Tag: News

How to Be Interim Dean and Make an Impact (opinion)

A little more than a year ago, I was appointed interim dean of my college. My predecessor had left us abruptly, and as a former school chair and senior associate dean, I was a predictable choice. Here are some recommendations based on this unexpected journey.

Before You Even Begin

Ask your provost to add the option of applying for the dean position to your appointment letter, just in case. I did but soon determined I would not be a candidate. I had become too much of an insider over the prior 13 years to be the improvement agent I thought my college needed. In my experience, external hires are better at bringing about critical change because they arrive without a set reputation and entrenched expectations. The fact that several colleagues encouraged me to apply for the position made clear to me that many people wanted things to stay the same. Many of them seemed to say, “We know you, and we know you won’t rock the boat.”

Seek the Fellowship of Staff

As an interim dean, more so than a full-term dean, you quickly need to earn the respect and goodwill of the college staff, associate deans, chairs and directors. I received buy-in by acknowledging that the continued success of the college didn’t depend on me as “decider in chief,” but on the hands-on collaboration from everyone. Send clear signals that “it’s the team, not the dean.”

‘Not All Those Who Wander Are Lost’

I participated in a formal orientation for new administrators by the University System of Georgia about legal, organizational and leadership matters. Other than that, I was mostly left to my own devices, especially when it came to prioritizing among the numerous events and meetings to which a dean gets invited. I ended up wandering into events at which I was the only dean, but ironically this earned me much fortuitous appreciation. When requesting a meeting with a newly elected Faculty Senate leader, they told me my kind of outreach was unheard-of. We had a great convo over a double espresso, and I learned loads about faculty concerns and hopes.

Seek the Fellowship of Other Deans

Deans operate at the intersection between senior leadership and department chair, and being wedged in the middle makes for good collegial collaboration. My fellow deans communicated swiftly and reliably and shared draft documents, and we often managed to speak with a common voice on issues. I reciprocated their support by creating a fancy name (“Veritable Decanalia”) for our monthly social gatherings at a hotel bar.

Don’t Be Interim

Don’t think of yourself as a placeholder who just keeps the trains running. You are, in fact, the dean, and it’s OK to improve upon your predecessor’s strategies. While you should think twice about too many radical changes (for example, to your college’s reporting structure), feel free to add your own signature. In my case, the signature moves had to do with a focus on student success. For example, two months after taking charge, I adjusted existing budget priorities based on recent data and moved 40 percent of new funding to support graduate education. I also convinced the college advisory board members to become a “giving board” and help fund additional need-based dean’s scholarships for undergraduate students.

Finally, I surprised everyone by organizing a Year of the Liberal Arts at my STEM-focused university. Such activities can amplify your college’s reputation, and more so when nobody expects this level of activity while an interim person is dean. And they signal to prospective dean candidates that your college is a vibrant place they might want to join.

And: Be Interim

Does that sound contradictory? Well, the temporary nature of your appointment can increase the success of your successor if you take care of essential housekeeping items before they arrive. Your successor should not, as one of their first actions, be obliged to impose a spending freeze on a department whose chair overspent by several hundred thousand dollars, and they should not have to press a unit into a memorandum of understanding to return to their contractually mandated (but clandestinely lowered) teaching load. It’s easier for you to repair such matters, and the new dean can begin their work without turning into Draco, the enforcer.

Over all, heed Gandalf’s advice from The Lord of the Rings for your interim appointment: “All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.” If being constantly reminded of the limited nature of the position bothers you, don’t go for this kind of job. My appointment as interim dean was announced at the same time as the timeline and details for the search committee to replace me; the search process ran simultaneously with my daily work, and an eager staff member changed the nameplate outside my office door two weeks before I moved out. So it goes.

If you enjoy, for a window of six months to one year, improving the conditions within which students, staff and faculty may thrive, jump at the chance. Your rewards include a steep learning curve and a better understanding of your own institution and higher education in general.

Of course, while you are on this exhilarating journey of servant leadership, start planning early on for the time after your appointment ends. I admit to having a momentary feeling of relief about moving out of a position that included, especially since January 2025, more political and budgetary emergencies than I had bargained for. But I was just as swiftly persuaded to support my new dean by remaining part of the college leadership team, albeit in an appointment that honored what I had recently learned.

Richard Utz is senior associate dean for strategic initiatives in the Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts at Georgia Tech.

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August 20, 2025
Public Media Cuts Could Limit Students’ Career Exploration

Student journalists have their fingerprints on more than 282 public radio or television stations across the country, providing behind-the-scenes support, working as on-screen talent or reporting in their local communities for broadcast content. But over $1 billion in federal budget cuts could reduce their opportunities for work-based learning, mentorship and paid internships.

About 13 percent of the 319 NPR or PBS affiliates analyzed in a report from the Center for Community News at the University of Vermont operate similarly to teaching hospitals in that a core goal of the organization is to train college students. Nearly 60 percent of the stations “provide intensive, regular and ongoing opportunities for college students” to intern or engage with the station.

Scott Finn, news adviser and instructor at the Center for Community News and author of the report, worries that the cuts to public media and higher education more broadly could hinder experiential learning for college students, prompting a need for additional investment or new forms of partnerships between the two groups.

In July, Congress rescinded $1.1 billion in federal funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which funds public media stations including NPR and PBS. The cuts threaten the financial stability of many stations, some of which are directly affiliated with colleges and universities.

Working at a public media station provides a variety of benefits for students, Finn said. In his courses, Finn partners with community outlets that will publish students’ stories, depending on the quality and content, which he says motivates students to submit better work.

“Being published, being broadcast is important. The whole focus of the exercise changes,” Finn said. “It’s not just trying to please me as the instructor or a tick box for a grade. They have real-world consequences. Their story will have an impact. It will move people, it will change policy, and that knowledge them inspires them to work harder.”

Most students want internship opportunities; a recent study by Strada found students rate paid internships as the most valuable experience for improving their standing as a candidate for future jobs. But nationally, there’s a shortage of available, high-quality internships compared to the number of students interested in participating, according to a 2024 report from the Business–Higher Education Forum.

A Handshake survey from earlier this year found 12 percent of students in the survey didn’t have an internship before finishing their degree, largely because they lacked the time or weren’t selected for one.

For interns or students working directly in the studio, partnering alongside career journalists also gives them access to a professional network and a career field they may not otherwise engage in.

But student journalists aren’t the only ones who lose out when internship programs are cut.

Emily Reddy serves as news director at WPSU, a PBS/NPR member station in central Pennsylvania associated with Penn State University. Reddy hosts a handful of student reporting interns throughout the calendar year, training them to write, record and broadcast stories relevant to the community.

“[Interns] bring an energy to the newsroom,” Reddy shared. “They’re enthusiastic. They are excited to go out to some board meeting that no one else wants to go to. They bring us stories that we wouldn’t know about otherwise.”

WPSU uses a variety of funding sources to pay student interns, including endowed scholarships at the university and donated funds. But like many other stations, WPSU is facing its own cuts. Earlier this year, Penn State reduced funding to the station by $800,000, or around 9 percent of the station’s total budget. That resulted in a cut of $400,000 from CPB.

In response, WPSU shrank its full-time head count, laying off five staff members and cutting hours for three. Roles vacated by retirements were left unfilled. In October, the station will lose around $1.3 million as a result of the federal cuts, though Reddy doesn’t know what the full impact will be on staffing.

WPSU had planned to increase its internship offerings, and Reddy is still hopeful that will happen. However, the laid-off personnel were among those responsible for managing learners.

“The big thing that I’m concerned about working with students is that you can’t just have the students; somebody has to train them, somebody has to edit them, somebody has to voice coach them and clean up their productions,” Reddy said.

About 12 percent of the stations in the Center for Community News’s report don’t sponsor interns, and they pointed to budget cuts as a key reason why. For stations experiencing financial pressures, Finn hopes newsrooms find creative ways to keep students involved in creating stories, including classroom partnerships or faculty editors who trim and refine stories. Universities are uniquely positioned to assist in this work, Finn said, because they have more resources than public stations and have a strong motivation to place students in successful internship programs.

“This is a really important time for universities to double down on their relationship with public media stations and not walk away from it,” Finn said. “A lot of [stations] are these underutilized resources, in terms of student engagement and student learning.”

Finn also says alumni and other supporters of student learning and public media can help to fill in gaps in funding, whether that’s supporting a paid full-time faculty role to serve as a liaison between students and stations or to endow internship dollars.

“If public media stations are important to student success, then university advancement has to embrace the public media station as a part of its mission and help raise money for it,” Finn said.

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August 20, 2025
Colleges Expect to Reduce Student Support Budgets

College and university staff often bemoan that they’re being asked to do more with less, and a recent survey underscores that sentiment. Thirty percent of institutions surveyed by Tyton Partners expect decreases of greater than 2 percent to their student support budgets over the next three academic years, while fewer than 25 percent expect an increase in budgets.

Financial pressures are tied in part to declining enrollments, as well as to changes in federal structures that reduce access to aid, according to the report.

Eighty percent of institutions expect budgets for support services in enrollment and admissions to shrink, and 50 percent anticipate cuts to student support services. Other student-facing offices expecting declines are academic program delivery and innovation (33 percent), career readiness (29 percent), and research development and funding (20 percent).

Threats to international student enrollment and visa complications could also significantly harm institutional resources and student success efforts; nearly 50 percent of four-year institutions cited international enrollment as critical to sustaining support budgets.

Executive orders and state legislation limiting efforts to support specific racial, ethnic and gender minorities have also reduced institutional investment in identity-based programs. Forty-four percent of public four-year colleges have seen programming for affinity groups decrease over the past 12 months, compared to 28 percent of two-year colleges and 25 percent of private four-year colleges.

While financial threats may hamper institutions’ ability to increase or scale offerings, a majority of student respondents said they’re not using the resources available on campus at this time anyway.

Students say they don’t take advantage of the support offices because they don’t see the relevancy (42 percent), because they doubt the service would be helpful, have not needed the service or want to do things on their own. Thirty percent said the services were offered at inconvenient hours, lacked walk-in appointments or had no flexibility in modality.

Methodology

Tyton Partners’ “Driving Toward a Degree” report includes responses from 468 administrators, 1,100 front-line support staff members, 1,038 four-year students and 403 community college students. The study was fielded in the spring. Those at public four-year colleges made up the greatest share of respondents, followed by private four-year institutions and two-year colleges.

Affordability: When administrators were asked how they’d respond to federal financial aid cuts during a time of financial constraint, 41 percent of public four-year colleges said they plan to expand institutional aid to offset students’ lost funding, compared to 25 percent of two-year colleges and 30 percent of private four-year institutions. Four-year private colleges and universities also reported re-evaluating enrollment strategies based on aid dependency, raising concerns about access for low-income students who may not be able to pay the full price of tuition, according to the report.

Students say financial aid and support are critical to their retention; previous studies point to cost being one of the top reasons why a student leaves higher education. Over half of students (59 percent) in Tyton’s report said financial aid counseling is very important to their decision to re-enroll, compared to 52 percent who indicated academic registration was very important and 49 percent who cited mental health counseling.

Staffing constraints: Retaining support staff is another challenge that institutions reported; over 60 percent say they’re having a hard time filling vacancies or face hiring freezes in support departments.

For many students, academic advising is a cornerstone of success in higher education, but many departments are under stress due to high caseloads (42 percent) and frequent turnover in staff (31 percent), according to the report. Despite these headwinds, 74 percent of public four-year institutions and 72 percent of large institutions (those with more than 10,000 undergraduates) plan to increase the caseloads of staff members to recoup lost revenue.

“Gaps in staffing directly erode advising capacity and quality,” the report authors wrote. “Our survey shows that advisers managing caseloads of 300 or more students are not only less able to engage regularly with those they serve but also more likely to leave their roles. This dynamic fuels a cycle of turnover and declining support quality, undermining institutions’ ability to sustain consistent, high-impact advising.”

Other popular strategies institutions may employ to combat staffing challenges include reassigning duties across departments, reducing or delaying services, or shifting services to peer advisers or part-time staff members.

To combat large caseloads, some institutions are considering implementing structured group advising sessions and developing flexible capacity for peak times, the survey noted.

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August 20, 2025
Texas A&M Professor Arrested on Indecent Exposure Charge

Johns was supposed to begin teaching at Texas A&M University this fall.

Texas A&M University professor Russell Taylor Johns was arrested by university police last Wednesday following an allegation that he exposed himself at the University of Texas at Austin earlier this year, KBTX reported.

Johns, who hadn’t yet begun teaching but was hired to join Texas A&M’s Harold Vance Department of Petroleum Engineering this fall, worked at UT Austin from 1995 to 2010 and was invited back to campus in April by its department of petroleum and geosciences. Court documents obtained by KBTX allege that Johns exposed his genitals and touched himself inappropriately at the UT Austin student center on April 29. A staff member told police that she saw Johns masturbate while looking at two female students sitting across from him.

Johns previously taught in the Department of Energy and Mineral Engineering at Pennsylvania State University.

Johns was booked at the Brazos County Detention Center and released on a $7,000 bond. His bond conditions require that he not contact the alleged victims or their families, refrain from committing additional offenses, and submit to random drug testing. In Texas, indecent exposure is a Class B misdemeanor and punishable by up to 180 days in jail and a $2,000 fine.

Texas A&M did not return Inside Higher Ed’s request for comment Tuesday. A university spokesperson told KSAT that the university was not aware of the allegation when Johns was hired and that he is currently suspended.

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August 20, 2025
AI Can Facilitate Mastery Learning in Higher Education
Learning in contemporary higher education is rooted deeply in calendars and time rather than mastery of the topic of the learning. With an inflexible semester or quarter calendar and an often-inflexible schedule and length of meeting times, learners are marched through the system in the orderly method of an assembly line.

As long as I have taught at the university level, beginning in the early 1970s, I have questioned this approach that puts time scheduling ahead of depth of learning. It seems to put teaching schedules ahead of learning outcomes. I must confess that over the decades, I have been an easy touch for an incomplete for a student who encountered some unforeseen life disruption or simply took on more than she or he could handle during the semester. My philosophy has been and still is that what is learned is more important than whether it was accomplished in eight weeks, 16 weeks or even longer.

I am not alone in that view. Back in the 1960s, one of learning’s highly recognized scholars, Benjamin Bloom, probed this very issue: “Bloom’s Learning for Mastery (LFM) strategy evolved and was later on implemented in primary and secondary school settings.” Meanwhile, psychologist Fred Keller developed his Personalized System of Instruction focused on five key principles:
Students should be allowed to work at their own pace.

Students should achieve at least 90 percent accuracy on the assessment before moving to the next lesson.

Lessons should be considered as “vehicles of motivation.”

Teachers and students should consider using written communication in textbooks and study guides.

Teachers and students should get closer through repeated testing, immediate scoring, continuous tutoring and progress tracking.
These five principles cannot be easily integrated into classes that march forward with a rigid class calendar based on three 50-minute class meetings for 15 weeks! However, recent technological developments have opened the door to reinventing higher education from the assembly-line model to an online, asynchronous, tutor-enhanced, mastery-based learning model.

To understand the differences between traditional teaching and mastery learning, one can best describe that our current practices place an emphasis on time-based teaching, while in mastery learning, the emphasis is, as the name suggests, on learning. Note that in Keller’s PSI approach, the goal is 90 percent or better learning as evidenced through frequent assessments required to move forward to the next module in the class.

The PSI stresses personalized scaffolding of learning and evidence of mastery throughout the course, whereas our current common mode of delivery views the class as a whole rather than recognizing differences in background and learning by individuals. Inevitably, the current approach penalizes students for unintended, unrecognized shortcomings in understanding caused by any of a number of circumstances, such as prior knowledge deficits in some aspect of that which they are studying, poorly taught prerequisite or assumed previously taken classes, unanticipated life interventions, or some other inability to learn essential class concepts that had not been anticipated in the development and design of the class.

If, instead, we were to create personalized learning intervention opportunities at every step of the way that are designed to be responsive to the needs of individual learners on a minimum of learning 90 percent of every module, we could ensure a minimum of mastery of 90 percent of the materials in every class.

Artificial intelligence employed in an asynchronous or blended online class opens the pathway to mastery learning. An instructor can experiment with this process by folding this prompt into one or two modules of a class. Released by There’s an AI for That (TAAFT) it is a free and openly available prompt that can be inserted into any of the major frontier models, such as Gemini, ChatGPT or Claude. Titled Precision Learning Companion, the prompt is introduced:

“This prompt turns AI into an ultra-detailed, dynamic personal tutor that doesn’t just quiz, it teaches deeply, layer by layer, until the user genuinely masters the material. It’s built to adapt in real time, constantly diagnosing knowledge gaps, and never moving forward without full comprehension. Every answer, right or wrong, triggers a structured, narrative-style breakdown explaining the what, why, how, and broader context, ensuring true understanding. The AI is designed to feel like having a supportive but meticulous mentor who scaffolds learning: progressively challenging the user if they perform well, slowing down and simplifying if they struggle, and always reinforcing psychological safety through encouragement. It uses textually described visual aids, memory tricks, real-world examples, and step-by-step remediation when needed. Mastery, not speed, is the goal.”

I encourage readers to test this out, to examine more closely the impact of using AI to deliver learning opportunities. It took me less than two minutes to get my module up and running:
1. I copied and pasted the page-long prompt from the TAAFT.Notion site into Claude 4 for test purposes and pressed enter.
2. I entered the topic as “human eye anatomy” (of course you can enter any topic that you might cover in a week or so in your current class schedule).
3. I was then launched into a congenial conversation with the AI module that probed deeply into my knowledge of the topic in a pleasant and reinforcing way.
4. I must admit that I was so engaged that I didn’t stop for more than an hour.
You can begin by testing it on yourself and perhaps a colleague, teaching assistant or another willing participant. Choose a relevant topic. I chose “physiology of the human eye,” which was a basic module in all of the many Communication Technology classes I offered. I found the AI module to be accurate, comprehensive, reinforcing and clear. If you find that it shows promise, you might choose to use it in one of your classes. Invite your instructional designer to join in a discussion of how this might best be used in your classes. Note how it personalizes instruction for learners by sharing additional information, readings and related learning opportunities to backfill areas that learners who may be deficient in background and need context to relate to the course. You can ask learners to share a copy of the exchanges. They may also share brief reactions on the quality and usefulness of the interaction with AI.

Over time, with the help of your instructional designer, you may want to go fully into mastery learning, ensuring that every student in your classes masters the material at a 90 percent level. In some cases, you may need to be flexible with offering incompletes to provide time for those who need to complete the additional material triggered by submission of wrong answers.

I always had an uncomfortable feeling in the pit of my stomach when I submitted a C, D or F as a final grade. I felt that I had failed my student. However, I had a full classroom and there was not enough time or opportunity to provide individualized attention to each student. Perhaps the new generation of university instructors who partner with AI assistants will enjoy the confidence that all their learners will master the topic of the class with the help of AI. No learner will be left behind, and none will be victims of the assembly-line model of teaching in higher education.
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August 20, 2025
More Barriers on the Horizon for International Students

The potential policy changes could give international students another hoop to jump through, further burdening consulates and embassies.

Photo illustration by Justin Morrison/Inside Higher Ed | tarras79/iStock/Getty Images

The Trump administration is planning to limit how long international students can remain in the U.S., likely mirroring a plan proposed at the end of Trump’s first term with the same name, advocacy groups and immigration attorneys say.

The regulations are expected to replace “duration of status,” a 1991 rule that allows international students to remain in the country as long as they are enrolled at a college or university. In 2020, the administration proposed limiting that time to just four years—a period shorter than most Ph.D. programs and shorter than the average student takes to complete a bachelor’s degree—though it would have allowed students to apply for extensions. Students from certain countries, including those the administration said were state sponsors of terrorism and those with high overstay rates, would have been afforded just two years.

That rule was withdrawn after President Joe Biden entered office. But the Trump administration is poised to propose it once again, based on a submission to the Office of Management and Budget. The Department of Homeland Security has yet to release details about the potential change, but a pending rule change with the same name as the 2020 proposal was sent to OMB in late June and approved Aug. 7. However, according to OMB’s website, the rule is now under review once again for unknown reasons. Neither OMB nor DHS responded to Inside Higher Ed’s request for comment. Until OMB signs off, DHS can’t publicly release the plan and take public comments.

The anticipated proposal comes amid the Trump administration’s ongoing attacks on international students, which included the sudden and unexplained terminations of students’ records in the Student Exchange and Visitor Information System, the database that tracks international students, in March and April. The administration has also taken steps to make it more difficult for prospective students to receive F-1 visas, including reviewing all applicants’ social media profiles.

Incoming international students, meanwhile, are struggling with long delays for visa interviews as a result of federal layoffs and a pause in student visa appointments this spring, leading to concerns that international enrollment could drop this fall semester. Changing duration of status, advocates say, would only gum up the works even more, giving international students another hoop to jump through and further burdening consulates and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.

“This is not just one particular proposed rule or change in policy; it fits within a number of policy changes that we’ve experienced throughout the past eight months that the administration has been in control,” said Jill Allen Murray, deputy executive director for public policy at NAFSA, the association for international education professionals. “Many of those interact with each other and make it much more difficult for international students to take the steps that are necessary to come to the United States and study, and this would be yet another challenge for students.”

A ‘Regulated Population’

Why is the administration looking to eliminate duration of stay? If its reasoning is the same as in 2020, it is aiming to reduce fraud and visa overstays.

International students are indeed one of very few nonimmigrant categories allowed to stay in the U.S. indefinitely, giving them special flexibility so they can finish their studies. But Samira Pardanani, associate vice president of international education and global engagement at Shoreline College, argued that doesn’t mean there’s any reason to believe duration of status leads students to be more likely to overstay.

“This is a very, very regulated population … there’s a lot of follow-up schools do with regards to helping students maintain their status, and there are a lot of record-keeping and reporting requirements for schools,” Pardanani said. “Duration of status is something that has been, in my opinion, working well.”

Murray also noted that the F-1 visa overstay rate reported by the government is not necessarily reliable, by DHS’s own admission.

Another policy aimed at streamlining the visa process for nonimmigrant visitors, including international students, is also on the chopping block. On Sept. 2, the Trump administration will end interview waivers for many nonimmigrant groups, including international students. Those waivers, which started during the COVID-19 pandemic, allow certain individuals whose visas have expired but who have maintained their lawful nonimmigrant status to renew their visas without an in-person consular interview.

The duration of a visa depends on the country and can range from a few months to several years. Thanks to interview waivers, an international Ph.D. student whose visa had expired could visit home in the summer, easily renew their visa without an in-person appointment and return the next semester without issue. But now, they would have to return to the consulate in their country even for a routine visa renewal.

Pardanani said she did not think the elimination of interview waivers was inherently problematic, but “right now, when there’s already a lot of visa backlogs and students are not getting visa appointments … it’s going to have a deeper impact in students and on universities and colleges.”

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August 20, 2025
ED Clamps Down on Student Voting Work

Students at the University of Pittsburgh participated in 2024 election activities.

Aaron Jackendoff/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

The Department of Education released guidance Tuesday discouraging colleges from using Federal Work-Study funds to pay students to work on voter registration efforts and other activities it deems political.

The department announced the change to work study provisions in a Dear Colleague letter signed by acting assistant ED secretary Christopher McCaghren.

“Jobs involving partisan or nonpartisan voter registration, voter assistance at a polling place or through a voter hotline, or serving as a poll worker—whether this takes place on or off campus—involve political activity because these activities support the process of voting which is a quintessential political activity whereby voters formally support partisan or nonpartisan political candidates by casting ballots,” McCaghren wrote.

He emphasized in the letter that ED “encourages institutions to employ students in jobs that align with real-world work experience related to a student’s course of study whenever possible.”

Education Secretary Linda McMahon echoed that sentiment in a Tuesday social media post, writing that the department is “done funding political activism on college campuses!” She added, “Under the Trump Administration, taxpayer dollars will be used to prepare students for the workforce.”

McCaghren’s letter also warned colleges about “aiding and abetting voter fraud.”

While institutions are required to make a “good faith effort to distribute voter registration forms to students,” they should refrain from distributing such materials to students they believe are ineligible to vote in state or federal elections, according to the letter.

The move comes as President Donald Trump has announced plans to overhaul how elections are conducted before the upcoming midterms next year, including barring certain voting machines and mail-in voting, though he does not have the authority to make such changes.

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August 19, 2025
Why Revenue Sharing Is a Bad Deal (opinion)

For many decades, the National Collegiate Athletic Association preserved student athletes’ amateur status by prohibiting their ability to profit off their name, image or likeness (NIL). As a former Division I compliance coordinator, I often felt the NCAA’s amateurism policies went too far—denying student athletes the right to earn money like other college students, such as by running their own sports camps.

But now the courts have turned the NCAA’s concept of amateurism on its head with the approval in June of a $2.8 billion athlete compensation settlement, which will be shared by student athletes who previously missed out on the opportunity to make money from their NIL. This historic deal between Division I athletes, the NCAA and the Division I Power 5 conferences—the SEC, Big Ten, Big 12, Pac-12 and ACC—has also made revenue sharing with current student athletes a reality.

Athletes at top football and basketball programs may be celebrating this financial victory, which allows institutions to share up to $20.5 million each year with student athletes—money generated from media, tickets, concessions and donations.

But many coaches who recruit them—along with professors like me, who teach them—believe that paying college athletes for their athletic ability will hurt college sports. That’s because doing so professionalizes college athletes in a way that hurts other students and sports over all and compromises the institution’s academic mission.

And while some student athletes stand to benefit from the new system, most won’t. Many universities will use the 75-15-5-5 model, meaning that 75 percent of the revenue would be distributed to football, 15 percent to men’s basketball, 5 percent to women’s basketball and 5 percent to all other sports.

Paying players will also change the spirit of college sports. Although the concept of amateurism has been a joke in college athletics for a long time—particularly in revenue-generating sports—a pay-for-play system would further move the emphasis away from educational goals and toward commercial ones. As one big-time head football coach described it to me, “As soon as you start paying a player, they become in some ways their [university’s] employees. It’s not amateurism anymore.”

On many campuses, a separation already exists between student athletes and nonathletes, which some believe is due to student athletes’ perceived privilege. According to one Division I women’s basketball coach I spoke to, implementing revenue sharing will only increase that divide. Student athletes receiving five- or six-figure salaries to play for their institutions will be incentivized to devote more time to their sport, leaving less time to engage in the campus community and further diluting the purpose of college as an incubator for personal and intellectual growth.

There’s also a possibility, one coach told me, that colleges will shrink staff and “avoid facility upgrades in order to fund revenue share,” putting off improvements to gyms or playing fields, for instance. At some institutions, funding the revenue-sharing plan will undoubtedly lead to cuts in Olympic and nonrevenue sports like swimming and track.

What’s more, it remains unclear how revenue-sharing plans will impact gender equity, because revenue distribution may not count as financial aid for Title IX purposes. Since 1972, Title IX has ensured equal opportunities for female student athletes that includes proportionate funding for their college athletic programs. If NIL payments from colleges are not subject to Title IX scrutiny, athletic departments will be allowed to direct all revenue generated from media rights, tickets and donations to their football and men’s basketball programs. As one Division I women’s basketball coach put it to me, “We are widening the gap between men and women athletes.”

To be sure, the college sports system is problematic; as scholars have pointed out, it exploits student athletes for their athletic talent while coaches and athletic leaders reap the benefits. But creating professional athletes within educational institutions is not the answer.

Instead, I propose that all student athletes participate in collective bargaining before being required to sign employment-type contracts that waive their NIL rights in exchange for a share of the revenue.

Collective bargaining would ensure that student athletes are guaranteed specific commitments by their institutions to safeguard their academic success, holistic development and well-being. These could include approved time off from their sport to participate in beneficial, high-impact practices like internships and undergraduate research, and academic support to help them excel in a program of their choosing—not one effectively chosen for them to accommodate their athletic schedule.

The graduation rates of student athletes—particularly Black male football and basketball players at the top Power 5 institutions—are dismal. A 2018 study by Shaun R. Harper found that, across the 65 institutions that then comprised the Power 5 conferences, only 55.2 percent of Black male athletes graduated in six years, a figure that was lower than for all student athletes (69.3 percent), all Black undergraduate men (60.1 percent) and all undergraduates (76.3 percent). Under collective bargaining, student athletes could retain their scholarships, regardless of injury or exhausted eligibility, to help finish their degrees. Such financial support would encourage athletes to stay in college after their athletic careers end.

They could also negotiate better mental health support consistent with the NCAA’s best practices, including annual mental health screenings and access to culturally inclusive mental health providers trained to work with athletes. Coaches would learn to recognize mental health symptoms, which is crucial; as one former women’s basketball coach told me, she didn’t “have the right language” to help her athletes.

Presently, the NCAA’s posteligibility injury insurance provides student athletes only two years of health care following injury. Collective bargaining could provide long-term health care and disability insurance for those sustaining injuries during college. This matters because football players risk their lives every day to make money for their institutions—doubling their chances to develop chronic traumatic encephalopathy with each 2.6 years they play and likely significantly increasing their chances of developing Parkinson’s disease relative to other nonfootball athletes.

As one football coach mentioned to me, it may be too late to put the proverbial genie back in the bottle when it comes to pay for play, but it’s not too late for colleges to prioritize their academic mission in their athletic programs, care for students’ well-being and restore the spirit of college sports.

Debbie Hogan works and teaches at Boston College. Her research focuses on holistic coaching, student athlete development and sense of belonging of Black student athletes.

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August 19, 2025
College Orchestrates Job Shadows in Students’ Hometowns

Job shadows are one way to give students a behind-the-scenes look at the daily operations and undertakings of a particular role or industry, giving them a deeper perspective than an informational interview or job description may provide. However, opportunities to engage in career exploration experiences can be limited, particularly for lower-level students.

A winter 2023 survey found 22 percent of respondents had never had experiential learning or an internship while in college. Among first-year respondents, that number grew to 28 percent.

To increase access to career exploration for first-generation students early in their college experience, Harvey Mudd College in California partnered with alumni around the country to offer short-term job shadows in students’ hometowns. The experiences offered students a chance to define their STEM career goals and establish a professional network.

Survey Says

Students say giving them access to and preparation for career-building spaces is critical for their success. A May 2024 Student Voice survey by Inside Higher Ed and Generation Lab found 38 percent of students believe helping them prepare for internships and career success should be a top priority for career centers.

The background: Harvey Mudd is a liberal arts college that provides exclusively STEM degrees. Its current strategic plan focuses on expanding students’ career navigation experiences, particularly helping them connect their major program with life after college, said Shannon Braun, director of career services.

“A lot of time they really know what they want to study because it’s interesting to them, but not how that applies to life after Mudd or during Mudd,” Braun said. “It can be a little difficult.”

Staff elected to focus first on students who could most benefit from a job-shadow experience and exposure to a professional work setting.

“We landed on our first-gen, who may not have had some of the opportunities that other students might have, like a take-your-kid-to-work day,” Braun said.

How it works: The pilot program focused on students enrolled in Mudd’s Summer Institute, a precollege program for incoming students from underresourced high schools and those who are first-generation or from groups historically underrepresented in STEM.

Summer Institute participants indicated if they would be interested in a summer job-shadow opportunity, as well as some information about their hometown, program of study and career goals. From there, the career services office partnered with the alumni and family engagement office to identify hosts that matched students’ location and interests.

The focus on a student’s hometown was in part tied to logistics—most first-year students go home during the summer before their second year, and it was more cost-effective to provide job shadows where they were residing, Braun said. But staff also hoped it would expose students to career opportunities locally and near family, which can be a strong pull for first-generation students in particular, and help them affirm their major decision.

“Another benefit of this program is, let me shadow an engineer and see if I’m into that, or let me shadow a programmer to see if I’m into that,” Braun said.

After the alumni and students were matched up, both groups completed orientations prior to the job shadow addressing what makes a good job-shadow experience, questions to ask of the student or host, and transportation to and from the host site. All job shadows happened in the metropolitan area of the student’s hometown, so most participants commuted at least some distance.

The college also reimbursed students for their travel and lunch for the day, about $150 on average.

The impact: Ten students participated in cities ranging from neighboring Los Angeles and Altadena to farther away in Redmond, Wash., and Denver. Over all, student and alumni feedback indicated all parties were pleased with the experience.

“Students said this was something that they felt was informative for them, either picking a different major or thinking about an industry that they wanted to go into,” Braun said. Alumni said it was a feel-good experience and an opportunity for them to give back, as well.

One change staff are considering is to rebrand the program. The pilot was titled “Muddship,” a play on internship, which was confusing for both groups, so staff are brainstorming a new title that clarifies this isn’t work-based learning but a low-stakes career-exploration experience.

For next year, Braun and her team are hoping to offer job shadows over winter, spring and summer breaks, allowing more students to participate.

The program has limited funds, but Braun would like to see additional dollars invested for stipends on the front end so the students don’t have to pay out of pocket to participate. Braun also sees value in offering students the opportunity to travel to job shadows or providing students with professional dress to enter job-shadow spaces, which would require more financial resources, as well.

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August 19, 2025
Business Development Specialists at U-M

If you have the opportunity to apply for a job at the University of Michigan’s Center for Academic Innovation, do so. If they offer you the gig, accept.

The two roles that CAI is recruiting for that I want to highlight are:

I asked Suzanne Dove, CAI’s chief education solutions officer, to answer four questions about the roles.

Q: What is the university’s mandate behind these roles? How do they help align with and advance the university’s strategic priorities?

A: Education Solutions is a new team within the University of Michigan’s Center for Academic Innovation, charged with bringing strategic focus and forward momentum to our partnerships with external organizations, both private and public, seeking an innovative educational provider for workforce development.

A growing and robust set of high-value strategic partnerships is an essential component of CAI’s growth strategy in the decade ahead. We are responsible for engaging prospective partners, identifying opportunities and crafting relevant educational solutions in collaboration with other CAI teams and U-M faculty and ensuring a high-quality partner experience. We also provide thought leadership around the shifting workforce-development landscape.

Q: Where do the roles sit within the university structure? How will the hires in these roles engage with other units and leaders across campus?

A: The Center for Academic Innovation is a strategically focused central campus unit at the University of Michigan. We aim to shape the future of learning by unlocking new opportunities for the University of Michigan community and learners, as well as organizations around the world. Our vision is a future in which education connects and empowers learners everywhere to reach their full potential throughout their lives.

The people who join our team in these two new business development roles will play a vital role in connecting CAI to organizations outside the university, understanding and supporting solutions that fulfill these organizations’ evolving workforce and talent development needs, and helping us scale these partnerships in alignment with CAI’s mission. Successful candidates will bring expertise in developing and nurturing strong partnerships with external organizations at regional, national and international levels, as well as the ability to adopt an industry perspective.

Q: What would success look like in one year? Three years? Beyond?

A: Year one is about building the foundations for successful partnerships, both by experimenting with different ways we can serve organizational partners and by taking a systematic approach to deliver, evaluate and learn as we go. We will work together to establish a robust and vibrant pipeline of strategic partner organizations, evaluate their organizational learning needs and determine ways in which our current and future catalog of offerings can serve those needs.

At three years, I expect we will be engaging with a set of strategic external partnerships and have built our understanding of the educational solutions that we’re best positioned to provide. Beyond that, we want to scale these solutions to match the vast needs of workforce trends and transitions around the world.

Q: What kinds of future roles would someone who took either of these positions be prepared for?

A: I am excited for the people we hire as business development specialists because their work will position them at the intersection of building relationships, understanding the dynamic world of workforce learning and building internal processes to allow effective delivery of educational solutions for organizations. The result will be a tangible impact not only on people’s lives but also on the organization’s performance.

I can envision plenty of doors that would open as a result of success in one of these positions, depending on the individual’s interests: HR or talent development leadership; a workforce or economic development agency at the local, state, federal or even global level; or a larger or more complex business development portfolio.

One thing I have noticed about CAI since I joined a few months ago is that there are plenty of opportunities for team members to grow and stretch. If you are an intellectually curious, creative problem solver who leads by listening and collaborating, if you love to take an initial concept and help a team and organization bring it to life, I hope you’ll apply!

Please get in touch if you are conducting a job search at the intersection of learning, technology and organizational change. If your gig is a good fit, featuring your gig on Featured Gigs is free.

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August 19, 2025