The 2023 calendar yr is the primary since COVID-19 arrived when each increased schooling development doesn’t must be seen via a pandemic lens.
Results of the coronavirus disaster linger, however new matters are taking heart stage, like potential reworks to the federal monetary support system, in addition to contemporary scrutiny — and the rejection of — U.S. Information & World Report’s extremely influential school rankings.
As Greater Ed Dive appears to be like forward to the brand new yr, we anticipate retaining you up to date on these seven tales, plus no matter else the brand new yr brings.
Efforts to repair monetary support within the limelight
Requires faculties to be extra clear about their monetary support presents have come from most corners of the upper schooling world — lawmakers throughout the political spectrum, associations and consumer-protection advocates.
College students and their households who obtain monetary help typically must decipher a posh internet of support sources, together with federal loans, grants and work-study, which might depart them guessing how a lot they’ll truly find yourself paying.
The difficulty appeared to come back to a head towards the top of 2022, as 10 increased schooling organizations late in November stated they might convene a activity power aimed toward standardizing monetary support data.
Following the associations’ announcement, the U.S. Authorities Accountability Workplace, a congressional watchdog, dropped a bombshell report discovering that greater than 9 in 10 faculties downplay their web value or don’t supply any particulars about it in monetary support presents.
Republicans have been offended. Rep. Virginia Foxx, a number one candidate to be the brand new chair of the Home’s schooling committee, known as the GAO’s findings “egregious and unacceptable.”
Foxx additionally promoted the School Value Transparency and Scholar Safety Act, a Republican-led invoice that might name on the U.S. schooling secretary to ascertain constant phrases and definitions for monetary support.
Some consultants additionally count on the U.S. Division of Schooling to suggest monetary support standardization laws, because the Biden administration has moved to ascertain a number of guidelines to date that purpose to shore up flaws within the scholar support system.
Scholar mortgage forgiveness retains heart stage
U.S. increased ed might have gained the widest consideration in 2022 for President Joe Biden’s plan to wipe away broad quantities of scholar mortgage debt for particular person debtors incomes as much as $125,000.
Every borrower was set to obtain as much as $10,000 in debt forgiveness — $20,000 in the event that they acquired a federal Pell Grant in school. The transfer meant to assuage Democrats’ progressive flank, a few of whom had known as on the president to cancel extra debt. It additionally acknowledged continued monetary ache factors from the pandemic.
Nonetheless, lawsuits floor the plan to a halt. Rulings in federal lawsuits paused it whereas elevating questions on whether or not the administration had overreached its authority. Now, debt forgiveness sits earlier than the U.S. Supreme Court docket, which expedited the case and expects to listen to oral arguments in February.
Authorized consultants have expressed doubts the conservatives who dominate the excessive court docket will again uniliteral debt forgiveness. Conservatives typically argue the debt forgiveness plan is financially reckless and spits within the face of taxpayers who didn’t attend school.
In the meantime, Biden prolonged a pandemic-era pause on mortgage repayments whereas the Supreme Court docket hears the case. The moratorium, which had been scheduled to run out on the finish of 2022, will now final till 60 days after litigation is resolved or 60 days after the top of June — whichever comes first.
The try at debt forgiveness appears to be like to have ramifications no matter whether or not it in the end succeeds. Foxx in September stated she would examine whether or not Biden administration officers who labored on the plan would personally profit from the cash.
Race-conscious admissions insurance policies underneath menace
The Supreme Court docket will lastly resolve this yr on long-simmering authorized challenges to insurance policies at Harvard College and the College of North Carolina at Chapel Hill that take into account candidates’ race through the admissions course of.
A conservative authorized group taking over the 2 establishments, College students for Truthful Admissions, has a protracted historical past of suing over faculties’ race-conscious insurance policies. However this time round, court docket watchers say SFFA appears nearly sure to succeed, because the justices’ conservative tilt nearly definitely give them the votes to strike down these practices.
Those that tuned into oral arguments in 2022 famous a number of justices’ skepticism towards Harvard and UNC-Chapel Hill’s causes for defending race-conscious admissions. Schools that take into account race, nonetheless, solely use it as one metric in admissions choices and argue various scholar our bodies carry sturdy instructional advantages.
Virtually, solely a small slice of faculties would wish to reshape their admissions practices ought to the court docket strike down race-conscious insurance policies, as most establishments settle for a majority of candidates. Nonetheless, school leaders have shared fears {that a} ruling in opposition to race-conscious admissions would sign to traditionally marginalized candidates that they aren’t welcome in increased ed. Additionally they fear campus range would take a big hit.
Specialists have suggested admissions workplaces to speak with different departments early about methods on messaging within the occasion of a ruling in opposition to race-conscious insurance policies and to develop methods to proceed crafting various lessons.
Can U.S. Information & World Report rankings recuperate?
Greater ed officers watched with nice curiosity as Yale College’s regulation faculty, after which Harvard College’s, in November introduced they might now not cooperate with U.S. Information & World Report’s Greatest Legislation Faculties rankings, one of many publication’s many school lists that carry main clout.
The rankings, specifically the Greatest Schools undergraduate checklist, have lengthy been the topic of complaints that they preoccupy institutional choice making to the detriment of faculties’ missions. U.S. Information’ methodology additionally typically comes underneath fireplace for measuring fame, wealth and exclusivity — and never the precise high quality of establishments’ schooling, how accessible it’s or how a lot it adjustments the lives of the scholars served.
Since Yale and Harvard stated they wouldn’t ship U.S. Information the mandatory knowledge, a contingent of different regulation faculties — top-ranked and never — have adopted go well with.
These regulation faculties typically say the rankings drawback establishments that need to carry regulation college students into public service careers. U.S. Information opened the brand new yr by asserting adjustments to its regulation faculty rating methodology. Nevertheless it wasn’t sufficient for a minimum of some regulation deans to purchase again into the system.
A serious unanswered query is whether or not regulation faculties’ rejection will spur the same motion amongst undergraduate faculties. Whereas no undergraduate school has shared that they’re revolting in opposition to the rankings, some consultants surprise if they’re biding their time till nearer to when the Greatest Schools checklist publishes, usually in September.
Regardless, the regulation faculties’ actions solely add to long-building animus in opposition to the U.S. Information rankings, which suffered different reputational blows in 2022. The publication booted Columbia College from its Greatest Schools rankings after questions on knowledge it submitted have been raised by one of many college’s arithmetic professors. It then kicked a number of different faculties from its 2022 rankings, alleging additionally they misreported knowledge.
Extra school consolidations on the horizon
Specialists in increased ed finance predicted the monetary stresses early within the pandemic would result in some low-enrollment faculties’ demise, just for federal pandemic help to considerably protect establishments.
Nonetheless, no new federal support seems to be coming down the pipeline. Some establishments had already turned to austerity measures, because the pool of traditional-age school college students begins to run dry.
Among the many main closings and consolidations introduced in increased ed in 2022 have been Lincoln School, a predominantly Black establishment in Illinois that shut down after a cyberattack added to already mounting stresses, and Indiana College-Purdue College Indianapolis, which is splitting up into separate operations run by its constituent analysis universities.
As faculties proceed to really feel the pandemic’s lingering monetary pinch on prime of demographic tendencies putting downward stress on the sizes of their scholar our bodies, extra establishments will doubtless meet comparable fates.
Enrollment woes proceed
As pandemic-related restrictions eased and life appeared to settle extra into normalcy, increased ed leaders held out hope a COVID-19-era enrollment decline would rebound.
That doesn’t look like the case. Enrollment fell by 1.1% in fall 2022 from the prior yr, in line with the Nationwide Scholar Clearinghouse Analysis Heart.
Establishments suffered throughout the board — neighborhood faculties, four-year public faculties and for-profits. Much less-selective faculties and two-year establishments bore the brunt of those declines.
Some knowledge factors, nonetheless, ought to encourage the sector. Enrollment at traditionally Black faculties and universities rose by 2.5% between fall 2021 and fall 2022. And between fall 2020 and as we speak, enrollment at HBCUs inched up by just below a proportion level.
Additionally, undergraduate enrollment at primarily on-line faculties jumped by greater than 3% between fall 2021 and fall 2022.
Skepticism of faculties’ worth might push down scholar counts. And the so-called beginning dearth through the Nice Recession is arriving for increased schooling, shrinking the contingent of highschool graduates obtainable to enroll in school — and which means enrollment will doubtless proceed to wane.
Scrutiny over OPMs grows
Ed tech traders and different observers will probably be watching carefully to see whether or not on-line program administration firms, or OPMs, will have the ability to recuperate from a rocky yr marked by layoffs and heightened scrutiny of their enterprise fashions.
2U, probably the most distinguished OPMs within the U.S., accomplished across-the-board layoffs final yr that led to a 20% discount in personnel bills. Coursera, a high-profile MOOC platform with a small OPM enterprise, additionally introduced in November that it was decreasing its workforce, although the corporate didn’t disclose what number of workers have been let go.
However financial headwinds aren’t OPMs’ solely hassle. Many of those firms depend on tuition-share agreements, through which they supply upfront capital for on-line applications in alternate for a reduce of their future income, typically between 40% and 60%.
Democratic lawmakers requested the U.S. Division of Schooling late final yr to formally examine whether or not the company ought to proceed to permit faculties to enter tuition-share contracts with OPMs that present recruiting providers. They questioned whether or not these fashions incentivize OPMs to use aggressive recruiting strategies.
Authorized hassle can also be brewing.
A lawsuit introduced in December by former College of Southern California college students made the same argument as Democrats. Their criticism focuses on on-line education schemes USC launched with 2U’s assist. They allege the college and firm labored collectively to lure college students into applications by promoting artificially inflated rankings in U.S. Information.
Natalie Schwartz contributed to this report.
