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.

More from UB: Only 7 U.S. universities make THE’s sustainability impact rankings’ top 100 list

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Wyoming is the only state not to report a campus data breach. However, many states only passed laws requiring the reporting of cyberattacks within the last few years, Comparitech points out. Here are the top 10 states for higher ed data breaches, with the number of the breaches and records affected:

1. California: 160 breaches/2.3 million records affected
2. New York: 82/758,000
3. Massachusetts: 65/1.8 million
4. Ohio: 57/1.8 million
5. Pennsylvania: 57/283,000
6. Florida: 53/1.3 million
7. Illinois: 47/535,900
8. Texas: 47/676,400
9. Indiana: 46/548,900
10. Virginia: 46/689,400

So far in 2023, there have been 11 separate educational data breaches, including six ransomware attacks, reported as of mid-March, a slight decline after a surge in incidents at the end of 2022. Comparitech points out that some breaches are not reported until weeks or months after they occur.

More from UB: Cybersecurity programs are set to launch across higher ed this fall

Two of the most common types of cyberattacks now involve ransomware that holds campus networks hostage and third-party data breaches, when a vendor or other partner’s networks are infiltrated. One of the biggest cyberattacks occurred in 2021 when a data breach at Illuminate Education affected more than 600 educational institutions, mostly in K12.

The 2020 Blackbaud ransomware attack also had a wide-ranging impact on educational institutions, Comparitech found.

A few of the biggest data breaches

Here’s Comparitech’s list of a few of the biggest attacks that have occurred over the past few years:

• 2013—Maricopa County Community College District (Arizona): 2.49 million records affected. A number of databases were breached and the records of nearly 2.5 million students, graduates, and staff were released on the internet. More controversy ensued over the length of time it took officials to notify the individuals impacted.
• 2017—Harvard Computer Society: 1.4 million records affected. Over 1.4 million emails containing the personal information of members of the Harvard Computer Society were made publicly available for a period of time.
• 2019—Georgia Tech University: 1.27 million records affected. A central database was hacked, potentially exposing the records of nearly 1.27 million students, faculty, and staff members.
• 2017—Washington State University: 1.12 million records affected. Thieves stole a safe from a storage locker that contained a computer hard drive backup with over a million personal records, including Social Security numbers.

The post Top 10 states for data breaches warn of constant cyber threat to higher ed appeared first on University Business.

The size of the global edtech market was about $238 billion in 2021, and artificial intelligence, virtual and augmented reality and the internet of things will be the biggest propellants of growth over the next several years, according to the latest analysis by Research and Markets. Many schools are adding VR and AR to create more interactive learning experiences for students, the report asserts.

Ever-expanding connectivity, bandwidth and speed, surging smartphone penetration, and growing investments by private equity and venture capital firms will also drive edtech demand.

Hardware accounted for approximately 60% of edtech revenue in 2021 while individual learners generated more than $100 billion due, in part, to the spread of smart classes such as the broadcasts that were provided to hundreds of thousands of students by Los Angeles USD and PBS during COVID lockdowns.

Government assistance in developing countries, such as China and India, is also giving the edtech market a boost. China, for example, has 282 million students and 17.32 million teachers in more than 530,000 schools.

Microsoft Corporation is the biggest player, holding an 8.1% share of the edtech and smart classrooms market, followed by Dell Technologies Inc., Oracle Corporation, Apple Inc., SAP SE, Anthology Inc., Cisco Systems Inc., IBM Corporation, Alphabet Inc., and Lenovo, a report by The Business Research Company found.

More from UB: Disabilities and edtech: How the pandemic sparked a revolution

Blackboard Inc., Chegg Inc., Edutech, Coursera Inc., edX Inc., Instructure Inc., Udacity Inc., and Think and Learn Private Limited are among the other global heavyweights, Research and Markets noted.

3 edtech market movers

Three key market drivers, trends and challenges are detailed in the market share forecast by Technavio:

• Driver: More and more learners are reading increasingly flexible and adaptable ebooks as instructors distribute texts via the internet. These shifts are supported by e-readers that allow annotations and bookmarks and that provide interactive dictionaries.
• Trend: Increased demand for distance learning that exploded during the early phase of COVID will continue, particularly in the realm of higher ed, where more students and professionals (including teachers) can take online courses from a growing range of colleges and universities.
• Challenge: Open-source learning content is one impediment to edtech market growth. Educational institutions, particularly in more impoverished countries, are offering curriculum either free or at a minimal cost.

The post Here is how big the global edtech market will grow by 2030 appeared first on University Business.

College leaders must therefore prepare for long-term enrollment challenges. “Higher education planners and policymakers are grappling with the lingering impacts of COVID-19 on college enrollment,” the authors of the report warn. “They should also watch for COVID19’s ravages on the K-12 student pipeline, as these young students may carry the effects of pandemic learning well into their college-going years.”

Graduation rates appear stable for students who were in 11th and 12th grade when COVID struck. But the decreases in middle school enrollment and the extent of learning loss may foretell larger-than-predicted declines in graduation rates starting in 2025, wiping out the hopes of some observers for a modest increase in high school completion, the WICHE report found. Researchers also noted a “bulge” in the number of ninth graders that could be a sign of students being held back, indicating academic struggles that could also weigh on graduation rates.

Falling enrollment can, to some extent, be blamed on students shifting to homeschooling and private schools. But variability also reflects the greater impacts the pandemic has had on historically underserved and underresourced students, which could further sap the education pipeline. And, as most K12 leaders know, the nation’s youth population was declining prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

More from UB: After a ‘no confidence’ vote, JSU sits its seventh president since 2010 

The U.S. birth cohort shrank for 14 years consecutively, resulting in a 3% decrease in first- through fifth-grade enrollment by fall 2019 when 18.17 million students attended those grades, compared to fall 2015 which saw a peak of 18.75 million students. “The complex convergence of shifting age demographics, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, and ongoing educational inequities make it increasingly difficult to determine the primary driving force behind changes in public school populations,” the report’s authors assert.

“Additionally, growing research suggests a significant number of enrolled students who may be falling behind or disengaging from schooling altogether, which would have an additional negative impact on high school graduate numbers.”

Education pipeline particulars

There was a disproportionate decrease in the number of white students in fall 2020 and fall 2021. White students, in fact, accounted for 75% of the overall nation’s public school enrollment decline during these two years even though they comprised less than half of public school enrollment in 2019. Enrollment of white ninth graders also dropped, indicating they may not have been held back in significant numbers.

On the other hand, public schools saw larger than expected increases in ninth-grade enrollment of Hispanic (+7%) and Black students (+6.7%). Total Hispanic enrollment was virtually unchanged from in fall 2020 to fall 2021 while Black student enrollment declined slightly each year. “A substantial portion of the public school enrollment declines may be students who shifted to other learning environments and not who have disengaged from school,” the report concludes. “It is unknown whether the level of homeschooling and possible shifts to private schools will be sustained.”

The post Surprising K12 enrollment declines are trickling up into higher ed appeared first on University Business.

And some 60% of the users report relying on the tool for 50% or more of their written assignments, according to a survey by Intelligent, which ranks colleges and universities based on publicly available data.

When it comes to the institution’s response, about half of the students surveyed say either their professors or schools have banned ChatGPT for homework but about one in four don’t believe their professors know it exists. Other instructors, meanwhile, are now thinking about how to incorporate ChatGPT or at least acknowledge its existence. Ronnie Gladden, an English professor, for example, told Intelligent that he is adapting by having students start drafts of essays in class.

More from UB: At the state level, these are the top priorities for higher ed in 2023

Lisa Maione, an assistant professor of graphic design at the Kansas City Art Institute, told Intelligent that she “will be activating ChatGPT as a partner in our projects.”

“As our department embraces an inquiry-based model for education, ChatGPT is one more place from which we can consider how a question might affect our sense of the answer,” she added. “ChatGPT does not replace critical thinking or critical reading or critical writing. In some ways, I sense this tool will encourage both my students and me to engage with even more reading, writing and editing.”

And Kristina Martin, an adjunct professor at Albright College, told Intelligent that she has asked students to experiment with ChatGPT but discourages them from using it to answer discussion posts or complete other writing assignments. “When I talk about ChatGPT and AI, I also discuss the ethical considerations of using these tools and the responsibility of the user,” Martin added. “I give them a list of things that they can use ChatGPT for as well.”

Here is one more potentially shocking stat from Intelligent’s survey: 20% of students said using ChatGPT does not constitute cheating.

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Woo, Sweet Briar’s 13th president, announced this week that she will resign at the end of the 2023-2024 academic year after leading the rural Virginia women’s college for seven years. Woo, a former University of Virginia dean, took over in 2017 shortly after alumnae, students, faculty and others successfully fought attempts by the board of trustees to shut the college down.

“Sweet Briar is an important institution with a distinctive mission,” Woo said in a statement. “Deeply loved and supported by one of the strongest alumnae networks in the nation, it now has an unstoppable momentum.”

During the remainder of her tenure, she says she will focus on raising resources to advance the five-year strategic plan Sweet Briar implemented this year. The initiative prioritizes women’s leadership, sustainability, engineering and equestrian programs. She also hopes to leverage Sweet Briar’s scenic campus to make the college a destination for creative and performing arts, similar to New York’s Chautauqua Institution.

Sweet Briar College has already been comprehensively restructured under Woo’s leadership. Upon her arrival, she and her team immediately began overhauling the college’s curriculum, replacing the traditional “general education” program with a Women’s Leadership Core that emphasizes hands-on, immersive learning, the college said.

More from UB: Sweet revival—A Virginia college finds ‘gold’ in its roots 

Woo also cut tuition by about 30%, which led to an enrollment surge of more than 200 students in 2021-22. She also prioritized the college’s agricultural roots by spearheading the construction of a 26,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art greenhouse and 18 acres of vineyards. During the pandemic, Sweet Briar opened a new health center and an AstroTurf field, renovated its 130-acre equestrian facility, and refurbished 24/7 dining areas and residence hall common spaces.

The college is also touting its designation as one of the nation’s “Most Innovative Liberal Arts Colleges” by U.S. News & World Report in three out of the last four years. Alumnae and other donors gave more than $25 million to the college during the 2021-2022 academic year and S&P Global recently raised the college financial’s outlook to “positive.”

The post After spearheading Sweet Briar’s revival, President Meredith Woo will step down appeared first on University Business.

A new analysis ranks the return on investment of all 50 state public university systems by comparing tuition and other financial factors to the increase in lifetime income that graduates earn from their degrees.

“While some state college systems succeed in moving large numbers of students into the middle class, others fail to deliver on the promise of economic mobility,” says study author Preston Cooper, a research fellow at Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity, an organization that works to improve outcomes for underrepresented students.

More from UB: Best law schools—US News is revising rankings after list dropouts 

“While maximizing ROI is not the only goal of higher education, students consistently report that their primary reasons for attending college are getting a better job and increasing their earnings potential,” Cooper adds.

Top performers include South Dakota, Kansas, and Pennsylvania while Montana, Louisiana and Connecticut, and New Mexico. For example, ROI at South Dakota’s public colleges is nearly twice the national median of $118,182 while the price and outcomes in the state at the bottom of the list was found to have a negative return on investment.

The report also identifies the most value individual academic programs in each state and the public systems with the riskiest returns. “To increase aggregate ROI, states should consider implementing performance-based funding and removing restrictions on high-value majors,” Cooper concludes.

Price & outcomes: ROI rankings

Here’s where each state system of public colleges and universities ranks for median ROI:

1. South Dakota: $217,000
2. Minnesota: $215,000
3. Iowa: $214,000
4. Kansas: $181,000
5. Pennsylvania: $167,000
6. Virginia: $166,000
7. Arizona: $164,000
8. Texas: $159,000
9. Michigan: $154,000
10. Nebraska: $154,000
11. Washington: $144,000
12. North Dakota: $142,000
13. Ohio: $138,000
14. Alabama: $138,000
15. Delaware: $136,000
16. Oklahoma: $134,000
17. Florida: $133,000
18. Wisconsin: $131,000
19. Missouri: $124,000
20. Indiana: $120,000
21. Georgia: $120,000
22. Illinois: $112,000
23. Maine: $115,000
24. California: $109,000
25. North Carolina: $107,000
26. Massachusetts: $106,000
27. New Hampshire: $106,000
28. South Carolina: $103,000
29. Vermont: $93,000
30. Oregon: $87,000
31. Maryland: $86,000
32. New York: $86,000
33. Colorado: $73,000
34. Idaho: $70,000
35. Wyoming: $67,000
36. Arkansas: $64,000
37. Tennessee: $64,000
38. Alaska: $63,000
39. West Virginia: $61,000
40. Rhode Island: $60,000
41. New Jersey: $59,000
42. Nevada: $57,000
43. Mississippi: $54,000
44. Utah: $54,000
45. Kentucky: $43,000
46. Connecticut: $39,000
47. Montana: $25,000
48. New Mexico: $21,000
49. Louisiana: $18,000
50. Hawaii: -$5,5720

The post Here is where all 50 state university systems rank on ROI—and why appeared first on University Business.

Higher ed R&D got a jolt from the largest increase in federal R&D spending since 2011, when Great Recession relief funding came to the rescue. Campus leaders also reported increases in state and local contributions though nonprofit spending dropped, according to the latest Higher Education Research and Development Survey.

The top 30 R&D universities—more than half of which were public institutions—accounted for 42% of total R&D spending, a number that has remained consistent over the last several years. Twenty-four of those universities invested more than $1 billion and all but three reported R&D expenditures for their medical schools.

More from UB: More education leaders ban TikTok for students and employees

Vanderbilt University and Vanderbilt University Medical Center moved into the top 30 (see the full list below) after making changes to their accounting systems while the University of California, Berkeley fell off the list. More effective accounting also helped Ohio State University make a big jump—from No. 24 to No. 12.​

Institutions that dropped down the list include the University of Minnesota, which slipped two positions even though the flagship spent $31 million more on R&D in 2021. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology moved down six positions to No. 29 after a decrease in R&D spending.

The top 30 R&D performers:

1. Johns Hopkins University: $3.2 billion
2. University of California, San Francisco: $1.7 billion
3. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor: $1.6 billion
4. University of Pennsylvania: $1.6 billion
5. University of Washington, Seattle: $1.5 billion
6. University of California, Los Angeles: $1.45 billion
7. University of California, San Diego: $1.42 billion
8. University of Wisconsin-Madison: $1.4 billion
9. Stanford University: $1.3 billion
10. Harvard University: $1.25 billion
11. Duke University: $1.2 billion
12. Ohio State University: $1.2 billion
13. University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill: $1.2 billion
14. Cornell University: $1.2 billion
15. Yale University: $1.2 billion
16. Texas A&M University, College Station and Health Science Center: $1.1 billion
17. University of Maryland: $1.1 billion
18. University of Pittsburgh: $1.1 billion
19. University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center: $1.1 billion
20. Georgia Institute of Technology: $1.1 billion
21. Columbia University in the City of New York: $1.1 billion
22. University of Minnesota, Twin Cities: $1.1 billion
23. New York University: $1.1 billion
24. Vanderbilt University and Vanderbilt University Medical Center: $1.billion
25. Washington University in St. Louis: $989 million
26. Pennsylvania State University, University Park and Hershey Medical Center: $971 million
27. University of Florida: $960 million
28. University of Southern California: $956 million
29. Massachusetts Institute of Technology: $949 million
30. Northwestern University: $913 million

Check the chart below for R&D spending in specific academic fields:

The post Billion-dollar business: These are higher ed’s top 30 R&D performers appeared first on University Business.

Within just a week this past fall, Yale, Harvard, UC Berkeley, Columbia, Georgetown and Stanford all opted out of U.S. News & World Report’s best law schools. Yale University, which regularly lands at the top of the list, kicked off the exodus when law school Dean Heather K. Gerken publicly criticized the rankings for causing more harm than good.

“We have invested significant energy and capital in important initiatives that make our law school a better place but perversely work to lower our test scores,” Gerken wrote. “That’s because the U.S. News rankings are profoundly flawed—they disincentivize programs that support public interest careers, champion need-based aid, and welcome working-class students into the profession. We have reached the point where the rankings process is undermining the core commitments of the legal profession. As a result, we will no longer participate.”

Harvard Law School withdrew from the rankings just hours after Gerken’s announcement.

Best law schools overhaul

U.S. News announced this week that the changes to its rankings system have been informed by conversations with more than 100 deans and representatives of law schools, amounting to “well more than half of this academic leadership group,” the publication’s Chief Data Strategist Robert Morse and Senior Vice President, Data & Information Strategy Stephanie Salmon wrote.

The main points included per-student expenditures, the weight of the peer assessment surveys, and indicators of student debt,” they said. “e also received broad feedback that the rankings should place more weight on outcomes.” Some law schools also complained that the rankings did not sufficiently value fellowships that allow them to encourage public service careers.

For the 2023-2024 list, law schools will be ranked based on publicly available data that the American Bar Association requires institutions to make available—regardless of whether university leaders respond to U.S. News’ annual survey. Still, the magazine and website will publish more detailed profiles of schools that participate so students can develop a more comprehensive picture of their potential choices.

Good news for higher ed: Applications are on the rise for fall 2023

But the rankings will reduce the weight given to data points such as peer assessment surveys of academics, lawyers and judges. U.S. News will increase emphasis on measures such as the number of students who pass the bar exam and employment outcomes. The conversations revealed other factors, such as loan forgiveness/loan assistance repayment programs, need-based aid, and diversity and socioeconomic considerations, which will require additional time and collaboration to address. In these areas, we will continue to work with academic and industry leaders to develop metrics with agreed-upon definitions.

“We maintain that data beyond the rankings is an essential resource for students navigating the complex admissions process and seeking to evaluate the important but costly education that you deliver,” Morse and Salmon wrote.

The rankings staff at U.S. News intends to continue to collaborate with campus leaders to create “fair and objective standards” that provide law students with a broad array of information as they choose among nearly 200 schools. “We have helped expand the universe of well-known law schools beyond the club of Ivy League schools of the last century,” Morse and Salmon wrote. “But we realize that legal education is neither monolithic nor static and that the rankings, by becoming so widely accepted, may not capture the individual nuances of each school.”

The post Best law schools: US News is revising rankings after list dropouts appeared first on University Business.

“As a result, sector-wide quantitative data and research are nearly nonexistent, and RPUs and their students experience ongoing invisibility in scholarly and policy discussions,” the authors wrote, adding some key stats about the schools. For instance, more than two-thirds of students at regional public universities and colleges are Pell grant recipients while RPUs also educate:

• 47% of bachelor’s degree-seeking students at four-year public institutions.
• 58% of Black students
• 47% of American Indian or Alaska Native students
• 35% of Asian American students
• 39% of Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander students
• 44% of Hispanic or Latino students
• 44% of multiracial students

RPUs also tend to be more affordable, with an average $8,896 in annual tuition and fees compared with $12,325 for non-RPUs.

More numbers: Regional public universities and colleges

The new analysis identified 474 RPUs that enroll 3.8 million full-time students and about 1.3 million part-timers, with an average enrollment of 10,987. RPUs exist in every state (except Wyoming) and in several U.S. territories.

The report aims to help leaders of regional public universities and colleges identify their counterparts at other RPUs to collaborate around best practices and other strategies. National associations—such as the American Association of State Colleges and Universities—can use the list to inform lobbying and advocacy efforts on behalf of RPUs.

About 30% of these schools qualify as minority-serving institutions and nearly half are rural-serving while the counties that RPUs serve have higher needs—such as low education, low employment, and persistent poverty—compared to counties served by other institutions.

Good news for higher ed: Applications are on the rise for fall 2023 

Regional public universities and colleges also receive $1,091 less per full-time student in state appropriations though those funds represent a larger proportion of RPUs’ budgets. As a result, RPUs have, on average, fewer tenured faculty and full-time instructional, research, and public service staff.

And even though state and federal policymakers have set goals and established initiatives to improve outcomes for underserved students, there has been far less effort made to better support the RPUs that enroll these students. The report urges the creation of federal grant or trust programs that would also require states to increase funding for RPUs. This spending could focus on student success programs such as aligning degree offerings with local industry needs, creating small business incubators, and conducting research on K-12 education.

One troubling trend identified in the report is the opening of branch campuses by larger universities in the service areas of RPUs.  For example, the University of Oregon and Oregon State University now operate campuses within Portland State University’s service area. Colorado State University will begin offering degree programs in Denver alongside Metropolitan State University of Denver.

Such moves are placing greater enrollment pressures on smaller colleges and universities. “RPUs are anchor institutions for their communities and for the nation, and their continued ability to serve in these roles hinges on improved policy, research, understanding, and funding,” the report concluded.

The post How an important group of colleges and universities has become ‘invisible’ appeared first on University Business.