Tag: staff

  • Johnson & Wales University to lay off 91 faculty and staff

    Johnson & Wales University to lay off 91 faculty and staff

    Dive Brief:

    • Johnson & Wales University plans to lay off 91 faculty and staff members — about 5% of its workforce — as it tries to rapidly evolve its operating model, officials said. The cuts will affect its two campuses in Providence, Rhode Island, and Charlotte, North Carolina.
    • The private nonprofit faces an operating deficit of $34 million after more than a decade of enrollment declines. “We simply cannot afford to be the size that we once were, and we believe this reduction will allow us to close a financial deficit and to move forward with a balanced budget,” Chancellor Mim Runey said Monday in a community message.
    • With its cash reserves almost depleted, the university is also delaying salary increases until later this year when officials can “evaluate what is possible,” Runey said.

    Dive Insight:

    To explain why Johnson & Wales is reducing its workforce, Runey pointed to a 54% decline in overall enrollment since fiscal 2012, with headcounts falling from a high of 17,294 to over 8,000 in recent years. 

    The chancellor attributed the shrinking student body to demographic declines, fewer international students and shifting public attitudes about higher education.

    Staffing and budgets, meanwhile, have fallen at a slower pace than enrollment, Runey said, framing the layoffs as rightsizing the university’s operations. 

    “While there is some indication that we are on the right track with enrollment, we do not believe we will return to levels of enrollment that supported a much larger organization and operating budget,” she said.

    The university has already downsized in the recent past. In 2021, Johnson & Wales shuttered its campuses in Florida and Colorado — both of which opened to expand the university during times of growth in the higher education market. 

    Along with reducing expenses, the sale of those former campus buildings added to university’s endowment and reserves. Those reserves, however, have been drained to plug recent budget gaps.

    The university has also pared down the number of senior leaders by about half since 2012, Runey noted. Additionally, it has consolidated academic programs, closed others with low enrollment, reduced jobs through attrition and streamlined aspects of its operations.

    At the same time, Johnson & Wales has invested in a wide array of new programs to try to attract students. Over the past decade, some of those new offerings have “yielded great results while others less so, and some were reduced or discontinued,” Runey said. 

    She also pointed to more recently launched health and wellness programs. Those come with start-up costs such as specialized facilities, faculty and marketing efforts. 

    “These new program investments, while showing great early outcomes, have not yet had time to yield returns that would significantly improve the operational budget,” Runey said.

    That stands in contrast to more rapid enrollment growth other rounds of new programming brought the university in the past, when market conditions were better. 

    “Today we plan with the conservatism that the times demand,” the chancellor said.

    Source link

  • AmeriCorps Cuts Force College Access Groups to Reduce Staff

    AmeriCorps Cuts Force College Access Groups to Reduce Staff

    Brianne Dolney-Jacobs has spent the last year advising high school seniors in Bay City, Mich., on their options after graduation.

    She met with 96 percent of the seniors at least once to talk about college applications, financial aid options, standardized tests and more. In doing so, she helped nearly 30 students access a countywide scholarship, up from under 10 in the previous year.

    But now, she’s one of 32,000 people affected by sweeping cuts to AmeriCorps, a federal agency focused on service and volunteerism across the United States. At least 100 college-access groups, including the Michigan College Access Network, where Dolney-Jacobs works, rely on AmeriCorps funding or members to make the college application process more accessible to high school students, especially those in low-income areas and at schools with low rates of college attendance.

    MCAN lost its grant funding this week and was ordered to cease all AmeriCorps work immediately, though the organization was able to use its own funds to buy staff members an extra month. Dolney-Jacobs will now wrap up her time at the high school at the end of May; she was supposed to stay on through late June.

    Without someone in her position, Dolney-Jacobs told Inside Higher Ed, there is no one at her school who would have the bandwidth to meet with individual students as they navigate the college application process. Many students would never have heard about different scholarships that are available to them or know that community college—including both an associate’s degree and some trade certifications—is free for recent high school graduates in Michigan.

    When her students heard that her position had been impacted, a group brought flowers to her office.

    “They told me, ‘you are the Class of 2025’s hero,’” she recounted. “And I was just bawling.”

    The National College Attainment Network, the association for MCAN and other similar organizations, is still taking stock of how many of its members have been impacted, said Elizabeth Morgan, NCAN’s chief external relations officer. But damage has been widespread.

    “I think it’s safe to say probably our members that use AmeriCorps are serving hundreds of thousands of students across the country,” Morgan said. “They are devastated by this news for a couple of reasons: The students they are supporting right now, many are high school seniors who are just weeding through their [college] decision-making process … [and] the AmeriCorps members are being thrown out of work months early.”

    A total of $400 million in AmeriCorps grants were axed, according to America’s Service Commission, a nonprofit that represents state and national service commissions, including funding for food pantries and disaster relief programs in areas impacted by recent natural disasters. The majority of AmeriCorps’ staff was also put on administrative leave in mid-April.

    It’s just one of the many agencies that have faced funding cuts and grant cancellations as part of the Trump administration’s war on government spending. Its defenders say that the agency, which pays modest stipends to its members, is anything but wasteful: It provides both vital supports for American communities and professional development training to its members, all for a low price tag.

    “I don’t believe Washington is really in tune to what is going on in the local communities,” said Grady Holmes, who works with a different MCAN AmeriCorps program that provides college success coaching to community college and tribal college students. “This is a program that is not government waste. It basically assists the government in making sure their productive citizens are being moved toward self-sufficiency and obtaining a college degree … When the powers that be decided this is wasteful spending—they don’t understand AmeriCorps.”

    Twenty-four states sued the Trump administration over the cuts, calling the dismantling of the agency, which was created by Congress in 1993, “unauthorized.”

    Advisers’ Impacts

    MCAN is facing cuts to two student-facing programs: AdviseMI, which is focused on college readiness for high schoolers, and the College Completion Corps, which is geared toward students at tribal and community colleges. Both rely on AmeriCorps grants and are staffed by AmeriCorps members, who work in yearlong service positions in exchange for stipends and educational awards that can cover current educational expenses or pay off student loans. The organization employs over 100 AmeriCorps members across both programs.

    Both programs have been successful, MCAN leaders say. In the 2023–24 academic year, students supported by AdviseMI advisers submitted 21,420 college applications and were awarded more than $32 million in financial aid.

    The advisers “often interact with parents, as well, to help parents understand the role of FAFSA and help parents understand what’s happening with their student,” said Ryan Fewins-Bliss, the organization’s executive director. “And [they] engage the school in what we hope to be a schoolwide college-going culture … so when the juniors become seniors, they’re ready for this.”

    After MCAN learned Friday night that it lost one of its AmeriCorps grants, the organization spent the weekend trying figure out how it could keep its AmeriCorps staff on board if the rest of the grants were also canceled. (In total, MCAN lost $2.1 million in AmeriCorps funds.)

    Come Monday, MCAN found out its remaining grants, including funding for AdviseMI and College Completion Corps, were indeed cancelled, and that it had to stop operating those programs immediately. MCAN was able to find funding in the budget to continue those programs for an extra month, but the future beyond then is uncertain.

    Other organizations had to lay off their AmeriCorps members entirely. Partnership 4 Kids, a Nebraska-based organization that works with students from prekindergarten through college, had two full-time AmeriCorps fellows working with high school seniors and three fellows working directly with college students. All five had to stop working Friday, immediately after P4K received word that its grants had been terminated.

    “These two in the high schools had great relationships with their students. They were doing one-on-one case management; they were the driving force [behind] college applications, scholarship applications, helping students overcome barriers they might have, and really to get them to that finish line to graduate,” P4K president Deb Denbeck said.

    This year, 97 percent of P4K’s senior cohort graduated and 80 percent of them are going to college—an impressive feat in a state where the college-going rate for high school graduates has been on the decline.

    ‘Brings Out the Best in People’

    AmeriCorps members have worked in high schools as college advisers for at least two decades, starting with the College Advising Corps, an organization that began in Virginia and has since expanded to 15 states. It’s a model that college-access leaders say has been incredibly effective, helping thousands of students go to college and boosting the careers of the advisers.

    It’s also been embraced by politicians on both sides of the aisle, according to Nicole Hurd, who founded the CAC and is now president of Lafayette College.

    AmeriCorps members are a natural fit for college-readiness work, these leaders say. Because many are recent college graduates, they can remember what it was like to be in the high schoolers’ shoes, making it easy for them to empathize with and respond to the challenges their students are facing. The college adviser positions are relatively easy to train, meaning individuals from any background can take on these roles.

    But perhaps most importantly, leaders of college-access nonprofits feel AmeriCorps’ long-standing ethos of volunteerism aligns perfectly with their missions to bring educational opportunity to all.

    “AmeriCorps brings out the best in people, and it gives them an opportunity to learn as well—to learn how to be professionals in their field,” said Denbeck. “When you look at everything that AmeriCorps does, whether it’s working in education or mentoring or agriculture or disaster relief, they’re doing it because of their heart.”

    The impacted organizations doubt they’ll be able to rely on AmeriCorps going forward. For now, they’re working to figure out how to continue their work and where they might get the funding necessary to deploy college advisers into the communities that need them most.

    “In the future, it’s safe to say that there are countless students that won’t attend college because they’re not getting this kind of support,” Morgan said.

    Source link

  • Streamlining payroll for casual and contract staff in education  – Campus Review

    Streamlining payroll for casual and contract staff in education  – Campus Review

    Australia’s higher education sector is highly dependent on casual and contract staff. As of 2021, 43 per cent of higher education employees were employed as casual or fixed-term contract employees. This puts education among the top 10 industries in terms of casual employment utilisation.

    While this workforce model provides flexibility for universities, it also introduces significant payroll complexities, including managing multiple roles under different awards, ensuring accurate timesheet approvals, and meeting compliance obligations for both domestic and international employees.

    For staff, payroll errors – such as delayed payments, incorrect classifications, or missed superannuation contributions – can have severe financial and emotional consequences.

    To mitigate these risks, universities are looking to adopt modern payroll systems that automate compliance, improve accuracy, and enhance payroll transparency. Without effective payroll management, institutions risk financial penalties, reputational risk, and damage to staff wellbeing.

    ‘Wage theft’ or just outdated technology?

    Campus Review readers will no doubt be familiar with the many stories of underpayment in the education sector.

    Dubbed ‘wage theft’ in a report by the same name in 2023, the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) reported underpayments of $159 million since 2009, across 97,500 staff, 55 separate incidents and 32 different institutions.

    The union blamed these underpayments to casual workers on ‘conditions of the awards not being followed’, bit in reality, it isn’t so simple.

    In its response to the NTEU report, the Australian Higher Education Industrial Association (AHEIA) found that “complex industrial agreements and government policy and funding arrangements had contributed to the [wage underpayment] issue, however, institutions have an obligation to ensure appropriate governance settings and frameworks to avoid these circumstances emerging.”

    “This includes implementing updates and changes to workforce system architecture, such as payroll and time recording systems.”

    Universities operate under some of the most complex employment frameworks in Australia. Staff can hold multiple contracts simultaneously, such as teaching undergraduates while working on a research grant, all under separate pay structures.

    Without an integrated HR and payroll system, ensuring compliance across these contracts becomes a high-risk administrative challenge. Instead of focusing on past underpayments, the focus should be on modernising payroll technology to prevent future mistakes.

    To do this, universities and higher-education institutions across Australia are investing in payroll automation, real-time compliance tracking, and award interpretation tools to ensure correct payments, protect their reputations, and improve staff confidence in payroll accuracy.

    The role of payroll automation in reducing errors

    Companies that rely on manual data entry and updates to data always run the risk of payroll errors and compliance issues. Relying on paper or even spreadsheets to track time worked and manually keying this data into systems creates a huge risk right from the start of the process.

    Errors often stem from these outdated and manual payroll processes, not from negligence or cost-cutting. It’s in these systems where complexities such as irregular working hours, different payment structures, and compliance with visa and employment laws create administrative strain.

    By eliminating manual data entry and automating compliance checks, universities can ensure employees receive accurate and timely payments while reducing financial and reputational risks.

    Automation also simplifies complex payroll calculations – such as processing multiple roles under different pay scales – ensuring employees are paid according to their specific contract terms without administrative bottlenecks.

    How real-time payroll reporting improves accuracy and transparency

    Payroll transparency is essential for improving trust between universities and their employees, as is the ability to run payroll in real-time and see the impact of calculations. This becomes possible when organisations automate the process and focus on managing exceptions rather than processing errors.

    A real-time payroll calculation allows payroll teams to identify anomalies early in the cycle, chase missing or invalid timesheets, and pinpoint specific employees whose pay data needs to be adjusted without having to reprocess the entire payroll.

    The latest technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML), will further improve automation and exception handling. These tools will enable payroll managers to identify potential issues earlier in the pay cycle, ensuring errors are corrected before payroll is finalised.

    Real-time reporting also allows universities to forecast workforce expenses more effectively, preventing payroll overruns and ensuring compliance with both internal financial controls and external regulatory obligations.

    The benefits of integrated HR and payroll systems

    Managing payroll for casual and non-permanent staff has long been a challenge for universities, particularly when employees hold multiple roles across different departments with varying conditions and payment rules.

    To overcome payroll complexities, universities need integrated HR and payroll systems, automated payments and improved compliance tracking. A truly integrated system, such as TechnologyOne’s Human Resources & Payroll (HRP), provides:

    • A single source of truth for multiple roles within an institution, ensuring that casual staff who also hold permanent positions are accurately classified and compensated.
    • Seamless onboarding and payroll management, ensuring new staff are correctly set up for payroll from day one.
    • Automated compliance monitoring, reducing the administrative burden on payroll teams.
    • Flexible self-service tools, allowing casual and contract staff to manage their employment records independently.
    • Real-time cost tracking, ensuring payroll expenses align with funding allocations and institutional budgets.

    Universities that are now using TechnologyOne’s Human Resources & Payroll have benefited from a more efficient approach to payroll. Charles Darwin University, for example, transitioned from separate legacy HR, recruitment and payroll systems to a fully integrated HR and Finance platform, eliminating inefficiencies and reducing payroll errors.

    Similarly, the University of Dundee in the UK moved from highly bespoke, costly custom systems to a standardised enterprise platform, resulting in cost savings and process efficiency.

    Future-proofing payroll for higher education

    As universities continue to adapt to workforce casualisation and regulatory changes, investing in a scalable and automated payroll system is essential. Future-proofing payroll means ensuring that universities have a system capable of handling evolving award structures, diverse employment types, and increasing compliance demands.

    TechnologyOne’s Human Resources & Payroll (HRP) helps universities automate payroll, ensure compliance, and reduce payroll errors, delivering a seamless, integrated workforce management experience.

    Find out how TechnologyOne HRP can transform your university’s payroll processes.

    Andy Cox is TechnologyOne’s General Manager for HR & Payroll Products, leading the development of innovative solutions that help organisations manage the entire employee lifecycle from recruitment to retirement.

    Do you have an idea for a story?
    Email [email protected]

    Source link

  • The Non-Exempt Staff Workforce in Colleges and Universities Is Shrinking

    The Non-Exempt Staff Workforce in Colleges and Universities Is Shrinking

    by CUPA-HR | April 8, 2025

    New research from CUPA-HR shows that the number of non-exempt* staff employees in higher education has been on a steady decline for the past several years. In the newest workforce trends report, The Non-Exempt Higher Education Staff Workforce: Trends in Composition, Size, and Equity, CUPA-HR examines the makeup of and trends in the higher ed non-exempt staff workforce from 2016-17 to 2023-24.

    One of the more notable findings: Since 2017, there has been a 9 percent decrease overall in the full-time non-exempt staff higher ed workforce. Part-time staff employee numbers have also fallen — down 8 percent in that same time period. The most significant downward trend began in 2020 (the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic), with decreases for both full-time (-3.3 percent) and part-time (-17.2 percent) staff.

    Some of the other key findings highlighted in the report:

    • Fewer non-exempt staff are age 55+. Non-exempt staff are slightly younger than they were pre-pandemic, and the proportion that is age 55+ has steadily declined from a high of 34% in 2019-20 to 31% in 2023-24.
    • Women make up 59% of the non-exempt staff workforce. They are best represented among office and clerical staff. Women in non-exempt positions are paid $.96 for every dollar White men are paid. Pay equity is lowest for Black ($0.92) and Hispanic ($0.94) women.
    • People of color make up 33% of the non-exempt workforce. This representation is much higher than in any other segment of the workforce, including administrators, faculty and professionals.
    • Women and Black staff experience multiple layers of inequity among non-exempt staff. They are better represented in the lowest-paying positions (e.g., dishwasher, custodian) than among the highest-paying positions (e.g., metalworker, electrician lead). They also have lower representation in lead positions than in non-lead positions.

    Read the report and explore this data with interactive graphics.

    *A non-exempt employee is one that is covered by (not exempt from) the Fair Labor Standards Act. As such, they are required to be paid overtime for every hour worked over 40 hours per week. Non-exempt staff must track their hours and be paid at least the federal minimum hourly wage. Examples of non-exempt staff in higher education include electricians, police officers, photographers, custodians, office assistants and food service workers.



    Source link

  • Two tribal colleges have been allowed to rehire staff that had been cut by the federal government

    Two tribal colleges have been allowed to rehire staff that had been cut by the federal government

    After weeks of uncertainty, two tribal colleges have been told they can hire back all employees who were laid off as part of the Trump administration’s deep cuts across the federal workforce in February, part of a judge’s order restoring some federal employees whose positions were terminated.

    Haskell Indian Nations University in Kansas and Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute, widely known as SIPI, in New Mexico lost about 70 employees in mid-February amid widespread staffing cuts to federal agencies. While most of the nation’s 37 tribal colleges and universities are chartered by American Indian tribes, Haskell and SIPI are not associated with individual tribes and are run by the federal government.

    About 55 employees were laid off and 15 accepted offers to resign, according to a lawsuit filed last month by tribes and students. The colleges were forced to cancel or reconfigure a wide range of services, from sports and food service to financial aid and classes. In some cases, instructors were hired by other universities as adjuncts and then sent back to the tribal colleges to keep teaching.

    Related: Interested in more news about colleges and universities? Subscribe to our free biweekly higher education newsletter.

    It was not clear this week when and if the workers would return, whether the employees who resigned would also be offered their jobs back, or if the government would allow colleges to fill vacancies. Both colleges said some employees had turned down the offers.

    The Bureau of Indian Education, which runs the colleges, declined to answer questions except to confirm the laid-off workers would be offered jobs with back pay to comply with a judge’s order that the government reverse course on thousands of layoffs of probationary employees. But the agency also noted the jobs would be available “as the White House pursues its appeals process,” indicating possible turmoil if an appeals court reinstates the layoffs.

    Both colleges said the bureau also has refused to answer most of their questions.

    SIPI leaders were told last week that the positions were being restored, said Adam Begaye, chairman of the SIPI Board of Regents. The 270-student college lost 21 employees, he said, four of whom decided to take early retirement. All but one of the remaining 17 agreed to return, Begaye said.

    The chaos has been difficult for those employees, he said, and the college is providing counseling.

    “We want to make sure they have an easy adjustment, no matter what they’ve endured,” Begaye said.

    Related: How a tribe won a legal battle against the federal Bureau of Indian Education and still lost

    The chairman of Haskell’s Board of Regents, Dalton Henry, said he was unsure how many of the 50 lost employees were returning. Like SIPI, Haskell was forced after the layoffs to shift job responsibilities and increase the workload for instructors and others.

    Haskell was reviewed by accreditors in December, and Henry said he was worried how the turmoil would affect the process. Colleges and universities must be accredited to offer federal and state financial aid and participate in most other publicly funded programs.

    Henry declined to discuss his thoughts on the chaos, saying there was nothing the college could do about it.

    “Whatever guidance is provided, that’s what we have to adhere to,” he said. “It’s a concern. But at this point, it’s the federal government’s decision.”

    The Bureau of Indian Affairs declined to make the presidents of the two colleges available for interviews.

    Tribal colleges and universities were established to comply with treaties and the federal trust responsibility, legally binding agreements in which the United States promised to fund Indigenous education and other needs. But college leaders argue the country has violated those contracts by consistently failing to fund the schools adequately.

    In the federal lawsuit claiming the Haskell and SIPI cuts were illegal, students and tribes argued the Bureau of Indian Education has long understaffed the colleges. The agency’s “well-documented and persistent inadequacies in operating its schools range from fiscal mismanagement to failure to provide adequate education to inhospitable buildings,” plaintiffs claimed.

    Related: Tribal college campuses are falling apart. The U.S. hasn’t fulfilled its promise to fund the schools

    Sen. Jerry Moran and Rep. Tracey Mann, both Kansas Republicans, said before Trump took office that they plan to introduce a bill shifting Haskell from federal control to a congressional charter, which would protect the university from cuts across federal agencies such as the Bureau of Indian Education.

    “[F]or the last few years the university has been neglected and mismanaged by the Bureau of Indian Education,” Moran said in a written statement in December. “The bureau has failed to protect students, respond to my congressional inquiries or meet the basic infrastructure needs of the school.”

    The February cuts brought rare public visibility to tribal colleges, most of which are in remote locations. Trump’s executive orders spurred outrage from Indigenous communities and a flurry of national news attention.

    “We’re using this chaos as a blessing in disguise to make sure our family and friends in the community know what SIPI provides,” said Begaye, the SIPI board president.

    The uncertainty surrounding the colleges’ funding has left a lasting mark, said Ahniwake Rose, president and CEO of the American Indian Higher Education Consortium, which advocates for tribal colleges. But she added she was proud of how the schools have weathered the cuts.

    “Indian country is always one of the most resourceful and creative populations,” she said. “We’ve always made do with less. I think you saw resilience and creativity from Haskell and SIPI.”

    Contact editor Christina A. Samuels at 212-678-3635 or [email protected].

    This story about tribal colleges was produced by The Hechinger Report, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for the Hechinger 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.

    Source link

  • Staff and Funding Cuts at the NEH Loom

    Staff and Funding Cuts at the NEH Loom

    The Department of Government Efficiency has struck higher ed institutions once again—this time through the National Endowment for the Humanities.

    Leaders of the agency—which supports research, innovation and preservation in disciplines related to culture, society and values—told staff members Tuesday that the Trump administration intends to make substantial reductions in staff, slash the agency’s grant programs and rescind grants that have already been awarded.

    Humanities advocates don’t know exactly how large the cuts to NEH’s approximately 180-person staff or $78.25 million grant budget will be, but they note that “patterns at other agencies” provide a solid hint. The impact on colleges and universities, they say, would be crushing.

    “The NEH supports the full range of humanities work that takes place at higher ed institutions, including support for research and teaching, academic publishing and professional development programs for faculty,” said Stephen Kidd, executive director of the National Humanities Alliance. “Cuts would be particularly devastating, because unlike a lot of private funders, the NEH is more prestige-blind. With its mandate to support the humanities across the country, it’s more likely to give grants to people at smaller and public institutions.”

    President Trump has been talking about cutting humanities funding since his first term. Even before whispers about the latest cuts began, humanities scholars expressed concern that new grant-eligibility rules imposed to comply with Trump’s executive order on diversity, equity and inclusion would “undercut NEH’s very mission.”

    The president and his cabinet secretaries have already fired or offered buyouts to tens of thousands of government employees in an attempt to hollow out the federal workforce. Two of the most notable cuts impacted the Department of Education—which supports higher ed through federal student aid programs, data collection and accountability measures—and the Department of Health and Human Services, one of the world’s largest research funding sources for colleges and universities.

    Now Trump is turning his focus from educational infrastructure and sciences to history, literature and philosophy. Paula Krebs, executive director of the Modern Language Association, believes the move is “sending a message.”

    The cut “adds up to a huge net loss for all of higher education” and suggests “it is not worth investing in the study of our culture and the culture of others,” Krebs said. “In the larger context of DOGE cuts, the nation is saying that it’s not worth investing in the study of anything at all.”

    The announcement of looming cuts at NEH comes just three weeks after the agency’s Biden-appointed chair, Shelly Lowe, resigned. A citizen of the Navajo Nation, Lowe was the agency’s first Native American chair. Before that, she served as executive director of the Harvard University Native American Program.

    The agency is now being led by interim director Michael McDonald, who previously served as its general counsel.

    Since Lowe stepped down, DOGE staff members have made several appearances at the office. On Tuesday, they said 70 to 80 percent of the staff would be let go, three staff members told The New York Times. Sources also told the Times that all grants approved by the Biden administration but not yet paid out in full will be canceled.

    Neither NEH nor the White House responded to Inside Higher Ed’s request for comment.

    Founded in 1965, the NEH has allocated more than $6 billion in grants to museums, historical sites, libraries, state humanities councils and higher education institutions to support a variety of programs.

    Kidd, from the Humanities Alliance, said one of the most substantial losses universities could face is funding for curriculum development. In an era when public doubt regarding the value of a college degree is on the rise and skills-based hiring is gaining traction, humanities departments across the country are looking for new ways to mix the classical liberal arts with modern pre-professional training. NEH grants, he said, have been a key source of support for such experimentation.

    “These kinds of curricular innovations can help to ensure that students in the humanities have strong pathways to future careers,” Kidd said. It’s “NEH’s support for curricular innovations that might bring the humanities in conversation with business or with biological and health sciences.”

    He and other humanities association leaders have also expressed concern about cuts to grants intended to help libraries and museums preserve historical documents, art and other materials that are key to humanities research. The cuts to NEH, they say, will only compound the damage that has already been done by Trump’s executive order to disband the Institute of Museum and Library Services.

    “Without funding for preservation, materials will disappear, degrade or not be collected in the first place,” Kidd said. “And once those are lost—they’re lost. The record of human activity is gone.”

    Though its mandate is much broader than the humanities, the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities also registered concern about the NEH cuts.

    “NEH-funded research documents American history and culture [and] explores the legal and ethical use of emerging technologies such as AI,” said Craig Lindwarm, the association’s senior vice president of governmental affairs. “While undoubtedly reforms to NEH can be made and efficiencies found, cuts to NEH research would undermine progress in these critical areas and beyond.”

    To Peter Berkey, executive director of the Association of University Presses, the looming endowment cuts are the epicenter of “a disastrous ripple through the entire scholarly ecosystem.”

    “Perhaps most importantly,” he said, “these actions will diminish the very disciplines that drive the development of critical thinking, the understanding of value and the pursuit of justice and democracy among the next generation of scholars and citizens.”

    Source link

  • 62% Jewish students, staff feel unsafe on campus: Survey – Campus Review

    62% Jewish students, staff feel unsafe on campus: Survey – Campus Review

    A survey of 550 university staff and students found six in 10 experienced antisemitic comments, and about the same felt unsafe on campus due to Israel-Gaza driven conflict in Australia.

    Please login below to view content or subscribe now.

    Membership Login

    Source link

  • 800 ANU staff vote no confidence in chancellor, vice-chancellor at “scandal-plagued” university – Campus Review

    800 ANU staff vote no confidence in chancellor, vice-chancellor at “scandal-plagued” university – Campus Review

    Nearly all Australian National University (ANU) union members on Thursday supported a vote of no confidence in vice-chancellor Genevieve Bell and chancellor Julie Bishop.

    Please login below to view content or subscribe now.

    Membership Login

    Source link

  • Professional services staff need equal recognition – visibility in sector data would be a good start

    Professional services staff need equal recognition – visibility in sector data would be a good start

    Achieving recognition for the significant contribution of professional services staff is a collaborative, cross-sector effort.

    With HESA’s second consultation on higher education staff statistics welcoming responses until 3 April, AGCAS has come together with a wide range of membership bodies representing professional services staff across higher education to release a statement warmly welcoming HESA’s proposal to widen coverage of the higher education staff record to include technical staff and professional and operational staff.

    By creating a more complete staff record, HESA aim to deliver better understanding of the diverse workforce supporting the delivery of UK higher education. AGCAS, together with AHEP, AMOSSHE, ASET, CRAC-Vitae, NADP and UMHAN, welcome these proposals. We have taken this collaborative approach because we have a common goal of seeking wider recognition for the outstanding contributions and work of our members in professional services roles, and the impact they make on their institutions, regions, graduates and students.

    A matter of visibility

    Since the 2019–20 academic year, higher education providers in England and Northern Ireland have had the option to return data on non-academic staff to HESA. However, this has led to a lack of comprehensive visibility for many professional services staff. In the 2023–24 academic year, out of 228 providers only 125 opted to return data on all their non-academic staff – leaving 103 providers opting out.

    This gap in data collection has raised concerns about the recognition and visibility of these essential staff members – and has not gone unnoticed by professional services staff themselves. As one AGCAS member noted:

    Professional service staff have largely remained invisible when reporting on university staff numbers. Professional services provide critical elements of student experience and outcomes, and this needs to be recognised and reflected better in statutory reporting.

    This sentiment underscores the importance of the proposed changes by HESA, and the reason for our shared response.

    Who is and is not

    A further element of the consultation considers a move away from the term “non-academic” to better reflect the roles and contributions of these staff members and proposes to collect data on staff employment functions.

    Again, we collectively strongly support these proposed changes, which have the potential to better understand and acknowledge the wide range of staff working to deliver outstanding higher education across the UK. The term non-academic has long been contentious across higher education. While continuing to separate staff into role types may cause issues for those in the third space, shifting away from a term and approach that defines professional services staff by othering them is a welcome change.

    As we move forward, it is essential to continue fostering collaboration and mutual respect between academic and professional services staff. Challenging times across higher education can create or enhance partnership working between academic and professional services staff, in order to tackle shared difficulties, increase collaboration and form strategic alliances.

    A better environment

    By working in this way, we can create a more inclusive and supportive environment that recognises the diverse contributions of all staff members, ultimately enhancing outcomes for all higher education stakeholders, particularly students.

    Due to the nature of our memberships, our shared statement focuses on professional services staff in higher education – but we also welcome the clear focus on operational and technical staff from HESA, who again make vital contributions to their institutions.

    We all know that representation matters to our members, and the higher education staff that we collectively represent. HESA’s proposed changes could help to start a move towards fully and equitably recognising the vital work of professional services staff across higher education. By expanding data collection to include wider staff roles and moving away from the term “non-academic”, we can better understand and acknowledge the wide range of contributions that support the higher education sector.

    This is just the first step towards better representation and recognition, but it is an important one.

    Source link

  • Body cams, staff to carry ID, change of culture: TEQSA draft rules for protests, student complaints

    Body cams, staff to carry ID, change of culture: TEQSA draft rules for protests, student complaints

    Security stand in front of a pro-Israel protest at the University of Sydney on May 3, 2024. Picture: David Swift



    By: Erin Morley

    in Industry & Research, Top Stories


    March 19, 2025

    Universities will be expected to publish de-identified complaints data publicly, make student complaints processes clearer, and analyse the data twice a year if the university regulator’s interim guidelines for student complaints mechanisms are adopted.

    Please login below to view content or subscribe now.

    Membership Login

    Source link