Top 10 U.S. Higher Ed Stories of 2024 with Robert Kelchen

Alex Usher: Hi everyone. I’m Alex Usher and this is The World of Higher Education podcast.
Robert Kelchen is a prolific higher education researcher and also the head of the University of Tennessee at Knoxville’s Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies. He is also a pretty steady blogger on higher education, but he doesn’t have the time to post quite as much as he did before he took on all those extra admin duties. One of the casualties of his reduced blogging schedule is that he no longer posts his regular “top ten” stories of the year in US higher education, which I, as an outsider, always used to find a handy way to keep track of what mattered over the long term in the US.
But last year, Robert agreed to reprise his role of summarizer-in chief for us on the year's final pod, and reaction was so positive, we thought we would have him on again for our final podcast of 2024. As always, Robert is sharp, succinct, and not one to shy away from unconventional calls. And so, without further ado, let’s hear Robert’s Top Ten.
Robert Kelchen: Number 10 out of the U. S. is more changes to big time college athletics. It seems like things cannot stay stable, and that's in part because there is so much money involved. So the big changes this year are more teams changing athletic conferences. Everyone is trying to jockey for position in big time college athletics to be on the right side of TV contracts. Never mind that the next round of TV contracts may look very different with people cutting the cord from cable. And the other big piece is a landmark settlement with former athletes, that requires a financial settlement and then also athletes going forward are going to get about 20 percent or so of all revenue.
Alex Usher: Gross revenue?
Robert Kelchen: Yeah.
Alex Usher: Wow.
Robert Kelchen: So this also affects the number of scholarships that programs can offer. Previously for big time athletics, that number was limited. Now it's not limited. They focus more on roster sizes instead. And this means that colleges have some really tough financial choices to make. Because they have to pay athletes, and if they want programs to be competitive, they need to offer more scholarships.
And that means what will probably happen is some colleges are going to look at dropping sports to club status so they don't have to pay for scholarships. While also keeping in mind they can't just drop the women's sports, at least right now under the Federal Title IX regulations. Although, who knows what's going to happen for regulations. We'll talk about those later.
Alex Usher: We'll get to that. Let's move along to number nine.
Robert Kelchen: Number nine is college closures. It always seems to hang on the list because we continue to see closures and we had a just a really chaotic closure in early June with the University of the Arts in Philadelphia. I don't think they were on anyone's radar for closing. Their public financials at the time looked decent but then their accreditors was stepping in saying we are going to shut you down and it happened within a week.
Alex Usher: Was it for financial reasons?
Robert Kelchen: It was apparently for financial reasons. And it wasn't immediately obvious from the financial statements from, say, a year and a half ago, what was going on.
But it seems like they just ran out of cash very quickly.
point where, with a week's notice, students couldn't finish, faculty couldn't find jobs, staff couldn't find jobs. It was just the absolute worst way to do things.
Alex Usher: And I mean, has, has the number of closures actually ticked up, I mean, I mean, you've made the point on many occasions that we have you know, that there are always programs closing. Yeah.
Robert Kelchen: It, the number of college closures has ticked up a bit in the nonprofit sector, it’s actually down in the for-profit sector because so many of them closed in the 2010s. Part of it was just the, the business cycle, and part of it was regulation from the Obama administration. They really did try to push a lot of the low performing for profits out, and there just aren't as many now. But I think the big piece that's coming now is not college closures as much as program closures, academic restructuring. It is a great time to be a consultant in this industry. Because consultants are the ones brought in to help do the studies on this, identify programs that may need to be closed, and institutional leaders like it because someone else gets to basically deliver the bad news.
Alex Usher: Okay, so let's move on. What about number number 8?
Robert Kelchen: Number 8 is, does anyone want international students? They’ve been a cash cow for a lot of English speaking countries for the last decade, but that is starting to change. Australia's gotten the majority of the global news coverage on this in their efforts to try to cap enrollment, which is really divisive there, especially among the more rural institutions that would like more international students. But, you're seeing it in Canada, the UK and US are looking to move in that direction, and that potentially creates opportunities in Southeast Asia, potentially creates opportunities in Europe, and another wildcard in international students is, what's going to happen with both China and India? Where China is always at risk of having a major policy change. And there seems to be a fair amount of instability in India right now.
Alex Usher: Yeah. Number seven.
Robert Kelchen: Number seven is, there's been a lot made in the U. S. about disinvestment in public higher education, but over the last decade or so, state funding for higher education in most states has been pretty strong. And the states where it's been the weakest often are the more politically liberal states, and that's basically because they've had more long standing budget issues.
But a number of the more conservative states have funded pretty well, and state funding is at a two decade high right now. I have a hard time seeing that continuing because State budgets have largely flatlined for the upcoming fiscal year. There have been some states that have gone down the route of tax cuts from post pandemic money that's starting to come due. But also, there's just more skepticism about the value of public higher education. And there are states like Utah where enrollment is up substantially. But they're looking at cutting funding and telling universities and colleges to expect less in the way of enrollment. And this really creates the haves and have nots in public higher education.
The big name public universities are growing like crazy. The regionally focused colleges are struggling mightily.
Alex Usher: You've talked about a flight to quality among students. Is it likely that state funding starts to follow into the more into the flagships than it used to like, is, are you going to see a shift in money as well?
Robert Kelchen: It depends in part on the funding model.
If it's an enrollment or performance funding type model, then that will happen. But also states are in a position where they don't want to see regional institutions fail. So they need to have some kind of capacity there. And the big question that states have to wrestle with is how big do they want their big name flagship institution to be.
And do they want to try to push students to regional institutions, where in some states they have the governance structure in place to do that, even though it's extremely politically painful. And then in other states, there is no centralization whatsoever. So there's really nothing they can do about it.
Alex Usher: Right? What about number 6?
Robert Kelchen: Number 6 is the protests about the war in Gaza, and the fall of several Ivy League presidents. I did some analyses back in the spring and it, it was really at a fairly small number of colleges, these protests. But they were at the institutions that policy makers care about. The super elite private colleges and some of the big public flagships.
And Congressional Republicans found out that hauling in college presidents, especially women of color, plays really well to the base. And I think that was one of the reasons behind republican electoral success.
Alex Usher: Yeah, so that appearance in front of Congress by the presidents of Penn and MIT and, and Harvard really was kind of the flashpoint of the year, wasn't it? I mean, that was, there's two of them were out within a month of that appearance. I mean, again, it's just, it's another example of Americans assuming that what happens at a very, a very small handful of prominent private institutions is actually reflective of something bigger, isn't it?
Robert Kelchen: That's exactly it. And one of the big reasons is so many of the policymakers, so many of the journalists, that is their sphere, that is what they know. And we're seeing a really interesting dichotomy as President elect Trump announces his key political appointments, where he has abolished the Department of Education, reform higher education, but also all of his press releases talk about here are the colleges that these people went to.
So he's highlighting they went to NYU, they went to Penn, while simultaneously dumping on them.
Alex Usher: Right. Interesting. We're just going to take a short break. We'll be right back.
And we're back. Uh, Robert, what about number five?
Robert Kelchen: Number five is just the increased political realignment by educational attainment. It used to be that if people had a bachelor's degree, there was a pretty good chance they were pro business Republicans. That was a pretty substantial part of the base. That was part of what really kept the party going post Reagan through the George W. Bush years. But then, I think we saw a bit of this starting with Obama and then really moving forward, where the Democrats made substantial gains among college educated individuals, especially post graduate.
And then Trump came in 2016 and really started the realignment where college educated individuals went to the Democratic Party, non college went to the Republican Party. And that is a sea change to where pollsters now are focusing on weighting polls based on education instead of race or gender. And there are still certainly large divides in those areas. And what this means for higher ed is, higher education has long been relatively, apolitical in the U. S. It's probably had a 50 year run that way that has started to change dramatically. And that really threatens higher education enrollment as well as public support for the industry.
Alex Usher: It's tough for a public university, you know, it's like saying hospitals are Democrats, right? Or K-12 schools are Republican. It's weird for a public institution to be identified on one side of the, you know, as being partisan. What's, I mean, it can't be easy for public university presidents to be in that position. What can they do? What are they doing to try and reverse that trend?
Robert Kelchen: A piece of it is who is becoming a president of a university or a system. We're seeing more politicians take on those roles. Some of them unsuccessfully and some of them very successfully as they try to be the bridge between the academics and the legislature. So, I, that's a piece of it, but also focusing on outreach, public mission. The two advantages that, that public higher education has is community outreach, which can be things like offering agricultural extension classes, community programming. And also athletics is a—
Alex Usher: I was going to say footballs, footballs, the traditional one, right?
Robert Kelchen: It is a big driver of public support.
Alex Usher: Okay. What about number four?
Robert Kelchen: Number four is accreditation. It's a topic that's deep in the weeds for a lot of people, but it is in the political spotlight right now. So two, two big examples to highlight. One is the toughest accreditation job in the U. S. is at the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, SACS. We no longer have truly regional accreditation in the U. S., that went away under the first Trump administration, but the SACS accreditor is largely focused in the South. They almost exclusively cover conservative states that are not happy with accreditation. We have Florida that decided you have to switch accreditors every cycle. We have a long time accreditation president at SACS, Belle Wheelan. She is retiring, and I have no idea who in the world would want that job. That is probably the most difficult job in American higher education. So finding good leaders is going to be crucial.
Alex Usher: What's the potential impact of accreditation becoming more politicized.
Robert Kelchen: Some of it is just administrative burden for higher ed if they're expected to switch accreditors or accreditation standards change all the time. But there are also questions about, will accreditors uphold basic standards? They've largely punted on holding up academic standards because they try to do that, they get sued every time. And while they often win, it's expensive. So accreditors have largely focused on finance, but the perception is they're focused too much on diversity, equity, and inclusion, which SACS is the only major accreditor that does not require that.
And another big pressure on accreditation is there have been several accreditors now that are trying to push for shorter bachelor's degrees. Going from a traditional 120 credits in the U. S. to more like 90. There's a push for shorter, faster, cheaper, better. Which, there's a strong rationale for it. But also there are concerns about educational quality. And this completely upends the higher ed finance system. Where if you get less revenue per student, and if you take away some of the upper level courses, that's okay. But it seems like they're taking away more on the lower level Gen Ed courses. And those are the ones that subsidize the other courses.
Alex Usher: Interesting. Okay. I think DEI has something to do to do with number three as well.
Robert Kelchen: Yes. State governments are pushing higher education hard on more of the social type of issues. Texas and Florida have probably taken the lead on trying to ban any mention of diversity, equity, and inclusion, which in a lot of conservative states, including mine, that is now known as access and engagement, access and belonging, something else. They do not want to use those words because people are expecting your emails will be searched for those terms. Your course syllabi will be searched for those terms. And there was a prominent example at the University of North Texas a few weeks ago—
Alex Usher: I was going to bring that up, yeah.
Robert Kelchen: The new leader there, who came from leading the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, basically went through and required any mentions of those be eliminated.
And they focused on the education school, and, the education school is also searching for a new dean. So I'm glad I did not respond to that request from the headhunter.
Alex Usher: But it's gone beyond just, just sort of excising words and renaming units around belonging. I mean, North Texas, the example, if I recall correctly, they were getting words, rid of words in course, syllabi like racism. Which makes U.S. history hard to teach, doesn't it?
Robert Kelchen: It, it does. And there, there was a round of this about a half dozen years ago, and the responses were more get rid of words while keep doing the same thing. Legislatures did not like that. So now they're going back trying to really root all of these out.
Alex Usher: Right. What about number two? We got to be
Robert Kelchen: to be coming pretty soon to the election.
We are, but I actually don't think the election is number one this year. The, The election of Trump is a big deal. It will have large effects on American higher education. Will the U S department of education go away? I am still extremely skeptical of that.
Every Republican since 1979 has said that, but it's difficult to get rid of an agency. And also, Republicans have united political control in Washington, D. C., but it is by the skin of their teeth. They can afford to lose, I think, two votes in the House of Representatives, and it is a fractured caucus. They have a lot of other priorities. And you have members looking ahead to, can they get reelected in 2026 when the majority party typically loses seats in the U. S.?
Alex Usher: Yeah.
Robert Kelchen: So it is going to be a very unsettled, interesting time, but I don't see the Department of Education going away. The question is, what can sneak its way onto the one bill a year that can be passed completely on a partisan basis?
And the way the mechanism works in the U. S. is everything has to be well tied into the budget in order to use a provision that goes around a legislative filibuster. So some of these items may not be in order. If they wanted to make changes to student loans, for example, that would have a direct budgetary impact. It could be in there. The challenge is then can you unite a Republican caucus that is not always well united and they have to figure out what they want to take on first. Is it immigration? Is it tax cuts that expire at the end of 2025? And even within education, how big of the focus would be on K 12 education versus higher education?
Alex Usher: Well, one consequence on a Trump administration is you get a new Secretary of Education. And we, we have one now and she's quite different from Betsy DeVos, I think. What do you expect from her?
Robert Kelchen: The, the big thing I think to expect is, she has run large organizations. She ran the Small Business Administration. Seems to have gotten fairly good marks from employees over there, and actually is one of the few high level Trump appointees that did not go to an elite institution. She got a teaching certificate and a French major from East Carolina University.
Alex Usher: Okay.
Robert Kelchen: But, I just found that piece fascinating. But it's also, put the person with the teaching credential at the Department of Education, but in terms of management, it could work out pretty well. In terms of what the policy goals are, the stated goals are get rid of the Department of Education. There's legislation to basically shuttle off a lot of the components to other federal agencies, but that is a long, complicated process. I'd probably say the chances of getting rid of the Department of Education are 5 to 10 percent at most.
Alex Usher: Yeah. All right, bring us to number one.
Robert Kelchen: Number one does not come from the White House, it comes from the U.S. Supreme Court. And it was a fundamental change to, what can be done administratively? There is a Supreme Court decision called Loper Bright that overturned about a 40 year old precedent called Chevron that gave administrative agencies a fair amount of discretion in writing regulations. This was something that conservatives wanted to get rid of for a long time to reduce the power of the administrative state. So essentially, since the U. S. Higher Education Act has not been reauthorized since 2008, almost everything has been done through executive action or administrative rules. That power looks to be substantially reduced at a time where the Trump administration would be able to get most of what they want to get done through executive action. So at least in theory, this decision makes it harder for the Trump administration to do what it wants to do. Will the Supreme Court continue to support that as challenges come to Trump era policies. I think there's a divide on the Supreme Court between the more traditionalists in terms of judicial precedents and the ones who are more supportive of the Trump administration's policies.
But this I think helps actually calm higher education's nerves a little bit right now, that it is more difficult to make big changes because most of them will likely have to go through a Congress where we saw how much trouble they had at electing a speaker last year. So it can be difficult to get anything big through.
Alex Usher: So Chevron was a great decision according to the Republicans, as long as the Democrat was in power. But now that now that you've got a Republican in power, it's a different story.
Robert Kelchen: Exactly. And now it, it ties their hands. And this is where I think the Trump administration learned a lot the first time about how to effectively use executive authority.
They struggled mightily the first few years of the administration on it, but then they started to figure it out, and now their hands are tied some.
Alex Usher: Interesting. So in fact they the impact of the Trump presidency might be much less than we think because they won't be able to use that power anymore.
Robert Kelchen: That's quite possible.
Alex Usher: Interesting. Well, Robert, thank you so much for being with us today. It's been a great ride. We'll see you back here in 12 months, I hope. And we can see whether or not you you know, how how much has changed in 2025.
Robert Kelchen: Probably quite a bit.
Alex Usher: Okay. Thanks, Robert.
And it just remains for me to thank our excellent producers, Tiffany McLennan and Sam Pufek. And of course you, our viewers and listeners for joining us. If you have any questions or comments about today's podcast, please don't hesitate to get in touch at podcast@higheredstrategy.com.
Subscribe to our YouTube channel, never miss an episode of the World of Higher Education. We will be back on January 9th, I believe. And with a mystery guest you'll see, you'll have to see. Until then, stay well, have a good holiday season and bye for now.