Much like the students they teach, colleges have a lot on their plates. They attempt to live up to competing expectations, often at the expense of their stated missions. “[Colleges] are generally expected to be simultaneously traditional yet innovative; elite yet open; competitive yet collegial; international yet local; and so…

Higher Education Number of the Day: 4,400 There are approximately four thousand four hundred degree-granting colleges in the United States as of 2018 (the last time NCES conducted their national study). This number is interesting for a couple of reasons. First, it signifies that over 1,000 colleges have been added…

In this week’s news review, we review 4 stories from higher education’s headlines. These include a critical look at tenure, college’s financial priorities amidst COVID, coaching salaries, and the continued rise of alternative credentials. Tenure is Dying a Slow Death Bryan Alexander, a higher education futurist, wrote a piece this week on Indiana University of Pennsylvania’s…

Higher Education Number of the Day: 119,618 One-hundred nineteen-thousand six-hundred and eighteen students. This is the last official enrollment total reported by Western Governors University. Over the last 5 years, they’ve seen their growth rate hover around 17% per year. Then, once COVID-19 hit, that number soared to over 30%. …

Soon after starting our marriage, my wife and I stumbled upon the FIRE movement. For the uninitiated, FIRE stands for Financially Independent, Retired Early. Their philosophy is an evolution of minimalist thinking. They extend the idea of owning less and spending less into a mathematical formula for freedom called the…

College is a public good with a luxury price tag. Tuition has risen by an astronomical rate at nearly every university in America since the 1980s (Source). What’s surprising, then, is how small of a role tuition plays in the overall funding structure for most colleges. …

Microservices architecture is a software design methodology that creates and connects applications as “suites of independently deployable services.” (Source) Understanding this model can help us better picture what a modularized university could look like. In much of the same way that technology will mirror nature as it develops (biomimicry), so…

Writer Bonnie Gillespie captures the problem of the modern university in the following sentence. When you try to be everything to everyone, you accomplish being nothing to anyone. — Bonnie Gillespie Universities are too big. …

Higher education needs to change. Nearly every person, both inside and outside of the academic world, would agree. The issue is what should that change look like? Herein lies one of the core concepts of this project: true adaptation. First, let’s build a clear definition, followed by some present opportunities…