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The Trends Report: 10 Key Shifts in Higher Education

Trends Main Front

Budget cuts, a skeptical public, uncertain enrollments, new competitors—higher education faces so many challenges these days, and isn’t known for responding nimbly. But the changing landscape could also offer new opportunities for colleges—to experiment with how students learn, find new ways to reach more-diverse students, and maybe even save money.

How can college leaders tell a passing trend from what’s important, while continuing to do their day-to-day jobs? Read The Trends Report, which describes 10 key shifts in higher education. You’ll find cutting-edge solutions being tried by other colleges, expert commentary, data, and more. Think of it as an essential road map to help navigate campus change.

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Ariel Blackwell (right), a student at Middle Tennessee State, meets with her adviser, Trever Thomas. The university set aside $3-million 
to hire 47 new academic advisers, with the goal of doing a better job of engaging students.
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Spotlight on retention: Students can’t graduate if they don’t return.
By Eric Hoover
Predictive analytics help colleges keep students enrolled, but that doesn’t always mean they’re progressing toward degrees.
Students meet with representatives of Spectrum Health in a networking session arranged by the Michigan Colleges Alliance.
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Career competence: Students need job guidance from Day 1.
By Beckie Supiano
Colleges need to think beyond the job fair to meet increasing expectations for work-force readiness.
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Job Advice for New Grads: Be Flexible and Mind Your Manners
We ask corporate trainers: “If you could persuade colleges to do one more thing to prepare students for the workplace, what would it be?”
Wallace Hall Jr., a regent of the U. of Texas system, took it upon himself to investigate the president of the flagship campus.
News
Board battles: Conditions are ripe for the rise of the rogue trustee.
By Jack Stripling
Frustrated with the pace of change, some board members go it alone.
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Taming the Toxic Trustee
By Terrence MacTaggart
The best antidote is prevention. Failing that, the steps get tougher.
Anthony P. Lubrano
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One Trustee’s View From the Trenches
By Anthony P. Lubrano
To understand the challenges facing board members today, look no further than Penn State, Anthony Lubrano writes.
Nancy Baym, a Microsoft researcher and visiting 
professor at MIT, says academics’ online presence is fraught with pressure: “We’re under a lot more surveillance at the same time that we have to be out there.”
News
Social-media skirmishes: More colleges are deciding how—and whether— to regulate faculty speech
By Jennifer Howard
More colleges are deciding how — and whether— to regulate faculty speech.
News
At U. of Kansas, Social-Media Policy Leads to More Conflict
By Jennifer Howard
The angry reaction to a professor’s bitter tweet prompted the regents to try to limit employees’ online behavior. Now faculty members feel a chill.
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Ph.D. or Microdegree?
By Jeffrey R. Young
How one early adopter turned a new kind of credential into a new job.
Anne McLeer (right), a former college instructor and an organizer for SEIU, speaks 
to faculty members during a union meeting at Maryland’s Montgomery College.
News
Adjunct advocacy: Contingent faculty members are demanding—and getting—better working conditions.
By Peter Schmidt
Contingent faculty members are demanding — and getting — better working conditions.
News
What Adjuncts Need
By Jonathan Karpf
Job security, health and retirement benefits, and offices would help a lot.
News
A Shift in the Work Force
College administrators are starting to think differently about adjunct labor, a change that is evident in shifts in the academic work force. The share of college faculties employed on a part-time basis has begun to shrink everywhere but at doctoral institutions, according to a recent analysis of…
Phillip Levy, an emergency-medicine doctor at Wayne State U., 
joined with behavioral scientists and others in research on 
cardiac health that led to a $1.9-million NIH grant.
News
Team science: Research cooperation grows as federal money tightens.
By Paul Basken
Shrinking budgets are pushing university scientists to form partnerships beyond their own campuses.
Peter Galison, a professor of history of science at Harvard U., found that his traditional 
lectures weren’t reaching today’s students. “We’re at a moment in which there is no dogma 
about what’s going to work,” he says.
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Teaching revival: Fresh attention to the classroom may actually stick this time.
By Dan Berrett
Fresh attention to the classroom 
may actually stick this time.
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One University Takes Multiple Paths to Improve Teaching
By Dan Berrett
When the leaders of the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor envision the world their graduates will inherit, they see a future brimming with political, social, and environmental volatility. If students are going to succeed, they will need to be nimble—able to handle complexity and to reinvent…
Kyle Robertson, a 2011 alumnus of Susquehanna U. who serves on the alumni board, says his fellow young alumni appreciate being asked to donate their time, rather than just their money.
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Wooing millennials: Colleges are trying to cultivate young alums as future donors before it’s too late.
By Ben Gose
Many colleges are deciding that forging closer connections now is the best bet for the future.
Students at Western U. of Health Sciences and the U. of La Verne watch the demonstration of a biceps manual muscle test. The two institutions are part of an effort, 
involving 19 colleges as well as schools, hospitals, and other organizations in California’s Inland Empire, to expand the health-care work force for the underserved region.
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Culture of change: Successful colleges can tell a passing trend from a true opportunity.
By Goldie Blumenstyk
“You have to run your old business while you’re figuring out what your new business is,” says one expert.
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Leading Beyond the Hierarchy
The seven traits of a “leader in balance.”
News
An executive summary of The Trends Report: 10 key shifts in higher education
There’s no doubt higher education is under attack on many fronts these days. Public scrutiny is growing as politicians, parents, employers, and students question the value and relevance of a college degree. Budgets are tight and enrollments uncertain. Shifting demographics mean more poor and…