Higher Ed in the Crosshairs [ The Aspen Institute ]

With Shavar Jeffries, David Leonhardt, Margaret Spellings, Michael Elliott, & Ted Mitchell

Policing higher education [ Bryan Alexander interviews Eve Darian-Smith ]

Eve Darian-Smith

Bryan Alexander

Record number of higher education students highlights global need for recognition of qualifications [ UNESCO ]

The flava:

The number of students enrolled in higher education worldwide reached a record 264 million, a surge of 25 million since 2020 and more than double the total in 2000, according to new UNESCO data.

This rapid expansion reflects a global broadening of higher education pathways, including online degrees, hybrid courses, and micro-credentials shift, complementing traditional models and reshaping how knowledge is delivered and assessed. Academic mobility is also on the rise, with 6.9 million students studying away from their home country, a number that has tripled since 2000. 

While global enrolment has surged — with women now outnumbering men in higher education globally (113 women per 100 men in 2023) — large disparities persist. Sub-Saharan Africa, for instance, has a gross enrolment ratio of just 9% compared to the global average of 43%. . . .  

The article:

https://www.unesco.org/en/articles/record-number-higher-education-students-highlights-global-need-recognition-qualifications

Behind the turmoil of federal attacks on colleges, some states are going after tenure [ The Hechinger Report ]

The flava:

The “gravy train.” That’s what a Hawai‘i state senator called the practice of awarding tenure to university research faculty when she proposed legislation stripping this long-standing form of job protection from them. 

The bill got little notice at the time. Now, obscured by the turmoil of the many other challenges to higher education since the start of Donald Trump’s second presidential term, tenure has come under siege in states across the country.

Never in the 110-year history of tenure in the United States have there been so many attempts to gut or reconfigure it, said Julie Reuben, a professor of the history of American education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. . . . 

The article:

https://hechingerreport.org/behind-the-turmoil-of-federal-attacks-on-colleges-some-states-are-going-after-tenure/

Teen paralyzed in pool dive finds new dream at SMU: "‘I never thought about college" [ CBS TEXAS ]

AI Agents Are Set To Transform Higher Education—Here’s How [ Forbes ]

The flava:

McKinsey’s Seizing the Agentic AI Advantage report notes that while 78% of companies have deployed generative AI tools, only a small fraction report meaningful impact. Most companies start with tools like Microsoft Copilot, ChatGPT, or Google Gemini. These are typically horizontal copilots—general-purpose tools for writing, summarizing, or brainstorming across many roles.

The issue is that many organizations stop there, using GenAI tools as assistants for individual productivity (such as helping an employee write emails or draft a document). These use cases often don’t change how work is structured, so the impact remains limited.

McKinsey contrasts this with agentic AI systems that are embedded into workflows. These systems take action, make decisions within guardrails, and solve problems in a domain-specific, goal-oriented way (like admissions, student advising, or academic research support). These vertical agents, when built with clear integration into business processes, are what lead to meaningful impact. . . . 

The article:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/avivalegatt/2025/06/16/ai-agents-are-set-to-transform-higher-education-heres-how/

Why Did Syracuse Offer $200,000 Deals to Teens Who Had Turned It Down? [ NYTimes ]

The flava:

By the time the usual May 1 college deposit deadline rolled around this year, David Berger’s daughter had already made up her mind: She would leave Alpharetta, Ga., and become a Penn State Nittany Lion.

But Syracuse University, which had also accepted her, wasn’t done with her yet. After having initially offered exactly zero merit aid, its staff began a poaching campaign.

A $20,000-per-year offer arrived on May 2. Then came a $10,000-per-year discount two days later. Weeks went by before Syracuse dangled an additional $20,000 per year.

“Spaces will be filled on a first-come, first-served basis,” that last email said.

All of this left the scores of families that received similar offers scratching their heads. “It’s almost like they’ve turned into used car salesmen,” said Mr. Berger, whose daughter is sticking with Penn State.

Syracuse appears to have played chicken with children and lost. Having lowballed their parents in March and April, the school presumably came up many heads short for its newest class. Once May rolled around, it had to offer eye-popping discounts to steal kids away from other schools.

The article:

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/14/your-money/syracuse-merit-aid.html

:-)

The recent history of AI in 32 otters [ Ethan Mollick ]

https://www.oneusefulthing.org/p/the-recent-history-of-ai-in-32-otters

Can we even imagine how the students will use A.I. tomorrow?

Are International Students Good for American Universities? [ David A. Bell ]

The flava:

This is the Trumpian viewpoint in a nutshell: The enrollment of foreign students is basically an elite scam. And the Trumpian solution, at least in Harvard’s case, is to shut things down as brutally as possible, regardless of the consequences for the students who cannot complete their degrees, the labs that need these students to conduct research and the university that is losing the tuition income.

But the fact that the Trump administration is handling the issue crudely doesn’t mean it’s not a real issue. Strikingly, the progressive historian Daniel Steinmetz-Jenkins and the conservative law professor Adrian Vermeule both suggested on X after Mr. Trump’s move against Harvard that perhaps international enrollments should not continue at the same level.

By some measures, the opening of American higher education to international students is an obvious, unqualified good. By others, it is much more problematic. . . . 

The article:

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/01/opinion/international-students-harvard-trump.html

The author:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_A._Bell