Tag: Student

  • Housing Program Increases Student Success in Calif.

    Housing Program Increases Student Success in Calif.

    An estimated 20 percent of college students experience housing insecurity and 14 percent experience homelessness, according to fall 2024 data from Trellis Strategies. Yet many colleges are ill-equipped to address student housing concerns, particularly institutions with nonresidential campuses or those that serve adult learners.

    The state of California created an initiative in 2020 to provide housing and short-term support to students who were experiencing housing insecurity while enrolled at one of the three public systems—the California State Universities, California Community Colleges or the University of California.

    A recently published analysis of the state’s College Focused Rapid Rehousing (CFRR) program identified promising practices and lessons learned from the pilot. The study—authored by the Center for Equitable Higher Education (CEHE) at California State University, Long Beach—found that students who participated were more likely to remain enrolled and graduate compared to their peers, and a majority had established stable housing one year later.

    The background: Passed in July 2019, Assembly Bill 74 allocated funding for college-focused rapid rehousing programs, which give students rental subsidies, moving assistance, wraparound supports, case management and emergency grants. The community college system received $9 million, CSU $6.5 million and UC institutions $3.5 million to invest in long- and short-term initiatives, depending on each system’s unique student needs.

    According to 2023 data included in the report, over half of CSU students and 65 percent of CCC’s who receive financial aid experience housing insecurity. One-quarter of CCC students and 11 percent of CSU students experienced homelessness during the 2022–23 academic year.

    The CEHE study evaluated the program over three years at eight CSU campuses and two community colleges. In total, 639 students participated in CFRR across the 10 institutions, and 3,949 received short-term assistance—often in the form of an emergency grant—from spring 2020 to spring 2024. Approximately 540 students fell into both categories, receiving short-term support before enrolling in CFRR.

    Some historically underserved populations were more likely to participate in CFRR: Black students and former foster youth were heavily overrepresented relative to the general population, and first-generation, transfer and returning students were also overrepresented to a smaller degree.

    Addressing housing insecurity: The program was successful in its goal of mitigating homelessness for enrolled students. After engaging with CFRR, participants experienced substantial housing stability, with an average of nine consecutive months of housing.

    In addition, a majority of students who left the program graduated (27 percent) or reached permanent housing (27 percent), while 15 percent failed to meet academic requirements, which is a common barrier to sustaining housing assistance.

    The greatest share of students (37 percent) were placed in stable housing in less than six months, though one-third took over 12 months to get housing from a community partner. The breakdown highlights the challenges in placing students in viable housing options, according to the report. However, two-thirds of surveyed students (n=181) said they believe they had been housed relatively quickly.

    One year after exiting the program, a majority of participants indicated that they were residing in an apartment or home that they directly leased or owned. Eighteen percent lived with a family member.

    Students credited the program with supporting their long-term success; 71 percent of survey respondents agreed or strongly agreed that their current housing situation was better because of the assistance they received.

    However, many still struggled with financial insecurity. Sixty-two percent said it was difficult to pay increased rent in the first year after exiting the program, and 25 percent underpaid or missed at least one rent payment during this period. Three in 10 said they had to move more than twice due to financial difficulties, and one-quarter of program graduates reported at least one episode of homelessness.

    Impacting student success: In addition to meeting students’ basic needs, the program had a demonstrated effect on persistence and attainment rates.

    Participants were more likely to remain enrolled or graduate (56 percent) compared to students receiving short-term housing assistance (47 percent). At CSU, CFRR students graduated within four years at higher rates than the broader CSU population (43 percent versus 35.5 percent), as well.

    Data also pointed to the impact housing crises can have on students’ academic performance, with housing-insecure students reporting their lowest GPA the semester they engaged in support interventions and the semester following.

    A graph showing the average GPA of CFRR participants compared to their peers who received short-term assistance from their institution.

    Twelve months after receiving assistance, CFRR students were significantly less likely to stop out of school compared to their peers who received just a short-term housing subsidy. Survey data showed students were more likely to engage in school activities, but a majority (70 percent) still held jobs to pay for college, working an average of 25 hours per week. Eighty percent of CFRR participants said they had difficulty balancing school and life responsibilities.

    Program participants were also more likely to be employed six months after entering housing (70 percent) versus three months before entering the program (56 percent).

    Housing insecurity can damage students’ mental health and in turn affect their persistence in higher education. At intake into CFRR, 76 percent of participants said they felt lonely, but that number dropped to 63 percent in follow-up surveys. Just under half of housing-insecure students experienced serious psychological distress at intake, while closer to one-third indicated distress at follow-up. These numbers remain elevated compared to the total student population at CSU, where 20 percent experienced serious psychological distress.

    The program also increased students’ emotional and mental resilience. Students rated their ability to handle personal problems higher after securing housing as well, from 33 percent to 52 percent during follow-up.

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  • Purdue Cuts Off Student Paper Citing Institutional Neutrality

    Purdue Cuts Off Student Paper Citing Institutional Neutrality

    Purdue University has ended a long-standing partnership with its independent student newspaper, The Purdue Exponent, and will no longer distribute papers, give student journalists free parking passes or allow them to use the word “Purdue” for commercial purposes.

    The Purdue Student Publishing Foundation board (PSPF), the nonprofit group that oversees The Exponent—the largest collegiate newspaper in Indiana—said the changes came without warning.

    On May 30, PSPF received an email from Purdue’s Office of Legal Counsel notifying the group that their contract had expired more than a decade ago and the university would not participate in newspaper distribution or give the students exclusive access to newspaper racks on campus.

    In addition, the message said, the university will not enter into a new contract for facility use with the paper to remain consistent with the administration’s stated policy on institutional neutrality.

    According to a statement from the university, it is not consistent “with principles of freedom of expression, institutional neutrality and fairness to provide the services and accommodations described in the letter to one media organization but not others.”

    The Exponent is the only student newspaper, though Purdue also has two student news channels, FastTrack News and BoilerTV.

    Legal counsel also asked The Exponent to keep “Purdue” off the masthead and out of the paper’s URL because “The Foundation should not associate its own speech with the University.” PSPF says it has a trademark on “The Purdue Exponent” until 2029.

    PSPF and Purdue have held distribution agreements since 1975, in which Exponent staff would drop papers off at various locations across campus and staff would then place them on newspaper racks.

    In 2014, the Exponent delivered the university a new contract to renew the agreement for the next five years, according to paper staff. The contract was never signed, but the terms of the agreement continued until Monday, June 2.

    Now, The Exponent is permitted to distribute papers themselves and have nonexclusive access to newspaper stands on campus, according to the university; students said they don’t have early access to many of the buildings the way staff do.

    “Purdue’s moves are unacceptable and represent not only a distortion of trademark law but a betrayal of the university’s First Amendment obligations to uphold free expression,” Dominic Coletti, a student press program officer for the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression, told The Exponent. “Breaking long-standing practice to hinder student journalism is not a sign of institutional neutrality; it is a sign of institutional cowardice.”



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  • Trump Proclamations Escalate International Student Attacks

    Trump Proclamations Escalate International Student Attacks

    President Trump issued two directives targeting international students just hours apart on Wednesday night. One is a ban on entering the U.S. for citizens from 12 countries and heightened visa restrictions for those from another seven. The other bans all international students, researchers and other “exchange visitors” from Harvard University.

    The orders represent another escalation of the Trump administration’s simultaneous, and sometimes overlapping, campaigns to both punish Harvard and curtail the number of foreign students studying in the U.S.

    Chris Glass, a professor of higher education at Boston College and a member of the college’s Center for International Education, said the combination of the travel ban and the Harvard order are part of the administration’s “flood the zone” strategy for its higher education agenda. He added that the timing of the dual orders, following on the heels of a “seemingly indefinite” pause on student visa interviews and a promise to “aggressively revoke” Chinese students’ visas, seems intended to cause the most chaos possible.

    “The timing couldn’t be worse … this is when 70 percent of international students are getting or renewing their visas,” he said. “It injects catastrophic uncertainty, and the uncertainty is the strategy from my perspective.”

    On Thursday evening, Harvard filed a legal challenge to the proclamation targeting the university and asked a judge to issue a temporary restraining order against the administration. Judge Allison Burroughs from the District of Massachusetts quickly granted that request and extended the current restraining order issued last month. She set a hearing for June 16.

    2017 Again

    The last time Trump instituted a travel ban, in his first term, it threw colleges into chaos and left students and researchers stranded for months in the middle of winter break, sending colleges scrambling to find ways to bring them back. Higher ed has been bracing for a repeat of that travel ban since Trump was elected in November; many institutions told their international students to return to campus before the inauguration to avoid the same fate.

    The new ban is not as drastic as many predicted; when the White House initially proposed another travel ban in March, officials rolled out a list of 43 potential target countries. But it is more expansive than the 2017 ban—it affects 19 countries instead of eight—and, combined with the administration’s barrage of attacks on international students over the past three months, could be even more damaging to international enrollment.

    The full ban applies to Afghanistan, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Eritrea, Equatorial Guinea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Myanmar, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen—largely Middle Eastern and African countries with substantial Muslim populations. Trump also restricted visas from Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan and Venezuela.

    The travel ban doesn’t immediately affect students currently in the U.S. or who have already been approved for visas. But with many admitted international students still languishing in a visa process that the State Department halted two weeks ago, it will likely prevent thousands of students from attending in the fall and upend institutions’ projected enrollments.

    The countries on the list send a relatively small number of students to U.S. colleges. Of the affected countries, Iran has by far the most students studying in the U.S. It is the 15th most common origin country for international students, with 12,430 studying at American colleges and universities as of fall 2024, according to the latest report from the Institute for International Education.

    Still, the order is likely to compound the uncertainty and fear that has grown among international student populations, leading to signs of a large decline in student visa applications. Glass’s research, along with more recent reports, shows a double-digit decline in student visas from March 2024 to this March alone; the latest moves could double that, he said.

    “[The] COVID [pandemic] was a disruption of 15 percent,” he said. “This looks like it could be more significant than COVID, if the pause is extended and the uncertainty continues.”

    In his proclamation announcing the travel ban, Trump wrote that the targeted countries had “deficient” vetting and screening processes for visa applicants, or had “taken advantage of the United States in their exploitation of our visa system and their historic failure to accept back their removable nationals.”

    Sarah Spreitzer, vice president and chief of staff for government relations at the American Council on Education, said the rationale outlined in the travel ban—that students pose a unique national security threat and have been overstaying their visas—doesn’t align with reality.

    “If this is for national security concerns, our students are some of the most vetted visas out there,” she said. “And I don’t know if our students actually overstay their visas very often.”

    Fanta Aw, the president of NAFSA, an association of international educators, echoed Spreitzer and said that international students are already “among the most tracked individuals entering the United States.”

    “Actions such as halting student visa issuance and implementing nationality-based travel bans do not enhance national security,” she wrote in an email. “Instead, they weaken it—undermining our economy, diminishing our global competitiveness and eroding our country’s ability to effectively engage with the global population.”

    The 2017 travel ban was amended twice after being challenged in the courts and eventually exempted nonimmigrant visas, including student and exchange visas. Spreitzer said the administration’s outsize focus on student visa holders over the last few months makes that outcome less likely, but only time—and the courts—will tell.

    Havoc at Harvard

    The travel ban came on the heels of another White House proclamation Wednesday night, this one banning foreign students and scholars from attending Harvard.

    Trump restricted visa applicants from entering the country “solely or principally to participate in a course of study at Harvard University or in an exchange visitor program hosted by Harvard,” claiming that allowing foreign students on campus would be “detrimental to the interests of the United States because, in my judgment, Harvard’s conduct has rendered it an unsuitable destination for foreign students and researchers.”

    A Harvard spokesperson wrote that the proclamation is “another illegal retaliatory step taken by the administration in violation of Harvard’s first amendment rights” and that the university “will continue to protect its international students.”

    The proclamation is the latest jab in a weeks-long fight over international students on Harvard’s campus. Last month the Trump administration attempted to revoke Harvard’s Student Exchange and Visitor Program certification, which would have banned the university from enrolling international students altogether, affecting not just visa applicants but also foreign students and researchers currently on campus. Harvard challenged the effort in court, and a judge swiftly granted the university an injunction; on Monday, the Trump administration lost its appeal to overturn that decision.

    Harvard amended that lawsuit to include a challenge to the newest proclamation, calling it “an unlawful evasion of the Court’s order.”

    “When the Court enjoined the Secretary [of State’s] efforts to revoke Harvard’s certifications and force its students to transfer or depart the country, the President sought to achieve the same result by refusing to allow Harvard students to enter in the first place,” the amended suit reads.

    Unlike the SEVP decertification attempt, Trump’s executive proclamation doesn’t immediately affect international students currently enrolled at Harvard, only those who have yet to secure visas—though it does instruct the State Department to determine whether current students “should have their visas revoked.”

    The proclamation runs through a gamut of justifications for its international student ban. Trump cites data on increasing campus crime rates in the interest of student safety, alleges discrimination in the admissions process that he claims foreign students exacerbate and points to academic partnerships and financial contributions from countries like China that he says endanger U.S. national security interests.

    Notably, Trump also says Harvard has failed to cooperate with the administration’s demands for student misconduct records; the university has provided data on “only three students,” which Trump wrote was evidence that “it either is not fully reporting its disciplinary records for foreign students or is not seriously policing its foreign students.”

    Glass said the move is almost certainly an attempt to work around the court injunction using executive powers rather than the visa bureaucracy. And making the issue about constitutional authority in the national security realm—rather than whether the proper SEVP decertification process was followed—could change the legal calculus in court.

    “That’s what’s going to set a precedent for generations,” Glass said. “Will the precedent of autonomy and academic freedom at Harvard win in the courts? Or will the precedent of national security powers for the government win the day?”

    (This story has been updated to correct the list of banned countries to include Republic of the Congo.)

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  • TOMORROW 7 PM ET—join our emergency organizing call! (Brandon Herrera, Student Borrower Protection Center)

    TOMORROW 7 PM ET—join our emergency organizing call! (Brandon Herrera, Student Borrower Protection Center)

    This bill threatens to gut $350 BILLION in critical education programs to deliver $4.5 TRILLION in tax cuts to billionaires. House Republicans’ plan to slash the Pell Grant and other financial aid programs and eliminate basic protections for students—this will only make college more expensive and force millions of working families with student debt further into the red.

    So far, we have nearly 1,000 (!) RSVPs from all over the country planning to take part in this call. We will hear from policymakers, movement leaders, and affected students and borrowers on how this bill will harm our communities and how you can get more involved to protect students and working families—NOT billionaires.

    You won’t want to miss this—make sure to RSVP below and clear your calendar for TOMORROW at 7PM ET.

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  • Week in review: Trump administration targets Chinese student visas

    Week in review: Trump administration targets Chinese student visas

    Most clicked-on story from last week: 

    House Republicans passed — by one vote — a massive spending bill backed by President Donald Trump with heavy implications for higher education. Among other proposals, it would raise and expand the endowment tax, introduce a risk-sharing program that would put colleges on the hook for unpaid student debt, nix subsidized loans and narrow eligibility for Pell Grants. Many expect the Senate to make changes to the bill.

    Number of the week

     

    7

    That’s how many regional branch campuses Pennsylvania State University is set to close after a 25-8 vote by its trustee board. The plan will pare down the university’s commonwealth campuses to 13 to cope with demographic declines and budget pressure. Detractors said the decision was made too hastily, ignored some campuses’ recent progress and could hurt the state’s rural areas.

    Trump administration updates:

    • The Trump administration aims to “aggressively revoke visas for Chinese students” while ramping up scrutiny and changing criteria for student visa applications from China and Hong Kong, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Wednesday. With nearly 278,000 students from China studying in the U.S. during the 2023-24 academic year, the move could have a steep impact on U.S. colleges.
    • Sixteen states sued the National Science Foundation over the agency’s 15% cap on indirect research costs and its mass termination of grants related to diversity, equity and other topics. The states’ colleges “will not be able to maintain essential research infrastructure and will be forced to significantly scale back or halt research, abandon numerous projects, and lay off staff,” plaintiffs said in their complaint. 
    • The Trump administration plans to cut Harvard University’s remaining federal contracts, amounting to about $100 million. An official with the U.S. General Services Administration cited what he alleged was “Harvard’s lack of commitment to nondiscrimination and our national values and priorities.” The salvo is the latest in the federal government’s escalating battle with the Ivy League institution. 

    Texas legislators look to tighten control of colleges:

    • The Texas House approved a bill that would give the state’s regents — who are appointed by the governor — the power to recommend required courses at public colleges and to reject courses deemed too biased or ideological. Regents would also gain approval authority over the hiring of administrators. 
    • Another bill approved by the House would limit where and how students can protest on campuses. The Texas House and Senate are working to resolve their differences over the bill, according to The Texas Tribune. 

    Quote of the week:

    “There’s a bit of anxiousness among accreditors and institutions and state legislators because of the uncertainty. Is it that they are intentionally being vague or general until they can work out all of the nuances of the policies that they want to implement? I can tell you, less is not more in this situation.”

    That’s Cynthia Jackson Hammond, president of the Council for Higher Education Accreditation, on the effects of Trump’s executive order on college accreditation.

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  • Trump cuts could expose student data to cyber threats

    Trump cuts could expose student data to cyber threats

    When hackers hit a school district, they can expose Social Security numbers, home addresses, and even disability and disciplinary records. Now, cybersecurity advocates warn that the Trump administration’s budget and personnel cuts, along with rule changes, are stripping away key defenses that schools need.

    “Cyberattacks on schools are escalating and just when we need federal support the most, it’s being pulled away,” said Keith Krueger, chief executive officer of the Consortium for School Networking, an association of technology officials in K-12 schools. 

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

    The stakes are high. Schools are a top target in ransomware attacks, and cyber criminals have sometimes succeeded in shutting down whole school districts. The largest such incident occurred in December, when hackers stole personal student and teacher data from PowerSchool, a company that runs student information systems and stores report cards. The theft included data from more than 60 million students and almost 10 million teachers. PowerSchool paid an undisclosed ransom, but the criminals didn’t stop. Now, in a second round of extortion, the same cyber criminals are demanding ransoms from school districts.  

    The federal government has been stepping up efforts to help schools, particularly since a 2022 cyberattack on the Los Angeles Unified School District, the nation’s second-largest. Now this urgently needed assistance is under threat. 

    Warning service

    Of chief concern is a cybersecurity service known as MS-ISAC, which stands for Multi-State Information Sharing and Analysis Center. It warns more than 5,700 schools around the country that have signed up for the service about malware and other threats and recommends security patches. This technical service is free to schools, but is funded by an annual congressional appropriation of $27 million through the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), an agency within the Department of Homeland Security.

    On March 6, the Trump administration announced a $10 million funding cut as part of broader budget and staffing cuts throughout CISA. That was ultimately negotiated down to $8.3 million, but the service still lost more than half of its remaining $15.7 budget for the year. The non-profit organization that runs it, the Center for Internet Services, is digging into its reserves to keep it operating. But those funds are expected to run out in the coming weeks, and it is unclear how the service will continue operating without charging user fees to schools. 

    “Many districts don’t have the budget or resources to do this themselves, so not having access to the no cost services we offer is a big issue,” said Kelly Lynch Wyland, a spokeswoman for the Center for Internet Services.  

    Sharing threat information

    Another concern is the effective disbanding of the Government Coordinating Council, which helps schools address ransomware attacks and other threats through policy advice, including how to respond to ransom requests, whom to inform when an attack happens and good practices for preventing attacks. This coordinating council was formed only a year ago by the Department of Education and CISA. It brings together 13 nonprofit school organizations representing superintendents, state education leaders, technology officers and others. The council met frequently after the PowerSchool data breach to share information. 

    Now, amid the second round of extortions, school leaders have not been able to meet because of a change in rules governing open meetings. The group was originally exempt from meeting publicly because it was discussing critical infrastructure threats. But the Department of Homeland Security, under the Trump administration, reinstated open meeting rules for certain advisory committees, including this one. That makes it difficult to speak frankly about efforts to thwart criminal activity.

    Non-governmental organizations are working to resurrect the council, but it would be in a diminished form without government participation.

    “The FBI really comes in when there’s been an incident to find out who did it, and they have advice on whether you should pay or not pay your ransom,” said Krueger of the school network consortium. 

    A federal role

    A third concern is the elimination in March of the education Department’s Office of Educational Technology. This seven-person office dealt with education technology policies — including cybersecurity. It issued cybersecurity guidance to schools and held webinars and meetings to explain how schools could improve and shore up their defenses. It also ran a biweekly meeting to talk about K-12 cybersecurity across the Education Department, including offices that serve students with disabilities and English learners. 

    Eliminating this office has hampered efforts to decide which security controls, such as encryption or multi-factor authentication, should be in educational software and student information systems. 

    Many educators worry that without this federal coordination, student privacy is at risk. “My biggest concern is all the data that’s up in the cloud,” said Steve Smith, the founder of the Student Data Privacy Consortium and the former chief information officer for Cambridge Public Schools in Massachusetts. “Probably 80 to 90 percent of student data isn’t on school-district controlled services. It’s being shared with ed tech providers and hosted on their information systems.”

    Security controls

    “How do we ensure that those third-party providers are providing adequate security against breaches and cyber attacks?” said Smith. “The office of ed tech was trying to bring people together to move toward an agreed upon national standard. They weren’t going to mandate a data standard, but there were efforts to bring people together and start having conversations about the expected minimum controls.”

    That federal effort ended, Smith said, with the new administration. But his consortium is still working on it. 

    In an era when policymakers are seeking to decrease the federal government’s involvement in education, arguing for a centralized, federal role may not be popular. But there’s long been a federal role for student data privacy, including making sure that school employees don’t mishandle and accidentally expose students’ personal information. The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, commonly known as FERPA, protects student data. The Education Department continues to provide technical assistance to schools to comply with this law. Advocates for school cybersecurity say that the same assistance is needed to help schools prevent and defend against cyber crimes.

    “We don’t expect every town to stand up their own army to protect themselves against China or Russia,” said Michael Klein, senior director for preparedness and response at the Institute for Security and Technology, a nonpartisan think tank. Klein was a senior advisor for cybersecurity in the Education Department during the previous administration. “In the same way, I don’t think we should expect every school district to stand up their own cyber-defense army to protect themselves against ransomware attacks from major criminal groups.” 

    And it’s not financially practical. According to the school network consortium only a third of school districts have a full-time employee or the equivalent dedicated to cybersecurity. 

    Budget storms ahead

    Some federal programs to help schools with cybersecurity are still running. The Federal Communications Commission launched a $200 million pilot program to support cybersecurity efforts by schools and libraries. FEMA funds cybersecurity for state and local governments, which includes public schools. Through these funds, schools can obtain phishing training and malware detection. But with budget battles ahead, many educators fear these programs could also be cut. 

    Perhaps the biggest risk is the end to the entire E-Rate program that helps schools pay for the internet access. The Supreme Court is slated to decide this term on whether the funding structure is an unconstitutional tax.

    “If that money goes away, they’re going to have to pull money from somewhere,” said Smith of the Student Data Privacy Consortium. “They’re going to try to preserve teaching and learning, as they should.  Cybersecurity budgets are things that are probably more likely to get cut.

    “It’s taken a long time to get to the point where we see privacy and cybersecurity as critical pieces,” Smith said. “I would hate for us to go back a few years and not be giving them the attention they should.”

    Contact staff writer Jill Barshay at 212-678-3595, jillbarshay.35 on Signal, or barshay@hechingerreport.org.

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

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

    Join us today.

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  • Supreme Court rejects case over ‘Two genders’ shirt ban, threatening student speech across New England

    Supreme Court rejects case over ‘Two genders’ shirt ban, threatening student speech across New England

    The Supreme Court just declined to review a case that threatens freedom of speech for over a million students across New England. In thousands of public schools, administrators now have power to silence student speech they dislike.

    Last year, the First Circuit Court of Appeals significantly weakened student speech rights in L.M. v. Town of Middleborough. The case involved a Massachusetts middle schooler named Liam Morrison who was banned from class for wearing a shirt that read, “There are only two genders.” When he taped “CENSORED” over the original message, the school banned that, too.

    Morrison’s school encourages students to express the view that there are many genders, but when he offered a contrary view — the school silenced him. However, if schools want to teach gender identity to seventh graders, the law says they must tolerate dissenting views on the issue. As the Supreme Court famously held in Police Dept. of Chicago v. Mosley, “above all else, the First Amendment means that government has no power to restrict expression because of its message, its ideas, its subject matter, or its content.”

    The prohibition on viewpoint-based censorship is a cornerstone of our First Amendment. Without it, the concept of free speech loses much of its meaning. Yet when Morrison and his parents, represented by the Alliance Defending Freedom, brought suit against the school and the town of Middleborough for violating his freedom of speech, the First Circuit disregarded settled First Amendment law to uphold the school’s censorship. Specifically, the First Circuit misapplied the Supreme Court’s landmark 1969 student speech case Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School Dist., which established the baseline rule that students do not “shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.”

    According to Tinker, schools cannot censor student speech absent evidence that doing so is “necessary” to avoid “material and substantial interference with schoolwork or discipline” or “invasion of the rights of others.” A few years ago, the Court reaffirmed the Tinker standard and emphasized that it’s a “demanding” one.

    But the First Circuit’s recent decision lowers that bar, replacing Tinker’s “substantial interference” test with a far more permissive one. Now, in thousands of public schools across Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Maine, and Puerto Rico, student speech that is “reasonably interpreted” to “demean personal characteristics” and thus “reasonably forecasted to poison the educational atmosphere” can be censored even if it doesn’t target any particular student. 

    That isn’t just a bad ruling. It’s a dangerous one.

    It distorts Tinker’s long-established standard and gives school administrators enormous power to silence unpopular student opinions. In doing so, it elevates disagreement to the level of “disruption” — and permits those experiencing the “discomfort and unpleasantness that always accompany an unpopular viewpoint” to silence dissenters in ways that directly contradict Tinker.

    The Supreme Court could have reviewed the First Circuit’s problematic decision and put it to rest. Instead, it looked the other way, leaving the lower court’s decision to remain on the books.

    That is quite a blow to student speech rights. As the Supreme Court recently said in Mahanoy Area School District v. B.L., “America’s public schools are the nurseries of democracy.” 

    Unfortunately, the First Circuit’s decision sends a very different message — and the Supreme Court has failed to set the record straight. 

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  • Solving our literacy crisis starts in the lecture hall

    Solving our literacy crisis starts in the lecture hall

    Key points:

    The recent NAEP scores have confirmed a sobering truth: Our schools remain in the grips of a literacy crisis. Across the country, too many children are struggling to read, and too many teachers are struggling to help them. But why? And how do we fix it?

    There are decades of research involving thousands of students and educators to support a structured literacy approach to teaching literacy. Teacher preparation programs and school districts across the nation have been slow to fully embrace this research base, known as the science of reading. Since 2017, consistent media attention focused on the literacy crisis has created a groundswell of support for learning about the science of reading. Despite this groundswell, too many educators are still entering classrooms without the skills and knowledge they need to teach reading.

    While there is steady progress in teacher preparation programs to move toward the science of reading-aligned practices, the National Council on Teacher Quality’s latest report on the status of teacher preparation programs for teaching reading (2023) still shows that only 28 percent of programs adequately address all five components of reading instruction. Furthermore, according to the report, up to 40 percent of programs still teach multiple practices that run counter to reading research and ultimately impede student learning, such as running records, guided reading, leveled texts, the three cueing systems, etc. This data shows that there is still much work to be done to support the education of the teacher educators responsible for training pre-service teachers.

    The disconnect between theory and practice

    When it comes to literacy instruction, this problem is especially glaring. Teachers spend years learning about teaching methods, reading theories, and child development. They’re often trained in methods that emphasize comprehension and context-based guessing. However, these methods aren’t enough to help students develop the core skills they need to become proficient readers. Phonics–teaching students how to decode words–is a critical part of reading instruction, but it’s often left out of traditional teacher prep programs.

    One primary reason this disconnect happens is that many teacher prep programs still rely on outdated methods. These approaches prioritize reading comprehension strategies that focus on meaning and context, but they don’t teach the foundational skills, like phonics, essential for developing fluent readers.

    Another reason is that teacher prep programs often lag when it comes to incorporating new research on reading. While the science of reading–a body of evidence built from decades of research and studies involving thousands of students and educators about how humans learn to read and the instructional practices that support learning to read–has been gaining deserved traction, it’s not always reflected in the teacher preparation programs many educators go through. As a result, teachers enter classrooms without the knowledge, skills, and up-to-date methods they need to teach reading effectively.

    A way forward: Structured literacy and continuous professional development

    For real progress, education systems must prioritize structured literacy, a research-backed approach to teaching reading that includes explicit, systematic instruction in phonics, decoding, fluency, and comprehension. This method is effective because it provides a clear, step-by-step process that teachers can follow consistently, ensuring that every single student gets the support they need to succeed.

    But simply teaching teachers about structured literacy is not enough. They also need the tools to implement these methods in their classrooms. The goal should be to create training programs that offer both the theoretical knowledge and the hands-on experience teachers need to make a lasting difference. Teachers should graduate from their prep programs not just with a degree but with a practical, actionable plan for teaching reading.

    And just as important, we can’t forget that teacher development doesn’t end once a teacher leaves their prep program. Just like doctors, teachers need to continue learning and growing throughout their careers. Ongoing professional development is critical to helping teachers stay current with the latest research and best practices in literacy instruction. Whether through in-person workshops, online courses, or coaching, teachers should have consistent, high-quality opportunities to grow and sharpen their skills.

    What do teacher educators need?

    In 2020, the American Federation of Teachers published an update to its seminal publication, Teaching Reading is Rocket Science. First published in 2000, this updated edition is a collaboration between the AFT and the Center on Development and Learning. Although some progress has been made over the past 20 years in teaching reading effectively, there are still too many students who have not become proficient readers.

    This report outlines in very specific ways what pre-service and in-service teachers need to know to teach reading effectively across four broad categories:

    1. Knowing the basics of reading psychology and development
    2. Understanding language structure for word recognition and language comprehension
    3. Applying best practices (based on validated research) in all components of reading
    4. Using validated, reliable, efficient assessments to inform classroom teaching

    There should be a fifth category that is directly related to each of the four areas listed above: the knowledge of how to address the specific oral language needs of multilingual learners and speakers of language varieties. Structured, spoken language practice is at the heart of addressing these needs.

    Moving forward: Reimagining teacher training

    Ultimately, fixing the literacy crisis means changing the way we think about teacher preparation and ongoing professional development. We need to create programs that not only teach the theory of reading instruction but also provide teachers with the practical skills they need to apply that knowledge effectively in the classroom. It’s not enough to just teach teachers about phonics and reading theory; they need to know how to teach it, too.

    Literacy instruction must be at the heart of every teacher’s training–whether they teach kindergarten or high school–and ongoing professional development should ensure that teachers have the support they need to continuously improve.

    It’s a big task, but with the right tools, knowledge, and support, we can bridge the gap between theory and practice and finally begin to solve a literacy crisis that has stubbornly endured for far too long.

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  • Why agentic AI matters now more than ever

    Why agentic AI matters now more than ever

    Key points:

    For years now, the promise of AI in education has centered around efficiency–grading faster, recommending better content, or predicting where a student might struggle.

    But at a moment when learners face disconnection, systems are strained, and expectations for personalization are growing, task automation feels…insufficient.

    What if we started thinking less about what AI can do and more about how it can relate?

    That’s where agentic AI comes in. These systems don’t just answer questions. They recognize emotion, learn from context, and respond in ways that feel more thoughtful than transactional. Less machine, more mentor.

    So, what’s the problem with what we have now?

    It’s not that existing AI tools are bad. They’re just incomplete.

    Here’s where traditional AI systems tend to fall short:

    • NLP fine-tuning
       Improves the form of communication but doesn’t understand intent or depth.
    • Feedback loops
       Built to correct errors, not guide growth.
    • Static knowledge bases
       Easy to search but often outdated or contextually off.
    • Ethics and accessibility policies
       Written down but rarely embedded in daily workflows.
    • Multilingual expansion
       Translates words, not nuance or meaning across cultures.

    These systems might help learners stay afloat. They don’t help them go deeper.

    What would a more intelligent system look like?

    It wouldn’t just deliver facts or correct mistakes. A truly intelligent learning system would:

    • Understand when a student is confused or disengaged
    • Ask guiding questions instead of giving quick answers
    • Retrieve current, relevant knowledge instead of relying on a static script
    • Honor a learner’s pace, background, and context
    • Operate with ethical boundaries and accessibility in mind–not as an add-on, but as a foundation

    In short, it would feel less like a tool and more like a companion. That may sound idealistic, but maybe idealism is what we need.

    The tools that might get us there

    There’s no shortage of frameworks being built right now–some for developers, others for educators and designers. They’re not perfect. But they’re good places to start.

    Framework Type Use
    LangChain Code Modular agent workflows, RAG pipelines
    Auto-GPT Code Task execution with memory and recursion
    CrewAI Code Multi-agent orchestration
    Spade Code Agent messaging and task scheduling
    Zapier + OpenAI No-code Automated workflows with language models
    Flowise AI No-code Visual builder for agent chains
    Power Automate AI Low-code AI in business process automation
    Bubble + OpenAI No-code Build custom web apps with LLMs

    These tools are modular, experimental, and still evolving. But they open a door to building systems that learn and adjust–without needing a PhD in AI to use them.

    A better system starts with a better architecture

    Here’s one way to think about an intelligent system’s structure:

    Learning experience layer

    • Where students interact, ask questions, get feedback
    • Ideally supports multilingual input, emotional cues, and accessible design

    Agentic AI core

    • The “thinking” layer that plans, remembers, retrieves, and reasons
    • Coordinates multiple agents (e.g., retrieval, planning, feedback, sentiment)

    Enterprise systems layer

    • Connects with existing infrastructure: SIS, LMS, content repositories, analytics systems

    This isn’t futuristic. It’s already possible to prototype parts of this model with today’s tools, especially in contained or pilot environments.

    So, what would it actually do for people?

    For students:

    • Offer guidance in moments of uncertainty
    • Help pace learning, not just accelerate it
    • Present relevant content, not just more content

    For teachers:

    • Offer insight into where learners are emotionally and cognitively
    • Surface patterns or blind spots without extra grading load

    For administrators:

    • Enable guardrails around AI behavior
    • Support personalization at scale without losing oversight

    None of this replaces people. It just gives them better support systems.

    Final thoughts: Less control panel, more compass

    There’s something timely about rethinking what we mean by intelligence in our learning systems.

    It’s not just about logic or retrieval speed. It’s about how systems make learners feel–and whether those systems help learners grow, question, and persist.

    Agentic AI is one way to design with those goals in mind. It’s not the only way. But it’s a start.

    And right now, a thoughtful start might be exactly what we need.

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  • Why the student experience has never mattered more – Campus Review

    Why the student experience has never mattered more – Campus Review

    It’s more important than ever to focus on student experience. The Albanese Government’s recent re-election has given higher education institutions a clearer idea of what’s ahead.

    With the Australian Tertiary Education Commission set to begin operations on 1 July 2025, we can expect further action on the recommendations laid out in the Australian Universities Accord.

    At the same time, the shifting geopolitical landscape presents Australia with an opportunity to become an even more attractive destination for international students. Ongoing debates around enrolment caps could influence this, but the potential is there.

    Meanwhile, the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) has once again raised the bar for digital expectations. Students now expect their university experience to match the ease and responsiveness of tech giants like Amazon or Meta.

    Together, these forces are putting pressure on universities to rise to the occasion and deliver better educational experiences.

    The Universities Accord is changing the landscape

    The Australian Universities Accord, released in 2024, outlines a vision for a more educated workforce with more accessible and flexible learning pathways. A key goal is for 80 per cent of the workforce to hold a tertiary qualification by 2050, up from around 60 per cent today.

    The Accord also calls for doubling the number of placements, reducing inequality in access to higher education, and addressing growing skill shortages. It encourages more regional hubs and deeper integration between VET and university providers.

    To achieve this, universities will need to create more flexible, hybrid learning environments that accommodate students from all walks of life. Whether a student is studying remotely or regionally, they’ll expect full access to resources, a sense of community, and seamless transitions across providers.

    This is where digital experience becomes critical. If university and VET learning are to be integrated, will students navigate one central dashboard or juggle 10 separate platforms?

    Improving the student experience is essential to achieving the Accord’s vision. Without a seamless, supportive and accessible student journey, the ambitious goals of expanding participation, reducing inequality and building a highly skilled workforce simply won’t be met.

    Delivering on the Accord’s goals will mean strengthening digital infrastructure and taking a holistic view of how students interact with services, from enquiry and enrolment to study and graduation.

    Student experience can be Australia’s global edge

    Student experience is also a powerful competitive advantage. International education is one of Australia’s largest exports. Recent discussions around student caps have created uncertainty, but a stable government may help clear the path.

    With rising tensions in countries like the US, Australia is well-positioned to attract more students, as long as it can compete. And student experience is a key part of that value proposition.

    From easy access to support services to the ability access resources from anywhere in the world, the small things make a big difference. Admin should be smooth. Communication should be seamless. The better the student experience, the higher Australia’s competitive advantage becomes.

    AI has changed the rules of engagement

    The pandemic fast-tracked digital adoption across universities and the AI boom is driving another major shift. Students are now interacting daily with AI-powered tools that offer personalised, intelligent, and immediate support. They’ll expect the same from their institution. Think AI chatbots for self-service, automated timetables, study recommendations, and more intuitive platforms.

    The question for institutions is what their student experience actually looks like right now, and how quickly they can evolve it. Keeping up with the modern market demands continuous adaptation.

    This is a critical moment to evaluate the entire student journey and make intentional improvements. Institutions have a choice: steer the ship with purpose or risk being swept off course by rapid change. A strong, student-centred experience is the compass that will keep them on track.

    Turning complexity into connection: where to focus next

    From admissions to graduation, there are countless ways to improve the student journey. But right now, many institutions are held back by legacy systems, under-resourcing, and tighter budgets.

    A bigger and more immediate challenge is the number of disconnected systems in use. When platforms don’t talk to each other, students feel the impact. You can have the best AI chatbot in the world, but if it’s buried across five different logins, the value is lost.

    The good news is, these problems aren’t new and there are technologies designed to solve them. Digital experience platforms (DXPs) act as a bridge between systems, bringing them together into one simple, seamless interface. Whether it’s a student portal, public-facing website, or alumni platform, DXPs let institutions improve the student-facing experience without having to rebuild their entire backend systems.

    That means you can start by improving how students interact with your institution – such as by creating a modern student portal that centralises resources and streamlines communication, then updating older systems over time.

    Once the right digital foundations are in place, you can unlock the power of your data, using insights to deliver personalised, real-time communication that meets students where they are.

    Right now, there’s a real opportunity for institutions to lead. The policy environment is shifting, AI is changing expectations, and students are demanding more flexible and human experiences. Institutions that can simplify the complexity and focus on what matters to students won’t just keep up, they’ll set the standard.

    Liferay’s education portal solutions are designed to meet the unique needs of your institution, from online student portals to alumni networks and research collaboration platforms. Download our exclusive e-book, which explores how three Australian institutions leveraged Digital Experience Platforms (DXPs) here.

    Do you have an idea for a story?
    Email rebecca.cox@news.com.au

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