Who Rules Higher Education in Florida?

Florida has emerged as a bold experiment in the transformation of American education, a place where the traditional lines between public and private, church and state, learning and indoctrination have become increasingly blurred. The state’s sprawling educational apparatus—from taxpayer-funded religious K–12 schools to politically captured public universities and a booming for-profit college industry—has been reshaped by a tightly knit network of ideological, financial, and political interests. The central question now is no longer just what Florida’s students are learning, but who is deciding what gets taught, who profits, and who is left behind.

This transformation did not begin overnight. It accelerated sharply under the administration of Governor Ron DeSantis, who has leveraged Florida’s educational system as a tool of ideological warfare. But the system’s current shape reflects a deeper pattern of coordinated influence, in which political appointees, religious institutions, for-profit executives, and powerful donors have each claimed a stake in the state’s educational future.

At the K–12 level, Florida now operates the nation’s largest private school voucher program. House Bill 1, passed in 2023, dramatically expanded eligibility, allowing nearly every student in the state to access public funds to attend private schools. The vast majority of these schools are religious in nature, with many promoting evangelical or fundamentalist Christian ideologies. The curricula often reject mainstream science, promote historical revisionism, and enforce gender and sexual conformity. These schools are not subject to the same accreditation or teacher certification standards as public institutions. They are legally permitted to discriminate in admissions, reject LGBTQ+ students, and bypass standardized academic expectations, all while receiving millions in taxpayer subsidies.

The expansion of vouchers has created a shadow education system—one that is state-funded but privately controlled. Some schools operate out of church basements or repurposed office buildings, others are part of large religious networks tied to national political movements. While the promise of "school choice" is used to market these reforms, in practice the policy has enabled a rapid exodus of students from public schools and directed public funds into ideologically driven and poorly regulated institutions. Investigations have revealed schools with histories of fraud, abusive discipline, and woeful academic performance continuing to receive state dollars with little to no oversight.

As students age into adulthood, the ideological structure built in the K–12 years feeds directly into Florida’s remade higher education system. The state’s public universities, long regarded as rising stars in research and student access, have become targets of political intervention. The takeover of New College of Florida in 2023 marked a turning point. Once a small, progressive liberal arts college, New College was transformed into a conservative experiment through political appointments and ideological purges. Faculty were pushed out. Curriculum was rewritten. Leadership was handed to figures with close ties to right-wing think tanks.

This playbook has since been replicated across the State University System. Boards of trustees are now stacked with DeSantis allies. Presidents are chosen not for academic leadership, but for political loyalty. Diversity, equity, and inclusion programs have been banned. Faculty are monitored. Student protests are suppressed. The message is clear: Florida’s public colleges are no longer institutions for the free exchange of ideas—they are instruments of ideological alignment.

Private colleges, meanwhile, have flourished in this environment—especially those aligned with conservative religious values. The University of Miami, while officially nonsectarian, operates in close partnership with powerful biomedical and corporate interests. Rollins College, one of the most prestigious liberal arts schools in the state, remains publicly apolitical but thrives by catering to the children of Florida’s wealthy elite. Religious institutions like Ave Maria University and Palm Beach Atlantic University are more explicit in their missions. Founded with deep connections to conservative Catholic and evangelical movements, these schools are more than just educational spaces—they are ideological outposts for a political and religious project that seeks to reshape American life.

Ave Maria, established by Domino’s Pizza billionaire Tom Monaghan, operates under strict Catholic dogma and enforces a rigid moral code for students. Palm Beach Atlantic champions evangelical Christian values and produces graduates steeped in conservative social teachings. These colleges, along with others in their orbit, often serve as landing pads for students educated in the voucher-funded religious K–12 system. The ideological pipeline is seamless, and its impact is lasting.

Beneath the surface, Florida’s for-profit colleges and credential mills continue to expand, often flying under the radar. Keiser University, once for-profit and now nominally nonprofit, functions much like a for-profit entity, aggressively recruiting students and maximizing revenue through online expansion and federal aid capture. Everglades University, Full Sail University, and dozens of cosmetology, theology, and career schools target working-class Floridians, military veterans, and immigrants with promises of upward mobility. In reality, many of these institutions saddle students with unmanageable debt and provide degrees of questionable value. Oversight is weak. Accreditation standards are often minimal. The end result is a parallel higher education market that profits off desperation and systemic inequality.

Connecting these layers of Florida’s educational system is a network of donors, foundations, and political groups. Organizations like the Council for National Policy, the Heritage Foundation, and the Claremont Institute exert disproportionate influence. Billionaires like Rebekah Mercer, Ken Griffin, and the Uihlein family fund candidates, schools, and think tanks that support the dismantling of public education and the promotion of conservative Christian alternatives. Hillsdale College, though based in Michigan, has launched affiliated charter-style “classical academies” in Florida and supplies training and curriculum to school boards eager to erase what they call “woke indoctrination.”

These efforts are coordinated, strategic, and well-funded. They are not random or reactionary. They represent the construction of a new education regime—one rooted in privatization, obedience, religious orthodoxy, and political control. Academic freedom, democratic engagement, and equitable access are treated not as ideals to strive for, but as threats to be neutralized.

The result is a cradle-to-career system in which education serves power rather than challenging it. From kindergarten classrooms preaching Christian nationalism to public universities led by political appointees to debt traps disguised as colleges, Florida’s students are moving through a system designed not to liberate but to conform. The public is funding it. The powerful are steering it. And for millions of students and families, the promise of education as a ladder to opportunity is becoming another broken dream.

The question of who rules education in Florida has a chillingly clear answer. Those who profit from ignorance. Those who fear critical inquiry. Those who believe education should serve the powerful, not the people. Florida may be the future—but not one built on truth, justice, or enlightenment. It is a future built on control.

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Sources

Florida House Bill 1 (2023), Florida Legislature
Orlando Sentinel, “Florida Private Voucher Schools Often Fail Students. The State Still Pays.”
U.S. Department of Education, College Scorecard and IPEDS Data
Florida Department of Education, Private School Directory
Inside Higher Ed, “DEI Ban Signed in Florida”
Chronicle of Higher Education, “The New College Coup”
New York Times, “Florida’s Education Overhaul Has National Implications”
Council for National Policy, internal documents and reporting via The Intercept
IRS Form 990 filings for Keiser University, Ave Maria University, University of Miami
National Student Legal Defense Network, Complaints and Lawsuits Involving Florida Institutions
ProPublica, “The Billionaire Behind Ave Maria’s Catholic Utopia”
Hillsdale College, Barney Charter School Initiative: Partner School Directory and Curriculum

Florida Education Association (FEA) and the United Faculty of Florida (UFF), Oppose Politically Driven State Accreditor in Florida

The Florida Education Association (FEA) and the United Faculty of Florida (UFF), representing educators, faculty, and graduate assistants statewide, strongly oppose the state’s creation of a politically driven accreditor for public colleges and universities. 

This move directly threatens the independence, integrity, and academic credibility of the state’s higher education system. By allowing political interference into the accreditation process, the state will continue to erode faculty voice, chill academic freedom, and further politicize hiring, curriculum, and tenure decisions. It sets a dangerous precedent that could fragment national accreditation standards, damage Florida’s academic reputation, and jeopardize our students’ futures, including their federal aid eligibility and degree recognition. 

“Accreditation matters because it’s the backbone of academic freedom, shared governance, and public trust in the quality of our institutions,” said Teresa M. Hodge, President of the United Faculty of Florida. “This proposed state accreditor appears designed to align more with political priorities rather than academic independence. It seems to be the state’s latest attempt to exert top-down control over what faculty can teach and what students are allowed to learn. Our communities don’t need more politics in our education systems—we need systems that are focused on the growth of our students and not on the political whims of whoever is in charge. It is critical that accreditation remain independent of political interference, grounded in academic standards and peer review, as well as transparent and inclusive of shared governance “principles.” 

The implications don’t end at higher education. A shift in accreditation standards will also impact Florida’s Pre-K-12 system in the form of teacher preparation programs at public colleges and universities, certification requirements, and even access to the profession.  

“Time and time again, we’ve seen political agendas take priority over sound education policy,” said Andrew Spar, President of the Florida Education Association. “The creation of this state accreditor could derail the very programs we rely on to train and prepare educators at a time when Florida faces a critical teacher and staff shortage. Even dual enrollment offerings for students could be disrupted. Students learn best when they’re free to learn and educators are free to teach—not when curriculum decisions are dictated by politics.” 

FEA and UFF call for accreditation processes that remain true to their purpose: Independent of political interference, grounded in academic standards and peer review, and inclusive of shared governance. Florida’s students, educators, and communities deserve nothing less. 

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CONTACT: FEA Press, feapress@floridaea.org, (850) 201-3223

The Florida Education Association is the state’s largest association of professional employees, with more than 120,000 members. FEA represents PreK-12 teachers, higher education faculty, educational staff professionals, students at our colleges and universities preparing to become teachers and retired education employees.

What caused 70 US universities to arrest protesting students while many more did not?

Earlier this year, the New York Times reported that about 3100 people had been arrested at pro-Palestinian campus protests across the US, noting that 70 schools had arrested or detained people. In addition to arrests, a varying degree of force has been used, including the use of targeted police surveillance, tear gas, and batons. 

After those arrests, some schools expelled those protesting students, banned them from campuses, and denied them degrees. Schools also established more onerous policies to stop occupations and other forms of peaceful protest. A few listened to the demands of their students, which included the divestment of funds related to Israel's violent occupation of Palestine. 

What can students, teachers, and other university workers learn from these administrative policies and crackdowns? The first thing is to find out what data are out there, and then what information is missing, and perhaps deliberately withheld.

Documenting Campus Crackdowns and Use of Force

The NY Times noted mass arrests/detentions at UCLA (271), Columbia (217), City College of New York (173), University of Texas, Austin (136), UMass Amherst (133), SUNY New Paltz (132), UC Santa Cruz (124), Emerson College (118), Washington University in Saint Louis (100), Northeastern (98), University of Southern California (93), Dartmouth College (89), Virginia Tech (82), Arizona State University (72), SUNY Purchase (68), Art Institute of Chicago (68), UC San Diego (64), Cal Poly Humboldt (60), Indiana University (57), Yale University (52), Fashion Institute of Technology (50), New School (43), Auraria Campus in Denver (40), Ohio State University (38), NYU (37), Portland State University (37), University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, (36), University of Pennsylvania (33), George Washington University (33), Stony Brook University (39), Emory University (28), University of Virginia (27), Tulane University (26), and University of New Mexico (16). In many cases, court charges were dropped but many students faced being barred from campuses or having their diplomas withheld.

The Crowd Counting Consortium at Harvard University's Kennedy School has also been keeping data on US protests and their outcomes from social media, noting that "protest participants have been injured by police or counter-protesters — sometimes severely — about as often as protesters have caused property damage, much of which has been limited to graffiti." Their interactive dashboard is here.  

According to a Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) database, out of 258 US universities that held protests, only 60 schools resorted to arrests.* Why did these schools, many name-brand schools, use arrests (and other forms of threats and coercion) as a tactic while others did not? A number of states reported no arrests, particularly in the US North, South, and West.

Analyzing the Data For Good Reasons

There appear to be few obvious answers (and measurable variables) to accurately explain this multi-layered phenomenon, something the media have largely ignored. But that does not mean that this cannot be explained to a better extent than the US media have explained it.

It's tempting to look at a few interesting data points (e.g. according to FIRE, Cornell University and Harvard did not have arrests, and neither did Baylor, Liberty University, and Hillsdale College. Six University of California schools had arrests but three did not. And all of the schools that came before the US House of Representatives Judiciary Subcommittee examining antisemitism (Harvard, Penn, MIT) had arrests after their appearances. The Arizona House had similar hearings in 2023 and 2024 regarding antisemitism and their two biggest schools, Arizona State University and the University of Arizona, had arrests.

Missing Data and Analysis

What else can we notice in this pattern about the administrations involved, the trustees, major donors, or the student body? How much pressure was there from major donors and trustees and can this be quantified? Anecdotally, there were a few public reports from wealthy donors who were unhappy with the protests. Who were those 3100 or so students and teachers who were arrested and what if any affiliations did they have? How many of the students who were arrested Jewish, and what side were they on? How many of these schools with arrests had chapters of Students for Justice in Palestine and Students Supporting Israel? How many schools with these student interest groups did not resort to arrests?

How much communication and coordination was there within schools and among schools, both by administrations and student interest groups? What other possible differences were there between the arrest group and the non-arrest group and are they measurable?

What other dependent variables besides arrests could be or should be be measured (e.g. convictions, fines and sentences, students expelled or banned from campus)? What will become of those who were arrested? Will they be part of a threat database? Will this interfere with their futures beyond higher education? Is it possible to come up with a path analysis or networking models of these events, to include what preceded the arrests and what followed? And what becomes of the few universities that operate more like fortresses today than ivory towers? How soon will they return to normal?


Arrest Group (Source: FIRE)*

4 Arizona State University Yes
8 Barnard College Yes
41 Columbia University Yes
46 Dartmouth College Yes
57 Emory University Yes
59 Florida State University Yes
60 Fordham University Yes
64 George Washington University Yes
78 Indiana University Yes
94 Massachusetts Institute of Technology Yes
105 New Mexico State University Yes
106 New York University Yes
110 Northeastern University Yes
111 Northern Arizona University Yes
112 Northwestern University Yes
115 Ohio State University Yes
123 Portland State University Yes
124 Princeton University Yes
140 Stanford University Yes
142 Stony Brook University Yes
155 Tulane University Yes
156 University at Buffalo Yes
161 University of Arizona Yes
163 University of California, Berkeley Yes
165 University of California, Irvine Yes
166 University of California, Los Angeles Yes
169 University of California, San Diego Yes
170 University of California, Santa Barbara Yes
171 University of California, Santa Cruz Yes
176 University of Colorado, Denver Yes
177 University of Connecticut Yes
181 University of Florida Yes
182 University of Georgia Yes
184 University of Houston Yes
187 University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign Yes
189 University of Kansas Yes
194 University of Massachusetts Yes
197 University of Michigan Yes
198 University of Minnesota Yes
206 University of New Hampshire Yes
207 University of New Mexico Yes
208 University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill Yes
209 University of North Carolina, Charlotte Yes
212 University of Notre Dame Yes
215 University of Pennsylvania Yes
216 University of Pittsburgh Yes
220 University of South Carolina Yes
221 University of South Florida Yes
222 University of Southern California Yes
225 University of Texas, Austin Yes
226 University of Texas, Dallas Yes
231 University of Utah Yes
233 University of Virginia Yes
236 University of Wisconsin, Madison Yes
242 Virginia Commonwealth University Yes
243 Virginia Tech University Yes
247 Washington University in St Louis Yes
248 Wayne State University Yes
257 Yale University Yes

Non-arrest Group (Source: FIRE)*

1 American University No
2 Amherst College No
3 Appalachian State University No
5 Arkansas State University No
6 Auburn University No
7 Bard College No
9 Bates College No
10 Baylor University No
11 Berea College No
12 Binghamton University No
13 Boise State University No
14 Boston College No
15 Boston University No
16 Bowdoin College No
17 Bowling Green State University No
18 Brandeis University No
19 Brigham Young University No
20 Brown University No*
21 Bucknell University No
22 California Institute of Technology No
23 California Polytechnic State University No
24 California State University, Fresno No
25 California State University, Los Angeles No
26 Carleton College No
27 Carnegie Mellon University No
28 Case Western Reserve University No
29 Central Michigan University No
30 Chapman University No
31 Claremont McKenna College No
32 Clark University No
33 Clarkson University No
34 Clemson University No
35 Colby College No
36 Colgate University No
37 College of Charleston No
38 Colorado College No
39 Colorado School of Mines No
40 Colorado State University No
42 Connecticut College No
43 Cornell University No
44 Creighton University No
45 Dakota State University No
47 Davidson College No
48 Denison University No
49 DePaul University No
50 DePauw University No
51 Drexel University No
52 Duke University No
53 Duquesne University No
54 East Carolina University No
55 Eastern Kentucky University No
56 Eastern Michigan University No
58 Florida International University No
61 Franklin and Marshall College No
62 Furman University No
63 George Mason University No
65 Georgetown University No
66 Georgia Institute of Technology No
67 Georgia State University No
68 Gettysburg College No
69 Grinnell College No
70 Hamilton College No
71 Harvard University No*
72 Harvey Mudd College No
73 Haverford College No
74 Hillsdale College No
75 Howard University No
76 Illinois Institute of Technology No
77 Illinois State University No
79 Indiana University Purdue University No
80 Iowa State University No
81 James Madison University No
82 Johns Hopkins University No
83 Kansas State University No
84 Kent State University No
85 Kenyon College No
86 Knox College No
87 Lafayette College No
88 Lehigh University No
89 Liberty University No
90 Louisiana State University No
91 Loyola University, Chicago No
92 Macalester College No
93 Marquette University No
95 Miami University No
96 Michigan State University No
97 Michigan Technological University No
98 Middlebury College No
99 Mississippi State University No
100 Missouri State University No
101 Montana State University No
102 Montclair State University No
103 Mount Holyoke College No
104 New Jersey Institute of Technology No
107 North Carolina State University No
108 North Dakota State University No
109 Northeastern Illinois University No
113 Oberlin College No
114 Occidental College No
116 Ohio University No
117 Oklahoma State University No
118 Oregon State University No
119 Pennsylvania State University No
120 Pepperdine University No
121 Pitzer College No
122 Pomona College No
125 Purdue University No
126 Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute No
127 Rice University No
128 Rowan University No
129 Rutgers University No
130 Saint Louis University No
131 San Diego State University No
132 San Jose State University No
133 Santa Clara University No
134 Scripps College No
135 Skidmore College No
136 Smith College No
137 Southern Illinois University, Carbondale No
138 Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville No
139 Southern Methodist University No
141 Stevens Institute of Technology No
143 SUNY at Albany No
144 SUNY College at Geneseo No
145 Swarthmore College No
146 Syracuse University No
147 Temple University No
148 Texas A&M University No
149 Texas State University No
150 Texas Tech University No
151 The College of William and Mary No
152 Towson University No
153 Trinity College No
154 Tufts University No
157 University of Alabama, Birmingham No
158 University of Alabama, Huntsville No
159 University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa No
160 University of Alaska No
162 University of Arkansas No
164 University of California, Davis No
167 University of California, Merced No
168 University of California, Riverside No
172 University of Central Florida No
173 University of Chicago No
174 University of Cincinnati No
175 University of Colorado, Boulder No
178 University of Dayton No
179 University of Delaware No
180 University of Denver No
183 University of Hawaii No
185 University of Idaho No
186 University of Illinois, Chicago No
188 University of Iowa No
190 University of Kentucky No
191 University of Louisville No
192 University of Maine No
193 University of Maryland No
195 University of Memphis No
196 University of Miami No
199 University of Mississippi No
200 University of Missouri, Columbia No
201 University of Missouri, Kansas City No
202 University of Missouri, St Louis No
203 University of Nebraska No
204 University of Nevada, Las Vegas No
205 University of Nevada, Reno No
210 University of North Carolina, Greensboro No
211 University of North Texas No
213 University of Oklahoma No
214 University of Oregon No
217 University of Rhode Island No
218 University of Rochester No
219 University of San Francisco No
223 University of Tennessee No
224 University of Texas, Arlington No
227 University of Texas, El Paso No
228 University of Texas, San Antonio No
229 University of Toledo No
230 University of Tulsa No
232 University of Vermont No
234 University of Washington No
235 University of Wisconsin, Eau Claire No
237 University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee No
238 University of Wyoming No
239 Utah State University No
240 Vanderbilt University No
241 Vassar College No
244 Wake Forest University No
245 Washington and Lee University No
246 Washington State University No
249 Wellesley College No
250 Wesleyan University No
251 West Virginia University No
252 Western Michigan University No
253 Wheaton College No
254 Williams College No
255 Worcester Polytechnic Institute No
256 Wright State University No 

*Media sources indicate that in 2023, 2 graduate students were arrested at Harvard, and more than 40 people were arrested at Brown University. 

Related links:

Campus Protests, Campus Safety, and the Student Imagination 

Democratic Protests on Campus: Modeling the Better World We Seek (Annelise Orleck)

Methods of Student Nonviolent Resistance

Wikipedia Community Documents Pro-Palestinian Protests on University and College Campuses

Dangerous Spaces: Sexual Assault and Other Forms of Violence On and Off Campus

One Fascism or Two?: The Reemergence of "Fascism(s)" in US Higher Education

A People's History of Higher Education in the US?

Letter to an incoming freshman

Santa Ono: Take the Money and Run

In a stunning development that has sent ripples through the world of higher education, University of Michigan President Santa J. Ono announced he will step down this summer to take the helm at the University of Florida. The announcement comes just seven months after he signed a lucrative contract extension at U-M—one that brought his salary to $1.3 million per year and was among the most generous in the nation.

Ono’s exit will mark the shortest presidential tenure in University of Michigan history—just two and a half years. And it’s happening at a moment of profound political and institutional tension, with many in Ann Arbor voicing frustration at what they perceive as the university's muted resistance to a suite of controversial measures emanating from the Trump administration.

From Rising Star to Abrupt Exit

When Santa Ono arrived in Ann Arbor in late 2022, he brought with him a sterling academic pedigree and a reputation as a charismatic, student-focused leader. His hiring was seen as a stabilizing move after years of controversy surrounding his predecessor.

But beneath the surface, Ono’s relationship with the university community frayed. Faculty members and students alike cite his increasing absence from public discourse in 2024, particularly as the federal government—under a resurgent Trump administration—moved to slash research funding, roll back diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs, and scrutinize university partnerships, including U-M’s involvement with The PhD Project, which aims to diversify business faculty.

“He’s been more or less invisible particularly this year,” said Faculty Senate Chair Derek Peterson. “What we need is a fighter, not a conformer.”

The Florida Move

Ono’s move to the University of Florida has sparked speculation about his motivations. On paper, Michigan is more prestigious, enjoys greater autonomy thanks to a unique governance structure, and has a massive $19.2 billion endowment. Florida, by contrast, is under the thumb of a politically active governor and a centralized board that has exerted pressure on universities to conform to ideological mandates.

Yet the financial allure may have been too great to ignore: reports suggest Florida’s presidential compensation could total $3 million annually—more than double Ono’s current pay.

Brendan Cantwell, a professor of higher education policy at Michigan State University, noted the irony: “He’s leaving a more prestigious, more autonomous institution. That says a lot about the pressures he faced.”

A State Under Fire: The Regressive Politics of Higher Education in Florida

For those familiar with the political climate in Florida, Ono’s move to the University of Florida is far from surprising. Over the past few years, Florida has become a hotbed for right-wing political maneuvering in higher education, with Governor Ron DeSantis spearheading efforts to reshape universities in line with his conservative agenda.

From banning certain books to defunding DEI programs and trying to control academic curriculum, DeSantis has made it clear that higher education in Florida is now a battleground for ideological warfare. His administration has launched aggressive campaigns against what he describes as “woke” politics in academia, citing the need to root out “liberal indoctrination” and promote “freedom” from progressive influences.

Florida’s approach to higher education has included an unprecedented wave of budget cuts to diversity programs, particularly those aimed at supporting historically underrepresented students. The state’s universities are now grappling with the loss of funding for programs designed to increase access for Black, Latino, and Indigenous students. DeSantis has also pushed for "anti-woke" laws that bar universities from offering certain courses or diversity-related initiatives. This is not only affecting the curriculum, but also the very way in which faculty and staff are hired and evaluated.

In 2023, the University of Florida eliminated many of its DEI programs under pressure from the state. The state’s Board of Governors is now actively involved in scrutinizing university curriculums, and its influence extends even to hiring practices, where faculty members are increasingly expected to align with a more conservative view of American history and culture. These moves have drawn ire from academics nationwide, who argue that Florida’s political leadership is attempting to stifle intellectual freedom and academic independence.

Moreover, Florida’s universities face a severe erosion of academic freedom, as DeSantis has sought to impose strict guidelines on speech and research. This includes revising what can and cannot be taught in classrooms and restricting discussions around race, gender, and political identity. The state's newly imposed curriculum laws have made it more difficult for universities to engage in meaningful discourse about topics such as climate change, systemic racism, and gender equality.

For Ono, stepping into this highly charged, politicized environment will represent a dramatic shift from his more moderate, research-focused tenure at Michigan. His leadership will likely be tested not just by university-level challenges but also by the state's political apparatus, which has shown a willingness to intervene in nearly every facet of higher education.

Institutional Challenges Ahead

Ono’s departure leaves U-M with significant challenges. The Board of Regents announced that he will remain in Ann Arbor until an interim president is named—a process that may take weeks. But finding a long-term leader capable of navigating the rapidly shifting higher education landscape could take much longer.

The next president will have to address:

• Federal Research Cuts: The loss of federal contracts—particularly from agencies like the National Institutes of Health—has cost Michigan and its peer institutions hundreds of millions of dollars. A $15 million Social Security study was among the casualties. U-M is using endowment funds to plug gaps, but that is not a sustainable strategy.

• DEI Backlash and Retrenchment: The university recently shuttered two DEI offices and scaled back programming, citing political and legal risks. While Ono promised to bolster financial aid and mental health support, many faculty and students felt betrayed by the move.

• Campus Unrest and Free Speech: Protests over the Gaza war led to harsh disciplinary action against student groups, including the suspension of Students Allied for Freedom and Equality (SAFE). Critics say the campus has become increasingly authoritarian, and several lawsuits have been filed by terminated employees alleging First Amendment violations.

• Board Relations and Governance: U-M’s elected Board of Regents is ideologically divided. While five Democratic regents penned a passionate op-ed in defense of academic independence, the board’s stance on DEI and other political flashpoints appears fractured.

A Bigger Crisis in Public Higher Ed?

Beyond the immediate concerns, the university’s upheaval reflects deeper anxieties about the future of public higher education in America. Declining public trust, rising tuition, and the politicization of universities—especially around issues of race, gender, and free speech—have created an atmosphere of volatility.

While the University of Michigan continues to see strong application numbers, including from international students, enrollment of in-state high school graduates is dropping. The university’s Go Blue Guarantee, which offers free tuition to families earning under $125,000, is a step toward addressing affordability concerns. But will it be enough?

Sandy Baruah of the Detroit Regional Chamber sees a broader mission: “Our research universities all have a responsibility to make the case for higher education. The value of higher ed is critical to the state of Michigan.”

What’s Next?

The Faculty Senate has passed resolutions urging the university to join a “mutual defense pact” with other Big Ten schools to resist political interference and defend academic freedom. But U-M is not obligated to act on those resolutions.

Interim leadership will be announced soon, and the search for a permanent successor will follow. Whoever takes the reins next will need to be a deft political operator—someone capable of rebuilding trust internally while weathering mounting external threats.

In the words of Cantwell: “Whoever they hire has to be prepared to be under intense scrutiny—locally, federally, ideologically. The next leader of Michigan must have both a spine and a strategy.”

As the University of Michigan enters this uncertain chapter, one thing is clear: the battle over the soul of public higher education is far from over.

Violence, Safety, and the Limits of Campus Security: From MIT to Brown and Beyond

The Monday killing of MIT professor Nuno F.G. Loureiro at his home in Brookline, Massachusetts has shaken the academic community and reinforced a troubling reality already examined in Higher Education Inquirer’s recent reporting on campus safety and mental health: violence affecting higher education in the United States is neither isolated nor confined to campus boundaries.

Loureiro, a Portuguese-born physicist and internationally respected scholar in plasma science and fusion research, was a senior leader at MIT and director of its Plasma Science and Fusion Center. His death occurred off campus, yet it reverberated powerfully within higher education because it underscores how scholars, students, and staff exist within a broader national environment shaped by widespread gun violence, strained mental-health systems, and limited preventive safeguards.

Authorities have confirmed the incident as a homicide. At the time of writing, no suspect has been publicly identified, and investigators have released few details about motive. The uncertainty has compounded the shock felt by colleagues, students, and international collaborators who viewed Loureiro as both a scientific leader and a deeply committed mentor.

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A Pattern, Not an Anomaly

Loureiro’s killing followed a series of violent incidents tied to U.S. college campuses throughout 2025, reinforcing that these events are not aberrations but part of a broader pattern.

Just days earlier, a deadly shooting at Brown University left two students dead and several others wounded when a gunman opened fire in an academic building during final exams. The attack disrupted campus life, forced lockdowns, and exposed vulnerabilities in building access and emergency response procedures.

Earlier in the year, Florida State University experienced a mass shooting in a heavily trafficked campus area, resulting in multiple fatalities and injuries. The suspect, a student, was taken into custody, but the psychological impact on students and faculty persisted long after classes resumed.

At Kentucky State University, a shooting inside a residence hall claimed the life of a student and critically injured another. The alleged shooter was not a student but a parent, underscoring how campus violence increasingly involves individuals with indirect or external connections to institutions.

In September 2025, violence took an explicitly political turn when Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA, was assassinated during a public speaking event at Utah Valley University. Kirk was shot during a large outdoor gathering attended by thousands. The killing, widely described as a political assassination, was unprecedented in recent U.S. campus history and raised urgent questions about security at high-profile events, free expression, and political polarization within academic spaces.

Together, these incidents — spanning elite private universities, public flagship institutions, regional campuses, and HBCUs — illustrate how violence in higher education now crosses institutional type, geography, and purpose, from classrooms and residence halls to public forums and nearby neighborhoods.

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The Limits of Traditional Campus Safety Models

HEI’s recent analysis of U.S. campus safety emphasized a central tension: colleges and universities rely heavily on reactive security measures — armed campus police, surveillance infrastructure, emergency alerts — while underinvesting in prevention, mental-health care, and community-based risk reduction.

The events of 2025 highlight the limitations of these approaches. Even well-resourced institutions cannot fully secure campus perimeters or prevent violence originating beyond institutional control. Nor can security infrastructure alone address the social isolation, untreated mental illness, ideological extremism, and easy access to firearms that underlie many of these incidents.

Federal compliance frameworks such as the Clery Act prioritize disclosure and reporting rather than prevention. Meanwhile, the expansion of campus policing has often mirrored broader trends in U.S. law enforcement, raising concerns about militarization without clear evidence of improved safety outcomes.

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Violence Beyond Active Shooters

While mass shootings and assassinations draw national attention, they represent only one part of a wider landscape of harm in higher education. HEI has documented other persistent threats, including hazing deaths, sexual violence, domestic abuse, stalking, false threats that provoke armed responses, and institutional failures to protect vulnerable populations.

Mental health remains a critical and often neglected dimension. Many acts of campus-related violence intersect with untreated mental illness, financial stress, academic pressure, and inadequate access to care — conditions exacerbated by rising tuition, housing insecurity, and uneven campus support systems.

For international students in particular, exposure to U.S. gun violence and emergency lockdowns can be deeply destabilizing, challenging assumptions about safety that differ sharply from conditions in other countries.

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An Urgent Moment for Higher Education

The deaths of individuals such as Professor Loureiro and Charlie Kirk, alongside students at Brown, Florida State, and Kentucky State, underscore a central truth: American campuses do not exist apart from the society around them. No amount of prestige, branding, or technology can fully insulate higher education from national patterns of violence.

For administrators and policymakers, the lesson is not simply to harden security, but to rethink safety holistically — integrating physical protection with mental-health infrastructure, transparent accountability, community engagement, and policies that address deeper cultural and structural drivers of violence.

As Higher Education Inquirer has argued, campus safety is inseparable from broader questions of public health, social policy, and institutional responsibility. Without sustained attention to these connections, tragedies across U.S. campuses will continue to be framed as shocking exceptions rather than symptoms of a deeper and ongoing crisis.

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Sources

Associated Press reporting on the MIT professor killing
Reuters coverage of campus shootings in 2025
Reporting on the Brown University shooting
Coverage of the Florida State University shooting
Reporting on the Kentucky State University residence hall shooting
PBS NewsHour and national reporting on the Charlie Kirk assassination at Utah Valley University
Higher Education Inquirer – Understanding U.S. Campus Safety and Mental Health: Guidance for International Students

How Right-Wing Ideology is Reshaping K–12 Education in Conservative States

In red states across the country, conservative ideology is reshaping K–12 education. Legislatures and governors have used their political power to exert greater control over what children learn in public schools. These changes reflect a broader cultural war playing out in classrooms, as political leaders seek to influence the future of American identity, history, and morality—often at the expense of marginalized students and professional educators.

In Texas, lawmakers have pushed for sweeping restrictions on how race, gender, and history are taught. Laws such as HB 3979 and Senate Bill 3 prohibit teachers from discussing so-called “divisive concepts,” including systemic racism and white privilege. These laws also mandate that educators present controversial historical topics in a “neutral” manner, which critics argue whitewashes the truth and undermines historical accuracy. Meanwhile, efforts by the Texas State Board of Education have promoted materials with religious overtones, such as the optional Bluebonnet Learning curriculum, which includes biblical references and is seen by many as a step toward religious indoctrination in public schools.

In Florida, Governor Ron DeSantis has led an aggressive campaign to root out what he calls “woke ideology” in public education. Florida’s “Stop WOKE Act” prohibits instruction that could make students feel discomfort based on their race or sex, effectively chilling honest discussions about American history and inequality. The state has also expanded the so-called “Don’t Say Gay” law to restrict classroom discussion on gender identity and sexual orientation from kindergarten through high school. At the same time, Florida has approved conservative content from groups like PragerU, a media organization criticized for promoting historical revisionism and partisan propaganda. Book bans and library censorship have surged under the pretext of parental rights, with thousands of titles—often involving LGBTQ characters or themes of racial justice—removed from shelves across the state.

In Oklahoma, State Superintendent Ryan Walters has become a national symbol of Christian nationalist education policy. Under his leadership, Oklahoma has moved to require Bible instruction in classrooms and to place physical copies of the Bible in every public school, a decision halted by the courts but still championed by Walters. The state’s curriculum standards now include directives for students to examine supposed discrepancies in the 2020 presidential election, encouraging distrust in democratic institutions. Walters has also made inflammatory public statements against teachers who discuss racism or gender identity, creating a hostile climate for educators and students alike.

Similar measures have taken hold in other Republican-led states. Arizona, Tennessee, Idaho, and Iowa have passed legislation banning instruction on critical race theory, even in schools where CRT was never part of the curriculum. These laws are often written vaguely, leading to confusion and fear among educators about what is permissible in the classroom. Across these states, teacher resignations are rising, and lawsuits are mounting, as educators refuse to remain silent in the face of increasing state surveillance and ideological control.

The rise of privatization further complicates the picture. Voucher programs and education savings accounts are being promoted under the banner of “school choice,” which critics argue undermines public education by redirecting taxpayer dollars to private and religious schools. In Florida and Texas especially, these efforts coincide with the ideological push to dismantle public trust in public education.

Christian nationalism has become an undercurrent of the new educational movement, with politicians and advocacy groups pushing for prayer in schools, Bible-based curricula, and faith-oriented discipline policies. In some cases, this aligns with efforts to incorporate conservative Christian morality into science education, including the promotion of abstinence-only sex education and skepticism about evolution.

The cumulative effect of these actions is the erosion of academic freedom, the marginalization of LGBTQ and nonwhite students, and the politicization of what should be a fact-based and inclusive educational system. Teachers are under pressure to self-censor. Students are being taught a sanitized, sometimes distorted version of American history. School libraries are being stripped of diverse perspectives. And voters are often unaware of the long-term damage being done in the name of “parental rights” and “traditional values.”

These changes are not merely symbolic. They reflect a fundamental struggle over who controls the narrative of American identity. As right-wing politicians in Texas, Florida, Oklahoma, and other red states reshape K–12 education, they are laying the groundwork for a future electorate steeped in selective memory, limited exposure to diversity, and an education system more responsive to political power than to pedagogy.

This ideological restructuring of K–12 education carries deep and lasting consequences for higher education. Students emerging from these red-state school systems may come to college with significant gaps in knowledge, diminished critical thinking skills, and exposure to misinformation presented as fact. A student who has never been taught about systemic racism, who has been told to question the legitimacy of the 2020 election, or who has grown up fearing open conversations about gender and sexuality, may find the university classroom bewildering—or threatening.

As a result, colleges and universities, particularly public institutions, are seeing increasing polarization in their student bodies. Some students enter ready for open discourse and academic exploration, while others arrive suspicious of professors, defensive about their beliefs, or wholly unprepared for the demands of college-level coursework. Faculty, in turn, face the difficult task of correcting misinformation without triggering political backlash or student grievances rooted in the ideological conditioning of their high school years.

There are broader administrative and cultural consequences. As universities work to build inclusive campuses that serve diverse student populations, they are being accused by conservative lawmakers and media outlets of promoting “woke indoctrination.” Funding for diversity, equity, and inclusion programs is being cut in states like Florida and Texas, as political leaders seek to exert greater control over what happens on college campuses. The message is clear: challenge the narrative, and you risk losing public support and state money.

Meanwhile, teacher shortages—already critical in many parts of the country—are worsening as qualified educators flee repressive school environments. The erosion of K–12 education quality leads to declining college readiness, which in turn affects admissions, retention, and graduation rates. Colleges may have to invest more in remedial programs and rethink traditional academic benchmarks to accommodate students whose schooling was stunted by political interference.

Higher education is also at risk of becoming a battlefield in the next phase of the culture war. As red states seek to bring public universities “in line” with state-approved ideologies, academic freedom and institutional autonomy are increasingly under threat. What begins in elementary classrooms does not stay there—it eventually shapes the electorate, the labor force, and the national discourse.

The right-wing assault on public education is not only a challenge to teachers and students—it is a challenge to democracy and the free exchange of ideas. As the K–12 system becomes a proving ground for ideological control, the mission of higher education as a space for critical inquiry and social mobility is being steadily undermined. What’s at stake is not just what children learn—but whether future generations will be allowed to think freely at all.

University of Florida Rejects Santa Ono in Favor of Right-Wing Conformity

In a stunning rebuke that underscores the escalating politicization of public higher education, the Florida State University System’s Board of Governors has rejected Santa Ono, the sole finalist to become president of the University of Florida, after hours of grilling over his past support for diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives. The 10-to-6 vote came despite Ono’s public disavowal of DEI and a pivot toward conservative values that aligned with the policies of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and his allies.

Ono, a seasoned academic leader with past presidencies at the University of Cincinnati, the University of British Columbia, and most recently the University of Michigan, was offered a package reportedly worth up to $3 million annually. But that wasn’t enough to satisfy Florida's right-wing political apparatus, which has increasingly treated university leadership as an arm of the culture wars.

“This is a guy who by all accounts was a true believer,” said Paul Renner, a DeSantis appointee to the board and former Republican Speaker of the Florida House. “Only after he comes to Florida does he do a complete, whiplash-style 180.” Renner and others said Ono’s reversal wasn’t convincing and lacked authenticity — a surprising take given that he had already dismantled the DEI infrastructure at Michigan under political pressure.

In Florida, however, even ideological surrender is not enough. What matters most is loyalty to a hardline version of conservatism, and Ono’s intellectual pedigree and past advocacy were red flags that could not be erased. Prominent GOP voices, including Rep. Byron Donalds (a Trump-endorsed gubernatorial candidate) and Donald Trump Jr., lobbied against his appointment, seeing it as an opportunity to further purge public universities of any perceived “wokeness.”

The University of Florida’s Board of Trustees had already selected Ono in May. But this week’s rejection by the Board of Governors — a higher body stacked with political appointees — is another clear example of how higher education in Florida has become a battleground for ideological purification rather than academic excellence or professional leadership.

A Troubled Exit and Reinvention

Ono’s rejection in Florida follows his abrupt and unexplained resignation from the University of Michigan earlier this year — a departure The Higher Education Inquirer previously reported as puzzling and suspiciously timed. As noted in our May 2025 article "Santa Ono: Take the Money and Run", his exit came amid growing pressure from anti-DEI forces, alumni dissatisfaction with his leadership, and internal upheaval within the Board of Regents.

Sources close to Michigan’s administration suggested that Ono’s “resignation” may have been forced, with pressure mounting after he slashed DEI budgets and issued a controversial column disavowing DEI as “more about ideology, division and bureaucracy, not student success.” Despite these moves, his attempts to pivot politically appear to have satisfied no one. Progressive critics accused him of betrayal; conservatives dismissed his conversion as opportunistic.

Ono’s shifting stance, from playing cello tributes to George Floyd as president of the University of British Columbia to abandoning DEI at Michigan, appears to reflect broader national political realignments. However, his experience now serves as a case study in how rapid repositioning in a hyper-partisan environment can backfire.

Academic Fallout

Faculty leaders in Florida have expressed concern that rejecting a candidate of Ono’s stature — one of the most experienced and internationally recognized university leaders in North America — will make it significantly more difficult to attract top-tier talent in the future.

“This means we can expect the continued politicization of the state university system,” said Amanda Phalin, a UF professor and former member of the Board of Governors, who warned the rejection could open the door for a purely political appointment — someone with more allegiance to DeSantis than to higher education itself.

The University of Florida declined to comment.

The Bigger Picture

At stake is not just one university presidency but the autonomy and credibility of public education in a climate where loyalty tests are replacing merit. Florida’s aggressive stance — gutting DEI programs, installing ideological loyalists, and rejecting leaders who fail to toe the line — reflects a broader authoritarian shift that is spreading to other Republican-controlled states.

Santa Ono’s rejection is not just about DEI. It’s about the closing of the Overton Window for what is acceptable in higher education leadership under a regime that demands ideological alignment above all else. The message is clear: even if you change your views, it might already be too late — unless you were always one of them.

GOP Attorneys General Shop for Judges in Effort to Crush Student Loan Debtors (David Halperin, Republic Report)

[Editor's note: This article originally appeared on Republic Report.] 

When a federal trial judge in St. Louis issued an order last week blocking the latest Biden-Harris administration student loan relief plan, the Republican state attorneys general who filed the case gleefully celebrated yet another court victory over Americans struggling to pay their college debts. But those GOP AGs apparently don’t want to discuss the route by which the case arrived in Missouri: They seemingly tried to hand-pick a federal judge in coastal Georgia to hear their complaint, only to have that judge, a close associate of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, mysteriously recuse from the matter, and then have a second Georgia federal judge, after granting temporary relief, ship the case to St. Louis.

Let’s break all that down.

On October 3, U.S. District Judge Matthew T. Schelp of the Eastern District of Missouri issued a preliminary injunction barring the Department of Education from implementing proposed regulations to provide student debt relief to several major categories of borrowers, including those who owe more than they first borrowed because of mounting interest, those who have made payments for more than 20 years, and those whose schools failed to offer them “sufficient financial value.” The Biden administration estimated the new rules would completely cancel student debt for 4 million people and erase accrued interest for 23 million.

Judge Schelp held that the GOP AGs were likely to succeed on their claim that the Department of Education lacked the legal authority to cancel all this debt without authorization from Congress.

The ruling was another notable case of extreme judicial activism by supposedly “conservative” judges; Schelp, unusually, struck down the proposed rule before the Department of Education had even finalized it.

Persis Yu, Deputy Executive Director and Managing Counsel at the non-profit Student Borrower Protection Center, said in a statement that Judge Schelp’s ruling was marked by “a dearth of legal reasoning.”

But Judge Schelp, a Donald Trump appointee, is not the first federal judge to handle the latest case in the month since it was filed. He is, remarkably, the fifth.

Led by Missouri attorney general Andrew Bailey, and that state’s solicitor general, Josh Divine, the states of Missouri, Georgia, Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, North Dakota, and Ohio filed the lawsuit, against the education department, on September 3 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Georgia, and specifically in that court’s division based in Brunswick, Georgia, on the state’s east coast, close to the Florida state line.

The Brunswick Division has exactly one U.S. District Judge: Lisa Godbey Wood, appointed by George W. Bush.

The Georgia attorney general’s office tends to file its significant federal lawsuits in the U.S. District Court in Atlanta. So why was this action to nullify major student debt relief filed in Brunswick, when the Georgia AG doesn’t even have staff there and had to rely on a private local lawyer to assist? There was always the risk that a case filed in Atlanta would be assigned to a judge skeptical of the Republican AGs’ effort to void debt relief, including whether the AGs would have legal standing to contest the action. Perhaps the GOP AGs thought Judge Wood was a better bet to do what they wanted.

But the same day that the case was filed, Judge Wood issued a two-sentence order recusing herself and transferring the case to R. Stan Baker, Chief Judge of the Southern District of Georgia. Wood did not state the reason she was recusing.

The next day, Chief Judge Baker issued an order reassigning the case to another judge on the court, J. Randall Hall, also a George W. Bush appointee.

One observer posited to me that the GOP AGs might have already known that Judge Wood had a reason for recusal when they filed the case in front of her; under this theory, the AGs bet that, after Judge Wood recused, Chief Judge Baker would hand-assign the case to another “conservative” judge who would be a good bet to strike down the new Biden student debt rules.

That theory might sound far-fetched. But the day after receiving the case, Judge Hall granted the GOP AGs’ motion for a temporary restraining order, thus blocking the regulations. On September 19, after yet another member of the court, Magistrate Judge Christopher L. Ray, had handled several preliminary motions in the case, Hall extended the restraining order an additional two weeks while he considered the AGs’ motion for a longer preliminary injunction.

But on October 2, Judge Hall threw a curveball: He granted the Department of Education’s motion to dismiss the state of Georgia from the case, holding, appropriately, that Georgia had not demonstrated an interest sufficiently concrete to provide standing to contest the debt regulations. In short, Georgia did not have a significant interest in ensuring that its own citizens, and those of other states, would remain mired in student loan debt.

With Georgia out of the litigation, Judge Hall further ruled that a federal court in Georgia was not the proper venue for the case. He transferred the lawsuit to Missouri, holding that that state had “clear standing” based on the potential harm the rule posed to MOHELA, Missouri’s student loan agency.

The transfer set the stage for the Missouri judge’s decision, the very next day after the case was sent over from Georgia, that blocked the Biden rule pending final resolution of the lawsuit.

So the GOP AGs got the outcome they wanted, at least for now. But why didn’t they go to Missouri, where the argument for standing to bring the case was much stronger, in the first place?

“It appears that the Missouri AG has achieved through dumb luck what they were hoping to get through strategic maneuvering,” Persis Yu told me. “Getting transferred to the Eastern District of Missouri was not necessarily going to be in their favor, which is why I assume they avoided it in the first place. While no liberal oasis, there are a number of Democratic-appointed judges, and so the outcome they got was far from guaranteed.”

But, Yu says, through apparently random assignment the GOP AGs ended up with Schelp, “one of the most ideologically driven judges, who is seemingly happy to eviscerate precedent and the [federal Administrative Procedure Act] to give the Missouri AG what he is looking for.”

Spokespersons for the AGs wouldn’t tell me why they didn’t file in Missouri in the first place, and declined to opine on the reason for Judge Wood’s recusal.

Kara Murray, communications director for Georgia attorney general Chris Carr, said their office was “unable to speak” to my questions, and simply noted that the Missouri District Court “immediately granted a preliminary injunction.”

Madeline Sieren, communications director for Missouri Attorney General Bailey, told me her office “cannot answer these questions at this time, as litigation is ongoing.” She added, “Happy to answer questions that don’t reveal litigation strategy or speculate on judges’ recusal decisions.”

Sieren referred me to Attorney General Bailey’s X (formerly Twitter) feed, where he crowed about the court victory. “A huge -and quick – win for every American who won’t have to pay for someone else’s Ivy League debt,” Bailey tweeted, ignoring that many of those who would benefit from the Biden debt relief plan are struggling middle- and low-income Americans who were scammed by high-priced for-profit colleges. And also ignoring that getting all these people out of heavy debt would help them to have families, buy homes, go back to school, and engage in other activity that would boost the U.S. economy.

Attorney General Bailey struck out with the U.S. Supreme Court in August when, facing a primary election challenge from a lawyer who has represented Donald Trump, he made an absurd effort to press the high court to halt Trump’s criminal sentencing in New York until after the November election. (Bailey won his primary, and the New York judge, Juan Merchan, eventually postponed the sentence on his own.)

The case in which Judge Schelp issued his injunction is the third lawsuit led by Attorney General Bailey to halt the Biden administration’s efforts to grant debt relied to student loan borrowers. Over the summer, the St. Louis-based 8th Circuit Court of Appeals temporarily blocked an earlier Biden debt relief plan called SAVE, as well as blocking parts of other federal Income-Driven Repayment plans on which millions of borrowers have long relied to reduce their debt burden.

Bailey originated that case, Missouri v. Biden, by suing in the St. Louis federal court, but this time he decided to try Brunswick, Georgia, and its only judge.

Shopping for judges is not a new tactic for Republican attorneys general in their quest to nullify Biden administration regulations (or for the for-profit college industry in its efforts to do the same). But proposed federal legislation to curb judge-shopping has gone nowhere in the bitterly divided U.S. Congress.

(Democratic attorneys general and progressive groups often appeared to try judge shopping during the Trump administration, especially by filing in California, headquarters of the relatively liberal 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, but California federal district court rules assign cases at random within a district, preventing the automatic assignment to a local federal judge by filing in a specific courthouse.)

Missouri’s solicitor general, Josh Divine, who has been litigating the case for Bailey’s office, is a former aide to U.S. senator Josh Hawley (R-MO). He also was once a law clerk for Judge William Pryor of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, the appellate region that includes Georgia, and perhaps gained some familiarity with Judge Wood and Judge Baker in that capacity. After clerking for Pryor, Divine clerked for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, and Divine trumpets his fandom of Thomas aggressively, calling Thomas “the GOAT Supreme Court Justice.”

Meanwhile, Justice Thomas appears to be a fan of Brunswick’s Judge Wood. When Wood was sworn in for her own term as Chief Judge of the Southern District of Georgia in 2010, Justice Thomas, a south Georgia native, showed up to effusively praise her.

When you have MAGA-inspired attorneys general and MAGA-connected judges and justices endless gaming the system and ignoring long-standing legal precedents, fairness and justice are crushed, as are, in this instance, the hopes and dreams of generations of hard-working Americans who are buried under insurmountable student loan debt.

College Enrollments Continue Decline in Several States

dahneshaulis@gmail.com

[Updated 10-20-2018]

Although the National Student Clearinghouse numbers won't be out until December, a cursory look at news articles over the last month suggests that US higher education enrollment will be down again in 2018-19.

This is not surprising news, given that only a minority of colleges surveyed by Inside Higher Education/Gallup had met their enrollment goals by June.

Thousands of learning sites and campuses have closed over the last seven years, and the trend looks like it will continue. You can track the school closings here.

For-profit colleges continue to downsize, although they aren't reporting numbers. However, many University of Phoenix and Virginia College campuses will be closing. Harrison College campuses closed abruptly leaving thousands of students shunted to other questionable subprime schools, like National American University.

University of Phoenix campuses will be closing in Albuquerque, Atlanta, Chicago, Colorado Springs, Columbia SC, Detroit, El Paso, Honolulu, Philadelphia, Virginia Beach, and several locations in California and Florida.

Community colleges are also expected to lose students for the foreseeable future.
In Illinois, freshman enrollment was down 20% at Western Illinois University and Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. 

In New Mexico, enrollment is down 7% at University of New Mexico and 5% at Santa Fe Community College. New Mexico State's enrollment dropped by 1% but the school is facing a $3.3 million shortfall. 

In Montana, enrollment at the University of Montana declined 7.6%.

In Hawaii, enrollment as University of Hawaii campuses saw drops at University of Hawaii-Hilo (3.8%), Hawaii Community College (6.6%) and UH-Maui (6.4%).

In Pennsylvania, enrollment was down for the eight consecutive year, a drop of 4%.  Indiana University of Pennsylvania experienced a 9% enrollment drop this semester. Cheney University's numbers were down 37%.

In New Jersey, Cumberland County College is merging with Rowan College at Glouchester County after years of enrollment declines.

In Michigan, enrollment is down 1.5% at Western Michigan and Grand Valley State.

In Mississippi, enrollment at universities and community colleges decreased by 1%. The greatest decline was at Jackson State, which saw a 10% decline.

In Missouri, enrollment is down at Crowder College (8%), Missouri Southern State University (2.7%) and Pittsburg State University (4%). University of Missouri increased enrollment significantly after rebranding itself.

In Nebraska, enrollment increased at Creighton, but decreased at all University of Nebraska campuses.

In Arkansas, enrollment is down 1.3%. University of Arkansas at Little Rock had an enrollment drop of about 10%.

In Wisconsin, UW system-wide enrollment was down 2,598 students or 1.5%.

In Kansas, University of Kansas, Kansas State and Pittsburg State all recorded declining enrollment.

Community college numbers in Oregon continue to drop, particularly at Lane Community College, where enrollment is down 11%.

In West Virginia, WVU-Parkersburg reported a 3% drop.

In Ohio, University of Akron's enrollment fell 7%. Enrollment dropped about 3% at Kent State, also with a decline in foreign students.

In North Dakota, the University of North Dakota experienced a 4% loss in enrollment. North Dakota State also had a 4% loss, resulting in an estimated $5M less in revenues.

In Iowa, enrollments dropped at Northern Iowa (5.8%), Iowa (1.6%), and Iowa State (2.8%. Hawkeye Community College had a 6% loss.

In Arizona, enrollments at Maricopa Community Colleges have declined after it was ruled that Dreamers were not eligible for in-state tuition. 

Nationwide, enrollment may also be influenced by recent declines in the number of foreign students.

There are some notable rises in enrollment. North Carolina is seeing increases after making tuition affordable with its NC Promise program. Texas and Utah are also likely to see continued gains in college numbers as more people move to their states.

Related articles:
College Meltdown: State By State Changes
Subprime College Crash Continues Under the Radar
Private College Revenues and the US College Meltdown
US Department of Education Fails to Recognize College Meltdown
College Meltdown: NY, IL, MI, PA, VA hardest hit
Community Colleges at the Heart of College Meltdown
Charting the College Meltdown

Public Higher Education is Splitting in Two (Robert Kelchen)

Even though there have been longstanding ideological differences across states, higher education leadership was largely insulated against these differences over the last half-century. Yes, they popped up in meaningful ways on topics such as South African divestment, affirmative action, and antiwar protests, but it was possible for university leaders to move from red states to blue states and vice versa. It helped to share the state’s political leanings, but it was generally not a requirement.

The last month has clearly shown that potential presidents now must pass an ideological litmus test in order to gain the favor of governing boards and state policymakers. Here are three examples:

Santa Ono’s hiring at Florida was rejected by the system board (after being approved by the campus board) due to his previous positions in favor of diversity initiatives and vaccine mandates. He tried to pivot his views, but it was not enough for Republican appointments on the board.Six red states, led by Florida and North Carolina, are seeking to launch a new accreditor to break free from their longtime accreditor (which was the only major institutional accreditor to never have a DEI requirement, although their diversity page is now blank). Florida Governor Ron DeSantis used his press conference to go on a tirade against higher education, but the North Carolina system’s statement was more cautious, focused on academic quality.
The Trump administration’s Justice Department effectively forced out University of Virginia president James Ryan over his alleged noncompliance in removing diversity initiatives from campus. This effort was successful because Virginia’s Republican governor also supported removal and has the ability to push the institution’s governing board to take action.

While there has been a long history of politicians across the ideological spectrum leading universities (such as Mitch Daniels at Purdue, John King at the State University of New York, and Dannel Molloy at Maine), these politicians have generally set aside most of their ideological priors that are not directly related to running an institution of higher education. But now a growing number of states are expecting their campus presidents to be politicians that are perfectly aligned with their values.

There are two clear takeaways from recent events. The first is that college presidents are now political appointments in the same way that a commissioner of education or a state treasurer would be in many states. Many boards will be instructed (or decide by themselves) to only hire people who are ideologically aligned to lead colleges—and to clean house whenever a new governor comes into power. The median tenure of a college president is rapidly declining, and expect that to continue as more leaders get forced out. Notably, by threatening to withhold funding, governors do not even have to wait for the composition of the board to change before forcing a change in leadership. New presidents will respond by requesting higher salaries to account for that risk.

Second, do not expect many prominent college presidents to switch from red states to blue states or vice versa. (It may still happen among community colleges, but even that will be more difficult). The expectations of the positions are rapidly diverging, and potential leaders are going to have to choose where they want to be. Given the politics of higher education employees, blue-state jobs may be seen as more desirable. But these positions often face more financial constraints due to declining enrollments and tight state budgets, in addition to whatever else comes from Washington. Red-state jobs may come with more resources, but they also are likely to come with more strings attached.

It is also worth noting that even vice president and dean positions are likely to face these same two challenges due to presidential transitions and the desire of some states to clean house within higher education. That makes the future of the administrative pipeline even more challenging.

[This article first appeared at the Robert Kelchen blog.]

Guild Education: Enablers of Anti-Union Corporations and Subprime College Programs

According to the Harvard Business School, "Guild Education is an education marketplace that connects employers and universities to provide employees with “education as a benefit.” Guild's employer clients include Walmart, Lowe's, Chipotle Mexican Grill, Taco Bell, Disney and Discover Financial. Its education partners include Penn Foster High School, eCornell (part of Cornell University), CSU Global, Purdue University Global (formerly Kaplan University), University of Denver University College, UF Online (part of University of Florida), Johnson and Wales University Online, Brandman University, Bellevue University, and Ancora Education. A majority of Guild's students are working class people of color. The company has been featured in Bloomberg, Forbes, CNBC, the Wall Street Journal, and Inside Higher Education.

History 

(2015) Guild Education founded by Rachel Romer Carlson and Brittany Stich, two Stanford graduates.
(2016) Guild Education raised $8.5 million in Series A funding. They also received an EQUIP grant from the US Department of Education "to provide low-income students with access to new models of education and training." 
(2017) Guild Education raised $20 million dollars in Series B funding. Guild Education teamed up with Lyft to offer programs to its drivers, making Lyft the "First Gig-Economy Company to Provide Access To Education Services to Contractors." Guild also worked with the Denver Public Schools system to help paraprofessionals, most of whom are people of color, become teachers. CEO Rachel Romer Carlson named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 list. 
(2018) Guild Education raised $40 million dollars in Series C funding. Felicis Ventures was a major investor. 
(2019) Guild Education valued at more than a billion dollars, a rare feat for a company founded by women. Guild Education raised $157 million in Series D funding. Investors included General Catalyst, Emerson Collective, Iconiq Capital and Lead Edge Capital. Ken Chenault joined Guild’s Board of Directors. NBA basketball star Stephen Curry also announced that he had invested in Guild Education.
(2020) Guild Education acquired edtech venture consultancy Entangled Group. CEO Rachel Romer Carlson was named a finalist for the EY Entrepreneur of the Year. 
(2021) Guild Education teamed up with online program manager 2U to connect employees with 500 bootcamp programs covering 30 disciplines and with Google to offer Google Career Certificates. It also added Ancora Corporate Training to its group of educational providers. 

Education Assistance Programs

Education assistance programs are used by many large businesses to recruit, retain, and retrain employees and to increase goodwill with former employees and the public. Corporations with these programs, include Walmart (Live Better U), Amazon (Career Choice), McDonald's (Archways to Opportunity) and Kroger (Feed Your Future). According to Wharton College professor Peter Cappelli, only a small percentage of workers actually use these benefits. 

Policy scholar Kelia Washington states that programs like those at Starbucks, Walmart, and Amazon "are limited in their ability to meaningfully increase college access and completion, and, at worst, they can create additional barriers for employees seeking to obtain high-quality, meaningful credentials." She added that "despite what may be advertised, corporate education assistance programs do not meaningfully relieve financial constraints facing employees interested in pursuing a college degree. These programs in fact limit the college and career choices for some of their employees."

Are Unicorns Real? 

Guild Education has gotten a lot of positive press as an innovative company doing good work. But what do we know about its operations? We know several of its high-profile clients (e.g. Walmart, Chipotle Mexican Grill, Taco Bell, The Walt Disney Company, Discover Financial Services, 5 Guys Inc) and educational providers (Penn Foster, University of Arizona Global Campus, Purdue University Global, University of Florida). The edtech startup is said to be valued at $1 Billion + (a unicorn), with annual revenues of $100 Million+. Paul Freedman has stated that Guild could become a $100 Billion company. But how about the real balance sheet? 

Bright Horizons is the company's largest competitor. Bright Horizons is publicly traded (BFAM) and has worked with more than 200 companies, including Home Depot and Goldman Sachs. Instride works with Arizona State University, Starbucks, and Uber. 

While University of Phoenix and EducationDynamics represent the old guard in for-profit education, Guild Education brings the "business model" of higher ed into the 2020s, connecting anti-union companies, low wage labor, and the new "lower ed," producing what appears to be little more than hype.

Leadership and Board Members

Rachel Romer Carlson is the CEO of Guild Education and the grand daughter of former Colorado Governor Roy Romer.  Her father Chris Romer is a lesser known politician who has worked in the oil and gas industry and charter schools.  Natalie McCollough is president and Chief Commercial Officer, Jessica Rusin is Chief Technology Officer, and Suzanne Stoller is the Chief People Officer.  Mae Podesta, VP of Finance and Strategy, is the daughter of DC power broker John Podesta. 

Guild's Board of Directors includes American business executive Kenneth Chenault, Google product innovator Wesley Chan, and Johnny C. Taylor Jr., President and CEO of the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM). Lisa Sherman, President and CEO of the Ad Council is a board advisor. Michael Horn, co-founder of the Clayton Christensen Institute for Disruptive Innovation, is a senior strategist. Other board members include Annie Kadavy of Redpoint Ventures and Byron Deeter of Bessemer Venture Partners.  

Current Partners

Walmart's program is called Live Better U. Associates have the opportunity to earn a college degree "for just $1 a day." Partners include Penn Foster High School, Southern New Hampshire University, Purdue University Global, University of Florida, Bellevue University, and eCornell. Penn Foster provides online courses in facilities maintenance, industrial maintenance, HVAC/refrigeration, electrical, plumbing and construction. 

Disney's Aspire program partners include Purdue University Global, Southern New Hampshire University, University of Arizona online, University of Central Florida, Valencia College, Brandman University, University of Florida Online, University of Denver University College, Wilmington University and Bellevue University. In 2019, Disney reported "that they had invested $150 million in the Aspire free education program for 90,000 of the company’s cast members." 

Chipotle's program partners with Bellevue University. Wilmington University, Southern New Hampshire University, Brandman University, and Purdue University Global.

Lowes' program partners are Penn Foster High School, Brandman University, Colorado State University School of Business, Wilmington University, and Bellevue University.

Taco Bell's program partners with Brandman University, Johnson and Wales University online, Pathstream, University of Denver, and Wilmington University.

Discover Financial Services' program partners include University of Denver University College, Brandman University, Wilmington University, Bellevue University, and University of Florida Online.

Five Guys' program partners include Penn Foster High School, Brandman University, Southern New Hampshire University, Wilmington University, and Bellevue University.

Education Partners

Ancora Education is a for-profit educator focusing on vocational and technical programs.
Bellevue University is a private university based in Nebraska.
Brandman University is part of the Chapman University system.
eCornell is part of Cornell University, an elite private university.
Pathstream is a "web-based platform for teaching in-demand tech skills for work."
Penn Foster High School is a for-profit online high school owned by Bain Capital.
Purdue University Global, formerly known as Kaplan University, is a part of the Purdue University system.
Southern New Hampshire University is a large non-profit university.
University of Denver University College is a private university.
UF Online is part of the University of Florida state system.
Wilmington University is a private non-profit university based in Delaware.

Competitors

Bright Horizons is the company's largest competitor. Bright Horizons is publicly traded (BFAM) and has worked with more than 200 companies, including Home Depot and Goldman Sachs. Instride works with Arizona State University, Starbucks, and Uber.

Humans Don't (Really) Matter

According to the company, from 2015 to 2019, 400,000 working adults used Guild Education to explore their paths back to school. Guild states that there is a 208 percent return on investment for every one dollar spent on education and that the 90-day retention rate for employees enrolled in Guild is 98 percent versus a 71 percent baseline employee retention rate. In 2018, according to Guild, the Lumina Foundation "agreed to research and measure the impact and effectiveness of the program and will work with the Walmart team to share findings." In 2021, Guild also claims to have "helped working learners avoid more than $363 million in student debt." 

According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, "about 15,000 of 950,000 eligible employees use the $1-a-day tuition benefit." That's only about two percent of Walmart's workforce.  In a piece for EducationDive, CEO Rachel Romer Carlson said about 3 to 5 percent of workers in the Guild programs use the benefits.  

With their other clients, is Guild providing educational services to more than two percent of the eligible workers? And how many workers are completing programs?  From this analysis, and the intentional lack of data, it would appear Guild Education for the most part is acting as an anti-union shill, for corporate PR, gathering personal data, upskilling a few workers, and creating lots of goodwill for Walmart and others.  It's possibly a profitable strategy in a world of growing automation and widening inequality, where working people have little to do with the calculus.