The Higher-Education Legacy of George H.W. Bush

George H.W. Bush, who died on Friday, is not generally regarded as having had a major influence on higher education. But in his single term as the 41st U.S. president, from 1989 to 1993, Bush’s role proved significant for the academy. Here are a few of his administration’s more noteworthy effects on colleges and students:

The reauthorization of the Higher Education Act in 1992. Among the key provisions were the creation of a direct-loan pilot program, a toughening of the path for student borrowers seeking to discharge their loans in bankruptcy, and the enactment of the 85/15 rule (which would later become the 90/10 rule), which specified that colleges could receive no more than 85 percent of their revenue from federal student aid. (Efforts by the first Bush administration — spearheaded by the education secretary, Lamar Alexander, now a U.S. senator from Tennessee — to rein in for-profit colleges are largely forgotten in higher-ed lore.)
The crackdown on the Overlap Group. The Justice Department investigated a group of admissions officers at elite colleges who gathered annually to compare and adjust financial-aid awards for prospective students with the intention of making aid dollars go further.
Supreme Court nominations. The Clarence Thomas-Anita Hill hearings heralded the #MeToo movement, and David Souter proved to be a key advocate of academic and intellectual freedom.
The subdued reaction to the Tiananmen Square massacre. China’s student-led pro-democracy movement electrified the world. Then came the slaughter of an untold number of protesters. Bush, who had embraced China’s people as the chief U.S. envoy in the mid-1970s, made diplomatic overtures to the country even as the rest of the Western world was seeking to isolate it.
Enactment of the Americans With Disabilities Act. In Bush’s most enduring legacy for higher education, he signed legislation expanding protections for college applicants and students with disabilities.

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The reauthorization of the Higher Education Act in 1992. Among the key provisions were the creation of a direct-loan pilot program, a toughening of the path for student borrowers seeking to discharge their loans in bankruptcy, and the enactment of the 85/15 rule (which would later become the 90/10 rule), which specified that colleges could receive no more than 85 percent of their revenue from federal student aid. (Efforts by the first Bush administration — spearheaded by the education secretary, Lamar Alexander, now a U.S. senator from Tennessee — to rein in for-profit colleges are largely forgotten in higher-ed lore.)
The crackdown on the Overlap Group. The Justice Department investigated a group of admissions officers at elite colleges who gathered annually to compare and adjust financial-aid awards for prospective students with the intention of making aid dollars go further.
Supreme Court nominations. The Clarence Thomas-Anita Hill hearings heralded the #MeToo movement, and David Souter proved to be a key advocate of academic and intellectual freedom.
The subdued reaction to the Tiananmen Square massacre. China’s student-led pro-democracy movement electrified the world. Then came the slaughter of an untold number of protesters. Bush, who had embraced China’s people as the chief U.S. envoy in the mid-1970s, made diplomatic overtures to the country even as the rest of the Western world was seeking to isolate it.
Enactment of the Americans With Disabilities Act. In Bush’s most enduring legacy for higher education, he signed legislation expanding protections for college applicants and students with disabilities.

Bush’s state funeral will take place on Wednesday at Washington National Cathedral. A graduate of Yale, he will be interred on Thursday at his presidential library, at Texas A&M University at College Station, which is also home to the Bush School of Government and Public Service.