Legislatures in Indiana and Texas are remodeling their financial allocation to colleges and universities based on an outcomes-based formula rather than blanket recommendations based on enrollment as each state grapples with higher education’s most prevailing trends: student workforce preparation and faltering enrollment.

“The current model is one that’s based upon contact hours, heavily influenced by enrollment and type of courses offered,” says Ray Martinez III, president and CEO of the Texas Association of Community Colleges (TACC), according to Diverse. “What do we need to do as a matter of state policy to ensure that students have the support they need, the scaffolding to ensure they can complete a post-secondary credential?”

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Texas tackles workforce demands at the community college level

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott approved legislation on Monday to increase its community college biennium funding by nearly 25% for $2.2 billion, according to Dallas Innovates. Aside from the increase in funding, the legislation also marks a bold new direction for which colleges will earn the lion’s share. Texas will now fund its community colleges based on upward student transfer rates, high school dual degree completion, and whether they’re awarding “credentials of value.” Credentials of value include badges, certificates and degrees that “position graduates for well-paying jobs” in high-demand fields.

Texas’ former community college state funding formula relied almost entirely on contact hours, according to the Texas Commission on Community College Finance (TxCCCF), which strongly recommended the outcomes-based changes to the state. TxCCCF found that 2021 was Texas’ worst year for community college enrollment, which is particularly damaging for the state considering that the sector makes up more than 40% of its post-secondary student enrollment.

By repositioning the state’s 50 community colleges to deliver credentials of values while promoting college affordability, TxCCCF and Texas legislatures believe they are in a prime placement to recoup state enrollment by churning out workforce-ready individuals.

“A highly educated and skilled workforce is critical for Texas to remain the most attractive state to do business, and community colleges are ground zero for students to access the necessary skills and training for in-demand careers,” said Sen. Brandon Creighton, according to the Austin American-Statesman. “This new funding framework will only encourage more successful programs for Texas to train the workforce of the future.”

Indiana wants to bring students back

With only 48% of Indiana’s citizens being credential or degree earners, Gov. Eric Holcomb wants to increase the rate of Hoosiers with postsecondary education to 60% by 2025. With public college tuition and fees decreasing 4% over the past five years and the state recuperating from one of its lowest enrollment rates in recent history, Indiana’s 2023 legislative session seeks to bump state college funding by $130 million in the next biennium budget.

With a revamped budget comes an updated budget strategy. On top of the base funding each college and university will receive, they will also be eligible for additional funding based on five metrics: quality and career relevance, completion, college-going rate, quantity of adult students and graduation retention rates.

For example, colleges that score 80% of their forecasted goal on one of those five metrics will receive 80% of the additional funding they were promised. That additional funding earned in the first year of the biennium would be guaranteed in year two. It then has the potential to build from there.

Equity concerns with outcomes-based funding

While more states become outcome-oriented when deciding which colleges and universities to fund, some professionals believe doing so can hurt minority-serving institutions.

Institutions that serve students and color and those from lower-income households are already under-resourced. If they can’t deliver on state metrics, their situation will never improve, creating a “self-fulfilling prophecy,” wrote Dr. Kalya C. Elliott, interim director of Education Trust and co-author of the report cautioning against outcomes-based funding.

The post Why these 2 states are changing their higher ed funding model appeared first on University Business.

“This landmark change in hiring practices for our state workforce will improve hiring processes, expand possibilities and career paths for job seekers and enhance our ability to deliver quality services,” Gov. Glenn Youngkin said in a statement accompanying the announcement, according to AP News.

Virginia joins a growing list of states opting to evaluate job applicants’ holistic skillset rather than the black-and-white metric of having a higher education degree. It will affect the evaluation process of about 20,000 state jobs advertised annually by Virginia’s state agencies, according to the governor’s office.

“By giving equal consideration to applicants with an equivalent combination and level of training, knowledge, skills, certifications and experience we have opened a sea of opportunity at all levels of employment for industrious individuals who have the experience, training, knowledge, skills, abilities, and most importantly, the desire to serve the people of Virginia,” Secretary of Labor Bryan Slater said in a statement.

It’s “a landmark change” that the National Governors Association believes will create more hiring equity and diversify a state workforce’s perspectives and skill sets, according to a statement. This move is especially important because it welcomes more individuals to apply during a tight labor market and a reduced pool of talented applicants.

More from UB: Despite regulation efforts and student complaints, this popular edtech platform marches on

Other states have enacted similar measures

Pennsylvania

On his first day in office this year, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro signed an executive order removing four-year requirements for most state jobs, affecting 92% (or 65,000) of state jobs. His administration is also reviewing four-year degree requirements for the remaining 8%.

Maryland

Last year, former Gov. Larry Hogan announced a similar measure across most of Maryland’s state-related jobs. Partnering with OpportunityatWork, whose mission is to “tear the paper ceiling,” Maryland is seeking residents who are “skilled through alternative routes,” or STARs. OpportunityatWork estimates that there are more than 70 million STARs in the U.S.

Colorado, Utah, Alaska, North Carolina, New Jersey, South Dakota and Ohio have enacted similar labor measures.

The post Virginia joins 9 others eliminating state jobs requiring 4-year degrees appeared first on University Business.

2U recently announced two new degree programs with Cabrini University, extended its contract with Southern Methodist University and signed an agreement with Arcadia University to launch its online Doctor of Education program. Additionally, last year they acquired another popular edtech company edX, which one American business magazine listed as the third-most innovative education company of 2023.

However, 2U has gained notoriety recently for allegedly engaging in deceptive recruitment strategies and contributing to students’ high debt load. Students and the federal government have waged lawsuits and called for stronger oversight of the edtech company. Yet, 2U has managed to fight back on all fronts. Should higher education hold faith in 2U despite its recent spats?

More from UB: Ohio is the latest state to try making college costs, ROI clearer—is it worth it?

Student lawsuits

Online students at the University of Southern California have sued the private Los Angeles school in two separate lawsuits relating to its online programs’ deceptive recruitment, which 2U helps operate. In one case filed late last year, Student Defense and Tycko & Zavareei LLP filed a lawsuit against USC and 2U for luring students to enroll in the Rossier School of Education using manipulated U.S. News data. According to the suit, 2U “assumed responsibility for recruiting these online students and was paid a substantial percentage of tuition.”

Additionally, students sued USC again in a class-action lawsuit last month, alleging the university’s online Master of Social Work (MSW) program misrepresented its program’s quality. Specifically, the university advertised its online and on-campus programs were equal in value; however, students found that its online MSW offerings, provided by 2U, were outdated and inferior in quality.

“They paid an unjustifiably high price for a program that was promised to be the same as the on-campus version when in reality, it was run by a for-profit education company. Students were lied to and now are standing up and fighting back,” said Eileen Connor, president and director of the Project on Predatory Student Lending, which is helping to represent the plaintiffs, in a statement, according to USA Today.

While 2U was not named a defendant in the MSW lawsuit, they quickly addressed it, claiming the allegations were “without merit” based on their call recordings and student feedback forms.

Pending federal regulation

Last year, several U.S. Senators voiced their concerns about the dangers of online program managers (OPMs), such as 2U. Aside from engaging in “aggressive marketing and recruitment practices,” the senators were also concerned about OPMs’ ability to burden students with high costs.

“We continue to have concerns about the impact of OPM partnerships on rising student debt loads,” wrote the senators. “OPMs often receive 50% or more of students’ tuition. These agreements may create a disincentive to lower costs.”

A year later, the Department of Education announced that it expanded its definition of third-party services to include OPMs, such as 2U. The department recognized that because the function of OPMs is interlinked with institutions’ Title IV administrative activities, companies like 2U must also comply with TPS requirements as well. Consequently, the edtech company would be forced to report their business dealings and be subjected to tighter regulation, oversight and potential audits.

However, 2U has since sued the Department of Education, claiming it exceeded its authority and did not collect enough input from outside stakeholders to make the decision. Additionally, several higher education leaders have asked the department to rescind the guidance, such as Ted Mitchell, president of the American Council on Education, who spoke for more than 80 higher education associations.

The department has since delayed implementing the ruling on OPMs. However, if the department eventually decides to rule against OPMs, 2U can find itself scrambling for a new revenue stream.

“Because revenue sharing with institutions is central to their business model, the Ed Dept’s expanded definition of a third-party service provider could pose significant challenges to 2U’s business model in the future,” said Matt Winn, Tambellini Group’s senior analyst covering academic technology in an email.

The post Despite regulation efforts and student complaints, this popular edtech platform marches on appeared first on University Business.

However, one member of Ohio’s American Association of University Professors chapter referred to quantifying students’ future earnings potential as “problematic,” according to the Dayton Daily News. The University of Cincinnati professor testified that he supports greater financial transparency, but his concerns do hearken back to the turbulence many proponents of greater cost transparency in higher education have faced.

Why are sweeping measures for transparency challenging to gain support for?

Unhelpful information

Data submitted by colleges is rarely strong enough to help parents and students make effective decisions. When former President Donald Trump called for similar initiatives to make higher education more transparent, many of the data colleges posted were found to be misleading or inaccurate. College Scorecard cannot track current student data and must rely on information from student loan borrowers due to a 2008 Congressional decision. Aside from being the partial truth, colleges’ self-submitted data is not usually refined for the average parent or student and often becomes too technical to use appropriately.

“The information we need to provide has to be accurate, has to be verifiable, has to be comparable. It has to be visible to students, and it has to be usable,” said Debbie Cochrane, executive vice president of the Institute for College Access & Success, according to The Hechinger Report. “Misleading information is not helpful. Perfectly valid information that can’t be found is also not helpful.”

Aside from the college information being impractical, some colleges have a track record of submitting bad information. Columbia and Temple University have been caught submitting erroneous data to U.S. News and World Report to pad their rankings.

Lack of use

Initiatives that do try to track critical measures for prospective students don’t seem to gain much traffic. One report in 2016 found that College Scorecard underperformed among users. Similarly, two state-driven initiatives have also achieved meek results. One partnership between the University of Texas and the U.S. Census Bureau to provide better earnings data did not gain popularity two years after its launch. And Virginia’s wide-ranging database is left mostly unused.

“I think some fraction of students use the data,” said Tod Massa, policy analytics director at the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia, according to The Hechinger Report. But “how many high school students are actually going to think to go to a state agency website to research colleges and universities?”

How have recent bills similar to Ohio’s fared?

At the federal level, three U.S. Senators are reviving the College Transparency Act after it stalled out last year. If approved, the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) would be responsible for securing student data and generating postgraduation outcomes reports with the help of federal agencies. Creating a user-friendly website that parents and students can easily navigate is also top of mind. Additionally, the College Transparency Act would lift the 2008 Congress ban that hindered College Scorecard’s data accuracy.

At the state level, the Colorado General Assembly has recently passed a bill appropriating $3 million to the department of higher education to create a public-facing data system that allows prospective students to compare and contrast “postsecondary success measures and workforce success measures” among different institutions. Another eight states have enacted some form of collection and distribution of college data, according to The Hechinger Report. Among them are Arkansas, Arizona, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia.

However, one proposed bill in New York stalled out last year and has yet to be reintroduced.

The post Ohio is the latest state to try making college costs, ROI clearer—is it worth it? appeared first on University Business.

Despite recent efforts to raise state funding for higher education and consolidate public universities, its public university system and state-related institutions are desperate for more financing to curb Pennsylvania’s rapidly declining student enrollment and intimidating college costs.

Since fall 2017, enrollment at Pennsylvania’s four-year public institutions has declined by 12.4%, which is dramatically worse than the nation’s overall 3% decrease in that sector, according to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center. While the Northeast region has experienced a dramatic decline in enrollment across every sector in that same period, Pennsylvania’s decline still outpaced the region’s average, 12.3% compared to 11.3%.

Aside from the demographic changes affecting the entire country, Pennsylvania’s public college system is catching fewer students per year due to its burdensome college costs. State funding per student ranks second worst nationwide, averaging $6,100 compared to the national average of $10,200, according to The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Among the American Association of Universities’ public institution members, Pennsylvania State University and Pittsburgh University claimed the top spots for the costliest colleges to attend.

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Two state systems, both in need

Allocating state funding for Pennsylvania’s public institutions is split among two different public college systems: the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education (PASSHE) and the Commonwealth System of Higher Education. The latter comprises the state’s most revered state-related colleges: Lincoln University, the Pennsylvania State University, Temple University, and the University of Pittsburgh.

While the governor’s proposed $40 million, 7.1% increase across all four institutions in the Commonwealth System exceeds Pitt’s request (6%), it’s far below what Temple (16%), Lincoln (25%), and Penn State (48%) asked for, according to Spotlight PA. Lincoln specified their requested funds would be used for tuition and fee support, while Penn State stated it’d be used for student aid. Consequently, no state-related university leader committed to a tuition freeze if allotted Shapiro’s budget. The biggest losers among Pennsylvania’s state-related institutions are families from disadvantaged socioeconomic backgrounds.

“And if you don’t have that kind of financial aid, particularly in a state with relatively high public college tuition like Pennsylvania, low- and moderate-income families just get priced out,” said Will Doyle said, a professor of public policy and higher education at Vanderbilt University, according to Spotlight PA. He also co-authored a report that ranked Pennsylvania among the country’s least affordable states for higher education in 2016.

PASSHE seems also to have gotten the short end of the stick, despite having consolidated six universities into two last year to cut costs. Chancellor of PASSHE Daniel Greenstein asked for a 3.8% increase in state funding to help freeze tuition for a fifth year; however, the governor proposed only a 2% bump in funding. If the state cannot meet Greenstein’s requests, the system looks at hiking tuition up 4.5%, which will barely cover PASSHE’s existing costs. And as faculty are currently negotiating new contracts, that percentage may need to rise. If allocation for PASSHE doesn’t increase whatsoever, universities could be looking at a 7.5% tuition increase, which would be “horrific” for future enrollment trends in the state, according to one PASSHE university president.

Consequently, university officials and state leaders are tangled on what to do. “We firmly believe PASSHE universities cannot raise tuition and then expect to also receive increased state support,” Senate President Pro Tempore Kim Ward, Senate Majority Leader Joe Pittman, and Senate Appropriations Committee Chair Scott Martin said in a statement, according to The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “We are committed to working together to adequately address the financial concerns of our higher education institutions.”

Long-term problems

The state of Pennsylvania has long been a culprit in reducing funding to its higher education system. Since 1980, public funding for the state’s institutions has decreased by 42%. So, despite last year’s 15% budget increase for PASSHE, the state university system still needs more funding to protect students from shouldering extra costs.

University of Pittsburgh Chancellor Patrick Gallagher also blames the state’s lack of cohesion in addressing the state’s higher education.

“Pennsylvania’s approach can hardly be called a system. Some residents live near a wealth of state-supported schools, all with a different funding relationship to the commonwealth and all competing for the same, limited number of students, said Gallagher, according to The University of Pittsburgh. “Other residents live in areas where their window into a state-supported college campus is limited to a 60-second commercial break during football season.”

The post Can higher education in Pennsylvania be saved? appeared first on University Business.

Enabling new forms of interaction between educators and students and more effectively personalizing learning are among the potential benefits of AI, the agency says in its recent report, “Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Teaching and Learning: Insights and Recommendations.” But the risks include a range of safety and privacy concerns and algorithmic bias. To mitigate them, the department strongly emphasizes keeping humans in the driver’s seat.

“We envision a technology-enhanced future more like an electric bike and less like robot vacuums,” reads the report. “On an electric bike, the human is fully aware and fully in control, but their burden is less, and their effort is multiplied by a complementary technological enhancement.”

Educators and policymakers should collaborate on the following principles:

1. Emphasize humans-in-the-loop: As students and teachers begin interacting with chatbots to help with coursework and plan personalized instruction, teachers must stay abreast of safety precautions if things begin to fall astray. Keeping other teachers involved in loops is a vital way to remain vigilant. Additionally, teachers must stave off becoming so reliant on AI that it depletes their judgment. AI is known to commit errors and make up “facts,” so teachers must analyze AI prompts to flag errors.
2. Align AI models to a shared vision for education: The educational needs of students should be at the forefront of AI policies. “We especially call upon leaders to avoid romancing the magic of AI or only focusing on promising applications or outcomes, but instead to interrogate with a critical eye how AI-enabled systems and tools function in the educational environment,” the Department of Education says.
3. Design AI using modern learning principles: The first wave of adaptive edtech incorporated important principles such as sequencing instruction and giving students feedback. However, these systems were often deficit-based, focusing on the student’s weakest areas. “We must harness AI’s ability to sense and build upon learner strengths,” the Department of Education asserts.
4. Prioritize strengthening trust: There are concerns that AI will replace—rather than assist—teachers. Educators, students and their families need to be supported as they build trust in edtech. Otherwise, lingering distrust of AI could distract from innovation in tech-enabled teaching and learning.
5. Inform and involve educators: Another concern is that AI will lead to a loss of respect for educators and their skills just as the nation is experiencing teacher shortages and declining interest in the profession. To convince teachers they are valued, they must be involved in designing, developing, testing, improving, adopting, and managing AI-enabled edtech.
6. Focus R&D on addressing context and enhancing trust and safety: Edtech developers should focus design efforts on “the long tail of learning variability” to ensure large populations of students will benefit from AI’s ability to customize learning.
7. Develop education-specific guidelines and guardrails: Data privacy laws should be reviewed and updated in the context of advancing educational technology. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) is a potential candidate facing reevaluation as new accessibility technologies emerge.

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The post How should we teach with AI? The feds have 7 fresh edtech ideas appeared first on University Business.

The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research concluded from its May polling that 63% of U.S. adults believe the U.S. Supreme Court should not block colleges from considering race or ethnicity in its admissions process. Contrary to the rise in political polarization in higher education, NORC found minimal differences across party lines.

However, most U.S. adults don’t believe race or ethnicity should significantly affect college admissions. Specifically, only 31% of adults thought it should be extremely, very or somewhat important to the college admissions process. The rest concluded it was “not too important” or “not important at all.” In fact, adults weighed athletic ability as a more important factor (38%).

On the other hand, high school grades (92%), standardized test scores (83%) and ability to afford tuition (71%) gained the most preference among those polled.

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While most U.S. adults, regardless of political preference, are against banning race-based admissions practices, Students for Fair Admissions, which sued the University of North Carolina in 2014, is primarily a conservative-based group. Similarly, Florida and Texas legislators responsible for banning diversity, equity and inclusion efforts among their public colleges mainly were Republican. While the Supreme Court last examined affirmative action in 2016 and upheld the practice at the University of Texas, former President Donald Trump has since appointed two Supreme Court justices with a conservative-leaning.

Some experts argue that restricting colleges from a race-conscious admissions process will deprive minority students of a sense of belonging. Ultimately, it will affect student success rates and academic equity.

“Not having students with similar experiences may make people of color feel like they don’t belong, which may decrease degree completion and increase transfers,” said Dr. Nika White, author of “Inclusion Uncomplicated: A Transformative Guide to Simplify DEI” and president of Nika White Consulting.

Consider these race-neutral alternatives

If the Supreme Court ruling favors eliminating affirmative action, schools can consider similar admissions practices that may ensure enrollment equity.

• Give preference to students with a lower socioeconomic status: In the U.S., a strong correlation exists between individuals’ race and ethnicity and socioeconomic status, according to a Harvard-affiliated public policy resource. “If you’re Black, you’re more likely to be in an under-resourced school,” said Justice Sonia Sotomayor, according to University Business. “You’re more likely to be taught by teachers who are not as qualified as others. You’re more likely to be viewed as having less academic potential.”
• Consider ending legacy-based admissions: Harvard, Johns Hopkins and most recently the University of Pennsylvania have pledged to eliminate considering a student’s potential legacy standing as a factor for admissions. Harvard’s Supreme Court ruling recently unveiled that despite Harvard’s 4% admissions rate, 30% of its accepted cohort comprises legacy students.

The post Most U.S. adults against banning race-based admissions, poll appeared first on University Business.

Referring to DEI as a concept that “promote(s) dangerous political and social activism,” DeSantis believes it espouses censorship and disproportionately antagonizes conservative voices on campus. When the governor helped revamp New College of Florida as a classical, conservative-leaning institution in January, the school swiftly eliminated its Office of Outreach and Inclusive Excellence.

“If you look at the way this has actually been implemented across the country, DEI is better viewed as standing for discrimination, exclusion and indoctrination,” DeSantis said at a news conference. “And that has no place in our public institutions. This bill says the whole experiment with DEI is coming to an end in the state of Florida.”

SB 266 also precludes public colleges and universities from teaching required general courses that insinuate “systemic racism, sexism, oppression, and privilege are inherent in the institutions of the United States” and that they are weaponized to sustain inequities across the country’s social, political and economic environment. Moreover, the bill places higher accountability on university presidents to fire faculty.

Another bill signed into law that day prohibits state institutions from requiring faculty or students to sign DEI statements. It also requires schools to establish an Office of Public Policy Events to ensure speaker events host a range of diverging opinions on public policy.

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Academic pushback

Some believe that initiatives by Florida’s politicians to limit DEI efforts constrain institutions’ academic freedom.

“It’s basically state-mandated censorship, which has no place in a democracy,” said Irene Mulvey, president of the American Association of University Professors, according to The Washington Post.

DeSantis’ flagship “Stop WOKE Act” bill in November aimed to clamp down on reviewing tenured faculty members who teach “divisive concepts.” However, a U.S. district judge struck down many critical aspects of the bill as he compared it to George Orwell’s famous book “1984.”

Efforts targeting DEI grow nationwide

Texas

In April, Texas’ Senate passed a bill requiring all state colleges and universities to close their offices pertaining to DEI. Like Florida, it would prohibit institutions from requiring diversity statements and training.

Ohio

One Ohio bill aimed to ban mandatory diversity training but recently has been modified to permit it when related to accreditation, licensing and grants.

Iowa

The Board of Regents for Iowa’s three public universities is pausing any new DEI programs to review its current initiatives. One proposed bill aims to defund DEI offices and administrators.

Oklahoma

Oklahoma can very well be the next state to enact similar measures. In February, the state’s secretary of education requested a detailed report on the state’s spending related to DEI, a similar measure taken by DeSantis.

The post DeSantis bans DEI in Florida, calling it “discrimination, exclusion and indoctrination” appeared first on University Business.

The budget cuts would be “devastating,” according to CSCU President Terrence Cheng. One university professor even remarked that Gov. Ned Lamont could be remembered as the “education destroyer” for this move.

The overall state budget for the state’s higher ed system is dropping by $117 million, but a significant reason for that is due to the last budget’s sizable allocation of emergency federal aid post-COVID. Specifically, the American Rescue Plan topped Connecticut off in fiscal year 2022-23 with another $195 million. Now, as HEERF III spending sets to expire at the end of June, long-term programs and initiatives partly funded by temporary aid are under threat.

“We’re about to fall off that cliff,” said Higher Education Co-Chairman Gregg Haddad to CT Insider referring to the reliance the state system placed on those one-time federal aid investments.

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Programs in trouble

Student support services such as mental health support and academic advising will be severely impacted by the cuts, according to Chen. Academic programs in manufacturing and healthcare can be taking a hit, too, which he wages will directly impact the state’s economy.

His proposed plan to make all community college tuition-free to all students may also be in trouble, considering it called for a $54 million budget increase from 2023, and another $127 million more the following year. Chen believes the Pledge to Advance Connecticut program can expand higher education opportunities to lower-income and first-generation students and help fill workforce shortages in nursing, teaching and mental health counseling.

State pushback

Despite the challenges Connecticut’s budget has placed on the state’s college system, some legislators believe it’s up to the school leaders to figure out how to operate without a ballooned budget, considering Connecticut’s enrollment has steadily declined.

“CSCU’s request for additional funding appears to be based on a belief that one-time federal funding to compensate for COVID-related costs should continue in perpetuity,” said Secretary of the Office of Policy and Management Jeffrey Beckham, according to CT Insider. “Simply asking for ever-increasing operating subsidies is not sustainable. Before looking to the taxpayers and students for additional funding, they must get their costs under control and in line with the current and expected future demand for students, which has decreased by 36 percent in the community colleges and 21 percent at the regional state universities.”

The state has steadily increased baseline appropriations for CSCU by $159 million since 2018. Since taking office, Lamont will have been responsible for raising total state funding by 55% or $334 million, according to Beckham.

The post Did emergency funding create a crutch for the Connecticut college system? appeared first on University Business.

Springing from their State of Higher Education 2022 study, the Lumina Foundation and Gallup have found that a majority of currently enrolled students—regardless of their political beliefs—are likely to reconsider where they’re currently enrolled based on the state’s legislative stance on:

1. The teaching of certain viewpoints on “divisive” topics such as race, racism or gender

2. Access to reproductive health services 

In a separate report that proved a substantial portion of high school graduates are likely to rule out a school based on state politics, both Republican- and Democratic-leaning students agreed that inhibitive stances on abortion and reproductive rights negatively influenced their perception of a potential school, too.

Over 6,000 U.S. adults currently enrolled in an associate degree, bachelor’s degree, certificate or certification program was selected to answer questions on these two surveys.

“Divisive” topics

When asked how important state laws on academic freedom were to their decision to stay enrolled in their current public institution, here is the proportion of student responses by likelihood, on a scale of one to seven:

• 7 (extremely important): 20%
• 6: 14%
• 5: 17%
• 4 (somewhat important): 23%
• 3: 9%
• 2: 5%
• 1 (not important at all): 12%

As a result, 74% of currently enrolled students say these policies are at least somewhat important in influencing their decision to stay enrolled in their institution.

At least half of all Democratic, Republican and Independent students said they deemed it somewhat important. Democrats had the highest proportion of students at 81%, Republicans the lowest at 64%.

“While these policies may be particularly attractive to the roughly one-fifth of all Republicans who would prefer to attend a college that prohibits instruction of certain viewpoints related to race or gender, this remains a minority preference even within Republican Party, and likely would not counterbalance the general public’s desire to attend unconstrained universities,” noted the report.

Among the three-quarters of students who deem it important, 77% prefer to attend a college in a state that allows instruction of all viewpoints related to potentially divisive topics.

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Reproductive rights

When asked how important state laws on reproductive rights were to their decision to stay enrolled in their current public institution, here is the proportion of student responses by likelihood, same scale:

• 7 (extremely important): 20%
• 6: 13%
• 5: 17%
• 4 (somewhat important): 22%
• 3: 9%
• 2: 6%
• 1 (not important at all): 13%

As a result, 72% of currently enrolled students say these policies are at least somewhat important in influencing their decision to stay enrolled in their institution, two points less than the previous report.

Party identification and gender did drive different degrees of support for this claim. Specifically, 76% of women claimed reproductive rights were somewhat important while 68% of men claimed this. Similarly, 80% of Democrat-leaning students found it somewhat important while 62% of Republicans did. Overall, though the claim gained the support of more than half of each demographic.

Among all students who agreed with the statement, 81% would prefer to enroll in an institution whose state system supports reproductive rights.

All in all, the Lumina Foundation and Gallup are concerned about downward trending higher education enrollment rates and legislative efforts at the state and federal level may jeopardize public higher education institutions even more.

The post Your state’s stance on these 2 hot topics may hurt school enrollment appeared first on University Business.