How does a college generate $25 million more a year by enrolling 800 more students? I explore how California campuses are in an enrollment doom loop and how they plan to get out of it. This story relies on records requests + 13 interviews 📸 @zinchiang.bsky.social calmatters.org/education/hi...

I wonder how universities plan to address AI glasses given concerns raised by investigations like this one. Faculty/students were already worried about classroom recordings. www.svd.se/a/K8nrV4/met...

"Administrators would do well to recognize when they...have engaged in what we call 'governance theater.' [...] And faculty should also recognize their responsibility to step forward and govern (that is, to lead and administrate)." www.insidehighered.com/opinion/care...

Developing a dynamic model of teacher productivity and presenting evidence that teacher effectiveness can change when teachers transfer across very different school contexts, from @matthewakraft.bsky.social, John P. Papay, Jessalynn K. James, and Manuel Monti-Nussbaum www.nber.org/papers/w34845

"Schools and systems do not set out to create incoherent experiences for students. [...] Over time, however, these well-intentioned efforts can accumulate into a complex web of mandates, policies, and resources that are not designed to work together." tntp.org/publication/...

What is the best use of a university board? Strategic oversight? Financial stewardship? Or reviewing Gen Ed courses for compliance? I’ve been thinking about the specificity of some reforms & whether these achieve what policymakers say they want. open.substack.com/pub/bradknig...

ICYMI, I went back & wrote about Judge Lin's preliminary injunction against the Trump administration & what the Spending Clause has to say about efforts to terminate federal funding to the University of California system. bradknight.substack.com/p/continuing...

Jeff Bezos bought the Washington Post offering “financial runway." This month it gutted its newsroom—more than 300 layoffs. Whatever you think of legacy news, the hard data shows us that newspaper closures hurt Americans. Here's how: 🧵

Yes, so much this, from Slate’s Christina Cauterucci: “it feels so surreal that in a lot of ways, our lives are kind of going on as normal, and then occasionally something will happen that makes us realize that we’re living in a completely different world.”

1. Agreed, coaching all the way. 2. I especially like the 'professional development serves student success' angle—spot on. 3. I want to discuss more how best to operationalize, because service v. culture can get muddy in practice. www.insidehighered.com/news/student...

I'm extremely interested in the coda included in this week's newsletter, about retirees as the next (possible) trend in int'l edu. www.scmp.com/news/people-... #lifelonglearning

Tough (but important) talk for administrators on working to change the culture around burnout in higher ed. www.insidehighered.com/opinion/care...

Flashing yellow lights: "Endowments’ growing role in university finances, combined with their weaker long-term returns, has heightened concerns about the financial health of the US higher education system." www.ft.com/content/5f24...

What working as a teenager in an internet startup taught me about community, governance, and technological change. open.substack.com/pub/bradknig...

Worthwhile read for those who work w/ students as partners. "Our discussion highlights...the need to attend to relationality, power hierarchies, and partner identities in pedagogical partnership programs." mulpress.mcmaster.ca/ijsap/articl...

Checking in on the Department of Education - a year(ish) into the second Trump administration and ahead of SOTU tomorrow, we looked back at what has happened to ED and what you might expect in the year ahead www.brookings.edu/articles/faq...

Initiatives like this one get press & might work, but I think there is also a whole-of-university evaluation that needs to happen, like deciding whether single rooms weaken student ties compared to traditional doubles & if that's a tradeoff we accept. www.chronicle.com/article/nyu-...

A $1,500 raise after a promotion, a celebrated 1% raise, and other tales from the frontlines of higher ed. How have you encountered higher ed's absurd compensation practices? Tell us about it. https://chroni.cl/3LZAGLP

“A lot of undergraduates feel alone and they feel like it’s vulnerable to reach out,” Tietsort said. “How do we help support students having meaningful connections with others? I see compassion as the heart of that.” www.insidehighered.com/news/student...

American University's plan to fund unpaid internships caught my attention. Not for the optics, but for what it could mean in practice. I share a few reflections why paying for possibility might be one of the most mission-aligned moves a university can make. open.substack.com/pub/bradknig...

The fact that we’re still having the same “assessment is ruining teaching” conversation month after month tells me something important: we STILL haven’t built shared understanding of what assessment for student learning actually is. 🧵 1/x www.chronicle.com/article/asse...

These folks are speaking my language! "What we lack is shared infrastructure robust enough to support diffusion and disciplined adaptation at scale — particularly inside established institutions." futureuniversities.substack.com/p/higher-edu...

New from @luminafoundation.bsky.social: New baseline shows 43.6% of U.S. adults in the labor force have degrees or other credentials with economic value (defined as earning at least a 15% wage premium); the goal is 75% by 2040. www.luminafoundation.org/our-work/str...

ICYMI: Do universities have too many administrators? Some reflections in response to a recent Chronicle essay: open.substack.com/pub/bradknig...

The Pell Grant is projected to be short at least $100 billion over the next 10 years—a shortfall that Congress will have to address either with cuts or new money. www.insidehighered.com/news/governm...

"Introspection allows college officials to try different approaches, both professionally and personally, and see what fits." This article contains some good ideas for leaders to consider. www.highereddive.com/news/the-pac...

It's that time of year (college admissions season)! My team meetings tend to involve a lot of idea sharing that we make better together. Here's one I think could improve the admissions experience and help campus communities stay aligned on their mission. bradknight.substack.com/p/what-if-ad...

Yes, but now there's also the reverse happening where applied fields are being privileged over more abstract or theoretical knowledges because grant dollars drive incentives in these areas. Neither extreme is good for the long-term health of our universities. stevenmintz.substack.com/p/against-ac...

I went to a law review symposium on labor and employment law and (unsurprisingly) kept finding higher education everywhere. open.substack.com/pub/bradknig...

“Today, most young workers do not attain a good job until their early 30s, and only young workers with a bachelor’s degree or higher are consistently more likely than those in the previous generation to have a good job before age 30.”

Putting teaching "back in faculty hands" or just cutting corners? Why recent T&L restructures worry me. substack.com/@bradknight/...

This should change: "While colleges are required to report graduation rates for undergraduates to the federal government—and often to state governments—no similar reporting is required for graduate students" www.insidehighered.com/news/student...

This new patchwork of restrictions will hurt the people in our communities who are poor or have food insecurity and will cost retailers. www.nytimes.com/2026/01/29/b...

I’ve been thinking a lot about how we design courses that make room for risk-taking—and whether, in our eagerness to support students, we’ve sometimes made failure so safe that it no longer teaches what we hope it will. substack.com/@bradknight/...

There's a lot of agreement that AI literacy matters—but far fewer agree on what it actually is. bradknight.substack.com/p/everyone-w...

Thanks @jeffgreene.bsky.social for sharing our meta-analysis led by Zohreh Fathi! Kudos to co-authors @pedram-zarei.bsky.social, @arnobsaha.bsky.social, & Sanzida Sharmeen! Faculty-student relationships are vital but complex; we tried to consider 6 dimensions! Open-access: doi.org/10.1007/s106...

This new article from @royeljohnsonphd.bsky.social brings together so many thought-provoking and useful threads. The Intersectional Ecological Model of Belonging (IEMB) ought to be on the next agenda for every higher ed team, everywhere. link.springer.com/article/10.1...

ICYMI: In my latest Knight School post, I reflect on graduate-employee collective bargaining and how different union philosophies produce distinct contracts and distinct conceptions of graduate work. open.substack.com/pub/bradknig...

Right now, the risks of generative AI to students overshadow the benefits—but the trajectory is not fixed. New research breaks down the evidence on AI’s impact and what we can do to reduce harm.

“Leadership roles are a privilege and must be continually earned.” er.educause.edu/articles/202...

New post up: a continuation of my reflections on The Disengaged Teen. This one explores achiever mode, fragility, and what happens when education rewards performance more than learning. substack.com/@bradknight/...

Thank god. open.spotify.com/album/06SGsY...

How do our courses hold together as part of a larger educational project? And how do we ensure that what we intend students to learn is still what they’re actually getting the chance to practice? My thoughts on curricular “drift” as a new semester begins. open.substack.com/pub/bradknig...

I’ve got a new post up on Knight School reflecting on The Disengaged Teen and what it suggests about engagement, the replenishment effect, and helping students find their spark. open.substack.com/pub/bradknig...

“We’re at a point now where we need to make sure that these things are backed by outcomes & figure out what’s working & what’s not working.” I’d go one step more: perhaps not treat these things as inevitable & ask ourselves if we ought to use them in the first place. www.nytimes.com/2026/01/02/t...

Going into the New Year, one emerging principle for me about AI in education is that we should be skeptical of adopting AI in ways that increase the distance between people. Not every use of technology does this, but some very clearly do. open.substack.com/pub/bradknig...

In 2026 I want all of the decent people to remember one thing. You aren’t meant to be this disciplined, this self-sacrificing to survive. The environment is supposed to support good living. We can have that. You are not a failure. That is politics. That is all.

I’ve found writing to be one of my best tools for thinking and learning, & after ages of sharing reflections with colleagues by email & on Slack, I’m excited to try continuing that practice more publicly on Substack: open.substack.com/pub/bradknig... If you're curious, I hope you'll read along.

A wave of large-scale studies is quantifying how early smartphone access and heavy screen use can harm adolescent minds. The numbers suggest screens are taking a broader, deeper toll on teens than many expected.

My essay for The Teaching Professor, "How Faculty Fool Themselves about Teaching and Learning" now freely available at ResearchGate www.researchgate.net/publication/...