Tag: Student

  • Q&A with a student success dean, Soka University of America

    Q&A with a student success dean, Soka University of America

    As an undergraduate student, Lisa MacLeod wasn’t sure where her career path would take her. She majored in English literature and international relations with the aspirations of being a journalist or a State Department staffer and found herself back in academia not long after.

    Lisa MacLeod, assistant dean of student success at Soka University of America

    Lisa MacLeod/Soka University of America

    Now, as the inaugural assistant dean of student success at Soka University of America since last fall, MacLeod is charged with breaking institutional silos at the California institution to improve student outcomes after graduation, working collaboratively across campus.

    MacLeod spoke with Inside Higher Ed about her time thus far at the institution, a private liberal arts college, and her aspirations in the long-term.

    Inside Higher Ed: What is your new role at Soka and how does it fit into institutional goals for student success?

    MacLeod: One of the most important things [about my role] is that I am housed under the dean of faculty, so I’m not under the dean of students, which is very different from how a lot of schools have done this.

    My top priority, luckily, isn’t getting students to graduate—because we already are doing that very well as an institution … I’m not just new in the job, the position is new at the university—so there’s some room for me to define what the position is.

    I was asked to look specifically at advising. Right now, our program is all faculty individually advising students for academic advising. Career services and internships is the other side of the house, and historically, the two sides of the house don’t talk to each other very well. So looking at how we advise, but also thinking about, are there ways that we can integrate better, because we have lots of good things happening by different people. But do faculty know about that? Do they know enough about it to recommend it to students? Not so much.

    The other thing is starting to integrate career readiness skills into the curriculum. This year, we are rolling out RATE (Reflect, Articulate, Translate, Evaluate), which was developed by the University of Minnesota for their liberal arts students.

    We’re having our first cohort this coming semester—so beginning in February—of faculty fellows who have pledged to develop the RATE system into their existing course, and we’re supporting them with some training and other kinds of activities so that we’re very specific in the application. We’re not asking you to change your course. What we’re asking is that you make it more evident to students how they are developing career readiness skills in addition to academic and subject area knowledge.

    Inside Higher Ed: You were a double major in college. While interdisciplinary learning can be an asset to students, sometimes academic departments can be more focused on helping students on a specific path within their discipline. Do you have any insights based on your experience as a dual major and helping students find their own path?

    MacLeod: At Soka, we don’t have majors—everyone graduates with a major in liberal arts, and then within that, we have concentrations. Students here do have the opportunity to double concentrate, so they’re not taking as many courses as you would for a major, but there’s still some degree of specialty.

    I encourage them to look at the whole course catalog and say, “Take the classes that really attract you, that are interesting, and you’ll figure out how they connect to each other if you look for it,” and to not worry about double concentrations. Or, you know, force yourself to take courses you wouldn’t otherwise.

    Certainly, I encourage students, depending on what their interests are, if you’re going to go to graduate school, yes, take statistics, take a research methodology course. Do these kinds of courses that are skill building [so] you’ll have that [for] the next level of your education; they will have expected you to have that background.

    But beyond that, I’m really focused on having students maybe try something they wouldn’t otherwise. I wish as an undergraduate I had taken an anthropology class, but it never occurred to me; it just wasn’t on my radar. Explore, because you don’t know what you don’t know, and to really find something that drives them, that they’re really excited about doing the coursework and learning more about that area. Because they’ll put more into it, and as they put more into it, they’re going to develop the liberal arts skills in the process. Whereas, if they’re forcing themselves to take a course because they feel they should take this course, they’re not going to have the same level of motivation. They’re not going to get the same out of it.

    Inside Higher Ed: As you said, one of your priorities is advising, which is so important to the student journey. What does quality advising look like to you?

    MacLeod: I think that quality advising really requires time and listening.

    I always ask students to come in with kind of a worksheet: Where are you [in your progress] toward graduation? Where are you in terms of taking required courses? But I also ask them things like, “OK, this is a required course, but you have a selection of five different faculty members that might be teaching that course, and of course, they bring their skills and expertise and kind of personality in each course. Why did you choose that faculty member? If you’re interested in this, maybe this other faculty member—even though it’s the same requirement—might teach that course in a way that you would find appealing?” And directing them to resources, encouraging them to talk to faculty before they enrolled in the course if they have questions or concerns or if they’re not certain about something.

    Then also asking them very blatant questions that I wish someone had asked me when I was an undergraduate. What are your plans after you graduate? What are you doing to achieve that goal? What information do you need to know, and how are you going to get it moving forward?

    I took time off [after graduating] because I’d never had those conversations. Maybe people at the university thought I was having it with my family. My family may have thought I was having it with people at the university. I’m not sure where I lost the memo, but it just didn’t happen. Before, someone had always come along and said, “Apply for this,” and it was a very structured thing. That’s not how life after graduation works at all. So I ask those questions I wish someone had asked me.

    Inside Higher Ed: What is student success to you?

    MacLeod: It’s not for me to define for someone else what success looks like. I have my own ideas, but I think it’s wrong to impose that on other people, because success can look like so many different things.

    In general, I feel that student success is they graduate from the program, and they feel good about that. That there’s not regret that they should have gone someplace else, but also that we’ve equipped them with the skills in their personal and in their professional life to face the challenges that will inevitably come and to be able to surmount them.

    The first couple years after graduation for everyone is hard—that’s just kind of the nature of the beast—but that they are prepared for, that they can get through it, and know that there’s something on the other side. that they are confident in their skills, that they will figure it out and then end up on the other side in a career that they find fulfilling in some manner, being able to contribute to the community, if that’s their goal, in a way that is meaningful to them. And hopefully happy alumni that are talking to our current students that and sharing their experiences.

    Inside Higher Ed: What are your long-term goals in this new role?

    MacLeod: It feels like so much of academic life is keeping your head above water for now.

    I think that in the long term, I’d really like to see a more collaborative campus culture, where faculty members are supporting each other in their endeavors, maybe a bit more. It’s not that my colleagues are unsupportive, but we don’t always ask each other or are aware of the ways in which our research overlaps and we could actually be doing more—whether it’s with our teaching or where we could be drawing more on each other’s skills and knowledge base.

    I’m still really new at this … so I think right now my priority is still listening, rather than planning for the future.

    Seeking stories from campus leaders, faculty members and staff for our Student Success focus. Share here.

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  • FIRE statement on reports of forthcoming executive order on student visas and campus protests

    FIRE statement on reports of forthcoming executive order on student visas and campus protests

    President Donald Trump is expected to sign an executive order today threatening action against international students in the United States for their involvement in campus protests related to Israel and Hamas. 

    Per reports, President Trump promises to “quickly cancel the student visas of all Hamas sympathizers on college campuses, which have been infested with radicalism like never before,” and to deport students who joined “pro-jihadist protests.” 

    The revocation of student visas should not be used to punish and filter out ideas disfavored by the federal government. The strength of our nation’s system of higher education derives from the exchange of the widest range of views, even unpopular or dissenting ones.

    Students who commit crimes — including vandalism, threats, or violence — must face consequences, and those consequences may include the loss of a visa. But if today’s executive order reaches beyond illegal activity to instead punish students for protest or expression otherwise protected by the First Amendment, it must be withdrawn.

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  • Making better decisions on student financial support

    Making better decisions on student financial support

    By Peter Gray, Chief Executive and Chair of the JS Group.

    As the higher education sector starts to plan its next budget cycle and many may need to make savings, there is a concern about the impact of any cuts on students and how this could negatively affect their university experience and performance.

    Universities are bound to look at a range of options to save money, especially given the stormy operating context. But one less-often highlighted aspect of university finances is the cost (and benefit) of the additional financial support universities devote to many of their students. Through cash, vouchers and other means, many universities provide financial help to support with the costs of living and learning.

    Using Universities UK’s annual sector figures as one indicator, roughly 5% of universities’ overall expenditure has gone towards financial support and outreach, equivalent to around £2.5 billion. Although some of this money will inevitably not go directly to students themselves, this is still a significant amount of spending.

    There are, naturally, competing tensions when it comes to considering any changes to targeted financial support. With significant financial pressures on students, exacerbated by the cost-of-living crisis, there is always a very justifiable case for more money. However, with the significant financial pressures universities are facing, there is an equally justifiable case to control costs to ensure financial sustainability. Every university has to manage this tension and trade-offs are inevitable when understanding just how much financial support to give and to whom.

    In many respects, the answers to those questions are partially governed by Access & Participation Plans, with the clear intention that these financial interventions really change student outcomes. However, properly measuring those outcomes is incredibly difficult without a much deeper understanding of student ‘need’ – and understanding these needs comes from being able to identify student spending behaviour (and often doing this in real-time).

    It always amazes me that some APPs will state that financial support ‘has had a positive impact on retention’ and some quite the opposite and I think part of this is a result of positioning financial support from the university end of the telescope rather than the student end.

    Understanding real and actual ‘need’ helps to change this. Knowing perhaps that certain groups (for example Asylum Seekers or Gypsy, Roma, Traveller, Showman and Boater students) across the sector will have similar needs would be helpful and data really help here. Having, using, and sharing data will allow us to draw a bigger picture and better signpost to where interventions are most effectively deployed so those particular groups of students who need support are achieving the right outcomes.

    Technology is at hand to help: Open Banking (for example) is an incredible tool that not only can transform how financial support can be delivered but also helps to build an understanding of student behaviour.

    Lifting the bonnet and understanding behaviour poses additional questions, such as: When is the right time to give that support? And what form should that support take?

    I am a big proponent of providing financial support as soon as a student starts. When I talk to universities, however, it is clear that the data needed to identify particular groups of students are not readily available at the point of entry and students’ needs are not met. Giving a student financial support in December, when they needed it in September, is not delivering at the point of student need, it is delivering at the point where the university can identify the student. I think there is a growing body of evidence that suggests the large drop off in students between September and December is, in part, because of this.

    Some universities in the sector give a small amount of support to all students at the start of the year, knowing that by doing so they will ensure that they can meet the immediate needs of some students. But clearly, some money must also go to those who do not necessarily need it.

    However, and this is where the maths comes in, if the impact of that investment keeps more students in need at university, then I would argue that investment is worth the return. And the maths is simple: it really doesn’t take many additional students to stay to have a profoundly positive impact on university finances. Thus it is certainly worthy of consideration.

    To me, this is about using financial support to drive the ultimate goal of improving student outcomes, especially the retention of students between September and December, which is when the first return is made, where the largest withdrawal is seen and where the least amount of financial support is given.

    As to the nature or format of support: of course, in most cases, it is easier to provide cash. However, again, this is about your investment in your student, and, for example, if you have students on a course with higher material and resource costs, or students who are commuting, then there is an argument to consider more in-kind support and using data to support that decision.

    Again, I am a proponent of not just saying ‘one size fits all’. Understanding student need is complex, but solutions are out there. It is important to work together to identify patterns of real student need and understand the benefits of doing so.

    My knowledge draws on JS Group’s data, based on the direct use of £40 million of specialist student financial support to more than 160,000 students across 30 UK universities in the last full academic cycle.

    I have also looked at the student views on such funding and there is an emerging picture that connects student financial support with continuation, participation and progress. A summary of student feedback is here: https://jsgroup.co.uk/news-and-views/news/student-feedback-report-january-2025/

    The real positive of this is that everyone wants the same goal: for fewer students to withdraw from their courses and for those students to thrive at university and be successful. We need to widen the debate on how financial support is delivered, when, and in what format to draw together a better collective understanding of student need and behaviour to achieve that goal.

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  • How to Build a Dynamic Student Enrollment Plan That Thrives Amid Change

    How to Build a Dynamic Student Enrollment Plan That Thrives Amid Change

    Key Takeaways:

    • Evolving student enrollment strategies require proactive, data-informed approaches that adapt to demographic shifts, economic pressures, and market dynamics.
    • Real-time metrics and prescriptive analytics enable institutions to refine recruitment strategies, address challenges quickly, and optimize enrollment outcomes.
    • Flexible tools and predictive modeling help mitigate disruptions, align team efforts, and support personalized student engagement.
    • Continuous refinement ensures institutions can navigate uncertainties, maintain competitive student enrollment plans, and prepare for future challenges.

    Higher education is in constant flux, primarily driven by student demographic shifts, economic pressures, and rapid technological advancements. For institutions to stay competitive in this environment, student enrollment strategies must evolve. By embracing a consistent, data-informed, and adaptable enrollment management approach, institutions can navigate current and unforeseen uncertainties and meet their enrollment goals.

    A Forward-Looking Approach to Enrollment Strategies

    Traditional enrollment strategies often rely on rearview analyses, evaluating successes and missteps only at the end of an enrollment cycle. However, the dynamic nature of student recruitment today demands a more proactive approach. Institutions must adopt prescriptive analytics to “look through the windshield,” using real-time data to understand how current strategies are performing and make adjustments on the fly. This forward-thinking approach allows enrollment managers to:

    • Identify what is working and what needs refinement during the current recruitment cycle.
    • Test potential strategies against historical data to predict their effectiveness before implementation.
    • Address emerging challenges quickly, such as unexpected FAFSA delays or shifts in application behavior.
    • Develop broad tactics to adapt to changes throughout the enrollment cycle as well as adjust to shifting dynamics with individual students.

    Such adaptability requires not just access to the right data but also the tools and expertise to act on it effectively. The combination of robust technology platforms, such as Liaison’s predictive analytics tool Othot, and experienced partners who understand the nuances of higher education can make all the difference. By integrating analytics and expert guidance, institutions can respond to challenges with precision and agility.

    Data-Informed Metrics for Strategic Refinement

    To optimize their student enrollment plans, institutions must evaluate specific metrics at each stage of the recruitment process. This means aligning data evaluation with the student journey, focusing on key performance indicators (KPIs) that matter most at each stage:

    · Search phase | Metrics such as inquiry volume, lead conversion rates, and source effectiveness provide insight into initial interest in the institution and the success of outreach efforts.

    · Application phase | Metrics such as application volume, completion rates, and demographic trends help institutions understand the reach and appeal of their efforts.

    · Yield phase | Yield rates and admitted student feedback provide insights into how students perceive the institution’s value.

    · Enrollment phase | Deposit rates and engagement tracking reveal which admitted students are likely to matriculate, enabling targeted follow-ups.

    Different variables also emerge during the cycle that require immediate action. For example, when unexpected disruptions such as a sudden change in application deadlines or a major shift in funding policies occur, enrollment leaders must have the tools and knowledge to not only pivot their strategies to address the issues at hand but also effectively predict the results of those changing approaches in real-time. This requires a flexible data infrastructure that can accommodate real-time adjustments.

    Overcoming Challenges Through Continuous Adaptation

    Flexibility is a nonnegotiable trait for enrollment management teams. The new realities of a post-pandemic world, declining high school graduating classes, and a highly competitive marketplace are significantly challenging existing strategies. The pressure to meet enrollment goals often comes with internal changes—such as staff turnover or shifts in leadership priorities—and external pressures like economic downturns or new legislation.

    • Turnover and continuity | Staff turnover can disrupt institutional momentum, particularly when strategies are person-dependent rather than system-driven. Tools such as Othot provide consistency by embedding critical data insights and processes into the institution’s framework, reducing the impact of turnover and fostering a culture of data-informed decision-making.
    • Adapting to unexpected variables | Challenges like sudden changes in funding or board directives require immediate adjustments. By leveraging “what-if” scenario modeling, institutions can simulate the impact of potential changes and make informed decisions quickly.

    Strategies to Increase Student Enrollment

    Strategic flexibility can make the difference between hitting enrollment targets and falling short. Institutions can take several steps to continuously refine their strategies:

    1. Monitor trends in real-time | Stay ahead of shifts in student behavior by regularly reviewing metrics such as engagement rates, application trends, and deposit patterns.

    2. Incorporate scenario planning | Use predictive tools to simulate how changes in funding, messaging, or outreach might impact enrollment outcomes.

    3. Align collaboration across teams | Align data and strategy efforts across departments to create a unified approach to enrollment management.

    4. Personalize student engagement | Tailor communication based on individual student data, ensuring that messaging resonates with their unique needs and interests.

    By integrating these strategies into their student enrollment plans, institutions can adapt to changing circumstances while maintaining a steady focus on meeting their overall long-term enrollment goals.

    Staying Ahead in a Dynamic Environment

    Continuous refinement isn’t just about meeting immediate needs—it’s about preparing for the future. Institutions that embrace adaptability, leverage data strategically, and invest in both technology and expertise are better positioned to succeed in today’s competitive higher education market.

    Whether it’s managing the challenges of staff turnover, responding to external pressures, aligning all your enrollment tools at hand, or identifying the most effective ways to engage prospective students, institutions must prioritize flexibility and innovation.

    With Liaison’s advanced tools and expert partnership, institutions can confidently navigate the complexities of data-driven enrollment management and set the stage for sustained success. Contact us today to get started.

    About the Author

    Craig Cornell is the Vice President for Enrollment Strategy at Liaison. In that capacity, he oversees a team of enrollment strategists and brings best practices, consultation, and data trends to campuses across the country in all things enrollment management. Craig also serves as the dedicated resource to NASH (National Association of Higher Education Systems) and works closely with the higher education system that Liaison supports. Before joining Liaison in 2023, Craig served for over 30 years in multiple higher education executive enrollment management positions. During his tenure, the campuses he served often received national recognition for enrollment growth, effective financial aid leveraging, marketing enhancements, and innovative enrollment strategies.

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  • Study Reveals Key Factors Driving Student College Choice in 2025

    Study Reveals Key Factors Driving Student College Choice in 2025

    A comprehensive new study by education research firm EAB has identified the most influential factors shaping how students choose colleges, with academic program variety, campus safety, and student organizations emerging as the top three drivers of student attraction.

    The research, analyzing data from U.S. four-year colleges, found that schools offering a wider range of majors see significantly higher student interest, with each additional program contributing to increased application and enrollment rates. Campus safety measures and the number of available student organizations were also found to be major factors in students’ decision-making process.

    “What’s particularly interesting is how these factors play out differently across institution types,” said Dr. Ryan Gardner-Cook, the project director. “For example, smaller schools gain more from incremental improvements in campus amenities and academic offerings compared to larger institutions.”

    The study also revealed that affordability remains a critical factor, especially for first-generation and low-income students. Schools with lower net prices and stronger financial aid packages showed notably higher attraction rates among these demographics.

    Environmental factors like climate and location also play a significant role. Schools in temperate climates and growing urban areas generally showed stronger appeal to prospective students. State-level political environments were found to increasingly influence student choice as well.

    The research identified nine distinct “institutional personas” ranging from “Accessible Education Anchors” to “Rigorous Academic Giants,” each with unique characteristics and challenges in attracting students. This classification system aims to help institutions better understand their competitive position and develop more effective recruitment strategies.

    For institutions looking to improve their student attraction, the study recommends focusing on controllable factors like admissions processes, student life offerings, and academic programs while finding ways to mitigate challenges related to location or cost.

    The findings come at a crucial time as higher education institutions face evolving student preferences and increasing competition for enrollment.

     

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  • Mercury in retrograde: How UT Dallas tried to roll back student press rights

    Mercury in retrograde: How UT Dallas tried to roll back student press rights

    At the University of Texas at Dallas, a new independent newspaper is bearing witness to an authoritarian streak undermining student rights on campus. Last week, The Retrograde published its first print edition — cementing its status as the successor to The Mercury, the historic student newspaper that administrators silenced last spring for expressing dissenting opinions. 

    The new paper’s name — a reference to the astrological phenomenon of “Mercury in retrograde” — also references student journalists’ perception that the university is “going in reverse” on important issues like free speech.

    “We are seeing the school backslide and we want to make sure that each step backwards is criticized and documented,” said Gregorio Olivares Gutierrez, former editor-in-chief of The Mercury and current editor of The Retrograde.

    Concerns about academic freedom on college campuses spurred an interest in journalism for Gutierrez, a UT Dallas sophomore studying political science and philosophy. In an interview with FIRE, Gutierrez explained that he joined The Mercury in October 2023, “mainly because I was hearing a lot of commotion around the removal of DEI from the classroom.” 

    Although Senate Bill 17 — which Texas passed in 2023 to ban DEI offices, training, and statements at public universities — included exceptions for teaching and research, headlines revealed in November 2024 that administrators were, in fact, subjecting teaching and research to “intense scrutiny” under the law.

    As Gutierrez tells it, he saw warning signs at the University of North Texas, UT Dallas’ closest neighbor in the statewide system, where administrators unilaterally removed references to concepts like diversity and critical race theory from course titles and syllabi. “Despite these being higher-ed concepts, you couldn’t even talk about them,” Gutierrez said. FIRE wrote a letter to North Texas on Dec. 6, 2024, urging administrators “to refrain from unlawfully ordering changes to faculty’s pedagogical material as part of UNT’s overreaching compliance with state law.”

    We are seeing the school backslide and we want to make sure that each step backwards is criticized and documented.

    At UT Dallas, Gutierrez describes the emergence of a similar climate, where faculty “are scared that what they’re going to say isn’t allowed or that it will get them in trouble,” or might be “a mark against them” in tenure review.

    Gutierrez says The Mercury was a watchdog not just at UT Dallas, but within the statewide system. 

    Retrograde editor Gregorio Olivares Gutierrez

    “Anytime [Governor] Greg Abbott wants to crack down on higher ed,” Gutierrez told FIRE, “he usually starts with UT Austin, and then the other presidents in the UT system will either . . . do the same themselves or . . . get the consequences thrown their way.” And these changes affect UT Dallas. As Gutierrez explains it, “if there’s something’s going on in one Texas school, it’s very likely that our administration is going to like what they see and try to incorporate that into our campus policy.”

    It was exactly this watchdog role that got Gutierrez and The Mercury into trouble. Last spring, after a police crackdown on First Amendment-protected protests at UT Austin, Gutierrez recalls asking, “If encampments form at UT Dallas, what will we do? How do we protect our student journalists if there are police there? Can we make sure that we’re not getting arrested while doing this important coverage?” 

    The Mercury’s journalists were not arrested by the state troopers that UT Dallas deployed to break up pro-Palestinian protests, but the newspaper’s relationship with the administration deteriorated after its coverage criticized the university for quashing peaceful protests. In the end, administrators forced Gutierrez out, firing him as editor-in-chief and then firing more staff when they went on strike in protest. To make it worse, administrators completed these terminations without following official policy on the removal of editors — denying due process to Gutierrez and his colleagues.

    It would have been very easy for us to just roll over and let the campus administration do whatever they wanted with the student newspaper. But that would be a failure on our part to do proper journalism. It would be a huge dereliction of our duty as student journalists.

    Over a thousand people signed The Mercury’s solidarity petition after Gutierrez was fired. Not only that, as Gutierrez recounted to FIRE, “The student government passed multiple resolutions denouncing the actions from campus administration and then supporting our new endeavors with The Retrograde, officially recognizing it as the student newspaper. And the faculty’s academic senate has also been in support of us. They passed a resolution, which was just like — We’ll support the student government’s decision.”

    For the student journalists behind The Mercury, the administration’s attempt to silence them marked the beginning of a new chapter for independent student expression. 

    Gutierrez told FIRE that The Retrograde is working to get 501(c)(3) status and is currently registered as a nonprofit in the state of Texas. This move would give the newspaper full control over its operations — unlike The Mercury, which was beholden to administrators and faculty on the university-sponsored Student Media Oversight Board. 

    Front page of the first issue of The Retrograde independent student newspaper at UT Dallas Jan 21 2025

    The first issue of The Retrograde independent student newspaper at UT Dallas published on Jan. 21, 2025.

    But this new era of editorial freedom has not come without challenges. Gutierrez told FIRE that although “we do what we want as student journalists and we don’t have to fear campus reprisal when it comes to our actions, the administration has been very insistent that they don’t want this structure to exist at all.” While The Retrograde is free from direct retaliation, the university has engaged in what Gutierrez calls a “subtle form of censorship” by directing inquiries to PR officials, ensuring that the official university response is the only one that gets heard.

    Administrators at UT Dallas have a lengthy history of suppressing transparency and keeping student voices under their control. During Gutierrez’s freshman year, he recalls a cat torturer being exposed in a front page article in The Mercury as an employee of the university. Although the investigation was thorough and newsworthy, Gutierrez says, “The university didn’t like that we were talking about it . . . They were like, oh, we’re dealing with this internally, so you don’t need to make it public.” And in the spring of 2020, when the paper covered a series of suicides on campus, administrators allegedly removed copies of the paper from campus kiosks.

    For Gutierrez, reporting on matters of public concern is often a question of safety. 

    “Students want to know that the people at the testing center [like the cat torturer] might not all be the safest individuals in that very specific circumstance,” he says, “and yet campus administrators don’t talk about stuff like that.” 

    Despite these challenges, Gutierrez believes student journalists have a sacred obligation to uphold the freedoms promised by the Constitution. “It would have been very easy for us to just roll over and let the campus administration do whatever they wanted with the student newspaper. But that would be a failure on our part to do proper journalism. It would be a huge dereliction of our duty as student journalists,” he added, “to allow this huge infringement upon the First Amendment to occur on campus.” 

    FIRE to University of Texas at Dallas: Stop censoring the student press

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    Join FIRE in demanding UT Dallas compensate journalists, protect student media from interference.


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    Gutierrez credits FIRE, the Student Press Law Center, and the Society of Professional Journalists for stepping in with support, resources, and advice. He encourages other student journalists to reach out to these groups if censorship comes their way. 

    “I think it’s really important for student journalists facing censorship to reach out to others, work together and fight back against the current regime of censorship that a lot of universities are so fond of,” he concluded.

    The Retrograde’s plans to hold UT Dallas administrators accountable are as ambitious as ever. After the May 1, 2024 police raid on a peaceful protest at UT Dallas, Gutierrez and his fellow journalists filed a public records request. 

    “Right now, we’re working through over 1,500 pages of emails that we’ve gotten from our FOIA request,” said Gutierrez, “and a lot of the information in there is damning.” 

    You can take action to remind President Richard Benson that UT Dallas is a public institution that must abide by the First Amendment and uphold freedom of the press, even when the administration disagrees with student reporting. As Gutierrez says, “I hope it will shame our university administrators into acting normally for once.”

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  • Student Debt by Ethnicity | HESA

    Student Debt by Ethnicity | HESA

    Hi all. Just a quick one today, this time on some data I recently got from StatsCan.

    We know a fair a bit about student debt in Canada, especially with respect to distribution by gender, type of institution, province, etc. (Chapter 6 of The State of Postsecondary Education in Canada is just chock full of this kind of data if you’re minded to take a deeper dive). But to my knowledge no one has ever pulled and published the data on debt by ethnicity, even though this data has been collected for quite some time through the National Graduates Survey (NGS). So I ordered the data, and here’s what I discovered.

    Figure 1 shows incidence of borrowing for the graduating class of 2020, combined for all graduates of universities and graduates, for the eight largest ethnicities covered by the NGS (and before anyone asks, “indigeneity” is not considered an ethnicity so anyone indicating an indigenous ethnicity is unfortunately excluded from this data… there’s more below on the challenges of getting additional data). And the picture it shows is…a bit complex.

    Figure 1: Incidence of Borrowing, College and University Graduates Combined, Class of 2020

    If you just look at the data on government loan programs (the orange bars), we see that only Arab students have borrowing rates in excess of 1 in 2. But for certain ethnicities, the borrowing rate is much lower. For Latin American and Chinese students, the borrowing rate is below 1 in 3, and among South Asian students the borrowing rate is barely 1 in 5. Evidence of big differences in attitudes towards borrowing!

    Except…well when you add in borrowing from private sources (e.g. from banks and family) so as to take a look at overall rates of borrowing incidence, the differences in borrowing rates are a lot narrower. Briefly, Asian and Latin American students borrow a lot more money from private sources (mainly family) than do Arab students, whites, and Blacks. These probably come with slightly easier repayment terms, but it’s hard to know for sure. An area almost certainly worthy of further research.

    There is a similarly nuanced picture when we look at median levels of indebtedness among graduates who had debt. This is shown below in Figure 2.

    Figure 2: Median Borrowing, College and University Graduates Combined, Class of 2020

    Now, there isn’t a huge amount of difference in exiting debt levels by ethnicity: the gap is only about $6,000 between the lowest total debt levels (Filipinos) and the highest (Chinese). But part of the problem here is that we can’t distinguish the reason for the various debt levels. Based on what we know about ethnic patterns of postsecondary education, we can probably guess that Filipino students have low debt levels not because they are especially wealthy and can afford to go to post-secondary without financial assistance. But rather because they are more likely to go to college and this spend less time, on average, in school paying fees and accumulating debt. Similarly, Chinese students don’t have the highest debt because they have low incomes; they have higher debt because they are the ethnic group the most likely to attend university and spend more time paying (higher) fees.

    (Could we get the data separately for universities and colleges to clear up the confound? Yes, we could. But it cost me $3K just to get this data. Drilling down a level adds costs, as would getting data based on indigenous identity, and this is a free email, and so for the moment what we have above will have to do. If anyone wants to pitch in a couple of grand to do more drilling-down, let me know and I would be happy to coordinate some data liberation).

    It is also possible to use NGS data to look at post-graduate income by debt. I obtained the data by in fairly large ranges (e.g. $0-20K, $20-60K, etc.), but it’s possible on the basis of that to estimate roughly what median incomes are (put it this way: the exact numbers are not exactly right, but the ordinal rank of income of the various ethnicities are probably accurate). My estimations of median 2023 income of 2020 graduates—which includes those graduates who are not in the labour market full-time, if you’re wondering why the numbers look a little low—are shown below in Figure 3.

    Figure 3: Estimate Median 2023 Income, College and University Graduates Combined, Class of 2020

    Are there differences in income here? Yes, but they aren’t huge. Most ethnic groups have median post-graduate incomes between $44 and $46,000. The two lowest-earning groups (Latin Americans and Filipinos) re both disproportionately enrolled in community colleges, which is part of what is going on in this data (if you want disaggregated data, see above).

    Now, the data from the previous graphs can be combined to look at debt-to-income ratios, both for students with debt, and all students (that is, including those that do not borrow). This is shown below in Figure 4.

    Figure 4: Estimated Median 2023 Debt-to-Income Ratios, College and University Graduates Combined, Class of 2020

    If you’re just dividing indebtedness by income (the blue bars), you get a picture that looks a lot like Figure 2 in debt, because differences in income are pretty small. But if you are looking at debt-to-income ratios across all students (including those that do not borrow) you get a very different picture because as we saw in Figure 1, there are some pretty significant differences in overall borrowing rates. So, for instance, Chinese students go from having the worst debt-to-income ratio on one measure to being middle of the pack on another because they have relatively low incidence of borrowing; similarly, students of Latin American origin go from being middle-of-the-pack to nearly the lowest debt-to-income ratios because they are a lot less likely to borrow than others. Black students end up having among the highest debt-to-income ratios not because they earn significantly less than other graduates, but because both the incidence and amount of their borrowing is relatively high.

    But I think the story to go with here is that while there are differences between ethnic groups in terms of borrowing, debt, and repayment ratios, and that it’s worth trying to do something to narrow them, the difference in these rates is not enormous. Overall, it appears that as a country we are achieving reasonably good things here, with the caveat that if this data were disaggregated by university/ college, the story might not be quite as promising.

    And so ends the first-ever analysis of student debt and repayment by ethnic background. Hope you found it moderately enlightening.

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  • Direct and Indirect Assessment Measures of Student Learning in Higher Education – Faculty Focus

    Direct and Indirect Assessment Measures of Student Learning in Higher Education – Faculty Focus

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  • Ventriloquising the student interest | Wonkhe

    Ventriloquising the student interest | Wonkhe

    Following the devastating review offered by the 2023 report of the Industry and Regulators Committee of the House of Lords, the Office for Students’ (OfS) proposed strategy makes a great play of being centred around “the student interest”.

    But while it recognises that students have diverse and changeable views about their interests, it is still significant that it characterises these as “the student interest” rather than “students’ interests”.

    The reason for doing this is that it makes it much more rhetorically powerful to claim you are doing something in relation to an interest that is definitive, rather than interests which are multivarious and shifting.

    And be clear, the OfS proposed strategy shows a huge appetite to intervene in higher education in the name of “the student interest”.

    Much talk, no sources

    In the draft, OfS boasts that it has done a great deal of work to renew its understanding of the student interest – polling students, holding focus groups, hosting engagement sessions and talking to their own student panel.

    But two things are particularly noticeable about this work. First, whilst a lot of other sources are referenced in their strategy consultation, this is one area where no evidence is provided.

    This means the OfS interpretation of the outcomes of this consultation cannot be interrogated in any way. Clearly OfS knows best how to interpret this interest and isn’t interested in collective conversations to explore its ambiguities and complexities.

    Second, none of this work involves open ended engagement with students and their representative organisations (who appear to have been excluded completely, or at least their involvement is not detailed). They are all forms of consultation in which OfS would have framed the terms and agenda of the discussions (non-decision-making power, as Steven Lukes would have it). It’s consultation – but within tightly defined limits of what can legitimately be said.

    This seems to explain the remarkable number of priorities in the strategy (freedom of speech, mental health, sexual harassment) that are said to be in the student interest but previously appeared in ministerial letters outlining the strategic priorities of the OfS.

    Get a job

    Perhaps most concerning is that the government/treasury logic that the only real reason for going to university is to get a well-paid job is now central to the student interest. Sometimes this is done more subtly by positioning it in the (never-)popular student language of “a return on investment”:

    …in return for their investment of time, money and hard work they [students] expect that education to continue to provide value into the longer-term, including in ways that they may not be able to anticipate while they study (p.12).

    At other times, we are left in no doubt that the primary function of higher education is to serve the economy:

    Our proposals…will support a higher education system equipped to cultivate the skills the country needs and increase employer confidence in the value of English higher education qualifications. High quality higher education will be accessible to more people, and students from all backgrounds will be better able to engage with and benefit from high quality higher education, supporting a more equal society which makes better use of untapped talent and latent potential. The supply of skilled graduates will support local and national economies alike, while the ‘public goods’ associated with high quality higher education will accrue to a wide range of individuals and communities. Public goods include economic growth, a more equal society and greater knowledge understanding (OfS 2024 p.30-31).

    So what we are left with is a proposed strategy that makes powerful claims to be grounded in the student interest – but which could have easily formed part of the last government’s response to the Augar review.

    Whose priorities?

    Through its consultation on its proposed strategy, OfS has presented the priorities of the previous government as if they are drawn straight from its engagement with students.

    We don’t yet know the higher education priorities of the current government, but given the proposed strategy was published under their watch it looks like we are moving in a depressingly familiar direction.

    It is worth reflecting on the profound injustice of this. Students are expected to pay back the cost of their higher education and now have the previous government’s priorities presented as their interest so that OfS can intervene in higher education.

    Yes, you have to pay – but the government and its friendly neighbourhood regulator are here to tell you why you want to pay! It seems that despite the excoriating criticism of the House of Lords Committee, OfS have not really learned how to engage with students or to reflect and reconcile their interests.

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  • Podcast: Funding, attendance, student hardship

    Podcast: Funding, attendance, student hardship

    This week on the podcast Minister of State for Skills Jacqui Smith helped launch a pamphlet on whether universities are “worth it” – and was notably cold on extra money. But does she mean outlay or eventual return to the Treasury?

    Plus there’s changes afoot in Scotland, UKVI is cracking down on attendance for international students and students are still feeling the pinch financially – is a return to maintenance grants a lost possibility?

    With Ben Vulliamy, Executive Director at the Association of Heads of University Administration, Dani Payne, Senior Researcher at the Social Market Foundation, Michael Salmon, News Editor at Wonkhe and presented by Jim Dickinson, Associate Editor at Wonkhe.

    Read more

    Jacqui Smith rules out (much) more money while her department assesses the impacts

    The Scottish government wants its own post-study work offer

    A new funding body landscape emerges in Scotland

    UKVI is tightening the rules on international student attendance

    Higher education should lift students out of poverty – not trap them within it

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