Climate Denial and Conservative Amnesia: A Letter to Charlie Kirk and TPUSA

Charlie Kirk and Turning Point USA have built an empire of outrage—rallying young conservatives on college campuses, feeding them culture war talking points, and mocking science in the name of “free thinking.” At the top of their hit list? Climate change. According to TPUSA, man-made global warming is a hoax, a leftist ploy to expand government, or simply not worth worrying about. But this isn’t rebellion—it’s willful ignorance. And worse, it’s a betrayal of the conservative legacy of environmental stewardship.

Let’s be clear: man-made climate change is real. It is measurable, observable, and already having devastating consequences across the planet. The science is not debatable. According to NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Earth’s average surface temperature has risen more than 2 degrees Fahrenheit since the late 19th century—largely driven by carbon emissions from human activities. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which aggregates peer-reviewed science from around the world, states unequivocally that “human influence has warmed the atmosphere, ocean and land.”

If Charlie Kirk and TPUSA were interested in truth, they wouldn’t be spreading climate denial. They’d be listening to the 97 percent of actively publishing climate scientists who confirm that this warming is caused by humans. They’d look to the Department of Defense, which recognizes climate change as a national security threat. They’d pay attention to farmers losing crops to drought, families displaced by floods and wildfires, and millions of people suffering through record-breaking heat.

In 2023, Phoenix experienced 31 straight days above 110°F. In 2024, ocean temperatures reached the highest levels ever recorded, accelerating coral bleaching and threatening global fisheries. Canadian wildfires covered U.S. cities in toxic smoke. Coastal towns face rising seas. These are not “natural cycles.” They are the direct result of burning coal, oil, and gas at unsustainable levels—driven by short-term greed and fossil fuel lobbyists.

And that brings us to a painful irony. TPUSA claims to speak for the working class, for rural Americans, and for future generations. But these are exactly the people being hit first and hardest by climate change. Farmers in Texas and Kansas are watching their yields collapse. Gulf Coast communities are being battered by stronger hurricanes. Urban neighborhoods with little tree cover and poor infrastructure are turning into deadly heat islands. Denying climate change doesn’t protect these people—it abandons them.

But perhaps the worst betrayal is ideological. TPUSA calls itself conservative. Yet real conservatism means conserving what matters—our land, our water, our air, and our future. And in this regard, the Republican Party once led the way.

It was Republican President Theodore Roosevelt who pioneered American conservation. He created national parks, forests, and wildlife refuges. He didn’t call environmental protection socialism—he called it patriotism.

It was Republican Richard Nixon who signed the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, and the Endangered Species Act. He founded the Environmental Protection Agency, understanding that pollution was not just bad for nature—it was bad for people and for capitalism itself.

Even Ronald Reagan, whose presidency is often associated with deregulation, signed the 1987 Montreal Protocol, an international agreement to phase out ozone-depleting chemicals. The result? The ozone layer began to heal—one of the greatest environmental successes in human history.

More recently, conservative leaders like Bob Inglis, Carlos Curbelo, Larry Hogan, and Susan Collins have advocated for carbon pricing, clean energy investments, and bipartisan climate action. Groups like RepublicEn, Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions, and the American Conservation Coalition are working to reintroduce common-sense environmentalism to the Republican movement. These are not radicals. They are conservatives who understand that freedom means nothing without a livable planet.

Young Republicans increasingly agree. Polls show that Gen Z conservatives are far more likely than older Republicans to support climate action. They’ve grown up in a world of extreme weather, mass extinction, and economic uncertainty. They know the cost of inaction. They see through the oil-funded lies.

So what exactly is TPUSA conserving? Not the environment. Not scientific integrity. Not the truth. They are conserving ignorance—and protecting the profits of ExxonMobil, Koch Industries, and the very fossil fuel billionaires who knew the risks of climate change in the 1970s and chose to deceive the public anyway. (See: Harvard University’s 2023 study on Exxon’s internal climate models.)

If TPUSA is serious about freedom, they must realize that freedom cannot exist without responsibility. There is no free market on a burning planet. There is no liberty when wildfires choke your air, when hurricanes destroy your home, or when heatwaves kill your grandparents.

We challenge Charlie Kirk and TPUSA not to “own the libs,” but to own the truth. Talk to climate scientists. Visit frontline communities. Debate conservatives like Bob Inglis who actually care about the world they’re leaving behind. Break the echo chamber. Lead with courage instead of trolling for clicks.

The earth does not care about your ideology. It cares about physics. And physics is winning.

Sources:

NASA – Climate Change Evidence and Causes: https://climate.nasa.gov
NOAA – Global Climate Reports: https://www.ncei.noaa.gov
IPCC Sixth Assessment Report, 2023: https://www.ipcc.ch
Harvard – Exxon’s Early Climate Models, Science, Jan 2023
U.S. Department of Defense – Climate Risk Analysis, 2022: https://www.defense.gov
Pew Research – Gen Z Republicans and Climate Change, 2023
RepublicEn – https://www.republicEn.org
American Conservation Coalition – https://www.acc.eco
Montreal Protocol overview – United Nations Environment Programme

The truth is not left or right. It is grounded in science, history, and conscience. Conservatives once led on environmental protection. They still can—if they’re brave enough to face the facts.

The Ghosts Are Real: Savage Inequalities and the Shadow Lives of American Education (Glen McGhee)

The ghosts that haunt our classrooms, our campuses, and our collective conscience are not fictional. They are the very real psychological, social, and structural consequences of a rigged system—one that begins sorting children before they can even read, and never stops. In the United States, your ZIP code can predict your future better than your talents, your effort, or your dreams. These are not just policy outcomes—they are hauntings.

In Savage Inequalities, Jonathan Kozol exposed a brutal truth that remains largely unchanged decades later: the American education system is a machine for manufacturing inequality. It is not broken. It is working exactly as designed.

Savage Inequalities as the Origin of the Ghosts

Kozol’s investigation of urban and suburban schools across the country uncovers a tale of two Americas. In some districts, students attend pristine campuses with swimming pools, art rooms, and science labs outfitted with modern equipment. In others—often Black, brown, and low-income neighborhoods—children cram into overcrowded, crumbling buildings with outdated textbooks, uncertified teachers, and toxic air. These are not outliers. These are the norm in a country that funds schools based on property taxes and then feigns surprise when the poor get less.

Kozol’s work reveals a 25% funding gap between the wealthiest and the poorest school districts. But this statistic only scratches the surface. What’s more disturbing is how these inequalities shape what children are prepared to become. As Kozol puts it, affluent children are educated to govern; the rest are trained to be governed. The ladder of opportunity is not just tilted—it’s a false metaphor altogether. In reality, it’s a labyrinth, its exits marked only for a privileged few.

The Doppelgänger as Social Reality

Kozol’s work makes this painfully clear: for every student who climbs the ladder of social mobility, there are countless others whose paths were blocked before they even began.

This “other self” haunts not only those who never had a chance, but also those who succeed. Elite college students from privileged backgrounds carry, consciously or not, the knowledge that their success is not purely meritocratic. For those who beat the odds and "make it out," there is often survivor’s guilt, a gnawing doubt that they belong, and an awareness of the parallel life they might have lived had luck not intervened.

In this way, every story of success is shadowed by the lives of those excluded. Every degree earned in privilege echoes the silent absence of another that could have been.

The Emotional and Ontological Toll

Kozol’s most powerful moments are not found in statistics, but in the voices of children. These children understand their disadvantage. They do not need scholars or officials to explain that they have been given less. They live it. This awareness fosters a quiet despair—a sense that they are “less than,” that the system is indifferent to their suffering.

This is where the ghosts become most palpable: in the trauma of unrealized potential, in the emotional residue of knowing that your future was narrowed before it began. For those who do succeed, the haunting takes the form of imposter syndrome, alienation, and a fractured sense of identity. For those left behind, the haunting is more visceral—resignation, defiance, or a hard-earned wisdom forged in adversity.

Systemic Labyrinth, Not a Ladder

American education pretends to be a ladder of opportunity, but in reality, it is a maze designed to preserve the status quo. Kozol shows that race, class, and geography—not effort or talent—determine the outcomes for millions. The system gaslights its victims by preaching meritocracy while practicing exclusion.

The labyrinth is not neutral. It favors white, wealthy, suburban students and punishes poor, Black, brown, and immigrant students. Its traps are numerous: underfunded schools, racist disciplinary practices, biased testing, and the school-to-prison pipeline. Those who navigate this maze without losing their way are the exception, not the rule.

Haunting as Political and Ethical Reality

The ghosts Kozol uncovers are not figments of imagination. They are real people—real children—whose lives were shaped by arbitrary forces long before they had a voice. These ghosts do not simply disappear. They persist into adulthood, into the workforce, into our democracy—or lack thereof.

As one scholar noted, these hauntings “carry profound political and ethical stakes.” They force us to reckon with our collective failure to create a just society. They ask us: What do we owe to Eli and the millions like him? How can we live ethically in a system that continues to destroy futures?

These questions are not academic. They are existential. They shape how we define citizenship, democracy, and justice.

The Moral of the Story 

The ghosts of American education are not metaphors. They are structural, psychological, and moral realities born of savage inequalities that begin in childhood and persist across lifetimes. Jonathan Kozol’s Savage Inequalities forces us to confront a society that prepares one child to lead and another to obey—based on nothing more than the location of their birth.

Until we confront this systemic cruelty, every success story will be haunted by the shadow of a life unrealized. The doppelgänger, the lost self, is not a ghost story. It is the story of America.

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Sources:

• Kozol, Jonathan. Savage Inequalities: Children in America's Schools. Crown Publishing, 1991.

• Carter, Prudence L. Keepin’ It Real: School Success Beyond Black and White. Oxford University Press, 2005.

• Anyon, Jean. Ghetto Schooling: A Political Economy of Urban Educational Reform. Teachers College Press, 1997.

• Reay, Diane. Miseducation: Inequality, Education and the Working Classes. Policy Press, 2017.

• The Education Trust. “Funding Gaps 2022.” https://edtrust.org.

Pigs on Parade: The University of Phoenix IPO

Apollo Global Management and Vistria have an offer only a pig would consider: the Phoenix Education Partners IPO.

Touted by Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, Bank of Montreal, Jefferies, and Apollo Global Securities, the offering of Phoenix Education Partners brings the University of Phoenix (UoPX) back to public markets—but few fans remain in the audience.

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A Decade of Decline: From Expansion to Erosion

In the early 2000s, UoPX was hailed as a pioneering force in adult education—cozy campuses near freeway exits and an advanced online infrastructure for working learners earned praise. Its founder John Sperling was seen as visionary.

But by 2010 enrollment had already begun plummeting after reaching nearly 470,000 students, and the school’s academic quality and recruiting ethics were under the microscope. Critics decried “The Matrix,” a perverse scheme where recruiters were aggressively incentivized to push enrollments—no matter the cost.

By 2018, more than 450 locations had shuttered, enrollment was down by approximately 80%, and half the remaining sites were no longer accepting new students. Even Hawaii, Jersey City, Detroit, and other major cities were on the closure list.

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Regulatory Fallout: Lawsuits, Settlements, and Borrower Defenses

From the early 2010s onward, UoPX saw an avalanche of legal scrutiny. In 2019, the FTC leveled a $191 million settlement against it for misleading advertising, including deceptive claims about job placement and corporate partnerships.

By late 2023, 73,740 borrower-defense claims had been filed by former students under federal programs. Many of these were settled under the Sweet v. Cardona class action, with estimates of the university’s potential liability ranging from $200 million to over $1 billion. Meanwhile, nearly one million debtors owed a combined $21.6 billion in student loans—about $22,000 per borrower on average.

Another flashpoint: UoPX agreed to pay $4.5 million in 2024 to settle investigations by California’s Attorney General over military-targeted recruiting tactics.

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The Ownership Unicorn: Apollo, Vistria, and Political Backing

After Apollo Global Management and the Vistria Group acquired UoPX in 2016, the school became a commodified unit in a larger private equity portfolio. The deal brought in figures like Tony Miller, a political insider, as chairman—signaling strategic power play as much as financial management.

Vistria’s broader stable included Risepoint (previously Academic Partnerships), meaning both UoPX and OPM entities were controlled by one private-equity firm—drawing criticism for creating a “for-profit, online-education industrial complex.”

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The IPO Circus: “Pigs on Parade”

Enter the Phoenix Education Partners IPO, steered onto the market with all the pomp of a carnival but none of the substance. The front-line banks—Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, BMO, Jefferies, Apollo Global Securities—are being paid handsomely to dress up this distressed asset as a growth opportunity.

But here’s what those colorful floats hide:

• Collapse, not comeback. Enrollment and campus infrastructure have withered.

• Debt, not opportunity. Nearly a million debt-laden alumni owe $21.6 billion.

• Liability, not credibility. Borrower defense claims and state investigations continue to mount.

• Profit, not public good. Ownership is consolidated in private equity with political access, not academic mission.

This is a pig in parade attire. Investors are being asked to cheer for ribbon-cutting and banners, while the mud-stained hooves of exploitative business models trudge behind.

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The HEI Verdict

This IPO isn’t a pivot toward better education—it’s a rebrand of an exploitative legacy. From aggressive recruitment of vulnerable populations (“sandwich moms,” military servicemembers) to mounting legal liabilities, the University of Phoenix remains the same broken system.

Investors, regulators, and the public must not be dazzled by slick packaging. The real story is one of failed promises, students carrying lifelong debt, and private equity cashing out. In education, as in livestock, parades are meant to show off—just make sure you're not cheering at the wrong spectacle.

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Sources

• Higher Education Inquirer. Search: University of Phoenix

• Higher Education Inquirer. “The Slow-Motion Collapse of America’s Largest University” (2018)

• Higher Education Inquirer. “University of Phoenix Collapse Kept Quiet” (2019)

• Higher Education Inquirer. “Fraud Claims Against University of Phoenix” (2023)

• Higher Education Inquirer. “University of Phoenix Uses ‘Sandwich Moms’ in Recruiting” (2025)

• Higher Education Inquirer. “What Do the University of Phoenix and Risepoint Have in Common?” (2025)

• Federal Trade Commission. “FTC Obtains $191 Million Settlement from University of Phoenix” (2019)

• Sweet v. Cardona Settlement Documents (2022–2023)

• California Attorney General. “University of Phoenix to Pay $4.5 Million Over Deceptive Military Recruiting” (2024)

Why Dating/Hooking Up Is Not a Good Idea for College Students and New Grads

In an era marked by rising tuition costs, crushing student loan debt, mental health crises, and economic uncertainty, college students and new graduates face mounting pressures from all directions. Amid this storm, the expectation to date—or participate in hookup culture—can seem like a rite of passage. But for many young adults, especially those without privilege or financial safety nets, dating and hooking up can distract from more urgent priorities, expose them to emotional and physical risks, and reinforce the same systems of inequality that exploit them.

It’s time we rethink the glorified image of the college romance and the casual hookup as liberating experiences.

Emotional Labor with Little Return

Dating and especially hooking up are often sold as part of the “college experience.” But what’s rarely discussed is the emotional cost: the anxiety, confusion, and heartbreak that often follow. For young people navigating their identities, finances, and future, romantic entanglements can amplify insecurities and derail emotional stability. Rather than providing intimacy or connection, dating in college often reinforces performative behavior and emotional detachment.

This is especially true in environments dominated by hookup culture, where emotional vulnerability is stigmatized and communication is shallow. A culture of disposability encourages people to use each other for attention or sex, often under the illusion of freedom, when in fact it's a distraction from deeper needs—like belonging, purpose, and healing.

Financial and Time Costs in a Precarious Economy

College students and new graduates are already financially strapped. A “cheap date” may still mean a $40 night out—money that could go toward groceries, transit, or student loan interest. For many working-class students, romantic relationships can add financial burdens they can't afford. Some even take on extra jobs or credit card debt just to impress a partner or maintain appearances.

Time is another critical resource. Hours spent chasing love or sex are hours not spent studying, building networks, applying for jobs, or sleeping. In the high-stakes reality of a declining job market and disappearing middle class, time and energy are luxuries. Romantic distractions can delay career paths, lower GPAs, or worsen burnout.

Exploitation, Power Imbalances, and Gendered Harms

In practice, dating and hooking up are rarely egalitarian. Women, nonbinary students, LGBTQ+ individuals, and students of color often face higher risks of exploitation, coercion, and assault. The Title IX system is overwhelmed and unevenly enforced, and many survivors are left unsupported, retraumatized, or silenced. The cultural normalization of hookup culture—facilitated by dating apps and alcohol-fueled party scenes—often masks deeply entrenched power dynamics.

For young men, toxic masculinity pressures them into performative sexuality and emotional suppression. For women and gender minorities, the stakes can be even higher, involving bodily autonomy, safety, and self-worth.

And while some college relationships are supportive and healthy, many are not. They may involve manipulation, codependence, or even intimate partner violence. At a time when mental health services are underfunded and stigmatized, these dynamics can go unnoticed and untreated.

The Illusion of Liberation Through Dating Apps

Tinder, Bumble, Hinge, and other apps promise connection and empowerment. In reality, they are profit-driven platforms that thrive on superficiality and dissatisfaction. Their algorithms commodify users, pushing us toward endless swiping rather than meaningful interaction. For many students, these apps become addictive distractions—dopamine hits that erode real-world social skills and deepen loneliness.

Moreover, dating apps collect massive amounts of personal data and monetize insecurity. Like the student loan system or the for-profit college industry, they prey on vulnerability and sell back false hope.

Post-Graduation Drift and Relationship Fallout

New graduates face enough instability: uncertain housing, job searches, cross-country moves, and identity crises. Romantic relationships often buckle under this pressure. What seemed like a connection during college may not survive the chaos of adult life. Graduates may find themselves navigating breakups while unemployed, uninsured, or thousands of miles from their support networks.

In worst-case scenarios, toxic relationships extend into early adulthood, delaying independence, or entrenching cycles of emotional or financial dependence. This is especially dangerous for those without parental safety nets or stable careers.

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Focus on Solidarity, Not Distraction

College students and new graduates don’t need romance or hookups to feel validated. They need community, purpose, and protection in a hostile economy. They need peer networks, mentorship, paid internships, unionized jobs, and access to affordable mental healthcare—not more heartbreak, ghosting, or gaslighting.

The myth of carefree college romance serves the same system that sells the dream of the American meritocracy. It diverts attention from the real structural challenges young people face and seduces them with fantasies that rarely play out as promised.

Rather than chasing validation through dating, young people might be better served investing in themselves, building collective power, and reimagining what intimacy and care can look like outside the logic of profit and performance.

Sources:

• The End of Love by Eva Illouz

• Trick Mirror by Jia Tolentino

• American College Health Association reports

• Pew Research Center on Gen Z dating and loneliness

• CDC: Sexual Violence on College Campuses

• Student Loan Hero: Average student loan debt statistics

• National Center for Education Statistics

• Data from Hookup culture studies, Lisa Wade (Occidental College)

Let the Higher Education Inquirer know your thoughts: contact us at gmcghee@aya.yale.edu.

Lee Zeldin as EPA Administrator: A Deregulatory Revolution and Its Risks

Lee Michael Zeldin’s January 2025 confirmation as Administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has triggered the most sweeping rollback of environmental protections in the agency’s history. Installed during President Trump’s second term, Zeldin’s tenure is marked by a radical deregulatory agenda that favors economic growth and fossil fuel interests over climate science, public health, and environmental justice.

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Deregulation as Doctrine

Within weeks of taking office, Zeldin unveiled the “Powering the Great American Comeback Initiative,” a deregulatory blitz that erased 31 major environmental rules in a single day. This initiative aims to dismantle longstanding safeguards in pursuit of what Zeldin terms “energy realism” — a euphemism for expanding fossil fuel production and reducing regulatory hurdles.

Key actions include:

• Repealing vehicle emissions standards that had helped reduce greenhouse gases and urban pollution

• Weakening pollution controls on coal and natural gas power plants

• Narrowing the scope of the Clean Water Act, reducing protections for rivers, wetlands, and drinking water sources

• Fast-tracking permits for oil, gas, and mining projects, often at the expense of environmental review

Environmental advocates warn these rollbacks jeopardize public health and the environment by prioritizing short-term corporate profits over scientific evidence.

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Climate Denial by Policy: The Endangerment Finding Under Siege

Perhaps the most consequential move is Zeldin’s effort to repeal the 2009 “Endangerment Finding,” which legally classified greenhouse gases as harmful to public health under the Clean Air Act. This ruling underpinned decades of federal climate regulation.

Zeldin claims repealing it will save $54 billion annually in compliance costs, calling it a “correction of regulatory overreach.” Legal experts and scientists counter that overturning the finding would strip the federal government of its ability to enforce climate protections and likely violate established legal precedents. Lawsuits challenging the repeal are already in preparation.

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Budget Cuts and the Gutting of EPA Science

Zeldin’s deregulatory campaign is matched by a dramatic downsizing of the EPA itself. The Trump administration’s 2025 budget slashed the agency’s funding by 55%, gutting its scientific capacity.

Among the casualties:

• Cancellation of $3 billion in climate justice block grants aimed at addressing environmental disparities in low-income communities

• Elimination of clean energy funding for rooftop solar programs

• Cuts to Superfund site cleanups and environmental justice research

The Office of Research and Development, the EPA’s scientific core, has been dismantled, with thousands of staff reassigned or laid off. The agency now emphasizes “state collaboration” and “industry efficiency,” shifting regulatory power to often under-resourced states and industry self-policing.

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Conspiracies, Culture Wars, and Science Under Siege

Zeldin’s EPA has also ventured into controversial territory, endorsing investigations into weather modification and “geoengineering transparency,” areas often linked to conspiracy theories. Internally, climate education materials are under review, and there are reports of pressure on universities to defund or redirect climate research away from contentious topics.

This ideological shift threatens to politicize science and erode the integrity of federal partnerships with academic institutions.

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Implications for Higher Education

Though the EPA does not directly govern education policy, its policies and budget cuts send shockwaves through higher education, especially at public and land-grant universities focused on environmental science and agriculture.

• EPA grant funding for climate and environmental research faces severe cuts, jeopardizing ongoing projects and future STEM initiatives.

• Scientific partnerships between universities and the EPA are imperiled, risking a loss of federal research infrastructure.

• Climate policy education is increasingly vulnerable to ideological scrutiny and defunding pressures.

• Programs designed to encourage STEM participation among underserved communities are at risk of collapse without federal support.

These trends threaten to dismantle vital components of the STEM pipeline and undermine America’s ability to educate the next generation of environmental scientists and policymakers.

Lee Zeldin’s EPA represents a historic pivot away from climate action and environmental protection toward deregulation, austerity, and ideological control. The long-term consequences for public health, environmental justice, and higher education remain deeply uncertain — but the alarm bells are ringing loud.

Sources

• Environmental Protection Agency. “Administrator Zeldin Announces Powering the Great American Comeback Initiative.” epa.gov. March–July 2025.

• Winston & Strawn LLP. “EPA Launches Historic Deregulatory Plan.” March 2025.

• The Washington Post. “EPA Moves to Overturn Endangerment Finding.” July 29, 2025.

• Associated Press. “Democrats Say EPA Budget Cuts May Kill People.” July 2025.

• The Guardian. “EPA Halts $3 Billion Climate Justice Program; Lawsuit Looms.” August 5, 2025.

• The Week. “How the EPA Plans to Nullify Climate Science.” July 2025.

• New York Post. “Zeldin Aims to Cut ‘Woke’ Climate Spending, Slash Energy Costs.” July 2025.

• Times Union (Albany). “Editorial: EPA’s Dangerous Ignorance.” July 2025.

• CNN Interview. “Zeldin Defends Record, Faces Tough Questions.” July 2025.

Hidden Cracks in the U.S. Economy: Inequality, Low-Wage Work, and the Robocollege Crisis

Recent analyses indicate that roughly one-third of the U.S. economy is already in recession or at high risk, while another third is stagnating. Certain states, such as Texas, Florida, and North Carolina, appear to be booming, but this growth masks a long-standing depression for the working class—trapped in low-wage, insecure jobs with few benefits or career prospects.

Economic Segmentation: A Divided Landscape

States in recession or at high risk include Wyoming, Montana, Minnesota, Mississippi, Kansas, Massachusetts, Washington, Georgia, New Hampshire, Maryland, Rhode Island, Illinois, Delaware, Virginia, Oregon, Connecticut, South Dakota, New Jersey, Maine, Iowa, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia.

States such as New York, California, and Ohio are stagnating, with flat GDP and weak job creation. Even in expanding states, much of the growth is concentrated in low-quality service-sector work or gig economy positions. These structural disparities highlight the limits of traditional economic indicators like GDP when assessing real well-being.

Inequality and the Gini Index

The United States ranks among the most unequal developed nations according to the Gini Index. Wealth is highly concentrated at the top, while median wages have stagnated for decades. Economic growth in certain states often benefits corporate executives and high-skilled professionals, while the majority of workers face economic insecurity.

This inequality has profound implications for higher education. Students from lower- and middle-income families increasingly enter college burdened by debt, often taking on low-quality, precarious jobs during and after their studies. The result is a widening gap between elite institutions—able to attract wealthy students and expand endowments—and regional or community colleges, which are struggling with declining enrollment and financial instability.

The Rise of Robocolleges

Amid these challenges, a new phenomenon has emerged: the rise of "robocolleges." These institutions often operate primarily online, relying heavily on pre-recorded lectures and automated feedback systems. While they may offer affordable tuition, the quality of education can be questionable. Students may have limited access to faculty members for guidance and support, and the emphasis on technology can raise concerns about the depth of learning.

Robocolleges may contribute to the student debt crisis, as high tuition costs and potential for low job placement rates can leave graduates with significant debt and limited employment prospects. The aggressive marketing tactics employed by some of these institutions have also raised ethical concerns, as they may mislead students about the value of the education provided.

Global Pressures

The U.S. economy is embedded in global markets, making it vulnerable to rising interest rates, commodity price volatility, and international competition. For higher education, this translates into shrinking research funding, fewer international students, and increased pressure to commercialize academic work. Public universities, in particular, face budget cuts while elite private institutions continue to thrive, deepening stratification within the sector.

Trumpenomics and Policy Illusions

As explored in "Trumpenomics: The Emperor Has No Clothes" (Higher Education Inquirer), former President Trump's economic strategy combined trickle-down rhetoric, tariffs, and authoritarian measures that disproportionately benefited elites. What has been presented as national economic growth is, in reality, an illusion that masks the persistent precarity and stagnation experienced by the majority of Americans.

Implications for Higher Education

The economic realities of recession, stagnation, and inequality reinforce a two-tiered higher education system. Elite institutions consolidate wealth and prestige, while regional public colleges and community colleges struggle to serve students in states facing economic decline. Student debt continues to rise, even as many degrees fail to provide upward mobility, especially in regions dominated by low-wage employment.

Without policy intervention, these trends threaten to erode access, affordability, and the social mobility function of U.S. higher education. The college meltdown is not just a financial issue; it reflects the broader societal impact of economic inequality, labor precarity, and regional economic disparities.

The Working-Class Depression 

Apparent growth in certain states hides a more profound working-class depression, fueled by insecure, low-quality jobs, widening inequality, and global economic pressures. Addressing these issues requires policies that improve job quality, reduce inequality, and build resilience against global shocks—not just headline GDP gains. A truly sustainable economy must be measured by the well-being and economic security of its citizens, rather than stock market highs or regional expansion statistics.

Sources:

• MSN: A third of the U.S. economy is already in a recession or at high risk

• Higher Education Inquirer: Trumpenomics: The Emperor Has No Clothes

• World Bank: Gini Index Data

• OECD Economic Outlook

• Higher Education Inquirer: Robocolleges 2025

A Word of Warning to Underclassmen: The Hidden Dangers of Fraternities and Frat Parties

 For generations, American fraternities have been romanticized as rites of passage for college students—symbols of brotherhood, status, and lifelong networking opportunities. But beneath the glossy images of Greek life sold in recruitment brochures and campus tours lies a darker reality that too many underclassmen learn the hard way.

At the Higher Education Inquirer, we aim to peel back the layers of higher education’s institutions, and fraternities—especially the powerful, well-funded ones that dominate social life on many campuses—deserve unflinching scrutiny.

The Risks No One Warns You About

1. Hazing: More Than Just "Tradition"
Despite high-profile deaths and public outcry, hazing persists in many fraternities under the guise of bonding. What starts as humiliation often escalates into physical and psychological abuse. According to Hank Nuwer’s Hazing Deaths Database, there has been at least one hazing-related death every year since 1959. The victims are overwhelmingly young, first-year pledges trying to fit in.

Students have been forced to binge drink, perform degrading tasks, or endure sleep deprivation, physical violence, and isolation. The trauma can last well beyond the pledge semester—and for some, it ends in tragedy.

2. Sexual Violence and the Culture of Impunity
Fraternities are disproportionately represented in campus sexual assault cases. A study published in Violence Against Women found that fraternity men are three times more likely to commit rape than their non-fraternity peers. Party houses with little oversight and a culture of entitlement and alcohol-fueled aggression create dangerous environments—especially for underclassmen who are less familiar with the warning signs or too intimidated to report what they've seen.

Frat parties often revolve around power imbalances—older male members controlling access to alcohol, space, and social capital while younger students (especially women and non-binary students) are objectified or manipulated. The “boys will be boys” excuse still shields perpetrators in too many cases.

3. Alcohol Poisoning and Drug Use
Fraternities are notorious for promoting extreme alcohol consumption. First-year students—many of whom are underage—are particularly vulnerable. Stories of punch laced with unknown substances or students pressured to drink to blackout are common. In many cases, by the time help is called, it’s too late.

Mix in the proliferation of date rape drugs and the false sense of safety that some partygoers feel at fraternity houses, and you have a recipe for silent epidemic.

4. Racism, Elitism, and Exclusion
Many fraternities continue to reinforce race, class, and gender hierarchies. Some have histories rooted in white supremacy, and others perpetuate exclusionary practices today—whether formally or informally. Incidents involving racist chants, blackface, or anti-immigrant rhetoric make headlines every year. But what often goes unreported is the systemic way many Greek organizations act as gatekeepers of privilege and cliques of conformity, reinforcing the worst aspects of campus inequality.

5. Legal and Academic Consequences
Joining a fraternity can have long-term consequences far beyond your social life. Students involved in hazing, sexual assault, or drug violations can face expulsion, civil lawsuits, and even criminal charges. And universities that look the other way? They’re beginning to face lawsuits too—for enabling a dangerous culture under the banner of “tradition.”

You Don’t Owe Anyone Your Silence—or Your Safety

Underclassmen often feel pressure to conform, to find “community” quickly, especially when they’re far from home or isolated. Fraternities promise belonging—but for many, that promise is a trap.

There are safer, more inclusive ways to find community and build your future—clubs, advocacy groups, faith organizations, co-ops, academic societies, and student-led initiatives. These alternatives often embody the values fraternities only pretend to uphold: mutual respect, real support, and meaningful friendships.

A Culture Ripe for Change

Universities must stop treating fraternities as untouchable. While some institutions have made efforts to reform Greek life, most have barely scratched the surface. Until schools are willing to confront the full spectrum of harm—cultural, legal, and psychological—the burden falls on students to protect themselves and their peers.

We urge underclassmen to stay informed, ask questions, and understand the risks—not just the reputational risk of being associated with Greek life, but the very real dangers to your body, mind, and future. Frat houses are not just party spaces. For too many, they are trauma sites.

Don’t let the illusion of status or tradition cloud your judgment. Trust your instincts. And know that real solidarity doesn't come from secrecy or submission—it comes from truth.

---

If you or someone you know has experienced hazing or assault, contact your campus Title IX office or a confidential support resource. You can also reach out to the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE.

Brutal and Beautiful: Advice for Incoming Freshmen on Navigating Life Mindfully

Starting college is a moment filled with excitement, hope, and a sense of possibility. It’s a time when many young people step into new independence, meet people from different walks of life, and discover passions that can shape their future. Yet, alongside the promise and energy, college life is often brutally challenging.

As an incoming freshman, it’s important to approach these years with mindfulness—aware that your experience will be a mix of hardship and beauty, setbacks and breakthroughs, confusion and clarity. The journey through higher education rarely follows a simple or linear path.

The Brutal Side
College can be harsh. The academic demands are intense, and the pressure to succeed weighs heavily. Many students face mental health struggles, financial strain, social isolation, and systemic barriers that can feel overwhelming. For some, the cost of tuition and living expenses leads to debt that will shadow their lives for years. For others, the classroom and campus culture can reveal inequalities and injustices that challenge ideals of fairness and opportunity.

You might encounter moments of self-doubt, exhaustion, or even failure. These experiences are part of the process—not signs of personal inadequacy. Recognizing the difficulties without sugarcoating them prepares you to face challenges without being crushed by them.

The Beautiful Side
Despite the hardships, college also offers moments of profound growth and connection. You’ll find friendships that change you, mentors who inspire you, and ideas that ignite your imagination. College can be a space to explore your identity, challenge assumptions, and develop a clearer sense of purpose.

The beauty of this experience is often found in resilience: how you respond to setbacks, how you carve out community, and how you claim your voice in academic and social spaces. It’s in the small victories—a paper well-written, a difficult conversation that leads to understanding, or the realization that you belong.

Being Mindful
Mindfulness means paying attention to your experiences as they come, without judgment or avoidance. It means acknowledging pain and joy alike and understanding that both are temporary, fluid parts of your college life. Cultivating this awareness can help you maintain balance and perspective.

Some ways to practice mindfulness during college include:

• Taking time to reflect regularly, through journaling or quiet moments.

• Seeking support when needed, whether through campus counseling, peer groups, or trusted adults.

• Staying aware of your physical health, as body and mind are deeply connected.

• Setting realistic expectations and celebrating progress, not just outcomes.

Chapter 1

Your college years will not be perfect or painless. They will be a complex mix of brutal and beautiful moments. Embracing that truth equips you with resilience and compassion—both for yourself and for others navigating this journey.

Approach your freshman year with open eyes and an open heart. The experiences you gather, both difficult and inspiring, will shape who you become—not just as a student, but as a person ready to engage with the world.

Welcome to this chapter of your life. It’s as challenging as it is transformative, and your mindful presence in it will make all the difference.

Gen Z losing more money to scams than Boomers (ABC News)

 

Can College Presidents Tell Us the Truth?

“Truth? You can’t handle the truth!” Jack Nicholson’s Colonel Jessup in A Few Good Men captures the tension at the heart of American higher education: can college presidents confront veritas—the deep, sometimes uncomfortable truths about their institutions—or will they hide behind prestige, endowments, and comforting illusions?

At the foundation of academia lies veritas, Latin for truth or truthfulness, derived from verus, “true” or “trustworthy.” Veritas is not optional decoration on a university crest; it is a moral and intellectual obligation. Yet 2025 reveals a system where veritas is too often sidelined: institutions obscure financial mismanagement, exploit adjunct faculty, overburden students with debt, and misrepresent outcomes to the public.

The Higher Education Inquirer (HEI) embodies veritas in action. In “Ahead of the Learned Herd: Why the Higher Education Inquirer Grows During the Endless College Meltdown,” HEI demonstrates that truth-telling can thrive outside corporate funding or advertising. By reporting enrollment collapses, adjunct exploitation, and predatory for-profit practices, HEI holds institutions accountable to veritas, exposing what many university leaders hope will remain invisible.

Leadership failures are a direct affront to veritas. “Scam Artist or Just Failed CEO?” scrutinizes former 2U CEO Christopher “Chip” Paucek, revealing misleading enrollment tactics and financial mismanagement that serve elite universities more than consumers. These corporate-style decisions in a higher education setting betray the very principle of veritas, prioritizing appearance and profit over educational integrity and human outcomes.

Student journalism amplifies veritas further. Through Campus Beat, student reporters uncover tuition hikes, censorship, and labor abuses, demonstrating that veritas does not belong only to administrators—it belongs to those who seek to document reality, often at personal and professional risk.

Economic and political realities also test veritas. In “Trumpenomics: The Emperor Has No Clothes,” HEI exposes how hollow economic reforms enrich a few while leaving the majority behind. Academia mirrors this pattern: when prestige is elevated over substance, veritas is discarded in favor of illusion, leaving students and faculty to bear the consequences.

Structural crisis continues. In “College Meltdown Fall 2025,” HEI documents federal oversight erosion, AI-saturated classrooms with rampant academic misconduct, rising student debt, and mass layoffs. To honor veritas, leaders would confront these crises transparently, but too often they choose comforting narratives instead.

Debt remains one of the clearest tests of institutional veritas. HEI’s “The Student Loan Mess: Next Chapters” shows how trillions in student loans have become instruments of social control. The Sweet v. McMahon borrower defense cases illustrate bureaucratic inertia and opacity, directly challenging the principles of veritas as thousands of debtors await relief that is slow, incomplete, and inconsistently applied.

Predatory enrollment practices further undermine veritas. Lead generators, documented by HEI, exploit student information to drive enrollment into high-cost, low-value programs, prioritizing revenue over truth, clarity, and student welfare. “College Prospects, College Targets” exposes how prospective students are commodified, turning veritas into a casualty of marketing algorithms.

Through all of this, HEI itself stands as a living testament to veritas. Surpassing one million views in July 2025, it proves that the public demands accountability, clarity, and honesty in higher education. Veritas resonates—when pursued rigorously, it illuminates failures, inspires reform, and empowers communities.

The question remains: can college presidents handle veritas—the unflinching truth about student debt, labor exploitation, mismanagement, and declining institutional legitimacy? If they cannot, they forfeit moral and public authority. Veritas is not optional; it is the standard by which institutions must be measured, defended, and lived.

---

Sources

• Calling All Campus Reporters: Help Us Tell the Truth

• Trumpenomics: The Emperor Has No Clothes

• HEI Resources Fall 2025

• College Meltdown Fall 2025

• Why the Higher Education Inquirer Continues

• Higher Education Inquirer Surpasses 1 Million Views

• Scam Artist or Just Failed CEO?

• Lead Generators in Higher Education

• The Student Loan Mess: Next Chapters

• Sweet

• Elite University Presidents: Most Hated Men (and Women) on Campus

• Elite Universities on Lockdown. Protestors Regroup.

Trumpenomics: The Emperor Has No Clothes

President Donald Trump calls himself a master of deals and a builder of wealth. But a closer look at his economic record shows otherwise. What passes as Trumpenomics is not a coherent strategy but a dangerous cocktail of trickle-down economics, tariffs, authoritarian force, and outright deception. The emperor struts confidently, yet his economic clothes are invisible.

Trickle-Down Economics with Tariffs

Trump’s policies leaned heavily on Arthur Laffer’s supply-side theories, promising that tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy would lift all boats. The 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act slashed the corporate tax rate from 35% to 21%, showering disproportionate benefits on the top 1%. The Congressional Budget Office found that by 2025, households making under $30,000 would actually see tax increases, while millionaires reaped permanent benefits.

At the same time, Trump imposed tariffs on China and other trade partners—despite claiming to be a free-market champion. Tariffs raised consumer prices at home, effectively acting as a hidden tax on working families. The Federal Reserve estimated that U.S. consumers and businesses bore nearly the full cost of Trump’s tariffs, with average households paying hundreds of dollars more each year for basic goods.

Demanding Tributes from Other Nations

Trump approached international trade less as economic policy and more as a tribute system. Nations that purchased U.S. arms, invested in Trump-friendly industries, or flattered his ego received preferential treatment. Those who did not were threatened with tariffs, sanctions, or military abandonment. His decision to reduce funding to NATO while deepening ties with Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE reflected this transactional worldview.

Altering Economic Data and Scapegoating the Poor

Trump consistently attempted to alter or spin economic data. When unemployment spiked during COVID-19, his administration pressured agencies to downplay the crisis. In some cases, career economists reported being silenced or reassigned for refusing to misrepresent figures.

When numbers could not be manipulated, scapegoats were manufactured. Trump blamed immigrants, people of color, and the poor for economic stagnation, while targeting Medicaid recipients and the homeless as symbols of “decay.” Instead of addressing structural problems, his rhetoric diverted public anger downward, away from billionaires and corporations.

Lie, Cheat, Steal

Lawsuits and corruption have always been central to Trump’s business empire, and they carried over into his economic governance. From funneling taxpayer money into Trump-owned properties to bending trade policy for donors, his approach blurred the line between public service and private gain. The New York Times documented that Trump paid just $750 in federal income tax in 2016 and 2017, even as he claimed to be a champion of the American worker.

Fourth Generation Warfare, AI, and Taiwan

Trump’s economic worldview also bleeds into Fourth Generation Warfare (4GW)—the mixing of political, economic, and psychological operations. His chaotic handling of AI development, threats over Taiwan, and erratic China policy destabilized global markets. Uncertainty became a feature, not a bug: allies and rivals alike never knew if Trump’s economic positions were bargaining tools, retaliations, or improvisations.

Authoritarianism at Home and Abroad

At home, Trumpenomics relied on force and intimidation. He threatened to deploy the National Guard against protesters, treating dissent as an economic threat to be neutralized. Abroad, he backed Netanyahu’s expansionist policies while cutting aid to Europe, effectively reshaping U.S. alliances around authoritarian partners willing to pay for loyalty.

Hostility Toward Higher Education

Trump also targeted higher education, cutting research funding, undermining student protections, and ridiculing universities as bastions of “elitism.” The move was both political and economic: by weakening critical institutions, he expanded the space for propaganda and disinformation to thrive.

The Emperor’s New Clothes

Beneath the spectacle, Trumpenomics have left the US more unequal, more indebted, and more divided. The federal deficit ballooned by nearly $7.8 trillion during his first term—before COVID-19 relief spending. Inequality widened: by 2020, the richest 1% controlled more than 30% of the nation’s wealth, while median household income gains evaporated. Tariffs have raised costs, tax cuts hollowed out revenues, and corruption flourished.

Trump’s economy was not built on strength but on illusion. Like the emperor in Hans Christian Andersen’s fable, Trump strutted in garments only his loyalists claimed to see. For everyone else, the truth was painfully visible: the emperor had no clothes.

---

Sources

• Congressional Budget Office, “The Distributional Effects of the 2017 Tax Cuts” (2018)

• Federal Reserve Board, “Effects of Tariffs on U.S. Consumers” (2019)

• The New York Times, “Trump’s Taxes Show Chronic Losses and Years of Income Tax Avoidance” (Sept. 27, 2020)

• David Cay Johnston, It’s Even Worse Than You Think: What the Trump Administration Is Doing to America (2018)

• Joseph Stiglitz, “Trump’s Economic Nonsense,” Project Syndicate (2019)

Calling All Campus Reporters: Help Us Uncover the Best Investigative Stories from College Newspapers Across the Country

In the shifting landscape of higher education, some of the most courageous and insightful journalism comes not from national outlets, but from the campus newspapers that quietly dig into the stories shaping student life, faculty struggles, and university governance.

At the Higher Education Inquirer (HEI), we believe that student investigative reporting holds the key to revealing systemic problems and sparking meaningful change. Yet these stories too often remain local, unamplified, and overlooked beyond campus borders.

That is why we are launching "Campus Beat"—a new series dedicated to curating and amplifying the best investigative research coming from college newspapers, whether from large flagship universities, small liberal arts colleges, or commuter-based community colleges.  

Student reporters regularly expose tuition hikes, mismanagement, labor abuses, campus safety failures, and other urgent issues affecting millions of students and workers. These investigations often anticipate or push back against narratives set by university administrations and mainstream media. From uncovering adjunct faculty exploitation at large state schools to revealing discriminatory housing policies at private colleges, student journalists perform vital watchdog work under difficult conditions—limited resources, censorship, and often threats from administration.

We want to highlight investigative or deeply reported pieces that expose systemic problems affecting students, faculty, or staff; illuminate trends in higher education policy or campus governance; tell stories of activism, resistance, or community impact; or offer data-driven or document-based reporting rather than opinion or commentary.

We especially encourage reporters who have faced censorship or suppression to submit their work or share their experiences. Your voice is critical to uncovering truths that might otherwise be silenced.

If you are a student journalist or adviser with an investigative story you are proud of, or if you know of exceptional reporting from your campus, please send us links or documents. Selected stories will be featured in our Campus Beat roundup, accompanied by context and analysis connecting them to the broader higher education landscape.

By sharing and spotlighting the work of student journalists, HEI hopes to build bridges across campuses and contribute to a more informed, equitable conversation about the future of higher education. We invite student reporters, advisers, and readers alike to help us identify the stories that deserve national attention. Together, we can amplify voices too often unheard and push for the systemic change our colleges and universities desperately need.

For submissions or questions, our email contact is gmcghee@aya.yale.edu.

HEI Resources Fall 2025

 [Editor's Note: Please let us know of any additions or corrections.]

Books

• Alexander, Bryan (2020). Academia Next: The Futures of Higher Education. Johns Hopkins Press.  
  
• Alexander, Bryan (2023).  Universities on Fire. Johns Hopkins Press.  
  
• Angulo, A. (2016). Diploma Mills: How For-profit Colleges Stiffed Students, Taxpayers, and the American Dream. Johns Hopkins University Press.
• Apthekar,  Bettina (1966) Big Business and the American University. New Outlook Publishers.  
• Apthekar, Bettina (1969). Higher education and the student rebellion in the United States, 1960-1969 : a bibliography.
  
• Archibald, R. and Feldman, D. (2017). The Road Ahead for America's Colleges & Universities. Oxford University Press.
• Armstrong, E. and Hamilton, L. (2015). Paying for the Party: How College Maintains Inequality. Harvard University Press.
• Arum, R. and Roksa, J. (2011). Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses. University of Chicago Press. 
• Baldwin, Davarian (2021). In the Shadow of the Ivory Tower: How Universities Are Plundering Our Cities. Bold Type Books.  
• Bennett, W. and Wilezol, D. (2013). Is College Worth It?: A Former United States Secretary of Education and a Liberal Arts Graduate Expose the Broken Promise of Higher Education. Thomas Nelson.
• Berg, I. (1970). "The Great Training Robbery: Education and Jobs." Praeger.
• Berman, Elizabeth P. (2012). Creating the Market University.  Princeton University Press. 
  
• Berry, J. (2005). Reclaiming the Ivory Tower: Organizing Adjuncts to Change Higher Education. Monthly Review Press.
• Best, J. and Best, E. (2014) The Student Loan Mess: How Good Intentions Created a Trillion-Dollar Problem. Atkinson Family Foundation.
Bledstein, Burton J. (1976). The Culture of Professionalism: The Middle Class and the Development of Higher Education in America. Norton.
• Bogue, E. Grady and Aper, Jeffrey.  (2000). Exploring the Heritage of American Higher Education: The Evolution of Philosophy and Policy. 
• Bok, D. (2003). Universities in the Marketplace : The Commercialization of Higher Education.  Princeton University Press. 
  
• Bousquet, M. (2008). How the University Works: Higher Education and the Low Wage Nation. NYU Press.
• Brennan, J & Magness, P. (2019). Cracks in the Ivory Tower. Oxford University Press. 
• Brint, S., & Karabel, J. The Diverted Dream: Community colleges and the promise of educational opportunity in America, 1900–1985. Oxford University Press. (1989).
• Cabrera, Nolan L. (2024) Whiteness in the Ivory Tower: Why Don't We Notice the White Students Sitting Together in the Quad? Teachers College Press.
  
• Cabrera, Nolan L. (2018). White Guys on Campus: Racism, White Immunity, and the Myth of "Post-Racial" Higher Education. Rutgers University Press.
  
• Caplan, B. (2018). The Case Against Education: Why the Education System Is a Waste of Time and Money. Princeton University Press.
• Cappelli, P. (2015). Will College Pay Off?: A Guide to the Most Important Financial Decision You'll Ever Make. Public Affairs.
• Cassuto, Leonard (2015). The Graduate School Mess. Harvard University Press. 
• Caterine, Christopher (2020). Leaving Academia. Princeton Press. 
• Carney, Cary Michael (1999). Native American Higher Education in the United States. Transaction.
• Childress, H. (2019). The Adjunct Underclass: How America's Colleges Betrayed Their Faculty, Their Students, and Their Mission University of Chicago Press.
• Cohen, Arthur M. (1998). The Shaping of American Higher Education: Emergence and Growth of the Contemporary System. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
• Collins, Randall. (1979/2019) The Credential Society. Academic Press. Columbia University Press. 
• Cottom, T. (2016). Lower Ed: How For-profit Colleges Deepen Inequality in America
• Domhoff, G. William (2021). Who Rules America? 8th Edition. Routledge.
  
• Donoghue, F. (2008). The Last Professors: The Corporate University and the Fate of the Humanities.
• Dorn, Charles. (2017) For the Common Good: A New History of Higher Education in America Cornell University Press.
• Eaton, Charlie.  (2022) Bankers in the Ivory Tower: The Troubling Rise of Financiers in US Higher Education. University of Chicago Press.
  
• Eisenmann, Linda. (2006) Higher Education for Women in Postwar America, 1945–1965. Johns Hopkins U. Press.
• Espenshade, T., Walton Radford, A.(2009). No Longer Separate, Not Yet Equal: Race and Class in Elite College Admission and Campus Life. Princeton University Press.
• Faragher, John Mack and Howe, Florence, ed. (1988). Women and Higher Education in American History. Norton.
• Farber, Jerry (1972).  The University of Tomorrowland.  Pocket Books. 
  
• Freeman, Richard B. (1976). The Overeducated American. Academic Press.
• Gaston, P. (2014). Higher Education Accreditation. Stylus.
• Ginsberg, B. (2013). The Fall of the Faculty: The Rise of the All Administrative University and Why It Matters
• Giroux, Henry (1983).  Theory and Resistance in Education. Bergin and Garvey Press
Giroux, Henry (2022). Pedagogy of Resistance: Against Manufactured Ignorance. Bloomsbury Academic
• Gleason, Philip (1995). Contending with Modernity: Catholic Higher Education in the Twentieth Century. Oxford U.
• Golden, D. (2006). The Price of Admission: How America's Ruling Class Buys its Way into Elite Colleges — and Who Gets Left Outside the Gates.
• Goldrick-Rab, S. (2016). Paying the Price: College Costs, Financial Aid, and the Betrayal of the American Dream.
• Graeber, David (2018) Bullshit Jobs: A Theory. Simon and Schuster. 
  
Groeger, Cristina Viviana (2021). The Education Trap: Schools and the Remaking of Inequality in Boston. Harvard Press.
• Hamilton, Laura T. and Kelly Nielson (2021) Broke: The Racial Consequences of Underfunding Public Universities
Hampel, Robert L. (2017). Fast and Curious: A History of Shortcuts in American Education. Rowman & Littlefield.
• Johnson, B. et al. (2003). Steal This University: The Rise of the Corporate University and the Academic Labor Movement
• Keats, John (1965) The Sheepskin Psychosis. Lippincott.
  
• Kelchen, Robert. (2018). Higher Education Accountability. Johns Hopkins University Press.
• Kezar, A., DePaola, T, and Scott, D. The Gig Academy: Mapping Labor in the Neoliberal University. Johns Hopkins Press. 
• Kinser, K. (2006). From Main Street to Wall Street: The Transformation of For-profit Higher Education
• Kozol, Jonathan (2006). The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America. Crown. 
• Kozol, Jonathan (1992). Savage Inequalities: Children in America's Schools. Harper Perennial.
  
• Labaree, David F. (2017). A Perfect Mess: The Unlikely Ascendancy of American Higher Education. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
• Labaree, David (1997) How to Succeed in School without Really Learning: The Credentials Race in American Education, Yale University Press.
  
• Lafer, Gordon (2004). The Job Training Charade. Cornell University Press.  
• Loehen, James (1995). Lies My Teacher Told Me. The New Press. 
  
• Lohse, Andrew (2014).  Confessions of an Ivy League Frat Boy: A Memoir.  Thomas Dunne Books. 
  
• Lucas, C.J. American higher education: A history. (1994).
• Lukianoff, Greg and Jonathan Haidt (2018). The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure. Penguin Press.
• Maire, Quentin (2021). Credential Market. Springer.
  
• Mandery, Evan (2022) . Poison Ivy: How Elite Colleges Divide Us. New Press. 
  
• Marti, Eduardo (2016). America's Broken Promise: Bridging the Community College Achievement Gap. Excelsior College Press. 
  
• Mettler, Suzanne 'Degrees of Inequality: How the Politics of Higher Education Sabotaged the American Dream. Basic Books. (2014)
Morris, Dan and Harry Targ (2023). From Upton Sinclair's 'Goose Step' to the Neoliberal University: Essays in the Transformation of Higher Education. 
• Newfeld, C. (2011). Unmaking the Public University.
• Newfeld, C. (2016). The Great Mistake: How We Wrecked Public Universities and How We Can Fix Them.
• Paulsen, M. and J.C. Smart (2001). The Finance of Higher Education: Theory, Research, Policy & Practice.  Agathon Press. 
• Rosen, A.S. (2011). Change.edu. Kaplan Publishing. 
• Reynolds, G. (2012). The Higher Education Bubble. Encounter Books.
• Roth, G. (2019) The Educated Underclass: Students and the Promise of Social Mobility. Pluto Press
• Ruben, Julie. The Making of the Modern University: Intellectual Transformation and the Marginalization of Morality. University Of Chicago Press. (1996).
• Rudolph, F. (1991) The American College and University: A History.
• Rushdoony, R. (1972). The Messianic Character of American Education. The Craig Press.
  
• Selingo, J. (2013). College Unbound: The Future of Higher Education and What It Means for Students.
• Shelton, Jon (2023). The Education Myth: How Human Capital Trumped Social Democracy. Cornell University Press. 
• Simpson, Christopher (1999). Universities and Empire: Money and Politics in the Social Sciences During the Cold War. New Press.
  
• Sinclair, U. (1923). The Goose-Step: A Study of American Education.
• Stein, Sharon (2022). Unsettling the University: Confronting the Colonial Foundations of US Higher Education, Johns Hopkins Press. 
• Stevens, Mitchell L. (2009). Creating a Class: College Admissions and the Education of Elites. Harvard University Press. 
• Stodghill, R. (2015). Where Everybody Looks Like Me: At the Crossroads of America's Black Colleges and Culture. 
• Tamanaha, B. (2012). Failing Law Schools. The University of Chicago Press. 
• Tatum, Beverly (1997). Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria. Basic Books
• Taylor, Barret J. and Brendan Cantwell (2019). Unequal Higher Education: Wealth, Status and Student Opportunity. Rutgers University Press.
• Thelin, John R. (2019) A History of American Higher Education. Johns Hopkins U. Press.
• Tolley, K. (2018). Professors in the Gig Economy: Unionizing Adjunct Faculty in America. Johns Hopkins University Press.
• Twitchell, James B. (2005). Branded Nation: The Marketing of Megachurch, College Inc., and Museumworld. Simon and Schuster.
  
• Vedder, R. (2004). Going Broke By Degree: Why College Costs Too Much.
• Veysey Lawrence R. (1965).The emergence of the American university.
• Washburn, J. (2006). University Inc.: The Corporate Corruption of Higher Education
• Washington, Harriet A. (2008). Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present. Anchor. 
• Whitman, David (2021). The Profits of Failure: For-Profit Colleges and the Closing of the Conservative Mind. Cypress House.
• Wilder, C.D. (2013). Ebony and Ivy: Race, Slavery, and the Troubled History of America's Universities. 
• Winks, Robin (1996). Cloak and Gown:Scholars in the Secret War, 1939-1961. Yale University Press.
  
• Woodson, Carter D. (1933). The Mis-Education of the Negro.  
• Zaloom, Caitlin (2019).  Indebted: How Families Make College Work at Any Cost. Princeton University Press. 
• Zemsky, Robert, Susan Shaman, and Susan Campbell Baldridge (2020). The College Stress Test:Tracking Institutional Futures across a Crowded Market. Johns Hopkins University Press. 

Activists, Coalitions, Innovators, and Alternative Voices

• Academe Blog
• Adjunct Crisis
• Adjunct Nation
• American Federation of Teachers Adjunct-Contingent Faculty Caucus
• Bryan Alexander (Futurist)
• Campus News (New York)
• Clery Center
• Coalition of Contingent Academic Labor
• College Futures Foundation (California, K-20)
• College is a Risky Business (Thomas B. Walsh)
• College Promise (Free Community College)
• College Tuition Advisory Services (CTAS)
• College Viability App (Gary Stocker)
• Con Job: Stories of Adjunct and Contingent Faculty
• Confessions of a College Professor (Professor Doom)
• Debt Collective
• Deep Thoughts on Higher Education (Jeff Doyle) 
• Diane Ravitch (K-12)
• EdTrust
  
• Higher Ed Not Debt
• Higher Education Labor United  
  
• Higher Education Strategy Associates
• I Am Ai
• ITT Tech Warriors
• Jim Wolfston and the Social Mobility Index (CollegeNet)
  
• Jonathan Kozol (K-12)
• Kelchen on Education
  
• National Consumer Law Center
• New Faculty Majority (Adjuncts)
• New Laws For America (Bob Hertz)
• Outside the Law School Scam
• Presidents Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration 
• Project on Predatory Student Lending
  
• Randall Collins (Credentialism and Credential Inflation)
• Remaking the University
• Republic Report (David Halperin)
• Saving For College (Mark Kantrowtitz)
• SEIU Faculty Forward (Adjuncts)
• Steve Foerster (Technologist and Educator)
• Strike Debt Portland
• Student Borrower Protection Center
• Student Debt Crisis
• Student Loan Justice
• Terri Givens (Radical Empathy)
• The Best Classroom is the Struggle (Joshua Sooter) 
• TuitionFit (Mark Salisbury)
• Whistleblower Revolution (Heidi Weber)
• Workplace: A Journal for Academic Labor
• Wrench in the Gears: A Skeptical Parent's Thoughts on Digital Curriculum (K-12)

 College Choice and Career Planning Tools

• Modern States (free college credits)
  
• College Promise
• TuitionFit 
• College Viability App
• College Scorecard (NCES) 
• Washington Monthly College Rankings 
• Apprenticeship Finder (US Department of Labor)
• FinAid
• College Navigator (NCES)
• Best Value Colleges (PayScale)  
• Hechinger Report College Fitness Tracker
  
• NBC News Investigation: Certificate schools are leaving many students in debt and unable to find jobs
• 2/3s of US Employees Regret Their College Degrees (CBS News)
• The Future of Work Won't Be About College Degrees (CNBC, Stepane Kasriel)
• Student Loan Meltdown (Dave Ramsey)
• Permanent Underemployment for College Grads (Burning Glass Technologies)
• College Is A Risky Proposition For The Working Class (Jon Marcus, Hechinger Report)
• Apprenticeships are a trending alternative to college — but there’s a hitch (Jon Marcus, Hechinger Report) 
• 15 Things College Doesn't Teach You
• Best Colleges for Social Mobility (CollegeNet)
• The Case Against Higher Education (Bryan Caplan)
• College May Not Pay Off For Everyone (Liberty Street Economics/NY FED)
• Online Education Has Questionable Outcomes (IHE)
• Colleges Where Most Students Borrow and Few Repay (TICAS)
• Broke, Busted, and Disgusted Trailer (Student Loan Debt)
• The Confusing Information Colleges Provide Students About Financial Aid (The Atlantic)
• College Affordability and Transparency Center (ED)
• Public College Dropout Factories (Third Way)
• Outcomes By Major (NY FED)
• Third Way
• GI Bill Comparison Tool (VA)
• 8 Tips to Help Vets Pick the Right College (Military Times)
• Warrior Scholar (For Veterans)
• Service to School (For Veterans)
• Peer Advisors for Veteran Education (PAVE)

Innovation and Reform

• Faculty Focus
  
• Strategies for Improving Student Success (Inside Higher Education)
• CUNY ASAP 
  
• Gap Year Basics (NYU)
• Union Plus Free College 
  
• Maryland Student Loan Debt Relief Tax Credit
• Canceling Student Loan Debt Would Grow Economy and Add Jobs (Levy Institute)
• Beyond Tuition: Promises for Affordability, Quality, and Accountability in Higher Education (Center for American Progress)
• Georgia State Turnaround (CHE)
• Spelman Health Initiative (IHE)
• University of Kansas: BA In Three Years
• Shady Grove: Nine Campuses in One (WAPO)  
  

Higher Education Policy

• Veterans’ Education Advocates Celebrate Closure of the 90/10 Loophole
• College Transparency Act (Senate Bill 800)
• Dropping Gainful Employment Rules Gives Billions to Subprime Colleges (Inside Higher Education)
• ED Announces Steps to Hold Institutions Accountable for Taxpayer Losses
• FTC Head Says Supreme Court Ruling Puts More Than $2 Billion for Cheated Consumers at Risk (Brent Kendall, WSJ)
• GAO Report Regarding Online Program Managers
• How to Stop Sudden College Closures (Century Foundation)
• Improving Outcomes Data for Online Programs (Robert Kelchen, Inside Higher Education)
• Spelman College Replaces NCAA Sports with Wellness Programs
• Strengthening Rural Anchor Institutions: Federal Policy Solutions for Rural Public Colleges and the Communities They Serve (Alliance for Research on Regional Colleges)
• The Distributional Effects of Student Loan Forgiveness (BFI Working Paper, Sylvain Catherine and Constantine Yannelis)
• The for-profit college system is broken and the Biden administration needs to fix it (Brookings)
• The Impact of a National Program of Free Tuition at Public Community Colleges and Free Tuition for Most Students at Public Four-Year Colleges and Universities on College Enrollments, Graduations, and the Economy (Robert Shapiro and Isaac Yoder)
• Three Things Policymakers Can Do to Protect Online Students (Century Foundation)  
  

Data Sources

• American Association of Colleges and Universities  
  
• American Association of State Colleges and Universities
• American Indian Higher Education Consortium
• Academic Labor Force Trends (AAUP)
• Century Foundation 
  
• Closed Schools Report (US Department of Education)
• College Closing Projections (EY)
• College Costs Increasing Over Time (College Board)
• College Debt Inhibits Home Buying (CNBC)
• Complete College America
  
• Debt by Degrees (Pro Publica)
• Department of Defense
• Education Statistics by Institution
• Enrollment Numbers 
• Excelencia in Education
• Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity
  
• Growing Inland Achievement 
• Hechinger Report
• Heightened Cash Monitoring
• Long-term Student Loan Default Rates
• Lumina Foundation 
  
• National Association of College and University Business Officers (NACUBO)
• National Assessment of Educational Progress
  
• National Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators (NASFAA)
• National Center for Education Statistics
• NCES Blog
  
• National Student Clearinghouse 
• Predicting College Closures and Financial Distress (Philadelphia Federal Reserve)
  
• School Counselor Numbers (ASCA)
• Scientists Leaving Academia in Droves
• Starving the Beast: The Battle to Disrupt and Reform America’s Public Universities
• State by State College Debt (TICAS)
• Student Loan Debt By State (Urban Institute)
• Student Loan Debt Clock
• Student Loan Debt Inhibits Home Buying (CNBC)
• Student Loan Default Projections (Brookings)
• Subprime Colleges (David Halperin)
• The 74: America's Education News Source
  
• Third Way Reports
• Tracking College Closures (Hechinger Report) 
  
• Transfer Credit Problems (GAO)
• United Negro College Fund
  
• University Business Officers Reports
• US Financial Aid (2024 Annual Report) 
  
• Veterans Affairs (GI Bill)

Trade publications

• Chronicle of Higher Education
• Diverse Issues in Higher Education 
• EdSurge
  
• Higher Ed Dive
• Inside Higher Ed