

    The Haskell Board of Regents said in a statement that it was “closely monitoring the recent directive from the Office of Personnel Management, which has resulted in the termination of certain probationary federal employees across multiple agencies. At this time, the Board has not received confirmation that Haskell Indian Nations University is exempt from these layoffs.”

    A member of Haskell’s Board of Regents said the layoffs are in “basically every department on campus”—faculty, student services, athletics, IT and more, according to The Lawrence Times.

    The institution has faced recent turmoil, running through eight presidents in six years and being subject to a congressional investigation over failing to address student concerns about sexual assault.

    In December, Kansas Republican senator Jerry Moran and Republican representative Tracey Mann put forward legislation to take the college out of the hands of federal oversight and transfer it to a Haskell Board of Trustees appointed by the tribal community.

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