tag:theconversation.com,2011:/global/topics/us-universities-22045/articlesUS universities – The Conversation2023-12-14T10:44:07Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2197692023-12-14T10:44:07Z2023-12-14T10:44:07ZAmerican universities in the spotlight over reaction to Israel-Gaza war – podcast<p>Tensions have been running high at many universities around the world since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7 and the subsequent Israeli assault on Gaza. In the US, protests and solidarity events have been met with varied responses from university administrations. Some institutions are now <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/17/nyregion/universities-antisemitic-anti-muslim-investigation.html">facing federal investigation</a> over incidents of alleged antisemitism and Islamophobia. </p>
<p>There’s been political fallout too: in early December, the president of the University of Pennsylvania <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/09/us/university-of-pennsylvania-president-resigns.html">stood down</a> after coming under pressure following her answers to a hearing in Congress about antisemitism on campus. </p>
<p>In the first of two episodes exploring how the war is affecting life at universities, <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/the-conversation-weekly-98901">The Conversation Weekly</a> podcast hears about what’s been happening at one American public college campus. </p>
<iframe src="https://embed.acast.com/60087127b9687759d637bade/6579e3ef983e2b001673ff15" frameborder="0" width="100%" height="190px"></iframe>
<p></p>
<p><iframe id="tc-infographic-561" class="tc-infographic" height="100" src="https://cdn.theconversation.com/infographics/561/4fbbd099d631750693d02bac632430b71b37cd5f/site/index.html" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>David Mednicoff says his department at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, tends to have the students who are “the most directly involved in issues around the Middle East, from different perspectives.” Mednicoff is chair of the university’s Department of Judaic and Near Eastern Studies and an associate professor of Middle Eastern studies and public policy.</p>
<p>Speaking to <em>The Conversation Weekly</em> podcast about the reaction on campus to the Israel-Gaza war, he said he’s been working to find ways of bridging divides, including putting on events designed to provide background to the conflict. Mednicoff believes that students should be able to listen to perspectives that can challenge them, “sometimes even to the core of their identity”. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>It is reasonable for a Palestinian Arab to hear an Israeli-Jewish student share their sadness and fear in light of the October 7 massacres. It is reasonable for a pro-Israeli activist to appreciate that there’s a long history and even more important recent history of demeaning of Palestinian rights, particularly in the occupied territories.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Mednicoff says the campus branch of Students for Justice for Palestine has been “louder than pro-Israel folks in terms of campus political discourse”. Pro-Palestinian protests, including a sit-in at a university administrative building <a href="https://www.wbur.org/news/2023/10/27/umass-amherst-protests-arrests">where 57 people were arrested</a>, have called for a ceasefire in Gaza. In a separate incident, a student was <a href="https://www.bostonherald.com/2023/11/05/umass-amherst-student-arrested-after-allegedly-punching-jewish-student-spitting-on-israeli-flag-the-disturbing-reality-for-jewish-students-on-campus/">arrested and charged</a> after allegedly attacking a Jewish student on campus. </p>
<h2>Role of a university</h2>
<p>Universities have come under fire from those – both pro-Israeli and pro-Palestinian – who think their leadership should take a stronger stance during the Israel-Gaza conflict. But Mednicoff thinks it isn’t the role of a university to do that. “In general, I think that it is ill advised for universities to take political positions on global issues,” he said. And because of the current climate for higher education, particularly in the US, he thinks it’s also a political choice for universities to try and foster well-informed, open debate.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Universities, I think all over the world, but certainly in the United States are themselves under a good bit of attack, by outside groups who think that universities either should push a particular perspective or they shouldn’t be places where broad free speech is allowed if it goes against what they would conceive as particular guardrails.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>You can listen to the full interview with David Mednicoff on <a href="https://podfollow.com/the-conversation-weekly/view">The Conversation Weekly</a>, plus an interview with Naomi Schalit, senior editor for politics and democracy at The Conversation in the US. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://cdn.theconversation.com/static_files/files/3001/The_Conversation_Weekly_Israel-Gaza_war_on_campus_part_1_transcript.pdf?1704802484">transcript of this episode</a> is now available. </p>
<hr>
<p><em>This episode of The Conversation Weekly was written and produced by Gemma Ware, and Mend Mariwany, with assistance from Katie Flood. Sound design was by Eloise Stevens, and our theme music is by Neeta Sarl.</em></p>
<p><em>Newsclips in this episode from <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4m1QQ0_Zzvs&ab_channel=NBCNews">N</a><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0EXgqQkLiDg&ab_channel=NBCNews">B</a><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4m1QQ0_Zzvs">C</a> <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IiLJPkHFkYI">News</a> and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upWD8RX6LPk&t=27s&ab_channel=CBSEveningNews">CBS News</a>.</em></p>
<p><em>You can find us on X, formerly known as Twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/TC_Audio">@TC_Audio</a>, on Instagram at <a href="https://www.instagram.com/theconversationdotcom/">theconversationdotcom</a> or <a href="mailto:podcast@theconversation.com">via email</a>. You can also subscribe to The Conversation’s <a href="https://theconversation.com/newsletter">free daily email here</a>.</em></p>
<p><em>Listen to The Conversation Weekly via any of the apps listed above, download it directly via our <a href="https://feeds.acast.com/public/shows/60087127b9687759d637bade">RSS feed</a> or find out <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-to-listen-to-the-conversations-podcasts-154131">how else to listen here</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/219769/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Mednicoff does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The first of two episodes of The Conversation Weekly podcast exploring how the Israel-Gaza war is affecting life at universities.Gemma Ware, Editor and Co-Host, The Conversation Weekly Podcast, The ConversationLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2014562023-04-06T12:05:47Z2023-04-06T12:05:47ZStudent reporters fill crucial gap in state government coverage<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518585/original/file-20230330-1211-oqh3hz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=27%2C27%2C4578%2C3418&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Devon Sanders, a statehouse reporter and student at the Lousiana State University Manship School of Mass Communication, interviewed State Rep. Katrina Jackson in 2018.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Richard Watts</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The local news business is in crisis. The nation is currently losing <a href="https://localnewsinitiative.northwestern.edu/projects/state-of-local-news/">two community newspapers a week</a>, on average, and <a href="https://localnewsinitiative.northwestern.edu/projects/state-of-local-news/">70 million Americans live in news deserts</a>, communities with little or no local news coverage. In much of the remaining territory, all that’s left are decimated newsrooms and advertisement-heavy publications with little local news, sometimes called “ghost papers.”</p>
<p>The problem is even more acute when it comes to covering the nation’s statehouses. The <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/journalism/2022/04/05/total-number-of-u-s-statehouse-reporters-rises-but-fewer-are-on-the-beat-full-time/">total number of full-time statehouse reporters declined by 6%</a> from 2014 to 2022. Yet state legislatures handle key issues, including <a href="https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/tennessee/articles/2023-03-26/states-divisions-on-abortion-widen-after-roe-overturned">abortion rights</a>, <a href="https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/voting-laws-roundup-february-2023">voting rights</a> and <a href="https://www.chronicle.com/article/never-seen-anything-like-it-new-bill-would-write-desantiss-higher-ed-vision-into-law">educational curriculum standards</a>.</p>
<p>Where full-time staff reporters have disappeared, university-led statehouse reporting programs have stepped in, according to research from the nonprofit, nonpartisan Pew Research Center. More than <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/05/19/in-some-states-students-account-for-a-large-and-growing-share-of-statehouse-reporters/">10% of statehouse reporters are students</a>, and in some states they are a significant presence in the statehouse media corps.</p>
<iframe width="100%" height="400" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" src="https://agis.maps.arcgis.com/apps/Embed/index.html?webmap=371da4f5779f46b8b12a3fa478644857"></iframe>
<figure><figcaption><span class="caption">A map showing university-affiliated local news programs around the U.S., from the <a href="https://www.uvm.edu/ccn/case-studies">University of Vermont Center for Community News.</a></span></figcaption></figure>
<h2>Journalism boosts democracy</h2>
<p>An informed citizenry is vital to a thriving democracy. Researchers have found strong ties between the availability of local news and <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/journalism/2016/11/03/civic-engagement-strongly-tied-to-local-news-habits/">community engagement</a>, <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/journalism/2016/11/03/1-regular-local-voting-community-attachment-strongly-linked-to-news-habits/">voting participation</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/1078087419838058">number of candidates</a> running for local office. Less local news <a href="https://theconversation.com/when-newspapers-close-voters-become-more-partisan-108416">leads to increased polarization</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jfineco.2019.06.003">higher municipal government costs</a> to taxpayers as accountability reporting declines.</p>
<p>Statehouse reporting programs are part of a <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-college-students-can-help-save-local-news-175501">larger commitment by universities to connect student education with local news needs</a>. Through classes, newsrooms and media collaborations, these programs give students essential opportunities to use skills they have learned in classrooms – and provide badly needed local news coverage. Emerging scholarship finds <a href="https://www.proquest.com/openview/b319e60910c6ccd576b77c808c12a246">partnerships between news outlets and universities</a> are effective at <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/1461670X.2021.2023323">both teaching students and serving the public</a>.</p>
<p>I lead a national effort to document these programs around the country as part of the <a href="https://www.uvm.edu/ccn">Center for Community News</a>. As of early 2023, we had cataloged <a href="https://www.uvm.edu/ccn/case-studies">more than 120 programs</a> in which university-led student reporting is contributing to local news coverage.</p>
<p>Among those, <a href="https://www.uvm.edu/ccn/reports">we found 20 instances</a> of university-coordinated statehouse reporting, covering 19 states; Florida has two.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518586/original/file-20230330-2588-xyrjtj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A person lit brightly speaks into a group of microphones, one of which is held by a person visible but in shadow." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518586/original/file-20230330-2588-xyrjtj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/518586/original/file-20230330-2588-xyrjtj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518586/original/file-20230330-2588-xyrjtj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518586/original/file-20230330-2588-xyrjtj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518586/original/file-20230330-2588-xyrjtj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518586/original/file-20230330-2588-xyrjtj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/518586/original/file-20230330-2588-xyrjtj.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">James Nani, with SUNY New Paltz’s Legislative Gazette, interviews U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Richard Watts</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>How the programs operate</h2>
<p>These programs are not internships but statehouse reporting bureaus led by veteran journalists who assign, edit and vet student work to ensure it meets ethical and professional standards.</p>
<p>Once ready for publication, the students’ work is shared with media platforms around the state, almost always free of charge. During 2022, about 250 student reporters <a href="https://www.uvm.edu/ccn/reports">produced more than 1,000 stories</a> for 1,200 media outlets across 17 states. The remaining two states’ programs, in Texas and Vermont, started in 2023.</p>
<p>Under professional direction, student reporters are producing important state-government stories across the country.</p>
<p>For example, at the University of Missouri, <a href="https://www.columbiamissourian.com/news/state_news/lack-of-broadband-puts-missouri-behind/article_097fc1cc-efe2-11e7-99b2-273eaf367ba9.html">student stories on lack of high-speed internet service</a> in rural areas in 2018 <a href="https://www.columbiamissourian.com/news/state_news/proposed-broadband-grant-system-may-provide-relief-for-rural-areas/article_39740144-0140-11e8-8b26-ab9124ea71d1.html">built momentum for lawmakers to pass new legislation</a> that has <a href="https://www.columbiamissourian.com/news/state_news/lawmakers-create-grant-program-to-spread-broadband-in-missouri/article_592c66c2-5ae9-11e8-8077-bfd88fea8ad6.html">provided millions of additional dollars</a> to increase access to broadband.</p>
<p>In early 2023, the University of Florida’s statehouse team broke the story of a <a href="https://www.wuft.org/news/2023/01/11/uf-to-spend-300000-on-new-pool-for-incoming-university-president/">new US$300,000 private swimming pool</a> being built at the mansion occupied free of cost by the university president just before Ben Sasse, a former U.S. senator, assumed that role.</p>
<p>In Louisiana, 92 publications run stories from Louisiana State University’s statehouse reporting team. In a companion effort, called the <a href="https://lsucoldcaseproject.com/case/shooting-at-southern-university/">Cold Case project</a>, students dive deeply into racist murders from the state’s past. In late 2022, a series of stories about the police <a href="https://lsucoldcaseproject.com/case/shooting-at-southern-university/">killing of two students at Southern University</a> led to a <a href="https://lailluminator.com/2022/11/16/gov-edwards-issues-state-apology-for-fatal-1972-shootings-at-southern-university/">public apology</a> by Gov. John Bel Edwards.</p>
<p>In Montana, a student statehouse reporter wrote a <a href="https://www.ekalakaeagle.com/story/2023/02/10/regional/montana-lawmakers-seek-more-information-about-governors-heart-fund/4232.html">probing story</a> in early 2023 questioning spending in a state fund focused on mental health and health prevention. The story was republished widely, including in small papers like the Ekalaka Eagle, serving a town of 400 people, as well as the statewide news outlet <a href="https://montanafreepress.org/2023/02/03/montana-lawmakers-seek-more-information-about-governors-heart-fund/">the Montana Free Press</a>. A week later, Gov. Greg Gianforte <a href="https://news.mt.gov/Governors-Office/Governor_Gianforte_DPHHS_Invest_2.1_Million_in_Universal_Mental_Health_Screening">announced $2.1 million in new spending</a> on universal mental health screening from the fund.</p>
<p>As far back as 2016, <a href="https://cnsmaryland.org/discharging-trouble-maryland-nursing-homes/">series of stories</a> from the University of Maryland’s Capital News Service generated a lot of attention about the lack of state oversight of nursing homes. Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh cited the students’ work in his pursuit of new regulations; legislators <a href="https://cnsmaryland.org/2018/05/04/legislation-aims-to-improve-oversight-of-nursing-homes/">passed two laws</a> addressing issues raised in the series.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/7XSIoAxE15g?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">A KOMU news report with student journalists covering the Missouri state capitol.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>New programs launch</h2>
<p>In Vermont, the University of Vermont’s <a href="https://www.communitynews.net/special-projects">Community News Service</a> started a statehouse reporting <a href="https://www.communitynews.net/special-projects">program this spring</a> with three students who each receive six credits and a stipend of $1,000. Together the students have already published 23 stories on issues as wide-ranging as <a href="https://vtdigger.org/2023/03/10/bill-would-give-500k-to-help-small-farmers-switch-up-their-products/">diversifying agriculture</a> and <a href="https://vtdigger.org/2023/02/28/vermont-legislators-look-to-ban-child-marriage-joining-other-states-this-session/">child marriage</a>. </p>
<p>For our university, the program meets several needs: Students get experience, media outlets get content and the university meets its <a href="https://www.uvm.edu/news/story/our-land-grant-mission-twenty-first-century">public-service mission</a>.</p>
<p>Clearly, more colleges and universities can step in to fill statehouse reporting gaps. We found that in just eight states – Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, Mississippi, South Carolina, New Jersey, Connecticut and Rhode Island – there are 42 colleges and universities with more than 200,000 students within 10 miles of the statehouses.</p>
<p>Public universities, with their public service mission and long-standing journalism programs, provide most of the student reporters in our study. Private colleges are largely missing.</p>
<p>But in Indiana, some of the 1,000 students at tiny Franklin College staff the <a href="https://www.thestatehousefile.com/">Statehouse File</a>, producing stories like a deep dive into the KKK’s <a href="https://www.thestatehousefile.com/politics/hoosiers-see-lasting-effects-from-time-kkk-dominated-state-politics/article_355201a2-e2ef-11ec-bef5-17a76bfe1736.html">effects on the state</a> and an examination of pregnancy-related deaths due to new <a href="https://www.thestatehousefile.com/politics/more-pregnancies-will-mean-more-deaths-but-numbers-are-difficult-to-pin-down/article_763a4b02-0482-11ed-9ab9-9f575f17b258.html">abortion laws</a>.</p>
<p>Student journalists in these university-led programs are filling local news gaps, adding legislative stories that are lacking while also building skills, polishing their clips and learning how government works. </p>
<p>I believe more public and private universities need to follow their lead. Democracy depends on an informed public.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/201456/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Richard Watts receives funding from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and donors to the College of Arts & Sciences at the University of Vermont. </span></em></p>Where regular reporters have disappeared, university-led statehouse reporting programs have stepped in.Richard Watts, Senior Lecturer of Geography and Founder of the Center of Community News, University of VermontLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1976582023-01-25T13:24:02Z2023-01-25T13:24:02ZThe SAT and ACT are less important than you might think<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/505209/original/file-20230118-11-d766pp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=54%2C0%2C6019%2C4000&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Whether on paper or computerized, standardized tests may be in decline.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/young-multi-ethnic-female-students-writing-exam-royalty-free-image/1171004870">Klaus Vedfelt/DigitalVision via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>College admission tests are becoming a thing of the past.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/admissions/article/2022/01/24/will-test-optional-become-new-normal-admissions">More than 80%</a> of U.S. colleges and universities do not require applicants to take standardized tests – <a href="https://fairtest.org/test-optional-list/">like the SAT or the ACT</a>. That proportion of institutions with test-optional policies <a href="https://www.urban.org/research/publication/how-test-optional-college-admissions-expanded-during-covid-19-pandemic">has more than doubled since the spring of 2020</a>.</p>
<p>And for the fall of 2023, <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2022/11/15/use-test-optional-and-test-free-admissions-keeps-rising">some 85 institutions</a> won’t even consider standardized test scores when reviewing applications. That includes the entire University of California system. </p>
<p>Currently, <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/admissions/article/2022/11/21/early-admissions-numbers-are-good">only 4% of colleges that use the Common Application system</a> require a standardized test such as the SAT or the ACT for admission. </p>
<p>Even before the pandemic, <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/has-pandemic-put-end-to-sat-act-180978167/">more than 1,000 colleges and universities</a> had either test-optional or so-called “test-blind” policies. But as the pandemic unfolded, <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/has-pandemic-put-end-to-sat-act-180978167/">more than 600 additional institutions</a> followed suit. </p>
<p>At the time, many college officials noted that <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/admissions/article/2020/09/14/pandemic-has-seen-rise-test-blind-admissions">health concerns</a> and other logistics associated with test-taking made them want to reduce student stress and risk. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/15/us/SAT-scores-uc-university-of-california.html">Concerns about racial equity</a> also factored into many decisions.</p>
<p>Other institutions are what some call “<a href="https://scholarship.shu.edu/dissertations/2823/">test-flexible</a>,” allowing applicants to submit test scores from Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate exams in place of the SAT or ACT.</p>
<h2>Tests under fire</h2>
<p>For many years, advocates and scholars have fought against the use of standardized tests, in general, and for college admission.</p>
<p>One critique is simple: Standardized tests aren’t that useful at measuring a student’s potential. <a href="https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189X20902110">Research has repeatedly shown</a> that a student’s high school GPA is a better predictor of college success than standardized test scores such as the SAT or ACT. </p>
<p>But there are deeper issues too, involving race and equity. </p>
<p>The development and use of standardized tests in higher education <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-sats-new-adversity-score-is-a-poor-fix-for-a-problematic-test-117363">came out of the eugenics movement</a>. That movement claimed – and then used misleading and manufactured evidence to support the idea – that people of different races had different innate abilities.</p>
<p>“Standardized tests have become the <a href="https://www.bosedequity.org/blog/read-ibram-x-kendis-testimony-in-support-of-the-working-group-recommendation-to-suspendthetest">most effective racist weapon</a> ever devised to objectively degrade Black and Brown minds and legally exclude their bodies from prestigious schools,” according to Ibram X. Kendi, director of the Center for Anti-Racist Research at Boston University. </p>
<p>Kendi is not alone in highlighting the historic links between standardized tests and discrimination. Joseph A. Soares, editor of “The Scandal of Standardized Tests: Why We Need to Drop the SAT and ACT,” has documented “<a href="https://www.tcpress.com/blog/dismantling-white-supremacy-includes-racist-tests-sat-act/">[t]he original ugly eugenic racist intention behind the SAT</a>, aimed at excluding Jews from the Ivy League.” He says that goal has now “been realized by biased test-question selection algorithms that systemically discriminate against Blacks.” In his work, Soares draws attention to the practice of evaluating pilot questions and removing from the final test version questions on which Black students did better than white students. </p>
<p>My colleague Joshua Goodman has found that Black and Latino students who take the SAT or the ACT are less likely than white or Asian students to take it a second time. They perform less well, which <a href="https://doi.org/10.1257/pol.20170503">contributes to disproportionately low representation</a> of college students from low-income and racial minority backgrounds.</p>
<p>Those factors – as well as a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/15/us/SAT-scores-uc-university-of-california.html">lawsuit arguing discrimination</a> based on test performance – were behind the May 2020 decision by the University of California’s Board of Regents to <a href="https://www.tcpress.com/blog/dismantling-white-supremacy-includes-racist-tests-sat-act/">discontinue using SAT and ACT scores</a> in admissions decisions. </p>
<h2>Economics of higher education</h2>
<p>Colleges and universities tend to seek applicants with good grades and other achievements. They are often seeking a diverse pool from which to build their classes. Colleges that did not require standardized tests in applications for students arriving in fall 2021 “generally received more applicants, better academically qualified applicants, and <a href="https://thehill.com/changing-america/enrichment/education/586321-harvard-ditching-standardized-testing-requirements-for/">more diverse pools of applicants</a>.” That’s according to Bob Schaeffer, executive director of FairTest, an advocacy group working to “end the misuses and flaws of testing practices” in higher education and in the K-12 sector.</p>
<p>In addition, birth rates are declining, and the number of 18-year-olds <a href="https://hechingerreport.org/college-students-predicted-to-fall-by-more-than-15-after-the-year-2025/">seeking to enter college is decreasing</a>. Many institutions are seeking to <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/admissions/article/2022/07/18/direct-admissions-takes-individual-colleges">make it easier for people to apply to college</a>. </p>
<p>As a result of these factors, I expect to see high school students begin to choose where to apply based at least in part on whether colleges require standardized tests, consider them or ignore them entirely. According to <a href="https://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/the-short-list-college/articles/top-colleges-that-still-require-test-scores">U.S. News & World Report</a>, most of the colleges in the U.S. that still require test scores are located in Southern states, with the highest count in the state of Florida.</p>
<h2>The testing business</h2>
<p>The test-taking business, including preparatory classes, tutoring and the costs of taking the tests themselves, is a <a href="https://marker.medium.com/a-slippery-slope-for-big-test-cf3f6f64e28b">multibillion-dollar industry</a>.</p>
<p>As more institutions reduce their attention to tests, all those businesses feel pressure to reinvent themselves and make their services useful. The College Board, which produces the SAT and other tests, has recently tried to make its flagship test more “<a href="https://newsroom.collegeboard.org/digital-sat-brings-student-friendly-changes-test-experience">student-friendly</a>,” as the organization put it. In January 2022 it released an online SAT that is supposed to be easier for test sites to administer and easier for students to take.</p>
<p>In recent conversations <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=pI7szcYAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">I</a> have had in research into higher education policies, admission directors at selective universities tell me that standardized test scores have become an optional component of a portfolio of activities, awards and other material, that applicants have at their disposal when completing their college applications.</p>
<p>Institutions that have gone test-blind have already decided that the SAT is no longer part of the equation. Others may join them.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/197658/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Mary L. Churchill does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>An increasing number of colleges aren’t interested in seeing applicants’ standardized test results.Mary L. Churchill, Associate Dean, Strategic Partnerships and Community Engagement and Professor of the Practice, Boston UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1946872022-12-02T13:40:41Z2022-12-02T13:40:41Z3 ways cryptocurrency is changing the way colleges do business with students and donors<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/498040/original/file-20221129-16-igul3k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=53%2C0%2C6000%2C3988&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Universities are seeking to boost bottom lines and personal connections with cryptocurrencies.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/illustration/woman-study-by-stock-trading-royalty-free-illustration/1356601296">Irina Marchenko/iStock via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Until about 2020, universities used cryptocurrencies only to <a href="https://theconversation.com/ransomware-criminals-are-targeting-us-universities-141932">pay ransoms to criminals attacking their networks</a>. A fast payment to criminals helped victim universities restore their networks quickly.</p>
<p>With <a href="https://www.insiderintelligence.com/insights/us-adults-cryptocurrency-ownership-stats/">increasing public adoption</a> of cryptocurrencies, especially <a href="https://www.ypulse.com/report/2022/04/07/buying-into-crypto-and-nfts-trend-report/">among young consumers</a>, universities are exploring them, too. As of early 2022, <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2022/03/31/cryptocurrency-news-21percent-of-adults-have-traded-or-used-crypto-nbc-poll-shows.html">20% of U.S. consumers had used</a> cryptocurrencies. According to an <a href="https://www.ypulse.com/report/2022/04/07/buying-into-crypto-and-nfts-trend-report/">April 2022 report</a>, 28% of 13- to 39-year-olds had purchased at least one type of cryptocurrency. Among consumers in this age group, <a href="https://www.ypulse.com/article/2022/04/11/heres-how-many-gen-z-millennials-have-bought-crypto-nfts/">13% had purchased and 38% were interested in</a> a particular offshoot of cryptocurrencies called non-fungible tokens.</p>
<p>Cryptocurrencies have lost market value from a peak of <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-06-30/bank-of-america-s-crypto-users-shrunk-by-50-in-bear-market">about US$3 trillion in November 2021</a> to <a href="https://coinmarketcap.com/">$804 billion in November 2022</a>. And their uses are not as widespread as they were as recently as 2021. Despite <a href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/money-mentor/article/is-bitcoin-crash-coming/">the crashes in value</a> and loss in confidence due to <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/17/briefing/crypto-collapse-ftx.html">the collapse of some large crypto exchanges</a>, universities appear to me to be open to a potential market recovery. </p>
<p>In my recent <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=g-jALEoAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">research</a>, I have looked at educational institutions’ use of crypto assets such as <a href="https://www.e-elgar.com/shop/usd/the-rise-of-blockchains-9781802208160.html">cryptocurrencies</a> and <a href="https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?arnumber=9903860">non-fungible tokens</a>. I see three ways that universities are using cryptocurrencies.</p>
<h2>1. Accepting tuition payments</h2>
<p>People want to be <a href="https://investors.sofi.com/news/news-details/2022/SoFi-at-Work-Study-Reveals-Three-in-Four-Workers-Are-Stressed-About-Financial-Issues-Spending-9-Working-Hours-Per-Week-Dealing-With-Personal-Finances/default.aspx">paid in cryptocurrencies</a> and use it to <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/airbnb-users-want-crypto-payment-options-according-to-ceo-twitter-poll">buy goods and services</a>. Businesses are responding to this trend, setting up systems to <a href="https://usa.visa.com/about-visa/newsroom/press-releases.releaseId.18711.html">accept payments in cryptocurrencies</a>. </p>
<p>Universities are responding, too. <a href="https://www.bizjournals.com/boston/news/2022/05/04/bentley-university-crypto-payments-tuition.html">Since May 2022</a>, Bentley University outside Boston has allowed students to pay tuition with <a href="https://www.bentley.edu/offices/student-accounts/payments">cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin, ethereum and USDC</a>. Some universities accept cryptocurrency payments only for certain programs. For instance, in the fall of 2021, the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania <a href="https://almanac.upenn.edu/articles/wharton-first-ivy-league-school-to-accept-tuition-payments-in-cryptocurrencies/">announced it would accept</a> cryptocurrencies to pay tuition in its executive education program in the <a href="https://news.wharton.upenn.edu/press-releases/2021/10/wharton-launches-economics-of-blockchain-and-digital-assets-executive-education-online-certificate-program/">economics of blockchain and digital assets</a>.</p>
<p>Paying tuition in cryptocurrency is faster, cheaper and easier for international students, because doing so lets them avoid paying fees for <a href="https://www.upromise.com/articles/pay-for-college-with-crypto/">currency conversion and international transfer transactions</a>. And universities benefit by receiving cryptocurrency payments immediately, rather than facing a delay of several days for overseas bank transactions.</p>
<p>Universities around the world deal differently with crypto’s price volatility.
The University of Nicosia in Cyprus <a href="https://www.topschoolsabroad.com/posts/list-universities-allow-pay-tuition-fees-bitcoin/">immediately converts bitcoin</a> to euros. But Paraguay’s Universidad Americana <a href="https://www.banklesstimes.com/cryptocurrency/resources/which-universities-accept-cryptocurrency/">evaluates price trends</a> before converting into its national currency.</p>
<h2>2. Receiving crypto gifts</h2>
<p>It is becoming increasingly common for universities to accept cryptocurrency gifts. In 2021, the public charity organization Fidelity Charitable received the equivalent of <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-02-15/crypto-gifts-surge-1-082-at-fidelity-s-philanthropic-powerhouse">US$331 million in digital gifts</a>, which was about 12 times more than in 2020.</p>
<p>As of 2021, technology company The Giving Block agreed to help <a href="https://www.bestcolleges.com/news/analysis/2021/12/13/crypto-philanthropy-higher-education-bitcoin-ethereum/">about 100 universities</a>, such as the University of Arizona, the University of Maryland, the University of Alabama, Catholic University and Wake Forest University, handle cryptocurrency payments and donations. Some universities have added cryptocurrency guidelines on their “How to Give” pages and <a href="https://uif.uillinois.edu/cryptocurrency">provided instructions for donors</a>. </p>
<p>In early November 2022, Vitalik Buterin, a co-founder of the ethereum blockchain, gave the University of Maryland <a href="https://today.umd.edu/record-breaking-9-4m-crypto-gift-to-fund-study-of-air-disinfection-to-prevent-future-pandemics">$9.4 million in cryptocurrency</a>. The money will be used to fund public health research.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/498064/original/file-20221129-24-aquvft.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A screenshot of an auction listing for an NFT" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/498064/original/file-20221129-24-aquvft.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/498064/original/file-20221129-24-aquvft.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=220&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/498064/original/file-20221129-24-aquvft.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=220&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/498064/original/file-20221129-24-aquvft.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=220&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/498064/original/file-20221129-24-aquvft.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=276&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/498064/original/file-20221129-24-aquvft.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=276&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/498064/original/file-20221129-24-aquvft.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=276&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The University of Pennsylvania auctioned off NFTs of images from university-held patents to raise money for further research.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://onlineonly.christies.com/s/university-pennsylvania-mrna-nft-vaccines-new-era/university-pennsylvania-mrna-nft-vaccines-new-era-1/157132">Christies</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>3. Exploring non-fungible tokens</h2>
<p>Some universities are successfully capitalizing on this trend to raise money, and to strengthen connections with alumni.</p>
<p>When blockchain technology, <a href="https://theconversation.com/can-blockchain-technology-help-poor-people-around-the-world-76059">a database of transaction records stored in many computers at once</a>, was first invented, it supported only money-like assets such as bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. The technology has evolved to create a special kind of digital asset called non-fungible tokens. A non-fungible token is a unique image, video or audio file <a href="https://blockchainhub.net/blog/blog/nfts-fungible-tokens-vs-non-fungible-tokens/">representing an item such as a physical painting</a> or a song stored on blockchains. The file, and information about who owns it, are stored on a blockchain. </p>
<p>Of course, a non-fungible token is not the asset itself, but is a <a href="https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/stamp/stamp.jsp?arnumber=9903860">one-of-a-kind, exclusive digital version</a> of it, which some people value and view as <a href="https://www.luxurytribune.com/en/nft-the-ultimate-in-dematerialised-social-status">a social status symbol</a>. One non-fungible token artwork, “The Merge,” which was created by a pseudonymous artist, was sold for <a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/life-changing-money-the-10-most-expensive-nfts-sold-to-date">$91.8 million</a> in December 2021.</p>
<p>In June 2022, the University of California, Berkeley minted a non-fungible token based on the <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2022/01/20/colleges-cash-nfts-new-fundraising-mechanism">Nobel Prize–winning research of immunologist James Allison</a>. The token’s auction raised <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-05-27/nft-for-nobel-prize-winning-data-to-be-auctioned-by-uc-berkeley#xj4y7vzkg">about $50,000</a>. The proceeds funded immunology research.</p>
<p>Colleges such as Brigham Young University and Syracuse University are <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/colleges-nfts-marketplaces-nil-student-athletes-2022-9">bundling non-fungible tokens with real-world perks</a> such as VIP seats for events they organized. Some people are willing to pay more for the combination than for the real-world items alone.This increases non-fungible tokens’ attractiveness.</p>
<p>In May 2022, Harvard University announced that every graduate from Harvard College would <a href="https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2022/5/24/class-of-2021-nfts/">receive a commemorative non-fungible token</a>. And Duke University grants <a href="https://pratt.duke.edu/about/news/duke-engineerings-fintech-program-sends-certificates-coursera-students-nfts">completion certificates in the form of non-fungible tokens</a> for those who pass one of its blockchain technology courses.</p>
<p>Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business gave the members of its class of 2020 non-fungible tokens as a gift. The tokens were digital twins of the physical 2020 Challenge Coin gifts <a href="https://twitter.com/GtownBlockchain/status/1530300142431088640">given to the students as a token of appreciation</a>. The coin’s back features the building that <a href="https://msb.georgetown.edu/news-story/a-token-of-appreciation-mcdonough-delivers-georgetowns-first-nft-to-the-class-of-2020/">houses the university’s business school</a>.</p>
<p>Universities are using cryptocurrencies to manage operations, raise funds and enhance relationships with students and alumni. If these assets recover from their current crash and begin to boom again, these trends may further accelerate.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/194687/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nir Kshetri does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Despite a recent crash in value, universities are using cryptocurrencies for a variety of purposes and reasons.Nir Kshetri, Professor of Management, University of North Carolina – GreensboroLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1746862022-01-14T13:36:00Z2022-01-14T13:36:00ZColleges accused of conspiring to make low-income students pay more<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/440539/original/file-20220112-21-1ikz9g9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C6594%2C4402&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A lawsuit claims that 16 elite U.S. universities give preference to children of donors over other applicants in their admissions. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/license/1264389817?adppopup=true">Alexi Rosenfeld/Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Sixteen universities – including six in the Ivy League – are <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/yale-georgetown-other-top-schools-illegally-collude-to-limit-student-financial-aid-lawsuit-alleges-11641829659?mod=hp_lead_pos7">accused in a lawsuit</a> of having engaged in price fixing and unfairly limiting financial aid by using a shared methodology to calculate the financial need of applicants. The schools in question have declined to comment or said only that they’ve <a href="https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2022/01/10/yale-other-top-universities-sued-for-allegedly-collaborating-to-limit-financial-aid/">done nothing wrong</a>. Here, Robert Massa, a professor of higher education at the University of Southern California, provides insights into what the case is about.</em></p>
<h2>Is this the latest ‘admissions scandal’?</h2>
<p>Although it may be tempting to brand this case as the latest college admissions “scandal,” this lawsuit harks back to an <a href="https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED540079.pdf">investigation of 57 private, four-year universities</a> conducted over 30 years ago by the Department of Justice on charges of “price fixing.” In this case, price fixing means limiting how the colleges compete for students by agreeing with one another to offer similar financial aid awards to admitted students.</p>
<p>Back then, groups of these colleges would meet to review the financial aid packages that each college had offered to students. The colleges stated that they did this to assure that each school in the group based their awards on the same financial information from the student, such as family income, number of students in college, non-custodial parent and the like, so that students could select schools based on which school was best for them instead of which school offered the best deal. The colleges did this by all offering aid that would make the price paid the same at each school.</p>
<p>The government, citing Section I of the <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/sherman_antitrust_act">Sherman Antitrust Act</a>, disagreed. It claimed the practice of sharing financial aid information on students limited competition and, in so doing, had the potential to lead to higher prices for students because without competition, there would theoretically be no reason to attempt to “outbid” a member of the group. </p>
<p>Eventually, all of the schools settled with the government and agreed to stop collaborating on financial aid awards. Congress <a href="https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED540079.pdf">exempted colleges</a> from antitrust laws in 1992, but only if they were “need blind” in admission. To be “need blind” means that a college won’t view a student’s application for financial aid prior to deciding whether to admit the student. Further, the exemption allowed these colleges to form groups to discuss aid policies and awards only if they agreed to award all aid on the basis of need and not merit.</p>
<h2>What are these colleges accused of doing?</h2>
<p>The five student plaintiffs in this case <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/admissions/article/2022/01/11/class-action-suit-filed-against-top-private-colleges?">accuse these colleges of making low-income students pay more</a> for their college education by agreeing to award them less financial aid than they would have been eligible to receive by using the <a href="https://www.nasfaa.org/uploads/documents/FAFSA_Series_Pt10_Federal_Methodology.pdf">standard financial need formula</a> approved by Congress for awarding federal financial aid. This, they claim, is in violation of the antitrust exemption. </p>
<p>Specifically, the plaintiffs claim that the colleges give preference to children of potential donors. In that way, according to the plaintiffs, these schools are not “need-blind” and do not qualify for the exemption. It is worth noting again, however, that “need blind” refers to admission decisions made without viewing a financial aid application. Children of donors who might be capable of a large gift would not likely file an application for financial aid. Therefore, prior to making an admission decision, colleges cannot view a form that doesn’t exist.</p>
<p>The suit also alleges that the schools are not 100% “need blind” because some look at financial aid applications when admitting students from their waitlists. Based on my more than four decades of experience in the field of admissions, this is a common practice at the end of the admissions cycle if space is available in the freshman class, but after most financial aid funds have been awarded.</p>
<p>Further, the suit alleges that these schools award less aid because they agree to use a “shared methodology,” with a formula that calculates higher family contributions toward college expenses than does the “<a href="https://www.nasfaa.org/uploads/documents/FAFSA_Series_Pt10_Federal_Methodology.pdf">Federal Methodology</a>” approved by Congress in the awarding of federal aid. The adjustments made to the formula, the suit alleges, decreases the student’s need for financial aid. Despite that assumption, colleges that agree on financial need calculations could also increase aid eligibility. For example, they could do this by deciding together that they will expect students to contribute less from their summer earnings because of COVID-19’s impact on the job market, therefore increasing their need for aid and decreasing the price they must pay.</p>
<h2>How does this affect the average college applicant?</h2>
<p>Only a small fraction of today’s college students would be affected by these alleged practices. The vast majority of the thousands of colleges and universities in this country must adhere to antitrust laws because they don’t promise to be need-blind, they don’t meet full need and they do not award aid solely on the basis of need. Thus, they do not meet the criteria for an exemption.</p>
<h2>Why should anyone care about this?</h2>
<p>Colleges are not legally required to provide grant aid from their own funds to admitted students who qualify. I have found in my 45 years of experience in college admissions that most colleges provide aid because they are committed to removing financial barriers for as many students as possible.</p>
<p>I also know that colleges believe that their degree leads to upward mobility, and they want to help students achieve their dreams. Of course, no one wants colleges – or consumer businesses for that matter – to engage in practices that eliminate competition and result in increased prices. Operating within the law, colleges must be transparent about how they admit students and award them financial aid. This is essential so families can be confident that they are indeed being treated fairly.</p>
<p>[<em>Get the best of The Conversation, every weekend.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/weekly-highlights-61?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=weeklybest">Sign up for our weekly newsletter</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/174686/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Robert Massa receives funding from Gates Foundation through University of Southern California to study impact of COVID on college admissions nationwide</span></em></p>A scholar weighs in on a new lawsuit that accuses several elite schools of price fixing and conspiring to lower the amount of financial aid offered to low-income students.Robert Massa, Adjunct Professor, Rossier School of Education, University of Southern CaliforniaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1694502021-10-25T12:33:05Z2021-10-25T12:33:05ZWhy do colleges use legacy admissions? 5 questions answered<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/428083/original/file-20211022-9655-15t59fs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">More than half of the top 250 U.S. colleges and universities offer legacy admissions. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/general-atmosphere-at-the-harvard-university-2018-367th-news-photo/962132834?adppopup=true">Paul Marotta / Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>Legacy admissions – a practice in which colleges give special consideration to children of alumni when deciding who to admit – have been <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/20/us/amherst-college-legacy-admissions.html">making headlines</a>. Colleges are increasingly being called on to rethink the merits of the practice – and some colleges are beginning to heed those calls. Here, Nadirah Farah Foley, a postdoctoral associate at New York University, answers five questions about the elitist history of legacy admissions and their uncertain future.</em></p>
<h2>1. How long have legacy admissions been around?</h2>
<p>Legacy admissions <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/23055549">became common in the 1920s</a> – one of the most <a href="https://theconversation.com/for-universities-making-the-case-for-diversity-is-part-of-making-amends-for-racist-past-101003">blatantly exclusionary and discriminatory eras</a> in the history of United States higher education.</p>
<p><a href="https://archive.dartmouthalumnimagazine.com/article/1922/1/1/selective-process-instituted-for-the-class-of-1926">Dartmouth College</a> instituted a legacy policy in 1922. <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/23055549">Yale University followed</a> in 1925.</p>
<p>At the time, Ivy League universities were preoccupied with preserving their status as bastions of the elite. Harvard, for example, had long been the university of choice for <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/murder-boston-brahmins/">Boston’s upper class</a>. But as students from other backgrounds — <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2005/11/06/books/review/the-chosen-getting-in.html">especially Jews</a> — began to gain admission, Harvard and other elite universities sought to keep “<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/27/AR2005102701733.html">social undesirables</a>” to a minimum on campus, according to
sociologist Jerome Karabel.</p>
<p>As Karabel revealed in his 2006 book “<a href="https://www.hmhbooks.com/shop/books/the-chosen/9780618773558">The Chosen</a>,” by the 1930s, nearly a third of Yale undergraduates were the children of people who themselves had graduated from Yale. This was no accident: Yale’s dean of admissions at the time, James Noyes, wrote in a confidential memo that “the [admissions] Board gives all possible preference to the sons of Yale men.”</p>
<p>Princeton made its preference for legacies even more explicit – and public. A 1958 alumni brochure stated: “No matter how many other boys apply, the Princeton son is judged on this one question: can he be expected to graduate? If so, he’s admitted.”</p>
<h2>2. Why are legacy admissions problematic?</h2>
<p>Legacy admissions are <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/admissions/article/2020/02/24/bloomberg-proposal-renews-debate-over-legacy-admissions">frequently debated</a> because they represent a glaring contradiction in American higher education. On the one hand, prestigious universities say they are committed to admitting the “<a href="https://unsp.upenn.edu/why-support/message-from-the-president/">best and brightest</a>.” On the other hand, these same universities uphold a preference for the children of alumni — a practice that <a href="https://tcf.org/content/book/affirmative-action-for-the-rich/?session=1">disproportionately benefits wealthy, white students</a> and is patently not about merit. Admitting an inordinately high percentage of children of privilege raises this question: Do universities really want the best and brightest? Or do they want the richest and whitest?</p>
<h2>3. Couldn’t legacy admissions eventually help historically underrepresented groups?</h2>
<p>Elite universities have grown more diverse in recent decades. Harvard College, for example, was <a href="https://www.wbur.org/news/2018/11/02/harvard-trial-closes">nearly 80% white in 1980</a> but enrolled a <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-40812196">class that was less than half white in 2017</a>.</p>
<p>So on a small scale, preserving legacy admissions could <a href="https://washingtonmonthly.com/2019/04/20/the-racial-justice-case-for-legacy-admissions/">benefit applicants of color who are children of alumni</a>. But at Princeton, where <a href="https://www.princeton.edu/news/2019/03/28/princeton-pleased-offer-admission-1895-students-class-2023">more than half of admitted students were people of color</a> in 2019, just <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/legacy-preference-gets-fresh-look-following-college-admissions-scandal-11582387200">27% of legacy admits were students of color</a>. The point is, even as universities like Princeton diversify, legacy admissions may continue to skew super white.</p>
<p>It’s also worth remembering that non-white graduates of Harvard and similar institutions — and therefore their children — represent a tiny fraction of people of color. Undergraduate classes at Harvard average around 1,600 students. So <a href="https://college.harvard.edu/admissions/admissions-statistics">even with admitted classes that are over 15% Black</a>, Harvard College graduates at most a few hundred Black students each year. </p>
<p>Giving an additional boost to the children of alumni, even if they are people of color, does little to move the needle on racial equity. Instead, it serves to reproduce an elite – and even a racially diverse elite is still an elite, which can only exist so long as stark inequalities do.</p>
<h2>4. Are colleges responding to calls to end legacy admissions?</h2>
<p>In recent years, a few high-profile universities – including <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/01/why-we-ended-legacy-admissions-johns-hopkins/605131/">Johns Hopkins University</a> and <a href="https://apnews.com/article/co-state-wire-colorado-race-and-ethnicity-higher-education-government-and-politics-edbc95b683b007e34a2ea214b3e19adb">all public colleges and universities in Colorado</a> – have ended legacy admissions. In October 2021, Amherst College <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/20/us/amherst-college-legacy-admissions.html?searchResultPosition=1">ended legacy admissions</a> as well. </p>
<p>These universities joined a <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/16/top-universities-that-do-not-consider-legacy-when-admitting-students.html">small list</a> of selective schools without legacy preferences. The list includes the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the California Institute of Technology, which never considered legacy status, and <a href="https://hechingerreport.org/column-as-elite-college-applications-soar-legacy-admissions-still-give-wealthy-and-connected-students-an-edge/">the University of California system</a>, which has not considered legacy status since the 1990s.</p>
<p>But while the percentage of the top 250 U.S. universities that use legacy admissions is <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/prestoncooper2/2020/02/25/the-real-problem-with-legacy-admissions/?sh=1057d1370901">down to 56%</a> – from 63% in 2004 – many selective universities still consider legacy status.</p>
<h2>5. Is there any reason to keep legacy admissions?</h2>
<p>Elite universities often say legacy admissions are necessary to keep alumni donations high. Harvard College’s dean of admissions, William Fitzsimmons, has repeatedly defended Harvard’s preferential treatment of the children of alumni and donors. In a deposition for an <a href="https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/harvard-says-defense-costs-top-25-million-affirmative-action-case-2021-09-20/">affirmative action lawsuit</a> filed against Harvard, he said that legacy preferences were <a href="http://samv91khoyt2i553a2t1s05i-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Doc-416-1-Kahlenberg-Expert-Report.pdf">“essential to Harvard’s well-being</a>.” At trial, <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/tylerkingkade/harvard-admissions-trial-fitzsimmons-donors">Fitzsimmons elaborated</a>, “It is important for the long-term strength of the institution to have the resources we need.”</p>
<p>Research, however, has found <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1299224">no correlation between legacy preferences and university revenues</a>. Another study indicated <a href="https://production-tcf.imgix.net/app/uploads/2016/03/08201915/2010-09-15-chapter_5.pdf">legacy admissions policies have little to no effect on alumni giving</a>. </p>
<p>Some defenders of legacy admissions now offer a different justification: the contributions legacy students make to the campus community. Brown University’s dean of admissions, Logan Powell, highlighted the fact that <a href="https://www.browndailyherald.com/article/2018/03/powell-dispelling-legacy-myths-should-help-focus-on-access">legacy admissions are very involved in mentoring</a> and internship experiences for current students. Rakesh Khurana, dean of Harvard College, has also highlighted the contributions that children of alumni make on campus. He asserted that it was valuable to have students who “have more experience with Harvard” <a href="http://samv91khoyt2i553a2t1s05i-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Doc-416-1-Kahlenberg-Expert-Report.pdf">alongside “others who are less familiar</a>.”</p>
<p>This use of diversity to defend legacy admissions is notable. Diversity is usually mentioned in defense of <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/affirmative_action">affirmative action</a> – a policy that supports the inclusion of historically underrepresented groups. But now, some universities seem poised to use “diversity” in defense of legacy admissions, which furthers the status quo and keeps generation after generation of elites on campus.</p>
<p>After a century of legacy admissions, there is abundant evidence that wealthy white alumni and their children are the most likely to benefit. There is also little evidence showing why such policies should continue. But legacy admissions are mostly an issue for a small number of selective universities, and a small portion — <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/09/25/metro/boycott-targets-college-admissions-boost-given-children-alumni-harvard-other-elite-schools/#:%7E:text=Among%20Ivy%20League%20schools%2C%20legacies,example%2C%20according%20to%20the%20colleges.">often between 10% to 15%</a> — of their total admissions at that.</p>
<p>Doing away with legacy admissions won’t fix an admissions game <a href="https://www.csmonitor.com/EqualEd/EqualEd-Voices/2017/0329/College-admissions-the-myth-of-meritocracy">tilted toward the children of privilege</a>. But as universities profess their commitment to diversity, heeding <a href="https://edmobilizer.org/legacy">calls from alumni to abandon legacy preferences</a> could be one small step toward making sure all applicants get a fairer shake.</p>
<p>[<em>Over 110,000 readers rely on The Conversation’s newsletter to understand the world.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=100Ksignup">Sign up today</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/169450/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nadirah Farah Foley does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Elite universities have been giving special preference to children of prior graduates for more than a century. Has the time come for that practice to stop? A sociologist weighs in.Nadirah Farah Foley, Postdoctoral Associate, New York UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1343212020-03-25T12:29:21Z2020-03-25T12:29:21ZWhy people need rituals, especially in times of uncertainty<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/322716/original/file-20200324-155631-nmoaxc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=10%2C16%2C1011%2C645&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">People wear a protective mask as they attend a Hindu ritual, known as Melasti, in Bali, Indonesia, on March 22.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/people-wear-a-protective-mask-as-they-attend-the-melasti-news-photo/1207962816?adppopup=true">Agoes Rudianto/NurPhoto via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Responding to the coronavirus pandemic, most American universities have <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/09/us/coronavirus-university-college-classes/index.html">suspended all campus activities</a>. Like millions of people all around the world, the lives of students all over the U.S. has changed overnight.</p>
<p>When I met my students for what was going to be our last in-class meeting of the academic year, I explained the situation and asked whether there were any questions. The first thing my students wanted to know was: “Will we be able to have a graduation ceremony?”</p>
<p>The fact that the answer was no was the most disappointing news for them.</p>
<p>As an anthropologist who <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrjCLvSQ_cw">studies ritual</a>, hearing that question from so many students did not come as a surprise. The most important moments of our lives – from birthdays and weddings to college graduations and <a href="https://theconversation.com/an-anthropologist-explains-why-we-love-holiday-rituals-and-traditions-88462">holiday traditions</a> are marked by ceremony.</p>
<p>Rituals provide meaning and make those experiences memorable.</p>
<h2>Ritual as a response to anxiety</h2>
<p>Anthropologists have long observed that people across cultures tend to perform <a href="https://anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1525/aa.1941.43.2.02a00020">more rituals in times of uncertainly</a>. Stressful events such as warfare, environmental threat and material insecurity are often linked with <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1548-1433.2010.01305.x">spikes in ritual activity</a>.</p>
<p>In a laboratory study in 2015, my colleagues and I found that under conditions of stress people’s behavior tends to become more rigid and repetitive – in other words, <a href="http://www.cell.com/current-biology/abstract/S0960-9822(15)00652-1">more ritualized</a>. </p>
<p>The reason behind this propensity lies in our cognitive makeup. Our brain is <a href="https://www.edge.org/response-detail/26707">wired to make predictions</a> about the state of the world. It uses past knowledge to make sense of current situations. But when everything around us is changing, the ability to make predictions is limited. This causes many of us to <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301008217300369">experience anxiety</a>.</p>
<p>That is where ritual comes in.</p>
<p>Rituals are <a href="https://www.academia.edu/35257965/The_Psychology_of_Rituals_An_Integrative_Review_and_Process-Based_Framework">highly structured</a>. They require rigidity, and must always be performed the “right” way. And they involve repetitition: The same actions are done again and again. In other words, <a href="https://www.nsnews.com/lifestyle/parenting/parenting-today-rituals-give-children-sense-of-security-1.5093339">they are predictable</a>.</p>
<p>So even if they have no direct influence over the physical world, rituals <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/cogs.12077">provide a sense of control</a> by imposing order on the chaos of everyday life.</p>
<p>It is of little importance whether this sense of control is illusory. What matters is that it is an efficient way of relieving anxiety.</p>
<p>This is what we found in two soon-to-be-published studies. In Mauritius, we saw that Hindus experienced lower anxiety after they performed temple rituals, which we measured using heart rate monitors. And in the U.S., we found that Jewish students who attended more group rituals had lower levels of the stress hormone cortisol.</p>
<h2>Rituals provide connection</h2>
<p>Collective rituals require coordination. When people come together to perform a group ceremony, they may dress alike, move in synchrony or chant in unison. And by acting as one, <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Fpspi0000014">they feel as one</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/322687/original/file-20200324-155702-5txdni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/322687/original/file-20200324-155702-5txdni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/322687/original/file-20200324-155702-5txdni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/322687/original/file-20200324-155702-5txdni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/322687/original/file-20200324-155702-5txdni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/322687/original/file-20200324-155702-5txdni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/322687/original/file-20200324-155702-5txdni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">When people come together for a ritual, they build more trust with each other.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/vivneal/36837209242/in/photolist-Y8bjVh-bC3J7q-eeStaw-XMdjYs-XMddM9-7J5UUq-25spuzu-2cvvYFA-24rtLoS-qokd1g-4Ap1u-RsdUmy-5jrCs9-JZLUJd-9jqNXL-MicFJd-27tJAwH-RshL8m-MdpAuF-cbG1Rw-GAHSwm-HmaGHf-8set5m-6Eh7zW-7BWtf8-3vTZ9-9GHYYi-RyQpM-2dUcrfv-YaHnuE-4VxsvP-6Z8NcB-nQrRM-6ZcN9b-egfR8-2cmmYfz-28YfEU3-RZbWH4-S7Pjeb-25x9zdW-QW9cw6-RZbDki-U5Rmkw-TYUoDu-c9yabA-osmFxS-24AXygL-y7qHeK-2ahTYdw-6LobiU">Neal Schneider?flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/">CC BY-NC-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Indeed, my colleagues and I found that coordinated movement makes people trust each other more, and even <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301051117301151">increases the release of neurotransmitters</a> associated with bonding.</p>
<p>By aligning behavior and creating shared experiences, rituals forge a sense of belonging and common identity which transforms individuals into cohesive communities. As field experiments show, participating in collective rituals increases generosity and even makes people’s <a href="https://aeon.co/essays/how-extreme-rituals-forge-intense-social-bonds">heart rates synchronize</a>. </p>
<h2>Tools for resilience</h2>
<p>It is not surprising then that people around the world are responding to the coronavirus crisis by creating new rituals.</p>
<p>Some of those rituals are meant to provide a sense of structure and reclaim the sense of control. For example, comedian Jimmy Kimmel and his wife encouraged those in quarantine to hold <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x1eN49HjXec">formal Fridays</a>, dressing up for dinner even if they were alone.</p>
<p>Others have found new ways of celebrating age-old rituals. When the New York City Marriage Bureau shut down due to the pandemic, a Manhattan couple <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/21/us/new-york-couple-married-street-officiant-trnd">decided to tie the knot</a> under the fourth-floor window of their ordained friend, who officiated the ceremony from a safe distance.</p>
<p>While some rituals celebrate new beginnings, others serve to provide closure. To avoid spreading the disease, families of coronavirus victims are holding <a href="https://www.inquirer.com/health/coronavirus/coronavirus-covid-burial-funeral-memorial-service-deaths-grief-cdc-20200320.html">virtual funerals</a>. In other cases, pastors have <a href="https://www.ctpost.com/news/coronavirus/article/Second-CT-man-dies-from-coronavirus-15142235.php">administered the last rites</a> over the phone.</p>
<p>People are coming up with a host of rituals to maintain a broader sense of human connection. In various European cities, people have started to go to their balconies at the same time every day to <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/health/coronavirus-italy-france-spain-czech-republic-balcony-europe-doctor-nurse-a9403951.html">applaud health care workers</a> for their tireless service. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/322676/original/file-20200324-155631-5yepe1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=40%2C75%2C4507%2C2870&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/322676/original/file-20200324-155631-5yepe1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/322676/original/file-20200324-155631-5yepe1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/322676/original/file-20200324-155631-5yepe1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/322676/original/file-20200324-155631-5yepe1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/322676/original/file-20200324-155631-5yepe1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/322676/original/file-20200324-155631-5yepe1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">People in Rome gather on their balconies at certain hours, to give each other a round of applause.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Italy-Virus-Outbreak/900ef0b55e69480fb57b9ec02b649712/6/0">AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In Mallorca, Spain, local policemen gathered to <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mEpkUawiLKA">sing and dance in the streets</a> for the people in lockdown. And in San Bernardino, California, a group of high school students synchronized their voices remotely to form a <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/21/us/school-virtual-choir-concert-trnd/index.html">virtual choir</a>.</p>
<p>Ritual is an ancient and inextricable part of human nature. And while it may take many forms, it remains a powerful tool for promoting resilience and solidarity. In a world full of ever-changing variables, ritual is a much-needed constant.</p>
<p>[<em>You’re too busy to read everything. We get it. That’s why we’ve got a weekly newsletter.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/weekly-highlights-61?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=weeklybusy">Sign up for good Sunday reading.</a> ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/134321/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dimitris Xygalatas does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>As the coronavirus spreads and life comes to a standstill, people are coming up with a host of rituals to maintain a sense of order and human connection.Dimitris Xygalatas, Assistant Professor in Anthropology, University of ConnecticutLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1338892020-03-23T12:33:43Z2020-03-23T12:33:43ZStudents could be undercounted in the census as coronavirus closes colleges – here’s why that matters<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/321612/original/file-20200319-22627-s64z9b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=22%2C15%2C4955%2C3296&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Howard University students moving out of dorms in Washington.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Virus-Outbreak-Washington-Daily-Life/91b2604378954143afc91b4eab6436cc/6/0">Patrick Semansky/AP Photo</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>At college dormitories and student apartments across the U.S., census forms will be piling up – but many run the risk of not being filled in.</p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/03/16/816707182/map-tracking-the-spread-of-the-coronavirus-in-the-u-s">spread of the coronavirus in the U.S.</a> has coincided with the <a href="https://apnews.com/3fc59096ab138fdd4795386a2987c573">start of data collection for the 2020 census</a>. </p>
<p>This may not affect the process for most people who are self-isolating at home. But for students, it could well affect where and if they are counted – and that could have big implications.</p>
<p>The rapid spread of the virus has meant that most colleges have by now closed their classrooms. Many universities have extended the usual weeklong spring break into a second week. At Texas A&M University, <a href="https://liberalarts.tamu.edu/sociology/profile/dudley-poston/">where I am an emeritus professor</a>, online instruction will <a href="https://www.tamu.edu/coronavirus/index.html">begin after the the spring break</a> and continue through the end of the semester in late April. It is a similar story elsewhere.</p>
<p>As a result, many students may not be returning to their campus residences any time soon.</p>
<h2>Usual residence</h2>
<p>Census data collected from college students are pretty much the same as for the non-student population. The census questions <a href="https://2020census.gov/content/dam/2020census/materials/group-quarters/questionnaires/Informational%20Copy%20of%20the%202020%20Individual%20Census%20Questionnaire%20(Stateside%20English).pdf">ask about sex, age, race and Hispanic origin</a>.</p>
<p>Students living off campus also answer questions about whether their household is rented or owned and about their relationships to those living with them.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/321707/original/file-20200319-22598-1yiaefg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/321707/original/file-20200319-22598-1yiaefg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/321707/original/file-20200319-22598-1yiaefg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/321707/original/file-20200319-22598-1yiaefg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/321707/original/file-20200319-22598-1yiaefg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/321707/original/file-20200319-22598-1yiaefg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/321707/original/file-20200319-22598-1yiaefg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Public and private colleges, like Bowdoin College, are emptying out amid the coronavirus crisis.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Virus-Outbreak-Maine/ee856aa9fcdc49f6b452045378e1cffe/39/0">Robert F. Bukaty/AP Photo</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Census Day is April 1, but the collection effort has already started. On March 12, households began receiving mailed invitations from the Census Bureau with instructions about how to respond. This will be followed up by four more reminder letters, through April 27.</p>
<p>For those who still haven’t responded by then, nonresponse follow-ups start on May 13 and continue until July 31, when census takers visit households they haven’t yet heard back from. However, Wilbur Ross, who as Commerce Secretary oversees the Census Bureau, has warned that <a href="https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2020-03-15/census-coronavirus-count-changes-homeless-college-students">the dates may change</a> as a result of coronavirus.</p>
<p>Since 1950, college students have been counted at their “usual residence” as of census day. Most attend college away from their family homes and live on or near their campuses, so are <a href="https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2010/03/15/college-students-count-in-the-census-but-where/">not counted at their parents’ homes</a>.</p>
<p>In private colleges, <a href="https://www.reference.com/world-view/percent-college-students-live-campus-d1d5a0fac8718894">almost two-thirds live on campus</a>, 20% off campus and 17% at home with their parents. In public colleges, around 40% live on campus, 40% off campus and 20% with their parents.</p>
<h2>Dorm closures</h2>
<p>Students living off campus in apartments or other housing may have already received a mailed census form. Those living in on-campus dormitories or housing owned by their university are classified as living in “group quarters” – this is similar to residents of nursing homes, seminaries, prisons, hospitals and vocational training facilities. </p>
<p>The on-campus students are counted in one of three different ways. Either a university official completes a single form for all students in the dormitory based on administrative data – the Census Bureau estimates that <a href="https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2020/modifying-2020-operations-for-counting-college-students.html">around 55% of on-campus students</a> will be counted this way – or students answer the census questions themselves by filling in forms or, <a href="https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2013/dec/2010_cpex_243.pdf">in rarer cases</a>, via face-to-face interviews with census workers on April 1.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/321706/original/file-20200319-22602-14mmf49.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/321706/original/file-20200319-22602-14mmf49.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/321706/original/file-20200319-22602-14mmf49.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/321706/original/file-20200319-22602-14mmf49.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/321706/original/file-20200319-22602-14mmf49.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/321706/original/file-20200319-22602-14mmf49.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/321706/original/file-20200319-22602-14mmf49.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Students are moving belongings into storage, anticipating long stay away from dorms.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/matthew-adams-of-midland-michigan-moves-belongings-into-a-news-photo/1213087457?adppopup=true">Gregory Shamus/Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>So how will the coronavirus impact the collection of census data for college students? </p>
<p>Just over half of those listed as living in “group quarters” do not need to be present when university administrators fill in the forms, so are less likely to be affected. But around a third of on-campus students would have been expected to answer the four census questions themselves. Many will no longer be in their dorms – indeed in some universities, dorms will have been closed due to coranavirus before the end of the spring semester. I believe this could affect as many as 2 million full-time students who risk being undercounted in the census.</p>
<p>As for those living off campus, a good number will be staying at their parents’ homes and will not be responding to the census invitations sent to their student address. By the time the “nonresponse follow-ups” begin, the spring semester will be over. As such, the usual window for census responses from students attending classes will be lost owing to the emergence and spread of the COVID-19 disease. </p>
<p>Around a third of the <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=372">12 million full-time college students</a> in the U.S. live off campus, adding, perhaps, another 4 million names to the pool of students who could be undercounted as a result of the virus. The fear is many will end up simply not being counted at all, while others will be counted at their parents address. </p>
<p>This undercount of both on-campus and off-campus students could run into several million and have big implications.</p>
<p>Many universities are not located in large metropolitan areas. Texas A&M, where I taught, has an enrollment of over 60,000 students in Brazos County – more than a quarter of the county’s <a href="https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/brazoscountytexas">total population of just over 226,000</a>. </p>
<p>College students overwhelm the demography of Brazos County, as they do at many other large universities not located in large metro areas, such as Penn State, Indiana University, University of Kansas, Virginia Tech University, Cornell University, Utah State University, University of Missouri, University of Illinois, University of Michigan and University of Florida.</p>
<h2>Funding concerns</h2>
<p>Counties with large universities depend heavily on student responses to the decennial census, because the census counts determine the levels of federal funding communities receive. </p>
<p>Every year, the federal government allocates over US$1.5 trillion dollars to states, counties, cities and households, based solely on their population counts. The state of Texas alone <a href="https://www.theeagle.com/opinion/columnists/being-counted-will-make-a-big-difference-for-texas-and/article_7ec268be-64c9-11ea-b084-07fed09f197f.html">receives over $100 billion dollars each year</a> based on the size of its population. </p>
<p>The more people counted in a state, the more money received by the state and its counties and cities. Federal funds <a href="https://www2.census.gov/programs-surveys/decennial/2020/program-management/working-papers/Uses-of-Census-Bureau-Data-in-Federal-Funds-Distribution.pdf">distributed on the basis of census data</a> include money for medical resources, poverty alleviation, infrastructure projects and emergency relief.</p>
<p>A county with a large university, such as Brazos County with Texas A&M University, especially benefits owing to the large proportion of college students living in the county.</p>
<p>This student advantage could be wiped out as a result of student undercounts, proving a costly setback for university towns entirely and solely resulting from the recent emergence and spread of the COVID-19 disease.</p>
<p>[<em>Want to learn more about the 2020 census?</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/census-72">Sign up here for our new newsletter course</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/133889/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dudley L. Poston Jr. does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Census data are used to determine federal funding on everything from highway construction to poverty services. With many students heading back to their parents’ homes, college towns may take a hit.Dudley L. Poston Jr., Professor of Sociology, Texas A&M UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1238322019-09-20T12:36:33Z2019-09-20T12:36:33ZWhat if college athletes got paid? 3 questions answered<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/293226/original/file-20190919-22437-13ud0v3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">California lawmakers have approved a bill that would enable college athletes to get paid endorsements. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Stanford-USC-Football/2fbc02df188f412bb66d214fa14d95df/22/0">AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez</a></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>The California state legislature has approved a bill that allows college athletes to earn money through athletic endorsements starting in 2023. The governor hasn’t said whether he’ll sign the bill into law. Jasmine Harris, an <a href="https://www.ursinus.edu/live/profiles/669-jasmine-harris">expert on student athletes</a>, addresses how the bill, known as “<a href="https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billAnalysisClient.xhtml?bill_id=201920200SB206">Fair Pay to Play Act</a>,” would alter college athletics if it gets signed into law. Her edited comments are below.</em></p>
<h2>1. The Fair Pay to Play Act mentions preventing the exploitation of student athletes. Just how are student athletes being exploited?</h2>
<p>College athletics has become such a business that the exploitation is happening on multiple levels. It’s not just that the colleges are making money off of the student athlete. </p>
<p>Players are also prevented from generating any kind of compensation around their image or likeness while they’re in college, which – for many of them – is going to be the only time when their likeness or their image has any economic value at all.</p>
<p>Right now <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2015/01/27/college-athletes-greatly-overestimate-their-chances-playing-professionally">less than 2%</a> of players end up going pro. And so you’ve got this entire industry that’s built on generating revenue off the athlete through ticket sales, <a href="https://magazine.promomarketing.com/article/forbes-announces-most-valuable-college-apparel-deals/">sponsorship deals</a> with apparel companies, and <a href="https://www.sbnation.com/college-football/2019/3/19/18273232/aac-television-deal-espn-conference-realignment">TV distribution deals</a>.</p>
<p>But that money – instead of being allocated back to the students or making changes that allow additional compensation to be accumulated by the students – goes to things such as <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-big-bonuses-for-winning-coaches-became-a-tradition-in-college-football-108171">coaches’ salaries</a> and new dorms and updated locker rooms with personal barbers and locker seats that <a href="https://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/look-lsus-new-locker-room-includes-dedicated-sleeping-pods-for-players/">roll out into beds</a>. </p>
<p>It’s enough to make me wonder whether these students are going to be sleeping in the locker rooms because they’re spending so much time in the stadium as opposed to in their own dorms or classrooms.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/5N9-QOTXBmY?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<h2>2. Why do student athletes need compensation on top of their scholarships?</h2>
<p>People expect non-student athletes to have a job or two. Studies have found that athletes spend <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/college-student-athletes-spend-40-hours-a-week-practicing-2015-1">32 to 44 hours</a> a week on their respective sports, which is in line with <a href="https://theconversation.com/its-naive-to-think-college-athletes-have-time-for-school-100942">my own research</a>, which shows that they spend three times as much time on their athletic responsibilities than they do on their student responsibilities. </p>
<p>So this idea that a scholarship – which is just tuition, fees, books, room and board – is enough, suggests that that’s enough for all college students and it’s not. And in fact it’s becoming increasingly likely that students across the board, in terms of socioeconomic class, are having to <a href="https://www.us.hsbc.com/content/dam/hsbc/us/en_us/value-of-education/HSBC_VOE5_USA_FactSheet_508r2.pdf">get additional jobs</a> to make more money or their <a href="https://www.us.hsbc.com/content/dam/hsbc/us/en_us/value-of-education/HSBC_VOE5_USA_FactSheet_508r2.pdf">parents are having to put in more money</a> on a day-to-day basis for them to live.</p>
<h2>3. The bill, if enacted, wouldn’t take effect until 2023. Why so long?</h2>
<p>I think the California legislature is hoping that the NCAA will see this and try to institute some of its own policy changes that are more in line with the way that this bill is written. The 2023 deadline for instituting this law is about providing a cushion to allow the NCAA time to adequately adjust its current bylaws to be more in line with this new legislation.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/123832/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jasmine Harris does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>California’s legislature has approved a bill that would let college athletes get paid endorsements. A sociologist explains what the measure would mean for the players.Jasmine Harris, Assistant Professor of Sociology, Ursinus CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1225252019-09-12T11:05:47Z2019-09-12T11:05:47ZThe problem with the push for more college degrees<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/291347/original/file-20190906-175668-1jj8inb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">President Obama sought to make the United States the most college-educated nation in the world by 2020.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-vector/graduating-studentspupil-hands-gown-trowing-graduation-1407666926?src=JD_i1FJ0cmwcUuQrx4p8-w-1-20">RIDTHISING/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In a 2009 speech, President Barack Obama <a href="https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/video/EVR022409#transcript">proclaimed</a> that by 2020, the United States will “once again have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world.”</p>
<p>As we near 2020, it is worth asking how close are we to reaching that lofty goal and what have been the results of focusing so intently on college graduation rates as a sign of success.</p>
<p>Based on my work as a historian of education and a <a href="https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781421429885">book I wrote recently</a> on the purpose of college, I argue that a focus on degree attainment discounts the value of what a true college education provides. It places more emphasis on the piece of paper and less on the experience of college. This is harmful because it creates an impetus to expand the number of degrees without necessarily devoting resources to increase access to college education.</p>
<h2>State support declines</h2>
<p>The number of Americans 25 years or older with a college degree <a href="https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2017/cb17-51.html">continues to rise</a>, from <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/pubs2011/2011016/outcomes.asp?type=8">29.5%</a> in 2009 to about <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d17/tables/dt17_104.60.asp">35%</a> in 2016.</p>
<p>However, despite the Obama administration’s 2020 college completion goal, state support for public colleges has <a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/education/most-americans-dont-realize-state-funding-for-higher-ed-fell-by-billions">fallen by about US$9 billion</a> over the past decade. In addition, <a href="https://www.questia.com/magazine/1P4-1946222730/gaps-in-degree-attainment-remain">large gaps</a> in degree attainment remain between wealthy and poorer Americans and between racial and ethnic groups. Moreover, despite a <a href="https://www.census.gov/library/visualizations/2017/comm/cb17-51_educational_attainment.htm">steady increase</a> in college degree attainment, the United States remains <a href="https://hechingerreport.org/10-years-later-goal-of-getting-more-americans-through-college-is-way-behind-schedule/">13th in the world</a> in the proportion of 25- to 34-year-olds who have earned a college degree. </p>
<p>In this context, elected leaders on both sides of the aisle, from <a href="https://www.nbcrightnow.com/news/president-obama-recognizes-wgu-for-innovation/article_82f026e1-59f7-53a2-aac7-3eea249327d7.html">Obama</a> to former Wisconsin governor <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2015/02/16/gov-scott-walker-mixes-it-higher-education-generating-national-headlines">Scott Walker</a>, called for new institutions and programs to provide fast, easy and cheaper access to degrees, instead of the time, curricula and professors that define a college education.</p>
<h2>New models emerge</h2>
<p>Responding to the call to speed students’ progress toward degrees, new nonprofit institutions such as <a href="https://contexts.org/articles/the-education-assembly-line/#neem">Western Governors University</a> and Southern New Hampshire University’s <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/susanadams/2019/03/28/meet-the-english-professor-creating-the-billion-dollar-college-of-the-future/#b104b71426ba">College for America</a> established online programs to award students credit for prior learning and meeting predetermined “competencies.” </p>
<p>Simultaneously, public colleges such as <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/mollyhensleyclancy/the-new-american-university-massive-online-and-corporate-bac">Arizona State University</a> and <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/mollyhensleyclancy/the-new-american-university-massive-online-and-corporate-bac">Purdue University</a> partnered with private corporations such as <a href="https://asunow.asu.edu/content/asu-partners-pearson-expand-online-learning">Pearson</a> and <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/digital-learning/article/2019/01/09/purdue-prepares-online-expansion-support-newly-acquired-profit">Kaplan</a>, respectively, to offer large numbers of online degrees without the kind of professorial oversight and interaction available to students on campus. </p>
<p>These approaches emphasize degree completion instead of the kinds of intellectual experiences that define a college education.</p>
<h2>Elements of a college education</h2>
<p>In my new book, <a href="https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781421429885">“What’s the Point of College?</a>,” I argue that what makes college distinct from other kinds of education is that a college education is not reducible to training. </p>
<p>I also argue that a college education does not just certify competency but expands the mind in unpredictable ways. A college education requires time and interactions with professors and peers. And most of all, a college education requires opportunities to think without placing a value or seeking a specific outcome on the thought. Colleges should, ideally, encourage such reflection and insight.</p>
<p>I believe Obama’s aspiration to increase the number of college graduates came at the cost of paying attention to the education that colleges should offer. The 2020 college completion goal shows that it is possible to increase the number of Americans with a college degree without necessarily increasing the number of Americans with a college education.</p>
<h2>A degree’s worth</h2>
<p>Certainly, the United States should support good-faith efforts to increase job training for people with or without college degrees. Many of the <a href="https://money.usnews.com/money/careers/slideshow/25-best-jobs-that-dont-require-a-college-degree">fastest-growing jobs</a>, in such fields as <a href="https://www.bls.gov/ooh/healthcare/dental-hygienists.htm">dental hygiene</a>, <a href="https://www.bls.gov/ooh/healthcare/home.htm">health care support</a> and <a href="https://www.bls.gov/ooh/construction-and-extraction/construction-laborers-and-helpers.htm">construction</a>, require specialization but not a college education.</p>
<p>However, I worry that a focus on economic outcomes could go too far. Recently, for example, the Gates Foundation called for the evaluation of all college degrees based on their economic payoff. That is to say, the Gates Foundation wants to determine <a href="https://theconversation.com/new-gates-funded-commission-aims-to-put-a-value-on-a-college-education-116930">which degrees are a worthwhile investment</a>. This would repeat the mistake of the Obama administration by again emphasizing the short-term salary gains of a college degree, rather than the broadening of the mind that comes with a college education. The emphasis that the Gates Foundation is placing on the economic value of a college degree threatens what makes college worthwhile – not just intellectually but also financially.</p>
<p>A college education is valuable in the labor market precisely because it cannot be reduced to one set of skills. What makes college graduates desirable is their ability to think broadly about the world and their capacity to use language and numbers well. These outcomes are achieved by immersing people for a portion of their lives on campuses devoted to thinking as an end in itself. </p>
<p>As 2020 approaches, I see a need for the United States to abandon its focus on degrees and instead support Americans – whether young or old, first-generation or legacy, poor or rich – to gain access to a true college education. This requires transforming America’s colleges to make them available to people in all stages of life.</p>
<p>Older people, often with mortgages, children or aging parents, need real and meaningful support to pursue a college education. If we Americans want more college-educated citizens, we must care about more than counting degrees.</p>
<p>
<section class="inline-content">
<img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/248894/original/file-20181204-133095-1p2xxs2.png?w=128&h=128">
<div>
<header>Johann N. Neem is the author of:</header>
<p><a href="https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781421429885">What’s the Point of College?</a></p>
<footer>Johns Hopkins University Press provides funding as a member of The Conversation US.</footer>
</div>
</section>
</p>
<p>[ <em><a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=expertise">Expertise in your inbox. Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter and get a digest of academic takes on today’s news, every day.</a></em> ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/122525/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Johns Hopkins University Press provides funding as a member of The Conversation US.</span></em></p>Efforts to get more Americans to earn a college degree steal attention from what makes up a college education, a historian of education argues.Johann N. Neem, Professor of American History, Western Washington UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1218102019-09-11T12:18:42Z2019-09-11T12:18:42ZHistorically black colleges give graduates a wage boost<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/291397/original/file-20190909-175663-n1sadi.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Research conflicts over how graduates of historically black colleges fare in the job market.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/closeup-graduate-looking-cropped-dean-female-143582296?src=ziFNrIs5GRQz4ZIM-q90yw-1-20">sirtravelalot/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In 2010, two economists claimed that graduates of historically black colleges and universities, or HBCUs, suffer a “<a href="https://cdn.theconversation.com/static_files/files/707/HB_fry_green.pdf?1567963245">wage penalty</a>” – that is, they earn relatively less than they would had they gone to a non-HBCU.</p>
<p>In an early draft of the paper, the economists – one from Harvard and the other from MIT - argued that while HBCUs may have served a useful purpose back in the 1970s, they were now, by some measures, serving to “<a href="https://cdn.theconversation.com/static_files/files/706/HBCUsFryerGreenstone2.pdf?1567963159">retard black progress</a>.” The reason why, they suggested, is that traditionally white institutions may have gotten better at educating black students and that there might be value in “cross-racial connections” when it came time to get a job.</p>
<p>The paper, which relied on data from the 1950s through the early 2000s, generated negative headlines for HBCUs. For instance, The Wall Street Journal called HBCUs “<a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748704654004575517822124077834">academically inferior</a>.” The New York Times warned readers about the “<a href="https://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/22/the-declining-payoff-from-black-colleges/?partner=rss&emc=rss">declining payoff from black colleges</a>.”</p>
<p>As a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=cU9jKgYAAAAJ">scholar who has researched HBCUs</a>, my colleagues and I have found contrary evidence: Students who went to HBCUs do not suffer a relative wage penalty. In fact, we found that they typically and on average earn more than similar students who went to non-HBCUs. Our findings are based on comparing HBCUs to other schools with a sizable black student population.</p>
<h2>Producers of black doctors, engineers</h2>
<p>Largely established to serve black people after the Civil War and in the <a href="https://www.history.com/topics/early-20th-century-us/jim-crow-laws">Jim Crow era</a> of racial segregation, HBCUs were the <a href="https://www.gse.upenn.edu/pdf/cmsi/Changing_Face_HBCUs.pdf">only higher education option for many black Americans up through the mid-1960s</a> during the push for integration. Since then, HBCUs have served a declining share of black students. For instance, HBCUs served 17.3% of black college students in 1980, but by 2015 the figure had <a href="https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/02/28/a-look-at-historically-black-colleges-and-universities-as-howard-turns-150/">fallen to 8.5%</a>.</p>
<p>HBCUs have been in a constant <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/views/2017/12/20/struggling-hbcus-must-consider-new-options-survival-opinion">struggle for their financial survival</a> because of declining enrollment, among other things. In fact, some college finance experts <a href="https://www.ajc.com/news/local/perilous-times-for-black-colleges/EhDuhVHMOjZqmskOeKBHoM/">predict that many HBCUs will disappear</a> in the next 20 years.</p>
<p>HBCUs currently serve about <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d18/tables/dt18_313.20.asp?current=yes">298,000 students</a> and rank among the <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6111265/">highest producers of black doctors</a>. HBCUs also play an <a href="https://www.chronicle.com/article/HBCUs-an-Unheralded-Role-in/235481">outsized role in the production of black graduates in science, technology, engineering and mathematics</a>, or STEM.</p>
<h2>A wage premium</h2>
<p>Our study included 1,364 nonprofit colleges and universities, both public and private, that award at least a baccalaureate degree.</p>
<p>Increased wages were strongest for the elite HBCUs: Hampton, Howard, Morehouse, Spelman and Xavier. But the effect persisted 10 years after graduation for graduates of all 59 HBCUs – more than half of the <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=667">100 or so HBCUs</a> in the nation – that were included in the sample. Other HBCUs were not included because of lack of data.</p>
<p>And it wasn’t a small amount of money, either. In our study, we found that HBCU students from the elite universities earn 32% more six years after attendance than students with similar characteristics who attended other colleges and universities.</p>
<p>But before anyone celebrates our findings as a clear victory for HBCUs, a few caveats are in order.</p>
<h2>Penalties exist</h2>
<p>First, all HBCU graduates don’t earn more than all non-HBCU graduates all the time. In fact, much like Freyer and Greenstone did a decade ago, we found that early in their careers – extending to six years after graduation – typical HBCU graduates do in fact suffer a wage penalty. </p>
<p>The HBCU study in 2010 found grads earned 20% less than peers from other colleges in the 1990s, although it’s not known how long after graduation this occurred.</p>
<p>We found that there’s an 11% wage penalty after six years but then it disappears after 10 years, and in fact turns into an advantage. So while typical HBCU graduates may be earning less money than non-HBCU graduates in their late 20s, by their early 30s, they are earning more.</p>
<p>We also found that the wage advantage for HBCUs remained no matter what the major. In my view as an economist, the relative gains for HBCU attendees after six years suggest, that on average, HBCU graduates are better able to find jobs that match their skill and capabilities. </p>
<h2>Demographic factors</h2>
<p>Just what is it that makes HBCUs more effective as escalators for labor market earnings and income mobility? <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1007/s12114-011-9088-0?journalCode=rbpa">Earlier research</a> my colleagues and I conducted at Howard University found that a high proportion of black students in a college or university serves as a boost to black identity and self-esteem. That boost, we found, translates into labor market skill acquisition that results in an earnings advantage. </p>
<p>Given the history of HBCUs receiving <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s41996-018-0009-5">unequal resources</a>, our results suggest that government and philanthropy could consider more funding for HBCUs. That could enable them to be even more successful at what they do, particularly when it comes to enabling students from households that <a href="https://hbcudigest.com/two-charts-show-how-essential-hbcus-are-to-low-income-college-students/">earn the least money</a> to move up economically.</p>
<p>[ <em>Like what you’ve read? Want more?</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=likethis">Sign up for The Conversation’s daily newsletter</a>. ]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/121810/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gregory N. Price receives funding from National Science Foundation. </span></em></p>Graduates of historically black colleges and universities make more than peers who went to other schools, according to new findings that refute prior research that showed they suffer a ‘wage penalty.’Gregory N. Price, Professor, Economics, University of New OrleansLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1207222019-08-16T12:53:13Z2019-08-16T12:53:13ZFree college proposals should include private colleges<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/288077/original/file-20190814-136180-1ihzx3n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Private college students graduate at higher rates, government statistics show.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/multiracial-students-walking-university-hall-during-685407808?src=7JOvhcaapQ_gLo_vpODSlg-1-0">4 PM production/Shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Students can use federal financial aid to attend any college they want, whether public or private. </p>
<p>But the <a href="https://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/high_school_and_beyond/2019/05/4_things_you_need_to_know_about_free_college_proposals.html">“free college” proposals</a> floated by some 2020 presidential candidates would increase federal funding only for community colleges or state-run universities. Private nonprofit universities would be excluded.</p>
<p>The question is: Why? </p>
<p>From my vantage point as scholar of <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=m2X4SScAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">economics of higher education</a>, I see a few factors at play.</p>
<h2>A question of resources</h2>
<p>One is cost. It would be easier to fulfill campaign promises to make higher education “free” by covering only public institutions, which tend to charge lower tuition and to spend less educating each of their students. </p>
<p>But cost and quality tend to go together, and this relationship holds true for higher education.</p>
<p>One way to measure quality is whether students complete their studies as planned. <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d17/tables/dt17_326.10.asp?referer=raceindicators">Four-year completion rates</a> at public institutions trail those at private non-profits by as much as 20% for students of the same race and sex. </p>
<p><iframe id="dbP3H" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/dbP3H/1/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Colleges and universities with more funding and higher tuition – typically private institutions – not only graduate students faster, but their graduates go on to earn <a href="https://cdn.theatlantic.com/static/mt/assets/business/dalekrueger_More_Selective_College.pdf">higher salaries</a> than their peers who graduate from less well-funded colleges, after accounting for differences in student characteristics and selectivity. Several <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/146304">studies</a> have come to <a href="https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/3804/aff8877f9cc4c3082c855ca4e92e2645a915.pdf">similar conclusions</a>: <a href="https://doi.org/10.1086/505067">Educational resources affect earnings</a>.</p>
<p>Since students at public colleges graduate at lower rates and earn lower salaries, they tend to default on their student loans <a href="https://www2.ed.gov/offices/OSFAP/defaultmanagement/schooltyperates.pdf">more often</a> than those who went to private nonprofit colleges. By making federal money available to both public and private colleges, it could lead to fewer students defaulting.</p>
<h2>Quality and spending</h2>
<p>Ideally, federal funds provided by “free college” initiatives would boost quality at colleges and universities. But covering tuition at only public institutions won’t increase the quality of education at these schools unless it means the schools have more money to spend.</p>
<p>Poorer outcomes at public institutions can be <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11162-005-9388-y">explained</a> by lower spending. For example, during the 2015-2016 school year, four-year <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d17/tables/dt17_334.10.asp">public institutions</a> spent about US$12,000 less than four-year <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d17/tables/dt17_334.30.asp">private nonprofits</a> per student per year. Two-year public colleges invest dramatically less.</p>
<p>But the resource problems at colleges won’t get better if federal money merely pays the same tuition that students are paying now. Many state governments <a href="https://www.mhec.org/sites/default/files/resources/mhec_affordability_series3_20170824.pdf">prohibit</a> state colleges and universities from increasing tuition, even as states have <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d17/tables/dt17_333.10.asp">cut the amount of money they spend per student</a>. Tuition caps would prevent public colleges from obtaining the additional resources they need to improve quality.</p>
<p>These price ceilings worsen problems such as <a href="https://trends.collegeboard.org/college-pricing/figures-tables/student-staff-ratio-in-postsecondary-institutions-over-time">high student-to-faculty ratios</a>, <a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/faculty-pay-survey_n_3038924">low instructor pay</a> and <a href="https://www.ppic.org/content/pubs/rb/RB_512HJRB.pdf">restricted course offerings</a>. They also mean schools must <a href="https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:vDBYPxvidhUJ:https://www.chronicle.com/article/More-Public-Universities-Cap/142873+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us">turn away qualified students</a> and allow facilities and equipment to fall into <a href="https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:0Dasw2dBjOIJ:https://www.chronicle.com/article/No-One-Likes-to-Talk-About/242046+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us">disrepair</a>.</p>
<p>Without tuition caps, price would still be limited by market competition. Private nonprofits compete with each other for students and offer education across a range of prices and quality levels.</p>
<p>Some free college proposals call for tying federal funding to <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/2598/text">state matching funds</a>. One prominent example is the Debt-Free College Act of 2018, which is cosponsored by <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/2598/cosponsors">several presidential candidates</a> – Sens. Cory Booker, Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren and Kirsten E. Gillibrand. But demanding more state funding could backfire. Some state governments might turn down federal funding for higher education if it <a href="https://www.apnews.com/8fbf0ba4b11a4c45b1344bdbbe3c94d9">requires states to spend more</a>. The same thing happened when many states turned down <a href="https://www.kff.org/medicaid/issue-brief/status-of-state-medicaid-expansion-decisions-interactive-map/">Medicaid expansion</a>.</p>
<p>Many students won’t attend college unless it is close to home, or is in a city where they hope to settle. Restricting these students to public institutions would limit their choice of academic programs and quality. For example, in <a href="http://bit.ly/2ixsOky">some parts of the country</a>, only private institutions offer programs like business economics or electromechanical engineering. Including private institutions would mean a wider range of choices.</p>
<h2>How it could work</h2>
<p>What could a federal subsidy look like that would empower students to choose the college they believe is best for them?</p>
<p>One option would be a voucher that would fund costs at a school of the student’s choice. For instance, a voucher could cover between 30% and 80% of tuition, fees, books and reasonable living expenses at any accredited public or nonprofit college or university.</p>
<p>Investing more public dollars in higher education boosts income and employment, which leads to <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2551567">more tax revenue</a>, which benefits the general public. </p>
<p>Some candidates have called for <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/6/23/18714615/bernie-sanders-free-college-for-all-2020-student-loan-debt">“means-testing”</a> public funding for higher education. Means-tested funds are only made available to those who can prove they fall below a certain income or wealth threshold.</p>
<p>But public investments in education do not have to be limited to the poor to help the poor. Programs that only benefit the poor are <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Mimi_Abramovitz/publication/11669976_Everyone_Is_Still_on_Welfare_The_Role_of_Redistribution_in_Social_Policy/links/00b7d5145ca8e2220c000000.pdf">more prone to budget cuts</a> than more universal programs. </p>
<p>Including private nonprofit institutions in affordability programs – or “free college” proposals – will benefit middle-income and poor students. Many private nonprofit institutions <a href="http://www.nber.org/papers/w18586">seek to include and assist</a> qualified students from less privileged backgrounds. Indeed, some of the most selective institutions – and typically the best funded – have been among <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/43821938">the most generous</a> with respect to assisting students with financial need. With more government support, private institutions could more easily educate more of these students.</p>
<p>Some might argue that making education funding available to private institutions would divert funding from public universities. But respecting student choice might make these programs more popular and build broader political support for increased funding for higher education.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/120722/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael Simkovic is a Professor of Law and Accounting at the University of Southern California.</span></em></p>The ‘free college’ proposals being floated by 2020 presidential candidates don’t include private colleges. A higher education scholar asks why, especially since privates have higher graduation rates.Michael Simkovic, Professor of Law and Accounting, University of Southern CaliforniaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1164092019-05-02T10:43:07Z2019-05-02T10:43:07ZUniversity of North Carolina at Charlotte shooting has these things in common with other campus shootings<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/272081/original/file-20190501-113839-f59lgk.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Police secure the main entrance to UNC Charlotte after a shooting at the school that left at least two people dead, Tuesday, April 30.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/College-Campus-Shooting-North-Carolina/cde63f7d6fee456abc9c0268bc16806e/11/0">Jason E. Miczek/AP</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The April 30 <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/05/01/us/university-of-north-carolina-charlotte-shooting-wednesday/index.html">shooting at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte</a> follows a familiar pattern of mass shootings at college campuses in the United States. </p>
<p>If authorities better understood these patterns, they may be able to prevent future shootings.</p>
<p>We’re a psychologist and sociologist who have been studying mass shooters in order to develop new prevention strategies. Our research is <a href="https://www.theviolenceproject.org/mass-shooters">part of a grant</a> from the National Institute of Justice.</p>
<p>Part of our work involves looking at the psycho-social life histories of mass shooters from 1966 through the present, as well as the kinds of places where
mass shootings occur.</p>
<p>Mass shootings are defined by the <a href="https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R44126.pdf">FBI</a> as incidents in which four or more people are killed. When mass shootings occur on college campuses, it tends to be at larger, public universities like UNC Charlotte.</p>
<p>Strikingly, more than 70% of campus shootings took place at the end of the school year – in April, May or June – a time that students <a href="https://www.mentalhelp.net/aware/mental-health-on-campus/">report as being the most stressed</a>. The shooting at UNC Charlotte took place on the <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/05/01/us/university-of-north-carolina-charlotte-shooting-wednesday/index.html">last day of classes</a> of the semester. </p>
<p>Indeed, April stands out as a particularly deadly time of the year when it comes to campus mass shootings – the 2007 <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2013/10/31/us/virginia-tech-shootings-fast-facts/index.html">Virginia Tech massacre</a> that claimed 32 lives, and the 2012 <a href="https://www.sfgate.com/crime/article/Oakland-school-massacre-Jury-told-of-5-minutes-5760283.php">Oikos University shooting</a> in Oakland, California, that killed seven and wounded three, both happened in April.</p>
<h2>Characteristics of campus shooters</h2>
<p>The UNC Charlotte shooting is not technically a mass shooting because there were only two fatalities. Two students were killed and four were injured as they listened to <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/05/01/us/university-of-north-carolina-charlotte-shooting-wednesday/index.html">final presentations</a> in <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/live-news/uncc-shooting-multiple-dead-injured-shooting-university-north-carolina-charlotte-today-2019-04-30/">class</a>.</p>
<p>So far, little is publicly available about the UNC Charlotte shooter, but the details emerging show he shares some of the same characteristics as the campus shooters in our data. The UNC Charlotte shooter is a 22-year-old former student of the school who <a href="https://www.wral.com/2-apex-men-among-the-wounded-after-gunman-storms-unc-charlotte-campus/18357454/">recently dropped out</a>.</p>
<p>All of the college mass shooters in our study were male, and the majority – 83% – were in their 20s. Unlike mass shooters at middle and high schools who are mostly white, the majority of mass shooters at college campuses – 83% – were non-white. More specifically, 50% were Asian and 33% were mixed-race. All but one was a current or former student at the university.</p>
<p>All of the university mass shooters in our study were suicidal prior to the shooting and had a history of mental illness. Half had been previously hospitalized. The majority of mass shootings at universities involved a high degree of planning. Most of the mass shooters leaked their plans ahead of time, or at least showed signs of trouble, on <a href="https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-isla-vista-shooting-suspect-felt-alienated-called-himself-magnificent-20140524-story.html">social media</a>, to <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/US/seung-hui-chos-mental-health-records-released/story?id=8278195">mental health professionals</a>, or to <a href="https://prev.dailyherald.com/story/?id=136849">people they knew</a>. </p>
<p>According to publicly available records, all of the university shooters in our database legally purchased their firearms. We do not know yet how the UNC Charlotte shooter obtained his guns.</p>
<h2>Troubled histories</h2>
<p>All of the university mass shooters in our study experienced childhood trauma, and two-thirds were known to have been previously bullied. Analysis of the cases in our database shows that the majority of university mass shooters had a history of previous violence. The background history of the UNC Charlotte shooter is currently unknown. </p>
<p>Reported prevalence rates of university shootings vary widely depending on <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2018/02/19/parkland-school-shootings-not-new-normal-despite-statistics-stretching-truth-fox-column/349380002/">the definition</a> being used. A <a href="http://www.nycrimecommission.org/pdfs/CCC-Aiming-At-Students-College-Shootings-Oct2016.pdf">study of college shootings</a> from 2001 to 2016 identified 149 incidents of gun violence on college campuses, though the vast majority were the result of a dispute, a targeted attack, a robbery or domestic violence. </p>
<p>Our database starts with the 1966 mass shooting at <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Texas-Tower-shooting-of-1966">The University of Texas at Austin</a>, widely considered the <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/tower-film-america-first-mass-shooting-austin-texas/">first mass shooting in modern American history</a>. When focusing on the past 20 years of our data, however, we identified six mass shootings on college and university campuses that meet the <a href="https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R44126.pdf">FBI definition</a> of a mass shooting, which is the same number of <a href="https://theconversation.com/school-shooters-usually-show-these-signs-of-distress-long-before-they-open-fire-our-database-shows-111242">mass shootings at K-12 schools</a>.</p>
<p>The deadliest attack, at <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2013/10/31/us/virginia-tech-shootings-fast-facts/index.html">Virginia Tech University</a> in 2007 in which 32 people died, <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2010-10510-011">changed the nature and role</a> of public safety departments at universities across the country. The recommendations to universities after Virginia Tech mirrored those made to high schools after the 1999 <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-columbine-became-a-blueprint-for-school-shooters-115115">Columbine shooting</a>, including increased cameras and security, communication systems, and increased training and drills for faculty and staff. However, prevention strategies have been <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/us/no-simple-answer-for-preventing-college-campus-shootings-security-experts-say">difficult to identify and implement</a> at universities due to a lack of research and resources.</p>
<h2>Prevention is possible</h2>
<p>Our data shows a distinct pattern in the background of university mass shooters that can help authorities think proactively about evidence-based prevention. University mass shooters are students with histories of trauma, mental illness and violence. They are often actively suicidal and in crisis.</p>
<p>Large universities need strategies to reach out and connect with vulnerable students. Current university funding for <a href="https://www.northcarolinahealthnews.org/2018/08/28/increasing-demand-for-mental-health-services-on-college-campuses/">mental health care on campus</a> is largely <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/college/2017/05/04/more-and-more-students-need-mental-health-services-but-colleges-struggle-to-keep-up/37431099/">inadequate</a>. And, if they aren’t already getting it, faculty and staff need training in how to identify and <a href="http://www.startribune.com/hamline-criminology-expert-says-we-all-can-learn-skills-to-defuse-a-crisis/491659381/">respond to students in crisis</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://threatassessment.vt.edu/">Threat assessment teams</a> at universities can respond to threats of violence by connecting students to needed resources on campus and in the community with long-term follow-up. And the findings from our research suggest <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2019/05/01/red-flag-laws-temporarily-take-away-guns/3521491002/">red flag laws</a>, which allow family or law enforcement to seek a court order to seize a person’s firearms temporarily if the person poses a threat to himself or others, coupled with <a href="https://www.thetrace.org/2019/01/universal-background-checks-reduce-gun-violence-research/">universal background checks</a>, which would require background checks for private gun sales, not just those by licensed dealers, may help avert these tragedies.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/116409/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jillian Peterson receives funding from the National Institute of Justice</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>James Densley receives funding from the National Institute of Justice.</span></em></p>The April 30 shooting at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte isn’t an outlier. Research shows it fits a familiar pattern of campus shootings in terms of time and place.Jillian Peterson, Professor of Criminal Justice, Hamline University James Densley, Professor of Criminal Justice, Metropolitan State University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1148922019-04-17T10:56:18Z2019-04-17T10:56:18ZShould you apply to a college that has had a recent scandal?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/268876/original/file-20190411-44776-1tcdbrt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Most of the nation's top schools experience a major scandal that causes applications to fall, new research shows.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/princeton-nj-10-march-2016-university-394834045">EQRoy from www.shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>When a scandal lands a college at the center of media attention, students and families are often repulsed – quite literally.</p>
<p>That’s what we discovered when we <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/coep.12427">examined admissions data</a> at dozens of schools where scandals took place over roughly a decade.</p>
<p>For instance, we found that in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2013/10/28/us/penn-state-scandal-fast-facts/index.html">child sex abuse scandal</a> at Penn State, applications dropped by 10%, or about 5,000 applicants, from 47,552 to 42,570.</p>
<p>At Dartmouth, applications fell by 3% in 2013 and 14% in 2014 after
Rolling Stone published an <a href="https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/confessions-of-an-ivy-league-frat-boy-inside-dartmouths-hazing-abuses-238604/">exposé</a> about the school’s fraternity hazing culture.</p>
<p>And back in 2006, Duke saw its applications drop by 2% after the <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/US/LegalCenter/story?id=3028515&page=1">Lacrosse rape case</a>.</p>
<p>The dips in applications tend to last about a year or two and then things go back to normal.</p>
<p>We are both economists with an interest in how students choose colleges and the consequences of those decisions.</p>
<p>While we found that applications temporarily drop at colleges that draw negative publicity, there may be some good reasons to apply to a school where a scandal recently took place.</p>
<h2>The silver lining</h2>
<p>First, our research found that around 75% of the U.S. News and World Report Top 100 Universities had a scandal reported by the media from 2001-2013. Simply put, scandals are common across selective college campuses. This suggest that having a scandal doesn’t imply that a school is worse than another school without a scandal - or that a school without a scandal won’t have a scandal in the future.</p>
<p>Second, we found that schools that have a scandal are less likely to have one in the following years than schools that didn’t have a scandal. We don’t believe our findings can be fully explained by the old saying that “lightning never strikes twice.” Rather, we think it is because colleges’ responses in the wake of a scandal – from shutting down fraternities after hazings to boosting campus police to changing administrators – make them less prone to a scandal (and hopefully safer). </p>
<p>Third, we find that fewer students apply to a school after a scandal, likely since scandals temporarily cause a hit to the college’s reputation. The decreased application volume may make it slightly easier to get into the school. </p>
<h2>The aftermath of a scandal</h2>
<p>To conduct our study, we searched for highly visible scandals in national newspapers such as The New York Times and magazines that publish long-form articles such as Rolling Stone. Just to be sure we caught the big scandals, we used a commercially available news archives site and found the same results. We placed scandals in four categories: sexual assaults, homicides, hazings and academic cheating scandals.</p>
<p>Examining the top 100 schools in the U.S. News and World Report National University Rankings from 2001-2013, we found that roughly 75% of schools in our dataset experienced a scandal that attracted media coverage. The scandals that became highly publicized witnessed a roughly 10% average decrease in the following year’s entering freshman applications.</p>
<p>We didn’t find that scandals had any impact on incoming students’ SAT scores or school yield – that is, the number of admitted students who actually go to the school. We also didn’t find any impact on alumni donations.</p>
<p>It’s worth noting that not all college scandals are the same. While we didn’t find any differences by scandal category, <a href="https://www.nber.org/papers/w24852">a recent study</a> has shown that Title IX investigations at less selective schools lead to an increase in applications, likely due to the adage “all press is good press” for these less prominent schools. This nuance is important for predicting the impacts of scandals, like the ongoing bribery scandal uncovered by the Department of Justice’s Operation Varsity Blues. Applications to schools with scandals could rise or fall based on the school’s selectivity and how much attention the scandal gets in the media.</p>
<p>So why do students and families tend to avoid highly selective schools that have recently experienced scandals?</p>
<h2>Rational behavior</h2>
<p>These scandals might provoke emotional reactions that overtake other factors that students and families consider.</p>
<p>Research has shown that applicants tend to rely on <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0272775716301248">simple metrics and pathways in their decision-making processes</a>. In the absence of such an event, applicants might be more likely to accurately weigh the many pieces of information, such as a school’s academic strength or extracurricular offerings, in the complex calculus of choosing a college.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/114892/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>When scandals take place at a college, the natural reaction for some people is to avoid the school. But two economists suggest potential applicants think hard about their decision.Jonathan Smith, Assistant Professor of Economics, Georgia State UniversityPatrick Rooney, PhD Candidate, University of TorontoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1149042019-04-05T23:58:05Z2019-04-05T23:58:05ZIn the name of ‘amateurism,’ college athletes make money for everyone except themselves<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/267884/original/file-20190405-180010-19atsg6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">College athletes are prohibited from profiting from their performance.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/APTOPIX-NCAA-Villanova-Purdue-Basketball/d933b6446f6149a2949c85af678d36c2/3/0">Jessica Hill/AP</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>As millions of people tune in to watch the Final Four, much of their focus will be on the numbers on the scoreboard. But a March 2019 report from U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy, a Democrat from Connecticut, calls attention to numbers of a different sort.</p>
<p>The report – titled “<a href="https://www.murphy.senate.gov/download/madness-inc">Madness, Inc.</a>” – details just how much money other people make off Division I athletes versus how much money is being spent on their college education.</p>
<p>Here are three points from the report that struck me as a <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?view_op=list_works&hl=en&user=btoK1KsAAAAJ">researcher</a> who studies the structure and culture of <a href="https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdSzb2A2auz4zMVysCKSjTlx8HA_pZdaoNPZ0nh5FsuI8JsFw/viewform">academic life for student-athletes</a> at Division I schools.</p>
<h2>College athletes matter to billion-dollar companies</h2>
<p>When one of the Nike shoes being worn by Duke’s Zion Williamson blew out just seconds into the <a href="https://espnmediazone.com/us/press-releases/2019/02/north-carolina-duke-third-highest-rated-regular-season-college-basketball-game-on-record-for-espn/">highly anticipated</a> game between Duke and the University of North Carolina this spring, it showed the increasingly important role that top men’s basketball players play in generating revenue for corporations – not just the schools for which they play.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/267879/original/file-20190405-180029-1akhm5e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/267879/original/file-20190405-180029-1akhm5e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/267879/original/file-20190405-180029-1akhm5e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267879/original/file-20190405-180029-1akhm5e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267879/original/file-20190405-180029-1akhm5e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=436&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267879/original/file-20190405-180029-1akhm5e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=548&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267879/original/file-20190405-180029-1akhm5e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=548&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267879/original/file-20190405-180029-1akhm5e.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=548&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Duke’s Zion Williamson sits on the floor following a freak injury that took place when his Nike shoe blew out in a game against North Carolina, on Feb. 20.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/North-Carolina-Duke-Basketball/194c86fd2e4540db9760fe8e7a908494/1/0">Gerry Broome/AP</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As noted in the “Madness, Inc.” report, more than 4 million people were watching when Williamson’s shoe failed. After depriving that huge audience of their star, it’s not hard to see why <a href="https://ftw.usatoday.com/2019/02/nike-stock-zion-williamson-injury">Nike’s stock dropped</a>.</p>
<p>Though they are considered student-athletes, the young men who play Division I football basketball are often much more. Quite a few of them are celebrities.</p>
<p>Yet, the NCAA wants to maintain the “amateurism” of college sports. Even though many of these players are nationally recognizable and influential figures, they are prohibited from profiting from their social status. Meanwhile, the people who surround these players, including <a href="https://www.si.com/college-basketball/2019/04/01/kentucky-offers-john-calipari-lifetime-contract-counter-ucla">coaches</a> and <a href="https://sports.yahoo.com/usc-athletic-director-lynn-swann-signed-autographs-for-money-this-weekend-amid-admissions-scandal-fallout-041710651.html">athletic directors</a>, make major money off of these players’ performance.</p>
<p>As noted in the report, college sports programs took in <a href="https://ope.ed.gov/athletics/#/">US$14 billion</a> in 2018 through ticket sales, television contracts, apparel deals and merchandise sales. Tickets for the game in which Zion’s Nike shoe blew out, sold for <a href="https://www.si.com/college-basketball/2019/02/19/duke-unc-ticket-prices-acc-rivalry-game-over-4000-zion-williamson">$4,000 each</a>, with revenue going back to participating schools. There were also purchases of <a href="https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/sports/2016/09/07/iowa-hawkeyes-iowa-state-cyclones-college-athletics-apparel-contracts-nike-under-armour-adidas/89788040/">merchandise</a> by fans online, on campus and at the game. The game aired on ESPN and drew the <a href="https://www.sportsmediawatch.com/2019/02/unc-duke-overnights-espn/">highest rating</a> of any regular season basketball game ever. The ACC conference championship rematch was the <a href="https://keepingitheel.com/2019/03/17/unc-basketball-north-carolina-duke-record-breaking-ratings-espn/">most watched</a> conference championship of all time. For ESPN, this level of interest is more than worth the $1 billion they <a href="https://collegebasketball.ap.org/article/uconn-expresses-reservations-about-aac-media-deal-espn">recently paid</a> ACC schools for exclusive rights to broadcast ACC sports over the next 12 years. </p>
<h2>Colleges value coaches’ labor more than their players</h2>
<p>Revenue generated from NCAA sports is concentrated among a small number of schools. </p>
<p>Just 65 schools out of 2,078 in the NCAA – less than 3% – were responsible for $7.6 billion in revenue in 2018. That’s more than half of all college sports revenue.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/267885/original/file-20190405-180052-xnt46y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/267885/original/file-20190405-180052-xnt46y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/267885/original/file-20190405-180052-xnt46y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267885/original/file-20190405-180052-xnt46y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267885/original/file-20190405-180052-xnt46y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267885/original/file-20190405-180052-xnt46y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267885/original/file-20190405-180052-xnt46y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267885/original/file-20190405-180052-xnt46y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Auburn head coach Bruce Pearl is set to earn $2.6 million in 2018-19 with $100,000 increases per year for a total of $14 million through 2022-23.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Final-Four-Basketball/cd5624bc03b24484a3bccd262044ea09/9/0">Jeff Roberson</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>How this money is split reveals who is prioritized in the current college sports structure. These priorities become clear when you compare coaches’ salaries to the average athletic scholarship.</p>
<p>According to the “Madness, Inc.” report, $986 million is spent annually on student-athlete scholarships at these schools to support 45,000 student athletes. That ends up being just under $22,000 per student. By comparison, approximately $1.2 billion is spent annually on coaches’ salaries to pay just 4,400 coaches. That averages out to about $273,000 per coach per year.</p>
<p>Make no mistake, the players work hard. The work they do involves much more than what fans see. In addition to regular season practice, team meetings and film sessions, there are media training and appearances, playoff practice and a lot of travel. As I have found in prior research, these activities severely <a href="https://theconversation.com/its-naive-to-think-college-athletes-have-time-for-school-100942">limit the time</a> these students have for academics. Despite the <a href="https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/sports/2016/09/07/iowa-hawkeyes-iowa-state-cyclones-college-athletics-apparel-contracts-nike-under-armour-adidas/89788040/">extra work</a> they do, the financial aid given to student-athletes on revenue-generating teams is <a href="http://www.scholarshipstats.com/average-per-athlete.html">remarkably similar</a> to what is given other student-athletes who don’t have all these additional responsibilities.</p>
<h2>The NCAA is a corporate entity</h2>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/267875/original/file-20190405-180052-hatm5x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/267875/original/file-20190405-180052-hatm5x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/267875/original/file-20190405-180052-hatm5x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267875/original/file-20190405-180052-hatm5x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267875/original/file-20190405-180052-hatm5x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267875/original/file-20190405-180052-hatm5x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267875/original/file-20190405-180052-hatm5x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267875/original/file-20190405-180052-hatm5x.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">NCAA President Mark Emmert at the 2019 Final Four college basketball tournament.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Final-Four-Basketball/08610e5d488a4a9aad908ed86b7783f2/60/0">Matt York/AP</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Although the National Collegiate Athletic Association began as an organization focused on sports and education, those two things are no longer balanced in NCAA sports. Broadcast rights and marketing deals have all but eliminated the spirit of amateurism used to justify the maintenance of scholarship aid as appropriate compensation for revenue-generating student-athletes.</p>
<p>Sports apparel companies engage in <a href="https://www.bizjournals.com/portland/blog/threads_and_laces/2015/04/nike-and-adidas-prepare-forncaa-apparel-war-heats.html">bidding wars</a> for logo placement on jerseys. </p>
<p>The evolution of the NCAA from a nonprofit to a billion-dollar corporation is especially clear to the players. When the NCAA <a href="https://twitter.com/NCAA/status/1107386124081811457">tweeted</a> a feel-good commercial detailing a day in the life of a student-athlete, current and former football and basketball players challenged the portrayal of their experiences as generally positive. Some even detailed what the NCAA got wrong about their <a href="https://twitter.com/ZachariahFiya/status/1108247171239948289">busy schedules</a>.</p>
<p>The players told a different story about their lives as athletes. One, Cameron Johnson of the North Carolina Tar Heels, told a newspaper that the life of a college athlete “<a href="https://www.newsobserver.com/sports/article228352354.html">ain’t a breezy existence</a>.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/114904/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jasmine Harris does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>As the nation prepares to watch the Final Four, a sports scholar examines new information that shows how college athletes make money for their schools, coaches and corporations – but not themselves.Jasmine Harris, Assistant Professor of Sociology, Ursinus CollegeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1145562019-04-04T10:45:12Z2019-04-04T10:45:12ZWhat parents should do to help students prepare for the first year of college<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/267362/original/file-20190403-177190-klkowb.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">First-year college students frequently report being stressed.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/side-view-two-tired-overworked-students-357965954">Antonio Guillem from www.shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>As the school year begins to wind down, high school seniors – and those who care about them – typically have their eyes on two prizes: getting into college and graduating from high school.</p>
<p>While both milestones are worthy of celebration, there’s much more that students and parents should do after those two milestones are reached. </p>
<p>That’s the message of our new book, “<a href="https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250225184">How to College: What to Know Before You Go (and When You’re There)</a>,” co-authored with Andrea Malkin Brenner, an education consultant and former program director and sociology professor at American University. The recommendations in our book are based on two decades of <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=yTnATSQAAAAJ&hl=en">teaching</a> and designing programs for thousands of first-year college students, such as “<a href="https://www.american.edu/provost/undergrad/auexperience/index.cfm">The American University Experience</a>,” a course that helps new students adjust to university life. </p>
<p>We also spoke to college faculty and staff about the many ways that new students arrive on campus underprepared for their first semester of college and incorporate tips from college students about what they wish they had known when they first arrived on campus.</p>
<p>Knowing what to expect can make a major difference in a student’s psychological well-being. Many first-year college students report feeling “<a href="https://theharrispoll.com/the-jed-foundation-partnership-for-drug-free-kids-and-the-jordan-porco-foundation-today-released-the-results-of-a-national-first-year-college-experience-survey-exploring-the-challe/">stressed most or all of the time</a>,” regardless of where they go to college. A national survey of first-year college students conducted by the JED Foundation, which studies college students’ mental health issues, found that students who feel emotionally unprepared for college were more likely to report <a href="https://www.jedfoundation.org/first-year-college-experience-release/">poor academic performance and negative college experiences</a>.</p>
<p>In recognition of how stressful the first year of college can be, here are five things that we believe can help ease the transition.</p>
<h2>1. Make it OK to ask for help</h2>
<p>While new college students may be intent upon gaining independence, it’s important to stress that knowing when to ask for help is actually a sign of maturity. Along those lines, it’s important to encourage students to seek out the various resources that might be available on campus, such as a counseling center, financial aid office or wellness center. Students who need it should also seek out academic support and tutoring programs. There are also programs to support students with disabilities, as well as diversity and inclusion programs for students who may not feel welcome on campus.</p>
<p>Students should be encouraged to <a href="http://www.academicinfo.net/campus-life/smart-students-take-full-advantage-of-campus-resources">research the support systems</a> that exist on campus before leaving home instead of waiting until they arrive.</p>
<h2>2. Develop empathy</h2>
<p>Parents and soon-to-be college students should discuss the time when the parent first left home and what the challenges were. By discussing what worried or excited the parent the most, and what the parent wishes they would have known before moving out, the parent and student can develop a <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2017/04/16/523592625/-when-i-was-your-age-and-other-conversational-pitfalls-of-talking-to-teens">better understanding</a> and bond over the similarities and differences of their experiences, regardless as to whether the parent attended college.</p>
<h2>3. Discuss your expectations</h2>
<p>The way that parents communicate their expectations can <a href="https://sciences.ucf.edu/sociology/parents-expectations-styles-can-harm-college-students-self-esteem/">affect college students’ self-esteem</a>.</p>
<p>In our book, we suggest several prompts for things to discuss that range from <a href="https://www.collegeparentcentral.com/2017/07/discussing-campus-safety-with-your-college-student-2/">personal safety</a> to religious observance away from home. Other topics include how often parents and their children who are in college will communicate with each other, to how the student should obtain health insurance and budget money. </p>
<p>Having explicit conversations with supporting adults will help prepare first-year students to more confidently face the challenges they encounter on their own without parental support (such as the first time a student experiences an illness or injury in college) and reduce the chance of family conflicts that arise from differing expectations. </p>
<p>For instance, disputes can arise from something as simple as what to do on move-in day. We’ve found that many parents see move-in day as a last special day together, while students often view it as the first day in their new community, not a time for family togetherness. In our book, we recommend that students and their families discuss their expectations about move-in day. Who will be present? Will a parent help unpack and make the bed, or will the family leave once you are unpacked? </p>
<p>Students and parents should also discuss their expectations about academic work. Will the student provide frequent reports? Do the parents understand that college professors and deans do not communicate with parents about grades? </p>
<h2>4. Emphasize what professors will expect</h2>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/267365/original/file-20190403-177184-i51tf8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/267365/original/file-20190403-177184-i51tf8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267365/original/file-20190403-177184-i51tf8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267365/original/file-20190403-177184-i51tf8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267365/original/file-20190403-177184-i51tf8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267365/original/file-20190403-177184-i51tf8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/267365/original/file-20190403-177184-i51tf8.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Expectations in college vary starkly from what students are expected to do in high school.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/back-view-greyhaired-woman-teacher-stading-1152031997">LStockStudio from www.shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>College level work comes with a new set of standards and expectations that are starkly different from what students are accustomed to in high school. Anticipating these higher standards can save students the time and trouble of finding out these things the hard way after the fact.</p>
<p>High school students can often count on reminders about when assignments are due, and high school teachers provide frequent feedback about how students are doing in class. In college, students must keep up with their work on their own. A midterm exam and final paper might be the only grades a student receives in a semester. For those reasons, students should plan to visit their professors during office hours to speak about their progress.</p>
<p>The writing required of college students is also vastly different from that required in high school. In high school, most writing is expository – explaining what you know. In college, most writing will be persuasive – making original claims and providing supporting evidence. We recommend that before leaving for college, students consider the types of assignments they’ve been asked to do in high school. Do they have experience writing persuasive papers? They should also consider the feedback they’ve received on their written work. What do teachers say they need to improve? Have they been told they write passionate opinions but need to work on supporting their claims? Students should set a goal to move forward in their writing, and plan to discuss their goal with their professors in office hours before the first paper is due.</p>
<p>Plagiarism and cheating is also dealt with differently in college. In high school, teachers might handle cheating and plagiarism themselves. But in college, plagiarism and cheating violate the school’s academic integrity code or honor code and result in larger penalties – including failing a course, suspension, academic probation, or in some cases, expulsion. </p>
<h2>5. Expect mistakes, encourage resilience</h2>
<p>Faculty and staff expect first-year students to make rookie mistakes as they get familiar with the demands of college.</p>
<p>Students don’t need to have it all figured out when they arrive on campus. Chances are new students miss an assignment deadline, lose something of importance, fail a test, or sleep in and miss a class during their first semester. Assure your almost-college student that mistakes are part of learning and that mistakes are not only OK, but also expected.</p>
<p>It is the <a href="https://aura.antioch.edu/etds/254/">resilience</a> that students show – that is, the ability to adjust to circumstances in the face of adversity and own up to their mistakes – that is a hallmark of being a responsible adult.</p>
<p>_Andrea Malkin Brenner, co-author of “How to College: What to Know Before You Go (And When You’re There),” co-authored this article.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/114556/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lara Schwartz does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>While the first year of college can be stressful, using the time between high school graduation and the college drop-off to prepare can help ease the transition, two educators say in a new book.Lara Schwartz, Director, Project on Civil Discourse, American University School of Public AffairsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1141462019-03-28T10:40:24Z2019-03-28T10:40:24ZNet price calculators were supposed to make it easier to understand the cost of college – instead, many are making it more difficult<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265395/original/file-20190322-36244-1bdszbv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">New research uncovers problems with a 'calculator' that colleges must put online to make it easier for prospective students to understand the cost of college.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/young-african-american-man-on-laptop-1029688297">Tina Gutierrez from www.shutterstock.com</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Ever <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/report-your-data/resource-center-net-price">since 2011</a>, colleges that get federal student aid have been required to post <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/report-your-data/resource-center-net-price#Template">net price calculators</a> on their websites. These calculators are supposed to help prospective students understand – before they apply – how much it will cost to attend a particular school.</p>
<p>But in a <a href="https://www.ahead-penn.org/research-projects/questioning-net-price-calculators">new study</a>, we found that not all colleges and universities have a net price calculator that is easy to find or that consistently works. We were able to navigate from an institution’s home page to the net price calculator for 88 percent of the 80 institutions in our study. Despite repeated efforts, we were unable to find a net price calculator on the websites of two institutions. For five other institutions, the link to the calculator did not consistently work.</p>
<p>Perhaps more worrisome – we also found that at least a third of the colleges and universities in our study are presenting information in ways that may mislead students and families about what they should expect to pay if they attend a given school. </p>
<p>One of us is a scholar who studies <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=MpiZLOEAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">how students decide to enroll in college</a>, while the other looks at issues of <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ecTgyEUAAAAJ&hl=en">college finance</a>. </p>
<p>For this study, we examined the websites of 80 public and private not-for-profit four-year institutions where at least one out of every four students receives a <a href="https://studentaid.ed.gov/sa/types/grants-scholarships/pell">Pell grant</a>, which are grants for students with exceptional financial need. The schools in our study all are classified by Barron’s as having “competitive” admissions – they are not the nation’s “most,” “highly” or “very” competitive. “Competitive” institutions admit many but not all applicants, and include large state universities as well as private liberal arts colleges. </p>
<h2>Cost distortion</h2>
<p>Our study shows the persistence of problematic findings documented in <a href="https://ticas.org/net-price-calculator-publications-and-resources">an earlier study</a>. For example, despite repeated efforts, we were unable to find a net price calculator on the websites of two institutions. For five other institutions, the link to the calculator did not consistently work.</p>
<p>Among net price calculators that we could find and that did work, our study found no shortage of examples of misleading presentations of the expected cost of attendance. About 40 percent of the schools in our study provided estimates using data that were three or four years old, ignoring the reality that tuition and other costs typically increase each year. Some schools emphasized an out-of-pocket cost that includes only the costs of tuition and fees and room and board, even though going to college comes with other costs, including books. Other institutions showed that both grants and loans will reduce out of pocket costs without making it clear that – unlike grants – loans have to be paid back. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/266124/original/file-20190327-139371-1fs9vy4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/266124/original/file-20190327-139371-1fs9vy4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=847&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266124/original/file-20190327-139371-1fs9vy4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=847&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266124/original/file-20190327-139371-1fs9vy4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=847&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266124/original/file-20190327-139371-1fs9vy4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1064&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266124/original/file-20190327-139371-1fs9vy4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1064&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266124/original/file-20190327-139371-1fs9vy4.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1064&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Example of net price calculator output for institution emphasizing out-of-pocket costs after loans and ignoring indirect costs, such as books and personal expenses.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The U.S. Department charges institutions with monitoring <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/report-your-data/resource-center-net-price">their own compliance</a> with the law. The lack of attention to compliance with the law – as well as the use of other misleading and confusing practices – can have important implications. Students who think a school costs too much, or that they won’t get enough grant aid, may end up bypassing schools they can actually afford. And students who underestimate how much it costs to go to a particular school may become get sidetracked if they enroll but end up not having the financial resources they need to pay the actual costs.</p>
<p>We don’t know if colleges and universities are using these misleading calculators on purpose or out of negligence. But whatever the case may be, colleges can make some simple changes to the net price calculators that will help prospective students more easily understand and compare cost estimates across colleges and universities.</p>
<h2>Simple fixes</h2>
<p>First, all colleges and universities should have a net price calculator that is easy to find and that consistently works. The output from the net price calculator should highlight only one net price. The highlighted net price should meet the <a href="https://collegecost.ed.gov/catc/">federal government’s definition</a>, which is cost of attendance minus grants and scholarships. It should also include all costs of attendance, and use data for the current or prior year. The net price calculator should specify the types of grants students may be eligible to receive – and tell students what they need to do to receive them. And it should make clear that, unlike grants, loans need to be repaid with interest. Providing students with estimates of the aid they may expect is the purpose of the net price calculator. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/266125/original/file-20190327-139368-opm5jr.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/266125/original/file-20190327-139368-opm5jr.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=667&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266125/original/file-20190327-139368-opm5jr.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=667&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266125/original/file-20190327-139368-opm5jr.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=667&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266125/original/file-20190327-139368-opm5jr.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=838&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266125/original/file-20190327-139368-opm5jr.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=838&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/266125/original/file-20190327-139368-opm5jr.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=838&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Example NPC output that includes all cost, disaggregates aid and calculates one net price.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>To be useful to all students, net price calculators should provide estimates that reflect a student’s circumstances and choices. The estimates should be dynamic so that they can show the costs and aid for all kinds of students, such as those who are financially independent and are not U.S. citizens. The calculators should also tell students if costs vary based on major, residence hall or meal plan. Schools should also make it easy for students to get answers to their questions.</p>
<p>Federal policymakers should also take action to address these issues. Bipartisan legislation proposed March 27 by members of the U.S. House and Senate – formally known as the <a href="https://cummings.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/cummings-guthrie-introduce-legislation-make-college-costs-more">Net Price Calculator Improvement Act</a> – would take steps toward addressing problems found in this study.</p>
<p>Among other things, the proposed bill would require colleges to place their calculators on webpages “where students and families are likely to look for cost and admissions information.” It would also authorize the U.S. Department of Education to develop a “universal calculator” that would allow students “to answer one set of financial and academic questions” and receive a list of net prices that could be readily compared. It also implies the importance of understanding the best ways to communicate information about college costs to students from low-income families. More specifically, it would “require the Department of Education to submit a report on the steps the Department has taken to raise awareness of Net Price Calculators.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/114146/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>This research was supported by a grant from Lumina Foundation. Findings and opinions are those of the authors and may not reflect the views of the funder. Laura Perna is James S. Riepe Professor at the University of Pennsylvania and Executive Director of the Alliance for Higher Education (Penn AHEAD). She is also a member of the Board of the Postsecondary National Policy Institute (PNPI).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jeremy Wright-Kim does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>While net price calculators are meant to help students figure out how much a particular college will cost, a new study reveals that many colleges’ calculators distort the true cost of attendance.Laura Perna, Professor of Higher Education, University of PennsylvaniaJeremy Wright-Kim, PhD Student, Higher Education, University of PennsylvaniaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1140592019-03-22T10:45:12Z2019-03-22T10:45:12ZWhat President Trump’s executive order on campus free speech is really meant to do<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/265215/original/file-20190321-93032-cb0wp4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">President Donald Trump holds up an executive order requiring colleges to certify that their policies support free speech as a condition of receiving federal research grants.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Trump/5653ca3fb09c4396a1390a66cdd55c8e/11/0">Jacquelyn Martin/AP</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The <a href="https://www.chronicle.com/article/Trump-Says-He-ll-Sign-Order/245812">much anticipated</a> executive order that President Donald Trump issued March 21 to protect free speech on campus is about politics, not policy.</p>
<p>The proof is in the <a href="https://www.chronicle.com/article/here-s-what-trump-s/245943?cid=bn&cid=bn&utm_medium=en&utm_source=bn">executive order</a> itself. The order implies that campuses that limit speech will lose federal grants. However, the free speech aspects of the order demand that universities to do what they do already.</p>
<p>The order directs 11 federal agencies that make research and education grants “to ensure institutions that receive Federal research or education grants promote free inquiry, including through compliance with all applicable Federal laws, regulations, and policies.”</p>
<p>Public institutions are already <a href="https://www.aclu.org/other/speech-campus">bound by law</a> to uphold the First Amendment. And, <a href="https://www.thefire.org/spotlight/public-and-private-universities/">as First Amendment watchdogs note</a>, most private universities protect speech. Universities are already required to comply with numerous <a href="https://compliance.berkeley.edu/laws-regulations">civil rights and equal protection laws</a> to qualify for federal funding. </p>
<h2>Political context</h2>
<p>The order comes at a time when many of Trump’s core supporters are concerned with what they <a href="https://www.wpxi.com/news/national-news/ap-top-news/proposed-order-on-campus-speech-follows-wave-of-complaints-1/927649130">perceive to be a culture of political correctness</a> in American higher education. In response to these political concerns, Trump <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/trump-threatens-uc-berkeleys-funding-after-violent-protests-shut-down-a-speaker/2017/02/02/2a13198a-e984-11e6-b82f-687d6e6a3e7c_story.html?utm_term=.8b64e29f7aa7">first threatened</a> to pull federal research funding from the University of California at Berkeley in 2017 after the school canceled a scheduled appearance by incendiary speaker Milo Yiannopoulos. The president repeated his promise to pull federal research dollars from campuses that do not protect the First Amendment in a <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/remarks-president-trump-2019-conservative-political-action-conference/">speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference</a> in February of this year. </p>
<p>The campus free speech executive order is the president’s attempt to make good on the promise to his political base.</p>
<p>It is not clear how the order would work or be enforced. But if the free speech order is political symbolism, why does it matter? As a scholar who studies the <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=dlN3SccAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">politics of higher education and research funding</a>, I believe the order matters in the following ways.</p>
<h2>Mostly about student outcomes</h2>
<p>The biggest likely impact of the order has nothing to do with free speech. </p>
<p>The order directs the Department of Education to provide more granular information about student debt and earnings on <a href="https://collegescorecard.ed.gov">the College Scorecard</a>. The Obama administration <a href="https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/blog/2013/02/13/obama-administration-launches-college-scorecard">set up the Scorecard</a> to provide information about college affordability and outcomes.</p>
<p>Under the order, institutions will have to give the Department of Education program-specific information about how much their graduates earn and how well they are doing at paying back their student loans.</p>
<p>In this sense, the order is an extension of long-term and bipartisan federal market-based education policy. The idea is that college affordability and student outcomes can help students make better informed choices about which college to attend.</p>
<h2>Federal research dollars at stake</h2>
<p>The order may also have some potential consequences to scientific research.</p>
<p>In 2017 the federal government spent over <a href="https://ncsesdata.nsf.gov/herd/2017/html/herd2017_dst_05.html">US$40 billion</a> on academic research, which supported included studies vital to improving health and public welfare. The University of California at Berkeley, for example, alone received $330 million in federal research funds. Pulling those funds to settle a political score would damage university finances and impede the course of science.</p>
<p>Holding a high standard for speech protection could also have consequences for the president’s base. Liberty University, headed by Trump ally Jerry Falwell Jr., has been cited by free speech advocates as having a <a href="https://www.thefire.org/10-worst-colleges-for-free-speech-2019/">repressive climate</a> for free expression. However, in 2017 Liberty won only <a href="https://ncsesdata.nsf.gov/herd/2017/html/herd2017_dst_05.html">$120,000 in federal research grants</a> – so it doesn’t have much to lose.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/114059/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Brendan Cantwell does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Though largely political and symbolic, the campus free speech order that President Trump issued matters because it ties millions of federal research dollars to how well colleges protect free speech.Brendan Cantwell, Associate Professor of Higher, Adult, and Lifelong Education, Michigan State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1084622019-02-26T11:40:15Z2019-02-26T11:40:15ZAmazon pullout from NYC shows the perils of partnerships between higher education and business<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259350/original/file-20190216-56236-100nb4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Amazon's plan to locate its second headquarters in New York City fell through.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Amazon-HQ/62a3c4a4fb584c38abd7efb3ca4a604f/7/0">Mark Lennihan/AP</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Amazon’s recent decision to pull out of plans to establish a new headquarters in New York City received a lot of attention. Much of it focused on whether the <a href="https://www.marketwatch.com/story/what-amazons-hq2-means-for-taxpayers-in-new-york-and-virginia-2018-11-14">big tax breaks</a> the company would have gotten as part of the deal were fair and reasonable.</p>
<p>Noting that the company would have brought 25,000 new jobs and major revenue to the region, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo called the pullout the “<a href="https://nypost.com/2019/02/22/cuomo-amazon-pullout-is-greatest-tragedy-ive-seen-in-politics/">the greatest tragedy I have seen since I’ve been in politics</a>.”</p>
<p>I study the <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=QopoQ1MAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">nexus of business, science and academic research</a>. From that vantage point, I think a different implication of Amazon’s decision needs attention.</p>
<p>But first a little background on the Amazon deal.</p>
<h2>In search of academic partners</h2>
<p>Amazon started searching for places to build a second corporate headquarters in 2017. Its request for proposals asked cities and regions to highlight creative partnerships with local colleges and universities. The idea was to make sure the new headquarters location could meet the company’s needs for a highly skilled <a href="http://www.documentcloud.org/documents/4114187-Amazon-HQ2-RFP.html">technical workforce</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.chronicle.com/article/Amazon-Mania-Revealed-These-3/245267">“Amazon mania”</a> ensued, prompting 238 proposals from interested cities and regions. In late 2018, Amazon chose two: Arlington, Virginia, and New York City. Both are home to – or surrounded by – many colleges and universities that do extensive work in areas of interest to Amazon.</p>
<p>On Virginia campuses, Amazon’s decision led to stepped up efforts in “<a href="https://www.chronicle.com/article/Amazon-Mania-Revealed-These-3/245267">Amazon-related fields</a>” such as business, computer science and math.</p>
<p>Virginia Tech is moving quickly to complete a US$1 billion “<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2018/11/14/amazon-hq-arrival-spurs-virginia-tech-build-technology-campus-northern-virginia/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.de4d098de53a">innovation campus</a>.” That campus will emphasize topics such as artificial intelligence and cybersecurity that are of special interest to Amazon. It will be located just minutes from HQ2.</p>
<p>Similar plans were being pursued in New York City. Several area universities, such as CUNY, NYU and Cornell Tech, developed <a href="https://therealdeal.com/2018/12/22/cornell-tech-nycs-hq2-trump-card/">research and partnership plans</a> to help Amazon meet its needs. But Amazon ran into <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/14/tech/amazon-hq2-statement/index.html">political opposition</a> from elected officials and community activists in New York City who were opposed to the nearly <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/amazons-pivot-raises-scrutiny-of-incentive-deals-11550259076">$3 billion</a> in tax incentives the company would receive. That resistance led the company to back out of the New York headquarters deal. Amazon’s withdrawal imperils the plans that the New York colleges developed to help attract it. Which brings us to a problem I think needs more consideration.</p>
<p>When colleges and universities rush to make sure that Amazon – or any other company – has what it needs, they run the risk of damaging the very things that make them unique and valuable to their communities in the long term.</p>
<h2>A narrow focus</h2>
<p>The first risk is narrowing their work. This is particularly the case when universities step up efforts in a few fields of immediate interest to a particular business partner without attending to other aspects of their missions. </p>
<p>As I argue in my new book, <a href="https://www.sup.org/books/title/?id=26387">“Research Universities and the Public Good: Discovery for an Uncertain Future</a>,” universities are a special kind of “anchor tenant” for their regions. They make good anchors because they are relatively open, committed to their places, and unlikely to go out of business. Their broad research and teaching allows them to engage with many different interest groups. That, in turn, helps make their communities more resilient and innovative.</p>
<p>Those things are endangered when campuses yoke themselves to the current needs of particular companies and industries whose situations and needs can change quickly.</p>
<p>The challenge is to ensure that new investments and activities to address particular partnerships do not come at the cost of pruning or ignoring other areas – such as social sciences, arts and humanities, education, urban planning or social work – that might be less immediately relevant to business but important to other stakeholders.</p>
<p>In the case of Amazon, both <a href="https://vt.edu/innovationcampus/index.html">Virginia</a> and <a href="https://tech.cornell.edu/programs/phd-studies/">New York</a> universities chose to emphasize computer science, engineering, business and mathematics exclusively in their plans.</p>
<p>I think a narrow focus that closely aligns university work with near-term business needs is perilous. One of the dangers is that powerful corporate partners might <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048733303000453">control universities</a> by formally or informally shaping the direction of their research and teaching. The result can be lower impact research and potentially fewer career possibilities for students.</p>
<h2>Things change</h2>
<p>The other risk that universities face when they rush to serve the needs of a particular business is that companies work on tight time horizons, and may change direction or just up and leave – as Amazon did in New York City.</p>
<p>The different agendas and concerns of higher education and business mean that when universities overcommit to the needs of a single partner, they may be left hanging.</p>
<p>That’s what happened with the University of California, Berkeley’s famous deal with <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/book/9803">Novartis</a> – a Swiss-based pharmaceutical company –in the late 1990s. There, concerns about academic freedom, corporate control of university activities and the deal’s impact on faculty and students loomed large. </p>
<p>Changing industrial conditions ultimately led the company to shift its focus away from the university. The joint Berkeley-Novartis research deal ultimately <a href="https://www.chronicle.com/article/Peer-Reviewers-Give-Thumbs/103070">dissolved in 2003</a> after the company spun out its agricultural division. A similar, 2007, $350 million deal between Berkeley and oil company BP went south when <a href="https://alumni.berkeley.edu/california-magazine/just-in/2015-02-20/not-so-fast-uc-berkeley-biofuel-research-takes-hit-bp-oil">oil prices dropped</a> in 2015.</p>
<p>More recently, <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2018/11/5/18064346/foxconn-deal-wisconsin-madison-university-partnership-students-ip">students expressed concerns</a> about a $100 million deal between the University of Wisconsin and Foxconn. Graduate students were worried about corporate control over academic research and ownership of intellectual property. In the Foxconn case, a lack of transparency and certainty about the process and <a href="https://www.fastcompany.com/90262695/foxconns-wisconsin-factory-is-shrouded-in-questionable-dealings">Foxconn’s changes</a> to a companion deal with the state of Wisconsin highlight conflicts between business and community needs.</p>
<p>The bottom line is that when colleges and universities focus on a single business or industry’s needs they run serious risks. If corporate deals come at the cost of broader research and teaching portfolios, universities put their stability, credibility and the expertise they need in other fields on the line. Those are the very things that make them good anchors for regional economies and communities.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/108462/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jason Owen-Smith receives funding from the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation.</span></em></p>When colleges rush to serve the needs of business, they risk losing sight of their purpose and entering into bad deals with a selfish partner, a scholar of research and business argues.Jason Owen-Smith, Professor of Sociology, Executive Director, Institute for Research on Innovation and Science (IRIS), University of MichiganLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1026892018-09-07T10:44:14Z2018-09-07T10:44:14ZFossil fuel divestment debates on campus spotlight the societal role of colleges and universities<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/235103/original/file-20180905-45166-g6qtn4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Divestment rally at Harvard University, April 17, 2015.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://flic.kr/p/resmQ1">350.org</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/">CC BY-NC-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>As a new academic year begins after a summer of <a href="http://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2018/08/02/summer-weather-climate-change">deadly heat waves, wildfires, droughts and floods</a>, many college students and faculty are debating <a href="https://www.chronicle.com/article/Why-We-Need-a-More-Activist/243924">whether and how to get involved in climate politics</a>. </p>
<p>Climate advocacy has become well established on U.S. campuses over the past decade, in diverse forms. More than 600 colleges and universities have signed the <a href="https://secondnature.org">American College and University President’s Climate Commitment</a>. Schools are expanding interdisciplinary teaching and research in environmental studies, sustainability science and climate resilience, and investing in “greening” their campuses. And many activists on campuses around the country are participating in global campaigns like “<a href="https://riseforclimate.org/">Rise for Climate, Jobs and Justice</a>” and “<a href="http://keepitintheground.org/">Keep it in the Ground</a>.” </p>
<p>One of the most controversial strategies is campaigning for schools to <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-bill-mckibbens-radical-idea-of-fossil-fuel-divestment-transformed-the-climate-debate-87895">divest their holdings in fossil fuel companies</a>. Campus divestment is widely viewed as mainly a student cause. But when I analyzed the movement with <a href="https://www.ucsusa.org/about/staff/staff/peter-frumhoff.html#.W46ikpNKi9Y">Peter Frumhoff</a> of the <a href="https://www.ucsusa.org/">Union of Concerned Scientists</a> and Yale (now Stanford) graduate student <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/leehi/">Leehi Yona</a>, we found <a href="https://www.elementascience.org/articles/10.1525/elementa.297/">widespread faculty support for divestment</a>. For example, in a <a href="https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2018/5/1/faculty-survey-part-1/">survey at Harvard</a> in spring 2018, 67 percent of faculty respondents supported divestment, while only 9 percent were opposed and 24 percent were neutral. </p>
<p>So far, however, only about <a href="https://gofossilfree.org/divestment/commitments/">150 campuses worldwide</a> have committed to fossil fuel divestment – and less than a third of those are in the United States. Why so few? I see two reasons. First, divestment is controversial because it acknowledges the need for radical change. Second, there is a disconnect in institutional priorities between administrators on one side and faculty and students on the other side. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/tdJ8FCSFTnQ?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Instead of divesting its fossil fuel holdings, Harvard University has committed to become fossil fuel-free by 2050 and fossil fuel-neutral by 2026.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A growing global movement</h2>
<p>Fossil fuel divestment is intended to <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/does-divestment-work">stigmatize the industry</a> and hold companies accountable for <a href="https://theconversation.com/30-years-ago-global-warming-became-front-page-news-and-both-republicans-and-democrats-took-it-seriously-97658">opposing action to slow climate change</a> and for their strategic misinformation campaign designed to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/aa815f">confuse the public about climate science and the risks of climate change</a>. </p>
<p>To date, <a href="https://gofossilfree.org/divestment/commitments/">over 800 institutions</a> with assets valued at over US$6 trillion have committed to some form of fossil fuel divestment. They include the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, the Guardian Media Group and the World Council of Churches. </p>
<p><a href="https://www1.nyc.gov/office-of-the-mayor/news/022-18/climate-action-mayor-comptroller-trustees-first-in-the-nation-goal-divest-from#/0">New York City</a> has set a goal of divesting its pension funds from fossil fuel companies by 2023. And in July 2018, the Irish parliament passed a bill making Ireland the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/jul/12/ireland-becomes-worlds-first-country-to-divest-from-fossil-fuels">first country in the world to divest</a> from fossil fuels. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"834267126169010179"}"></div></p>
<h2>Student and faculty support</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.elementascience.org/articles/10.1525/elementa.297/">Our analysis</a> of campus support for divestment focused on 30 colleges and universities in the United States and Canada. We reviewed the number and type of faculty at these schools who had signed publicly available letters endorsing fossil fuel divestment. Over 4,550 faculty had taken such positions, representing all major disciplines and fields. They included 30 members of the <a href="http://nas.edu/">National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine</a> and two Nobel laureates. These findings suggest that faculty engagement in the divestment movement is broader than generally realized. </p>
<p>Faculty support reflects concern about fossil fuel companies’ negative influence in our political system, in our increasingly unequal economy and in public understanding of science. Faculty are also concerned about the industry’s direct influence over research and teaching within higher education.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2017/mar/13/the-fossil-fuel-industrys-invisible-colonization-of-academia">A wide array of U.S. schools</a>, ranging from large state universities to prestigious elite institutions such as Harvard and MIT, have received financial support from individuals or foundations whose wealth comes from fossil fuels. Many professors and students are concerned about how these relationships constrain campus research, inquiry and conversation about responses to climate change and the need for radical change in energy systems. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/235107/original/file-20180905-45169-1031miz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/235107/original/file-20180905-45169-1031miz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/235107/original/file-20180905-45169-1031miz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/235107/original/file-20180905-45169-1031miz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/235107/original/file-20180905-45169-1031miz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/235107/original/file-20180905-45169-1031miz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/235107/original/file-20180905-45169-1031miz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/235107/original/file-20180905-45169-1031miz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=502&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announces on January 10, 2018, that the city will seek to divest its pension funds from fossil fuel holdings by 2023.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www1.nyc.gov/office-of-the-mayor/news/022-18/climate-action-mayor-comptroller-trustees-first-in-the-nation-goal-divest-from#/0">City of New York</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Resisting calls to divest</h2>
<p>So why have leaders at institutions like <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2014/04/07/after-refusing-divest-from-fossil-fuels-harvard-takes-new-steps-promote-environment/k0Y8ig27Uq1cdRtF85qnzO/story.html">Harvard</a>, <a href="https://www.ai-cio.com/news/swarthmore-endowment-will-not-divest-fossil-fuels/">Swarthmore</a> and <a href="http://www.middlebury.edu/newsroom/node/459563">Middlebury</a> resisted faculty and student calls to divest? Many administrators cite their <a href="https://www.harvard.edu/president/news/2013/fossil-fuel-divestment-statement">fiduciary responsibility</a> to maximize returns on endowment investments. However, a recent study that compared financial performance of investment portfolios with and without fossil fuel companies from 1927-2016 found that fossil fuel divestment <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2017.11.036">did not reduce investment portfolio performance</a>. </p>
<p>Administrators also often contend that their school’s investments should not be politicized. They say the endowment <a href="https://www.wellesley.edu/about/president/mytake/divestment">is not an appropriate lever for social change</a>. But there is no such thing as an apolitical investment. Every investment does, in fact, influence change in one way or another. Many schools are now implicitly acknowledging this by <a href="https://www.universitybusiness.com/article/more-colleges-investing-impact">developing guidelines</a> for socially or environmentally responsible investing.</p>
<p>Senior administrators may also fear alienating important university constituents who are connected to the fossil fuel industry. They may feel a need to protect direct or indirect funding from fossil fuel companies for academic programs, or to maintain a non-threatening environment for board members with fossil fuel interests. </p>
<p>Higher education administrators also resist calls to divest because they recognize the potential for campus activists to call for <a href="https://dealbook.nytimes.com/2015/02/10/using-anti-apartheid-divestment-strategies-to-battle-fossil-fuels/">divesting from other ethically challenged businesses</a>, including tobacco and firearms. As social impact investing grows, it is not clear whether or how fossil fuel energy companies will be integrated. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="InstagramEmbed" data-react-props="{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/p/0QjRwZGxVZ/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link","accessToken":"127105130696839|b4b75090c9688d81dfd245afe6052f20"}"></div></p>
<h2>Colleges and universities as citizens</h2>
<p>The core missions of our institutions of higher education are to generate knowledge and educate citizens and leaders. Many schools also embrace a <a href="https://ideas.repec.org/a/oec/edukaa/5kzdcsdmjcvb.html">third role</a>: addressing pressing social issues, whether through research and teaching or other strategies – for example, <a href="https://www.citylab.com/solutions/2017/09/how-universities-are-protecting-their-dreamers/539337/">protecting undocumented students</a> from the Trump administration’s aggressive enforcement of immigration law.</p>
<p>Education scholars have argued that all universities transmit powerful educational messages <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10805-007-9045-5">far beyond their specific teaching and research activities</a>. Concepts of “universities as citizens” or “<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/14676370810885916">universities as change agents</a>” capture the potential for universities to be active, contributing, influential and responsive members of society. Higher education thought leader <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/academias-golden-age-9780195054644?cc=us&lang=en&">Richard Freeland</a> and many others have argued that colleges and universities have a responsibility to cultivate civic responsibility and citizenship via a scholarship of public engagement. </p>
<p>As disruptions linked to climate change <a href="https://www.technologyreview.com/s/609642/the-year-climate-change-began-to-spin-out-of-control/">become more intense</a>, many faculty and students are asking why their schools are not explicitly incorporating their strategic societal priorities into financial decisions and investment portfolios. Under the Trump administration, standing up against <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2018/jul/25/facebook-video-spreads-climate-denial-misinformation-to-5-million-users">misinformation about climate change</a> takes on greater urgency. </p>
<p>That’s why I believe fossil fuel divestment raises important questions about the changing role and responsibilities of higher education in society. At this moment in human history, education must engage with how to bridge the gap between knowledge and action. Divestment debates are forcing colleges and universities to reconsider how to contribute to a more resilient and sustainable future.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/102689/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jennie C. Stephens receives funding from the National Science Foundation. She is affiliated with New England Women in Energy and the Environment, the Union of Concerned Scientists and Mothers out Front. </span></em></p>Many students and professors at US colleges and universities want their schools to divest holdings in fossil fuel companies, but it’s a hard sell for school administrators.Jennie C. Stephens, Dean’s Professor of Sustainability Science & Policy and Director, School of Public Policy & Urban Affairs, Northeastern UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/938992018-03-29T10:30:17Z2018-03-29T10:30:17Z4 charts show why Trump’s tariffs will hurt everyone – not just China<p>On March 22, the Trump administration lobbed its <a href="https://theconversation.com/trumps-go-it-alone-approach-to-china-trade-ignores-wtos-better-way-to-win-93918">second volley</a> in a planned escalation of punitive trade measures against America’s trading partners.</p>
<p>The latest salvo targets China, the <a href="https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/statistics/highlights/top/top1801cm.html">largest U.S. trading partner</a>, and covers a much wider range of products than the first set of tariffs, which <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trade-steel/trump-temporarily-excludes-eu-six-other-allies-from-steel-tariffs-idUSKBN1GZ0ET">focused on steel and aluminum</a>.</p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/trumps-60-billion-in-china-tariffs-will-create-more-problems-than-they-solve-93897">There are many reasons</a> why this is a bad idea.</p>
<p>The president, however, believes that China has unfairly exploited U.S. workers and businesses and must be punished. Rather than take the more prudent approach and work with <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-03-15/these-are-the-six-biggest-wto-disputes-you-need-to-care-about">other countries</a> that have been affected by Chinese exports, Trump has instead chosen to strike a blow that will hit not just China but the global economy as well. </p>
<p>That’s because the complexity and interconnectedness of the global trading system make it nearly impossible to narrowly target specific countries, as the U.S.-China trade relationship demonstrates.</p>
<h2>Chinese exports to the US</h2>
<p>China exports US$386 billion worth of goods to the U.S. every year, most notably a variety of manufactured products that most Americans associate with the “Made in China” label. </p>
<p>These trade flows are dominated by computers and other electronics, which constitute 45 percent of all exports. Computers alone represent 11 percent. </p>
<figure>
<h3>Top Chinese exports to the U.S. in 2016</h3>
<iframe height="400" width="100%" src="https://atlas.media.mit.edu/en/visualize/embed/tree_map/hs92/export/chn/usa/show/2016/?controls=false" frameborder="1"></iframe>
<figcaption>Source: <a href="https://atlas.media.mit.edu/en/">The Observatory of Economic Complexity.</a></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>‘Foreign’ inputs</h2>
<p>These complex electronics products are comprised of dozens of parts and components that are sourced from many countries, including the U.S. </p>
<p>To get a sense of how much is actually made in China and how much comes from elsewhere, economists calculate the share of “domestic content” in the goods versus “foreign content.”</p>
<p>It turns out that China’s exports of manufactured products <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Zhi_Wang11/publication/228679803_How_much_of_China's_exports_is_really_made_in_China_Assessing_domestic_and_foreign_added_value_in_gross_exports/links/0deec5213bd3bc57f6000000.pdf">consist nearly equally</a> of foreign and domestic content. But for high-technology products, such as electronics, around two-thirds are foreign. </p>
<p><iframe id="5Dl15" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/5Dl15/2/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>In other words, a computer that is “Made in China” is, in fact, mostly made elsewhere. </p>
<p>So who gets hurt when the U.S. imposes a tariff on Chinese computers? A lot of people – including Americans. </p>
<p>Many products that are made in China were conceived of and sold by American companies – the Apple iPhone being a prominent example. In these cases, American workers provide a range of high-value services as inputs into the final product, such as the design, marketing and management provided by Apple employees in Cupertino. More than that, American companies <a href="https://www.lifewire.com/where-is-the-iphone-made-1999503">make many of the iPhone’s components</a>, including the camera, glass screen, touchscreen controller and the Wi-Fi chip.</p>
<h2>A boon for US service workers</h2>
<p>The upside to all this is that the recent growth in global manufacturing output has been a boon for American service workers. In fact, U.S. services exports to China doubled from 2011 to 2015.</p>
<p>On the other hand, this provides a stark illustration of how a tariff on Chinese goods could quickly come back to hit U.S. workers. </p>
<p><iframe id="1b0wI" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/1b0wI/4/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>And it is not just the direct trade links that matter. Trade also has important indirect effects on the economy by bringing countries closer together in other ways. </p>
<p>A case in point is Chinese tourism to the U.S., which has risen rapidly in recent years. So much so, in fact, that “travel services” is now the largest U.S. export to China. </p>
<h2>Students: Another kind of export</h2>
<p>A final underappreciated benefit to the U.S. from growing cultural and economic ties has been soaring Chinese enrollment in American universities.</p>
<p>Enrollment quintupled to 351,000 in 2016 from a decade earlier, with the Chinese now representing about a third of all international students in the U.S., up from 12 percent. </p>
<p><iframe id="1qN6d" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/1qN6d/3/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Again, this represents a type of U.S. export to China and can be directly linked to deepening economic integration. In this case, the benefits to the U.S. are both tangible – admissions fees – and intangible – more innovation and knowledge sharing.</p>
<p>In summary, the world is highly integrated, in ways we often don’t see. As a result, when trade policy is made without careful thought, a tariff on flat-screen TVs can lead to fewer visitors to the Grand Canyon or the loss of marketing jobs in Cleveland. And we are all poorer for it.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/93899/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Greg Wright does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A closer look at the US-China trade relationship shows why Trump’s ‘targeted’ tariffs are likely to hurt American workers and businesses as well.Greg Wright, Assistant Professor of Economics, University of California, MercedLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/893542018-01-09T11:15:01Z2018-01-09T11:15:01ZUniversities must prepare for a technology-enabled future<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/201238/original/file-20180108-83567-ks4agd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A professor teaches an online class with students from around the world.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Harvard-Online-Classroom/9f026ca56cfc4deb98fbcab08efa92d5/11/0">AP Photo/Gretchen Ertl</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Automation and artificial intelligence technologies are <a href="https://theconversation.com/introducing-operator-4-0-a-tech-augmented-human-worker-74117">transforming manufacturing</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-the-industrial-revolution-really-tells-us-about-the-future-of-automation-and-work-82051">corporate work</a> and the <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/04/retail-meltdown-of-2017/522384/">retail business</a>, providing new opportunities for companies to explore and posing major threats to those that don’t adapt to the times. Equally daunting challenges confront colleges and universities, but they’ve been slower to acknowledge them.</p>
<p>At present, colleges and universities are most worried about competition from schools or training systems using <a href="https://campustechnology.com/articles/2017/03/01/technology-and-the-future-of-online-learning.aspx">online learning technology</a>. But that is just one aspect of the technological changes already under way. For example, some companies are moving toward requiring workers have <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/impatient-with-colleges-employers-design-their-own-courses/">specific skills trainings and certifications</a> – as opposed to college degrees. </p>
<p>As a professor who researches artificial intelligence and offers distance learning courses, I can say that online education is a disruptive challenge for which colleges are ill-prepared. Lack of student demand is already closing <a href="http://indiatoday.intoday.in/education/story/800-engineering-colleges-to-shut-down-aicte/1/1040312.html">800 out of roughly 10,000 engineering colleges</a> in India. And online learning has put as many as half the colleges and universities in the U.S. at risk of <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/digital-learning/article/2017/04/28/clay-christensen-sticks-predictions-massive-college-closures">shutting down in the next couple decades</a> as remote students get comparable educations over the internet – without living on campus or taking classes in person. Unless universities move quickly to transform themselves into educational institutions for a technology-assisted future, they risk becoming obsolete.</p>
<h2>Existing alternatives to traditional higher ed</h2>
<p>Enormous amounts of information are now available online for free, ready for watching, listening or reading at any time, by anyone who’s connected. For more than a decade, private companies, nonprofits and universities alike have been experimenting with online courses, often offered for free or at low cost to <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-online-courses-can-bring-the-world-into-africas-classrooms-63773">large numbers of students around the world</a>. Research has shown that it’s as effective for students to use a <a href="https://digitalcommons.wku.edu/ijesab/vol9/iss2/19/">combination of online courses and traditional in-classroom</a> instruction as it is to <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/276119100_Innovative_blended_delivery_and_learning_Exploring_student_choice_experience_and_level_of_satisfaction_in_a_hyflex_course">just have classes in person</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/200752/original/file-20180103-26163-1brho2u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/200752/original/file-20180103-26163-1brho2u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/200752/original/file-20180103-26163-1brho2u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200752/original/file-20180103-26163-1brho2u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200752/original/file-20180103-26163-1brho2u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200752/original/file-20180103-26163-1brho2u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200752/original/file-20180103-26163-1brho2u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/200752/original/file-20180103-26163-1brho2u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Is this the future of a college education?</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/student-learning-on-line-headphones-laptop-549162715">PR Image Factory/Shutterstock.com</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><a href="https://www.class-central.com/report/mooc-providers-list/">Providers of massive open</a> online courses (often called “<a href="http://mooc.org/">MOOCs</a>”) are refining ways for people who complete the classes to present their accomplishments in ways employers can understand easily. For example, students in certain classes from major MOOC provider <a href="https://www.edx.org/">edX</a> can get an <a href="https://www.edx.org/gfa">official Arizona State University transcript</a> listing their courses and grades. An employer would never know the person studied online. (There’s another threat to universities’ business model, too: Students can take the classes and get their grades for free; they only need to <a href="https://www.edx.org/gfa">pay if they are happy with their grades</a>, and if they want official college credit.)</p>
<p>This is a period of rapid change unlike what universities have dealt with for centuries.</p>
<h2>The evolution of the university</h2>
<p>Medieval European universities trained would-be clergy members in canonical law, theological discussion and <a href="http://doi.org/10.3386/w17979">religious administration</a>. These institutions amassed huge repositories of knowledge, storing and indexing them in libraries, which became the focal point of the campus.</p>
<p>As European countries explored the world and established overseas colonies <a href="http://www.whoi.edu/page.do?pid=66617">starting in the 15th and 16th centuries</a>, universities evolved to train officers to manage those territories, study navigation across the oceans and look after colonists’ health. <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-the-industrial-revolution-really-tells-us-about-the-future-of-automation-and-work-82051">After the Industrial Revolution</a>, colleges changed again, teaching workers how to use new scientific and technological methods and tools. </p>
<p>In the 21st century, the workplace is transforming once more; what businesses, governments and society need from education is shifting, and technology has made the brick-and-mortar library obsolete. It used to be that users of a technology needed to know how it works. In the early days of driving, for instance, it was important for a driver to be able to fix a car that broke down on the side of the road, perhaps far from any expert mechanic. </p>
<p>But in the current <a href="https://www.thoughtco.com/post-industrial-society-3026457">post-industrial economy</a>, that has changed: Even a car mechanic uses a computer to connect to car systems to <a href="https://www.solopcms.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Solo-PCMS-automotive-computer-mechanic-768x512.jpg">identify what is not working properly</a>. Very few people need to know how these internal computer systems work; they just need to be able to interpret <a href="https://qz.com/1054261/the-connected-car-of-the-future-could-kill-off-the-local-auto-repair-shop/">sensor readings and error messages</a>. </p>
<h2>A changing job market</h2>
<p>Now, the number of jobs mostly involving routine skills – both physical and cognitive – is <a href="https://www.stlouisfed.org/on-the-economy/2016/january/jobs-involving-routine-tasks-arent-growing">shrinking over time</a>.
Increasing automation at factories is rapidly replacing workers at factories, <a href="https://www.zmescience.com/other/economics/china-factory-robots-03022017/">even in low-wage countries like China</a>. Artificial intelligence technologies like machine learning and computer vision are permanently <a href="https://techcrunch.com/2017/03/26/technology-is-killing-jobs-and-only-technology-can-save-them/">eliminating high-skill jobs</a> in offices, too. Many world economies – including in the U.S. – are turning from manufacturing to service, in which most new jobs do not require advanced education. </p>
<p>The remaining jobs <a href="https://www.stlouisfed.org/on-the-economy/2017/may/growing-skill-divide-us-labor-market">will involve fewer routine tasks</a>. The people doing that work will still need some education beyond high school. But they may not have as much need to attend classes at, or even live on, a physical university campus. Colleges that are outside the very top tier of quality and name recognition – and those that have taken on large amounts of <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2016/07/the-paradox-of-new-buildings-on-campus/492398/">debt to build physical facilities</a> – will suffer as demand for their services lessens.</p>
<h2>Competition between colleges</h2>
<p>Another factor challenging universities’ existence is the <a href="https://trends.collegeboard.org/college-pricing/figures-tables/average-published-undergraduate-charges-sector-2017-18">rapidly rising cost</a> of a traditional college education. So far, in the U.S. demand for degrees from residential colleges has remained high because government-backed <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/the-for-profit-college-trap_us_5814edb7e4b09b190529c588">loans are easy to get</a>. But student loan debt in the <a href="https://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/g19/current/default.htm/">U.S. has reached US$1.45 trillion</a> – and as many as <a href="https://www.newyorkfed.org/medialibrary/interactives/householdcredit/data/pdf/HHDC_2017Q3.pdf">20 percent of borrowers</a> may not be earning enough to pay them back.</p>
<p><iframe id="ZIOiu" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/ZIOiu/6/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Universities might highlight intangible values of in-person learning, like personal contact and nonverbal communication, but the costs are becoming a larger factor. Parents and students in the U.S. are increasingly asking whether it’s worth spending <a href="https://trends.collegeboard.org/college-pricing/figures-tables/tuition-fees-room-board-over-time">around $30,000</a> – or even <a href="https://www.harvard.edu/about-harvard/harvard-glance">more than $60,000</a> – for <a href="https://handbook.fas.harvard.edu/book/calendar-academic-year">less than 240 days of school</a> in an elite private residential college – more than $250 a night. </p>
<p>Private colleges’ main competition at the moment comes from public universities. Their <a href="https://trends.collegeboard.org/college-pricing/figures-tables/average-published-undergraduate-charges-sector-2017-18">prices are two-thirds lower</a>, but studying still involves taking many courses that are just as easily taught online.</p>
<p><iframe id="KGCet" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/KGCet/5/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p>Soon students will want to take a variety of courses from different universities, choosing each class and school for its particular merits and benefits. That will stiffen competition between institutions, lowering students’ costs – and universities’ revenues. </p>
<p>Courses will become shared experiences for online learning communities. Some colleges might seek to charge students for special in-person learning experiences, but these will be extras for those who can afford them, not the higher education norm they are today.</p>
<h2>Finding a new way to teach</h2>
<p>Some universities – those at the top, with the most money and expertise – are responding to the coming changes to higher education. Some are forming partnerships with international universities and online teaching companies, or building remote-learning programs on their own. Some of these, like the <a href="https://www.extension.harvard.edu">Harvard Extension School</a>, are high-tech adaptations of correspondence courses people used to take by mail. </p>
<p>Harvard Extension School enrolls nearly <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2013/09/did-i-really-go-to-harvard-if-i-got-my-degree-taking-online-classes/279644/">2,000 degree candidates and over 13,000 non-degree students</a>, who <a href="https://www.extension.harvard.edu/registration-admissions">take classes online, on campus or a mix of both</a>. Students can earn a <a href="https://www.extension.harvard.edu/academics/undergraduate-degrees/bachelor-liberal-arts-degree">Bachelor of Liberal Arts degree in extension studies</a>. At an <a href="https://www.extension.harvard.edu/registration-admissions">estimated cost of $49,500</a>, a four-year degree is cheaper than a <a href="https://www.harvard.edu/about-harvard/harvard-glance">single year on campus</a> at Harvard.</p>
<p>But the vast majority of people who take its classes <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2013/09/did-i-really-go-to-harvard-if-i-got-my-degree-taking-online-classes/279644/">never get a degree</a> at all. They’re just looking for one particular course, or maybe a few, <a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2016/09/25/495188445/shaken-by-economic-change-non-traditional-students-are-becoming-the-new-normal">customizing their own education</a>. </p>
<p>Employers will soon take advantage of options like this, too: Universities will find themselves asked to build specific programs for particular companies. And universities will find themselves needing to explore other ways artificial intelligence technologies can help reduce the cost of education.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/89354/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Subhash Kak does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Artificial intelligence and automation are bringing changes to higher education that will challenge, and may even threaten, traditional universities.Subhash Kak, Regents Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Oklahoma State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/884282017-12-02T07:37:34Z2017-12-02T07:37:34ZTax bill’s attack on higher education undermines America’s economic vitality<p>With the <a href="https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/12/01/us/politics/senate-tax-bill.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage">Senate’s passage</a> of the “<a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/1">Tax Cuts and Jobs Act</a>,” President Donald Trump seems close to notching his first legislative victory – a huge tax cut for the 1 percent. All that remains is the need to reconcile the Senate bill with the <a href="https://waysandmeansforms.house.gov/uploadedfiles/bill_text.pdf">version passed earlier</a> by the House of Representatives. </p>
<p>The bill is a travesty. Never have so many been forced to give up so much to benefit so few. The <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/white-house-open-striking-health-provision-tax-bill-51270294">president’s claims to the contrary</a> notwithstanding, this is no wonderful Christmas present for the American people. It’s more like a grimy lump of coal – many lumps, in fact.</p>
<p>In a pair of bills that each runs to more than 400 pages, it is not hard to find objectionable provisions. As a long-time academic, I am particularly appalled by the <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-tax-package-would-slam-higher-ed-86913">treatment</a> of America’s colleges and universities, the widespread network of institutions charged with training America’s talent pool of the future. </p>
<p>The Republican plan undermines <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/video/2017/10/27/white-house-says-tax-plan-would-boost-long-term-economic-growth.html">what its backers claim</a> is their goal: boosting America’s economic vitality. Here’s why. </p>
<h2>Targeting higher ed</h2>
<p>For instance, as part of its effort to pay for <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-tax-plan-rich-people-benefits-2017-11">the generous tax cuts</a> for corporations and the wealthy, Republicans aim to impose a <a href="https://theconversation.com/gop-plan-to-tax-college-endowments-like-yales-and-harvards-would-be-neither-fair-nor-effective-86912">1.4 percent tax on investment income</a> at private schools with endowments worth at least US$250,000 per full-time student. This would affect as many as 70 schools and cost them an estimated $2.5 billion over a decade. </p>
<p>Not only will that shrink the resources available to support research, much of which <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-universities-boost-economic-growth-65017">helps to fuel</a> the nation’s economic growth. It will also make it more difficult to hold down rising tuition expenses, thus closing off educational opportunities for many students from lower- and middle-income families. </p>
<p>Public universities in states like New York and California can also expect to be hard hit by the bill’s elimination of the federal deduction for state and local taxes. Since this change <a href="https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/10/30/16557554/the-state-and-local-tax-deduction-explained">will actually add</a> to residents’ overall tax bills, state governments are bound to come under voter pressure to offset them with tax cuts closer to home, which in turn will require corresponding expenditure reductions. Public universities, by definition, tend to be <a href="https://www.cbpp.org/research/state-budget-and-tax/funding-down-tuition-up">highly dependent</a> on the public purse for their revenues. That makes them particularly vulnerable targets when budgets are slashed at the state level.</p>
<p>Those of us who teach in the University of California system, for instance, still remember the pay cuts we all had to endure when Sacramento’s budget was hit by the Great Recession of 2008-2009. <a href="http://www.dof.ca.gov/budget/historical_budget_Publications/2009-10/FullBudgetSummary.pdf">Funding</a> for the system as a whole was cut by 40 percent, leading to an exodus of faculty, tight limits on new hires and severe limits on financial aid for students. It took years for support of instruction and research to return to pre-crisis levels.</p>
<p>And even more egregious are some “reforms” in the House version that might yet make it into law depending on how negotiations with the Senate turn out. The House bill is far stingier than the Senate’s when it comes to higher education. For example, House Republicans <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/11/11/your-money/tax-student-debt.html">propose eliminating</a> a benefit that lets some taxpayers deduct student loan interest. That too will close off opportunities for many poorer students.</p>
<p>The House bill also takes aim at a break that presently makes graduate school more affordable by allowing students to work as research or teaching assistants for tuition waivers that don’t count as taxable income. Counting these waivers as income <a href="https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2017/11/07/grad-students-and-policy-experts-say-taxing-graduate-students-tuition-waivers-would">would make graduate school unaffordable</a> for tens of thousands of current and would-be students. </p>
<p>All in all, the House bill alone <a href="http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxvox/house-tax-bill-would-simplify-higher-ed-subsidies-price-would-be-higher-costs-many">would reduce tax incentives for higher education</a> by an estimated $64 billion over 10 years. </p>
<h2>Higher ed’s economic impact</h2>
<p>Whatever the final shape of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, the provisions targeting higher education will have adverse economic effects that will be both substantial and long-lasting. </p>
<p>Numerous studies have shown that a college education adds substantially to an individual’s lifetime earning potential. <a href="https://trends.collegeboard.org/sites/default/files/education-pays-2013-full-report.pdf">Research by the College Board</a>, a nonprofit that helps students prepare for college, shows that the median income of bachelor’s degree recipients with no advanced degree and working full time in 2011 was $56,500, some $21,100 more than median earnings of high school graduates. Put another way, the benefits of a four-year college degree <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/research/where-is-the-best-place-to-invest-102000-in-stocks-bonds-or-a-college-degree/">are equivalent to an investment</a> that returns 15.2 percent per year – over a lifetime. And the earnings premium grows even wider for additional years of study. </p>
<p>Furthermore, over time individual earnings tend to rise more rapidly for those with higher levels of education, and unemployment levels are significantly lower. The evidence is strong that these benefits bolster the overall economy as well. </p>
<p>Zvi Griliches, a Harvard economist who died in 1999 and was a specialist on the topic, <a href="http://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674003439">found</a> that the historical growth of years devoted to higher education and other advanced training accounted for about a third of productivity growth in the U.S. economy over the 50-year period he examined.</p>
<p>These productivity gains, in turn, translated into higher output and incomes for the economy as a whole, adding substantially to America’s wealth. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.asu.edu/president/p3/Reports/EdValue.pdf">Evidence also suggests</a> that regions with a higher proportion of college graduates tend to have lower crime rates, higher levels of civic participation and improved performance across a number of other socioeconomic measures.</p>
<h2>Shattered dreams, stunted economy</h2>
<p>In its essence, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act embodies a contemptuous disregard for intellectualism and expertise that over time can only erode the quality of the U.S. work force. </p>
<p>Many schools will see their budgets cut; faced with higher fees and tuition, many students will be forced to drop out – their dreams shattered, their earning potential stunted, their contribution to the American economy significantly curtailed. </p>
<p>America will not be made great again by attacking its system of higher education in such a mindless manner.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/88428/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Benjamin J. Cohen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Universities play a vital role in promoting economic growth, something the writers of the Republican tax plan have apparently forgotten.Benjamin J. Cohen, Professor of International Political Economy, University of California, Santa BarbaraLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/869122017-11-08T11:16:25Z2017-11-08T11:16:25ZGOP plan to tax college endowments like Yale’s and Harvard’s would be neither fair nor effective<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/193647/original/file-20171107-6766-1k9z6zs.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Harvard, located along the Charles River in Cambridge, boasts the largest endowment at $37.6 billion.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Jorge Salcedo/Shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Tucked away in the recently <a href="https://waysandmeansforms.house.gov/uploadedfiles/bill_text.pdf">announced GOP tax bill</a> is a small item you may have missed: a new tax on university endowments. As I have spent decades working in higher education, the proposal immediately piqued my interest.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/06/universityendowment.asp">Colleges create endowments</a> by raising funds from alumni, companies and other donors, invest the money in stocks, bonds and other assets, and use the returns to fund student aid programs, professors’ salaries and any other expenses needed to run a college. Republicans want to slap a 1.4 percent tax on certain endowments’ investment income, also known as their returns.</p>
<p>Some college leaders are already <a href="http://www.acenet.edu/news-room/Pages/Statement-by-ACE-President-Ted-Mitchell-on-the-House-Tax-Reform-Proposal.aspx">howling</a> at the proposal – and at <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2017/11/04/opinions/tax-plan-student-loans-dancy-opinion/index.html">several others</a> in the tax bill targeting higher education – arguing it would threaten their autonomy and reduce support for poorer students. </p>
<p>Since tax revenue to run the government has to come from somewhere, I believe colleges and universities are fair game. To me, the questions that matter are simple: Is the tax itself fair? And would it be effective?</p>
<h2>Endowments swell in size</h2>
<p>Republicans have <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-04-18/universities-seek-to-defend-endowments-from-republican-tax-plan">expressed concern about the tax-exempt status</a> of college endowments for several years, arguing the largest ones aren’t spending enough on tuition assistance and questioning how the funds are managed. </p>
<p>Such endowments have grown dramatically recently, presenting a juicy target for GOP lawmakers looking for revenue to offset <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/02/us/politics/tax-plan-republicans.html?_r=0">nearly $1.5 trillion</a> in tax cuts for companies and individuals. </p>
<p>Post-secondary institutions <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d16/tables/dt16_333.90.asp">reported a total of $547 billion</a> in endowment assets as of 2016, up 54 percent from five years earlier, shortly after they got whacked by the financial crisis. And in the preceding academic year, from 2014 to 2015, schools earned a total of $26 billion off their endowment assets.</p>
<p></p><hr><p></p>
<p><iframe id="Zi1Gw" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/Zi1Gw/4/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p></p><hr><p></p>
<p>Currently, <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d16/tables/dt16_333.90.asp">Harvard University boasts the largest</a> endowment, at $37.6 billion – more than neighboring state <a href="https://www.bea.gov/newsreleases/regional/gdp_state/qgsp_newsrelease.htm">Vermont’s entire annual GDP</a>.</p>
<p>Harvard, however, is not alone in having a hefty endowment. Fellow private universities Yale, Stanford and Princeton all have <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d16/tables/dt16_333.90.asp">more than $20 billion each</a>, as does the public University of Texas. The 10 biggest endowments combined were worth more than $183 billion in 2016, about a third of the total. </p>
<p></p><hr><p></p>
<p><iframe id="hqzvD" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/hqzvD/7/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p></p><hr><p></p>
<h2>How the tax would work</h2>
<p>Republicans aren’t targeting all schools with an endowment, however, or even only large ones. </p>
<p>Their plan has <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2017/11/03/tax-reform-hits-college-endowments-and-maybe-tuition-and-scholarships.html">three criteria</a>: To be taxed, a school must be private, enroll at least 500 students and have an endowment that amounts to at least $250,000 per student – up from an earlier proposal of $100,000. This means all public colleges are exempt, as are private schools with an endowment smaller than $125 million or a disproportionately large or small student body.</p>
<p>One other requirement is that an endowment must actually earn a return on its investments to be taxed. Many do not in any given year.</p>
<p>Some of the largest endowments generate quite a bit of money. During the 2014 to 2015 academic year, Yale earned the most of any university, returning $2.55 billion – or more than $200,000 for every one of its 12,385 students. Princeton came second at $2.51 billion, while Harvard’s endowment returned $2.23 billion. </p>
<p></p><hr><p></p>
<p><iframe id="P8Vqm" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/P8Vqm/6/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<p></p><hr><p></p>
<h2>How much it would raise</h2>
<p>The earlier proposal, which was detailed only last week, would have affected about 150 of the <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/Home/AboutIPEDS">3,922 colleges that have an endowment</a>, yielding what I estimated would have amounted to just under $270 million based on the 2014-15 academic year. Republicans said the tax would reap $3 billion over a decade. </p>
<p>The latest version, with the much higher threshold, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/grade-point/wp/2017/11/07/house-gop-trims-total-of-colleges-targeted-for-new-endowment-tax/?utm_term=.e6373aff8e0a">would affect fewer than half that</a>, or roughly 60 to 70 schools. That would probably not lower the amount raised that much since only a handful of primarily elite schools will pay almost all of the tax. </p>
<p>Most colleges, on the other hand, would not pay very much. For example, Carleton College in Minnesota, which ranks in the middle of the tax list, would owe about $250,000. Some colleges, such as Emory in Atlanta, whose endowment lost almost $160 million in the period, most likely would receive a tax credit, useful for deferring this tax in the future.</p>
<h2>Is the tax fair?</h2>
<p>Fair <a href="http://businessmacroeconomics.com/">tax systems</a> do not punish select groups. The bill as currently written fails this criterion. </p>
<p>The bill primarily punishes the Ivy League and a small number of other elite private universities like Stanford, MIT, Notre Dame and Duke. These four schools, along with seven of the eight Ivy League colleges, would have paid about $200 million of the total tax, according to my calculations. </p>
<p>While lawmakers have expressed concern over large endowments, the tax does not punish universities just for amassing a huge amount of money. I work for <a href="https://www.osu.edu/">The Ohio State University</a>, which has a $3.6 billion endowment, but it is exempt since it’s a public college. </p>
<p>Regional rival the University of Michigan, with an endowment of almost $10 billion, is similarly exempt, as is the University of Texas system, which has the third-largest endowment, at $22.5 billion. </p>
<p>The tax is also unfair even among private universities, since those with large endowments but very small or large student bodies would not be taxed. </p>
<p>For example, Rockefeller University in New York City has a $2 billion endowment, which returned $111 million in 2014-2015. But it does not have enough students to be taxed under the present plan. On the other end, Brigham Young University in Utah has a $1.58 billion endowment and earned $202 million in investment income during that period, yet its large student body means it wouldn’t pay a tax either. </p>
<p>If the goal is to raise revenue from colleges that collect large amounts of tax-free donations, limiting the tax to just a few private institutions is simply punitive.</p>
<h2>Who’s a student?</h2>
<p>Another problem is that the proposal uses the number of students to determine whether to apply the tax.</p>
<p>The bill states the count of students “shall be based on the daily average number of full-time students attending such intuitions (with part-time students taken into account on a full-time student equivalent basis).”</p>
<p>I believe this would allow schools to find creative ways to avoid paying the tax, just as <a href="https://itep.org/3-percent-and-dropping-state-corporate-tax-avoidance-in-the-fortune-500-2008-to-2015/">Fortune 500 companies do</a>. The student body figures reported to the Department of Education count part-time students the same as those matriculating full-time. So schools would have to compute a new number based on the “full-time equivalent” calculation, which creates ample room for creative accounting. </p>
<p>For example, many schools provide executive education and extension programs for individuals who are generally not considered students. But you can expect many schools to turn them into students, and the same goes for people enrolled in <a href="https://library.educause.edu/topics/teaching-and-learning/massive-open-online-course-mooc">massive open online courses</a>, or MOOCs. Given that <a href="https://www.onlinestudies.com/news/How-Many-Students-Enrolled-in-MOOCs-in-2016/-1390/">58 million people signed up for MOOCs</a> in 2016, this would not be a particularly high hurdle.</p>
<p>An effective tax is one that is not easy to evade. The proposed bill is not very effective because it is easy to evade.</p>
<h2>A fairer approach</h2>
<p>Republicans presented their plan as a method of <a href="https://www.politico.com/agenda/story/2017/11/02/trump-republican-tax-plan-not-simple-000569">simplifying the tax code</a>. The tax on private colleges’ investment income does not accomplish this but rather makes things even more complicated.</p>
<p>If endowment earnings are going to be taxed, a fair approach would be to keep things simple. Just institute a tax on endowment income from all colleges and universities, regardless of number of students or whether it’s public or private. This would have raised about $359 billion – not a lot more, but it would do it a lot more simply, fairly and effectively.</p>
<p>In general, I am not against taxing university endowments or investments. However, if we are going to do it, the tax needs to be fair and not have giant loopholes. The current bill is a punitive mess that is extremely suspect in its long-term ability to raise money.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/86912/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jay L. Zagorsky does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Colleges and universities boast US$547 billion in endowment assets, yet only a handful of elite schools would be taxed under the proposal.Jay L. Zagorsky, Senior Lecturer, Boston UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/736372017-03-09T09:15:41Z2017-03-09T09:15:41ZWe are losing sight of higher education’s true purpose<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/159975/original/image-20170308-24226-z04o4e.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">pexels photo</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Approximately two years ago, I was appointed as the vice-chancellor’s fellow for the public benefit of higher education at the University of Sheffield. This means it’s my job to research the public purpose of universities and advise my vice-chancellor on matters relating to the public value of higher education.</p>
<p>When I took up this position, I could not have predicted quite how significant the question of public value would become in discussions related to higher education reform in the UK. </p>
<p>But beyond that I never – not for one second – would have believed that the very notions of “truth” and “expertise” would become objects of scorn and vilification in the media and the politics of advanced democracies. </p>
<p>And yet, here we stand. </p>
<p>On the one hand, efforts to further regulate UK universities into commercially competitive entities <a href="https://www.lrb.co.uk/v35/n20/stefan-collini/sold-out">continue</a> largely (but not entirely) unabated. On the other, we find ourselves in a post-Brexit and post-Trump political culture that is so divided as to make all appeals to a common ground (let alone to truth) in public discourse seem ridiculous in the eyes of one side or the other. </p>
<p>But while these two phenomena may seem unrelated, I believe that, in fact, they are not.</p>
<h2>Competition, competition, competition</h2>
<p>In the UK, higher education has been in a seemingly endless process of reform for at least two decades now. These <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/higher-education-success-as-a-knowledge-economy-white-paper">reforms</a> promise “efficiency gains” and “<a href="http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/dearing1997/dearing1997.html">deliverable outcomes</a>”, as well as “competition”, “<a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/422565/bis-10-1208-securing-sustainable-higher-education-browne-report.pdf">choice</a>” and success in the “rankings” – in exchange for reducing public expenditure and increasing student investment in higher education. </p>
<p>Describing this “marketisation” of higher education, Rajani Naidoo – a higher education researcher at the University of Bath – speaks of a global “<a href="http://www.universityworldnews.com/article.php?story=20160413131355443">competition fetish</a>”, which aims at little more than competition for its own sake. </p>
<p>The latest face of this competition fetish within UK higher education is found in the <a href="http://services.parliament.uk/bills/2016-17/highereducationandresearch.html">Higher Education and Research Bill</a>, which is currently going through parliament. This bill proposes to make it easier for private providers to gain the right to award degrees and to obtain the title of university in order to make it simpler for them to compete with public universities.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/159976/original/image-20170308-24211-jdvp8x.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/159976/original/image-20170308-24211-jdvp8x.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/159976/original/image-20170308-24211-jdvp8x.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/159976/original/image-20170308-24211-jdvp8x.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/159976/original/image-20170308-24211-jdvp8x.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/159976/original/image-20170308-24211-jdvp8x.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/159976/original/image-20170308-24211-jdvp8x.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Are we losing sight of higher education’s true purpose?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Pexels Photo</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The bill also changes the regulatory framework for all universities, subjecting them to the authority of what is called the “Office for Students”. This is a body composed of sector actors <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/applications-open-for-chair-of-new-office-for-students">whose remit</a> is to “increase competition and choice in higher education”. </p>
<p>This body would be tasked with administering a scheme to rate the quality of teaching (the <a href="http://www.crickcentre.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/TEF-Whats-the-Purpose-booklet-Josh-Forstenzer.pdf">Teaching Excellence Framework</a>) and would have the authority to define, <a href="https://www.timeshighereducation.com/news/higher-education-bill-seeks-powerful-office-students">in practice</a>, which institutions of higher learning are “universities” and which are not. </p>
<h2>What’s in a name?</h2>
<p>Allowing universities to be defined primarily by their capacity to meet market criteria (such as balancing the books and delivering customer satisfaction) is a radical departure from the idea that universities exist to serve the public. </p>
<p>In the 1963 <a href="http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/robbins/robbins1963.html">Robbins Report</a>, universities were tasked with four functions: “instruction in skills” and “the promotion of the general powers of the mind so as to produce not mere specialists but rather cultivated men and women”, as well as “the search for truth”, and the transmission of a common culture and common standards of citizenship. </p>
<p>Mindful of the risks posed by entirely abandoning the idea that universities have a public role, the House of Lords, in their committee stage opposition amendment of the Bill, <a href="https://www.timeshighereducation.com/blog/he-bill-lords-committee-stage-response-government-defeat">affirmed</a> that:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>UK universities must make a contribution to society through the pursuit, dissemination, and application of knowledge and expertise.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>And that they:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Must be free to act as critics of government and the conscience of society.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Most recently, the Lords <a href="http://wonkhe.com/blogs/government-defeated-in-the-lords-over-tef-and-fees/">voted</a> to stop (or at least <a href="http://wonkhe.com/blogs/analysis-what-the-tef-is-going-on-in-the-lords/">slow</a>) any linking of fee increases to the results of the Teaching Excellence Framework.</p>
<p>Now, it is true that these legislative actions may be overturned in the Commons. But these efforts reaffirm the idea that universities exist to serve not just customers, but the public as a whole. And this is important because democracy cannot work without an educated and informed public. </p>
<h2>Truth is a democratic value</h2>
<p>It is clear that there is a deep tension at the heart of democracy. On the one hand, it calls for all to count as equally as possible in making collective decisions. On the other, it seeks to promote the common welfare of all. These are not always reconcilable. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/159979/original/image-20170308-24204-ux1xur.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/159979/original/image-20170308-24204-ux1xur.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/159979/original/image-20170308-24204-ux1xur.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/159979/original/image-20170308-24204-ux1xur.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/159979/original/image-20170308-24204-ux1xur.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/159979/original/image-20170308-24204-ux1xur.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/159979/original/image-20170308-24204-ux1xur.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Is higher education becoming just another market?</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But if our universities are further encouraged to leave the public behind to simply focus on serving their customers, our chances of knowing and understanding one another across enduring lines of difference will likely recede. And without this knowledge, finding a stable common ground grows harder, trust becomes elusive, lies and confusion reign.</p>
<p>To my mind, universities exist, at least partially, to serve as a place where a society comes face-to-face with itself. Do they truly succeed in this? Rarely, if ever. But does that mean they should stop trying? I think not.</p>
<p>Now, perhaps more than ever, we need universities to find ways to enrich our understandings of ourselves and others. That is why I hope that this commitment to serving the public will ultimately be reflected in the legal definition of the “university”.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/73637/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joshua Forstenzer, as part of his institutional role, advises the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Sheffield on matters relating to the public value of higher education. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Society for the Arts.</span></em></p>How to define the public role of universities in the age of post-truth populism.Joshua Forstenzer, Vice-Chancellor's Fellow for the Public Benefit of Higher Education, University of SheffieldLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.