Breaking: A federal judge in Massachusetts has blocked the Trump administration's effort to shutter much of the Education Department. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

There is a false dichotomy drawn between "the ivory tower" and "the real world," and I'm here to report that in a post-industrial society, your real-world economy absolutely hinges on the university. University towns are factory towns. Universities drive economic activity, not the other way around.

Damn it’s like U Michigan had a Kim Philby type situation on its hands! Ono comes in from the cold in this oped. www.insidehighered.com/opinion/view...

Butler pres signs letter criticizing Trump administration’s ‘overreach’ He was one of just 3 Indiana college leaders to sign, incl. Rev. Dowd at Notre Dame and Katie Conboy from SMC. mirrorindy.org/butler-unive...

For all the claims that Americans are in a populist mood and therefore scornful of higher education it sure seems as though Trump’s War on College is super-unpopular. www.washingtonpost.com/politics/202...

University leaders need to understand: they are holding INCREDIBLY good cards. It is so rare in today's polarized era to have the support of 70+ percent of the public against the Trump admiministration on anything. Universities have that—AND winning legal arguments.

My latest. It’s feelings-forward and was hard to write. “It’s an isolating experience when your industry, the source of your livelihood, is being uniquely targeted by your own government, and many Americans are either completely unaware or cheering on its demise.” www.chronicle.com/article/high...

The Miami Herald is doing remarkable public service journalism on deported Venezuelans and the crimes being committed against them. Almost like news institutions that are located in and around the communities they serve end up being accountable for serving those communities

Ok Northwestern has signed up. If your college hasn’t joined up, call up the alumni or president’s office and ask why.

This statement is quite strong. Signed by nearly 200 presidents, including about a third of them publics. But the headline is remarkably mild: "A call for constructive engagement." www.aacu.org/newsroom/a-c...

Is public media already giving up? www.theatlantic.com/culture/arch...

Here's what RFK is saying in private to the family of a girl who died last week from a vaccine-preventable disease www.theatlantic.com/health/archi...

The lesson for universities is you may as well fight back. You'll lose the money either way. The only question is whether you keep your dignity.

Texas readers may not have known his name but the product they read every day for free – The Texas Tribune – was made possible by John. Rest in power. Remembering John Thornton, founder of The Texas Tribune www.texastribune.org/2025/04/01/j... via @texastribune.org

This www.nytimes.com/2025/03/22/n...

We built a page that gathers up the specific actions the Trump administration is taking related to higher ed. Inspired by the NYT version that's for all topics. We needed a place to point our local reporters to when we talk about all that's going on. www.opencampus.org/higher-educa...

Ted Mitchell, president of ACE talking today about #PSLF on webinar: "Another chapter in the book of break it now and the probabilities of fixing it later go way down." He worries that delay in processing will "take the heart out of program because people won't trust it."

Some of my Columbia Law School colleagues and I offer our thoughts on legal issues with the Administration's March 13, 2025 letter to our University's president, and its threat to academic freedom. balkin.blogspot.com/2025/03/a-ti...

Appeals court lifts ban on Trump executive orders regarding DEI. Higher ed groups had won at stay at the district court. 1/ apnews.com/article/dei-...

Good story here from @wyofile.com about the U of Wyoming dropping its partnership with The Ph.D. Project. The Ed Dept announced on Friday that it was opening civil rights investigations in 45 universities that partner with the Ph.D. Project. wyofile.com/university-o...

Nick Dirks, the former chancellor of Cal, is spot on here: "Universities have made two general mistakes in the face of sustained right-wing criticism. ... www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

The federal government is applying unprecedented pressure on universities. At @opencampus.org we've launched the Higher Ed Under Pressure project to expand beyond our network of local reporters and help ANY journalist cover what this means for their community. www.opencampus.org/higher-ed-un...

The subjugation of universities to official power is a hallmark of autocracy. No one should be under any illusions about what’s going on here. www.nytimes.com/2025/03/13/n...

American universities have been the envy of the world and the engine of our economy for decades. 🤷‍♂️

"While laid-off staffers are still technically employed until March 21, they had limited access to their email, phones and computers, making a response to the outage difficult" apnews.com/article/stud...

Another episode of Trusted Voices is live! 🎇 @tvparrot.bsky.social and @erinahennessy.bsky.social talk with @holdenthorp.bsky.social about the role of transparency in leadership, speaking up in controversy, and the responsibility institutions have to the public 👇

Of course they know this, and they have no magical plan to do all the core functions but this time Efficiently(TM). The plan is to break things, so government can’t help you anymore. So yes, absolutely you should worry about your financial aid being affected. It appears to me that is the intention.

attacking higher education is economic sabotage the largest employer in 10 states + 60 of the 100 top cities “The local impact would reach far and wide: In 2022, Johns Hopkins affiliates accounted for over 93,600 jobs+over $15 billion in economic output in Maryland.” www.wsj.com/health/healt...

The Trump administration is planning to cut the staff at the Education Department by about 50 percent. @liamknox.bsky.social and @jessicablake.bsky.social on what we know now about the layoffs. www.insidehighered.com/news/governm...

Ed Department plans to cut nearly 50 percent of its staff as part of what Linda McMahon calls "its final mission." Going from 4,133 --> 2,183. www.ed.gov/about/news/p...

among other serious issues here, if i'm reading this right, the administration has not found any violations but is pre-emptively pausing $100 million in funding because of "prospective violations"? www.pressherald.com/2025/03/11/u...

The Ed. Department's Office for Civil Rights sent letters to 60 additional institutions "warning them of potential enforcement actions" for "violations relating to antisemitic harassment and discrimination" including Harvard, Brown, Stanford, Princeton, UNC, and several UC's

The acting U.S. attorney for DC demanded Georgetown Law stop teaching diversity-related topics. It’s wrong (and illegal) for political appointees to try to dictate what colleges can teach. But institutions must also stand up to authoritarian actors. My latest: www.newamerica.org/education-po...

NIH just posted this news announcement. "Today the National Institutes of Health is announcing plans to centralize peer review of all applications for grants, cooperative agreements and research and development contracts within the agency’s Center for Scientific Review (CSR)"

2 things can be true at the same time: 1. America’s universities are under attack & it is a crisis 2. OMG Harvard is NOT “the soul of higher education” & its crises pale in comparison—“pale” feels too weak a word— to what state, regional, & community colleges—ie the actual soul of US higher ed—face

This is a really thoughtful piece that used open records requests to look at why Ohio public university presidents stayed publicly quiet on the biggest legislation to affect the sector in years (and how they got a 0.1% increase in funding instead of the 2% they wanted).

Ohio’s SB1 bans faculty strikes and eliminates diversity efforts, among other things. Ohio’s higher ed lobbying group told colleges to avoid picking fights over it and to try to get more funding instead Great reporting: signalcleveland.org/ohio-univers...

Join Open Campus this week in Austin at #SXSWEDU. @charlottewest.bsky.social will be speaking on Monday at 2:30 and @shebel.bsky.social will be speaking on Thursday at 10 am. We hope to see you there! www.opencampus.org/2025/01/14/o...

The Ed Dept is launching an “End DEI” portal and asking people to share “concerning practices”

"Lead. Don't Follow." reads one sign in protest this morning outside the U of Cincinnati board of trustees meeting. www.cincinnati.com/videos/news/...

SCOOP: The National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine, arguably the nation's most powerful scientific organization, is bending to political pressure and removing terms like "health equity" from pending reports. Members are not happy. Story by me: www.statnews.com/2025/02/20/n...

Legal scholars argue: "the J21 EO does not prohibit universities from using their own voice to proudly proclaim their commitment to egalitarian values like diversity, equity, and inclusion."

"I don't know what NSF is going to be now, but it's not more efficient. It's just a mess." My story on today's firings and their impact. www.npr.org/2025/02/18/n...

On webinar today, ACE president Ted Mitchell cautioned colleges to not engage in "over-compliance" or "anticipatory compliance" in face of what he termed a "ridiculous" Dear Colleague letter. 1/2

Talking with our reporter in Ohio today about how various universities in the state are responding to the Ed Department's Dear Colleague letter from Friday night calling on colleges to immediately end all race-conscious policies and programming. www.ed.gov/media/docume...

NC State University is pausing hiring of faculty and staff. Provost Warwick Arden announced the change in a memo to deans today. The freeze comes as the Trump administration has ordered several policies reducing federal research funding for universities.

Government files first status report to federal judge (in suit filed by medical schools against NIH) confirming that they are abiding by the TRO and that NIH reimbursements are being made. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...