Ed Cervone: How a Maine college has adjusted to pandemic and recession

From The New England Journal of Higher Education, a service of The New England Board of Higher Education (nebhe.org)

In October 2019, NEBHE called together a group of economists and higher education leaders for a meeting at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston to discuss the future of higher education (Preparing for Another Recession?). No one suspected that just months later, a global pandemic would turn the world upside down. Today, the same challenges highlighted at the meeting persist. The pandemic has only amplified the situation and accelerated the timeline. It also has forced the hands of institutions to advance some of the changes that will sustain higher education institutions through this crisis and beyond.

At the October 2019 meeting, the panelists identified the primary challenges facing colleges and universities: a declining pool of traditional-aged students, mounting student debt, increasing student-loan-default rates and growing income inequality.

Taken together, these trends were creating a perfect storm, simultaneously putting a college education out of reach for more and more students and forcing some New England higher-education institutions to close or merge with other institutions. Those trends were expected to continue.

Just three months later, COVID-19 had begun spreading across the U.S., and the education system had to shut down in-person learning. Students returned home to finish the semester. Higher-education institutions were forced to go fully remote in a matter of weeks. Institutions struggled to deliver content and keep students engaged. Inequities across the system were accentuated, as many students faced connectivity obstacles. Households felt the economic crunch as the unemployment rate increased sharply.

By summer, the pandemic was in full swing. Higher-education institutions looked to the fall. They had to convince students and their families that it would be safe to return to campus in an uncertain and potentially dangerous environment. Safety measures introduced new budgetary challenges: physical infrastructure upgrades, PPE and the development of screening and testing regimens.

In the fall, students resumed their education through combinations of remote and in-person instruction. Activities and engagement looked very different due to health and safety protocols. Many institutions experienced a larger than usual summer melt due to concerns from students and families about COVID and the college experience.

Despite these added challenges, New England higher-education institutions have adapted to keep students engaged in their education, but are running on small margins and expending unbudgeted funds to continue operations during the public-health crisis. Recruiting the next class of students is proving to be a challenge. The shrinking pool of recruits will contract even more and reaching them is much more difficult. Many low- and moderate-income families will find accessing higher education even harder and may choose to defer postsecondary learning.

Change is difficult but a crisis can provide necessary motivation. Maine institutions are using this opportunity to make the changes needed to address the current crisis that will also set them on a more sustainable path over the long term. Maine has a competitive advantage relative to the nation. A low-density rural setting and the comprehensive public-health response from Gov. Janet Mills have kept the overall incidence rate down. Public and private higher-education institutions coordinated their response, developed a set of protocols for resuming in-person education that were reviewed by the governor and public health officials, and successfully returned to in-person education in the fall.

In addition, Mills established the Economic Recovery Committee in May and charged the panel with identifying actions and investments that would be necessary to get the Maine economy back on track. This public process has reinforced the critical ties between education and a healthy economy. Not only is higher education a focus of the work, but the governor appointed Thomas College President Laurie Lachance to co-chair the effort. In addition, the governor appointed University of New England (in Biddeford, Maine) President James Herbert, University of Maine at Augusta President Rebecca Wyke, and Southern Maine Community College President Joseph Cassidy to serve on the committee.

At the individual institution level, a wide array of innovations will enable Thomas College to endure the pandemic and position itself for the future. Consider:

Affordability. Most Thomas College students come from low- to medium-income households and are the first in their families to attend college, so-called “first-generation” students. Cost will always be top of mind. For motivated students, Thomas has an accelerated pathway that allows students to earn their bachelor’s degree in three years (sometimes two) and they have the option of doing a plus-one to earn their master’s. This, coupled with generous merit scholarship packages (up to $72,000 of scholarship over four years) and a significant transition to Open Educational Resources to reduce book costs, represents real savings and the opportunity to be earning sooner than their peers.

Student success supports. Accelerated programs (or any program, for that matter) are not viable without purposeful strategies to keep students on track to complete based on their plans. In addition to a traditional array of academic and financial supports, Thomas College has invested in a true wraparound offering serving the whole student. For eligible students, Thomas has a dedicated TRIO Student Support Services program. Funded through a U.S. Department of Education grant, the program provides academic and personal support to students who are first-generation, are from families of modest incomes, or who have an identified disability. The benefits include individualized academic coaching, financial literacy development and college planning support for families. Thomas was also first in the nation to have a College Success program through JMG (Maine’s Jobs for America’s Graduates affiliate). Thomas College has expanded physical- and mental- health services in the wake of the pandemic, including our innovative Get Out And Live program, which uses Maine’s vast natural setting to provide a range of exciting four-season, outdoor activities for the whole campus community.

Employability. Thomas College students see preparing for a rewarding career as part of their college experience. This is core to the college’s mission and more important than ever in an uncertain economic environment. It is so important that it is guaranteed through the college’s Guaranteed Job Program. Thomas College’s Centers of Innovation focus on the employability of each student. Students pursue a core academic experience in their chosen field, and staff work with each student starting in their first semester to increase their professional and career development. This means field experiences and internships with Maine’s top employers. About 75 percent of Thomas College students have an internship before graduation. As part of their college experience, Thomas College students are coached to earn professional certificates, licenses and digital badges prior to graduation that make them stand out in their professional fields and improve their earning potential. These might include certificates in specific sectors like accounting and real estate or digital badges that show proficiency in professional skills like Design Thinking or Project Management, to name just a few. On the academic side, Thomas has expanded both undergraduate and graduate degree offerings to programs where the market has great demand, including Cybersecurity, Business Analytics, Applied Math, Project Management and Digital Media. Delivery is flexible in terms of mode and timing. And the institution is now offering Certificates of Advance Study (15-credit programs) in Cybersecurity, Human Resource Management and Project Management to meet the stated needs of our business partners seeking to upskill their employees.

Looking Ahead

Some of these changes and investments align with challenges identified before the pandemic as necessary if higher education institutions are to survive and sustain changing demographic and economic trends. The pandemic provided the opportunity to focus on these more quickly, allowing institutions such as Thomas College to right the ship today and set the right course for tomorrow.

Ed Cervone is vice president of innovative partnerships and the executive director of the Center for Innovation in Education at Thomas College, in Waterville, Maine., also the home of Colby College.

How fares 'Open Education' in Rhode Island?

— Photo by Johannes Jansson

From The New England Journal of Higher Education (NEJHE), a service of The New England Board of Higher Education (nebhe.org)

In the following Q&A, Fellow for Open Education Lindsey Gumb takes the pulse of Open Education in Rhode Island with two key leaders in the field: Dragan Gill, who is a Rhode Island College reference librarian and co-chair of the Rhode Island Open Textbook Initiative, and Daniela Fairchild, who is director of the Rhode Island Office of Innovation.

In September 2016, Rhode Island Gov. Gina Raimondo announced her Open Textbook Initiative, challenging the state’s postsecondary institutions to save Rhode Island students $5 million over five years in textbook costs using “open” textbooks instead of expensive, commercial textbooks. The Rhode Island Office of Innovation (InnovateRI) has helped lead the initiative through its partnership with the Adams Library at Rhode Island College (RIC) and steering committee that includes a librarian from each of the state’s postsecondary institutions. Now a little over four years into the initiative we ask Dragan Gill and Daniela Fairchild to share their thoughts on the status of the challenge, lessons learned and their hopes for the future use of open educational resources (OER) in Rhode Island.

Gumb: Interestingly, Rhode Island’s Open Textbook Initiative isn’t mandated by any specific legislation. In what ways has this made the challenge easier … or more difficult?

Gill: Without legislation, we have been able to develop individualized methods of reaching a shared goal within the scope of the governor’s challenge. Each institution has been able to find a meaningful way to incorporate open textbooks and OER in their curricula, while developing strategies that fit within the scope of the institution’s mission and goals, resources and support they have for this work. On the other hand, having funding tied to well-crafted legislation would better support the staffing, professional development and faculty time needed to further the initiative. Having had time to understand the needs of Rhode Island institutions and to review legislation from other states, I believe we now could work with the governor to draft legislation that supports and guides OER efforts in a pragmatic way for our state.

Fairchild: Legislation can be a blessing and a curse. While it adds gravity and force to an initiative, it also can lead to prescription and a compliance-focus. Sometimes, those doing the work end up spending more time preparing for the next mandated legislative report and less time thinking strategically and creatively about the best way to solve for the need or problem identified through legislation. As one of my policy-wonk colleagues once said, legislation is a sledgehammer. There are times when that is necessary; there are times when one would be better served by a scalpel. For this initiative specifically, not having associated legislation has allowed for campus-specific efforts and has allowed a true fostering of a “coalition of the willing.” It has let us experiment and think creatively for each institution’s context. That said, it has meant that the work has truly stayed a coalition of the willing—those who have understood the need have continued to engage. Those who might need a sledgehammer-like prod have not. To Dragan’s point above, now that we are four years into the work, and have a more intricate understanding of the needed guidance, resources and supports for our collective institutions—as well as a sense of lofty, yet realistic goals—it might be time to revisit the conversation.

Gumb: This challenge tracks student savings data from using open textbooks in place of commercial textbooks, but we know that OER does so much more than save students money. How is the Rhode Island Open Textbook Initiative Steering Committee addressing these other areas like equity and pedagogy?

Gill: Unfortunately, we aren’t doing as much as we’d like. Because the challenge was issued as part of the governor’s broader educational attainment goals, equity has been a key component of outreach, but we haven’t found a way to measure this across the state yet. On my campus, Rhode Island College, I have been working on collecting faculty OER and open textbook adoption data in our student information system for several reasons, including better analyzing the impact OER and open textbooks are having on student retention and completion. We are also currently working on creating a way to collect qualitative data about OER-enabled pedagogy practices across the state. We want this data collection to be both easy for faculty to use, but also provide meaningful information for the steering committee. We also want to showcase it. Lastly, this will provide a more complete picture of faculty engagement with openly licensed materials than our data collection thus far, which, focusing on adoption, hasn’t included more creative work or pedagogical practices.

Fairchild: We’ve seen this manifest in different ways at different institutions. Some of our steering committee members, knowing that textbook cost doesn’t resonate with their faculty as loudly as other rationale for open, have focused their “why” communication around open pedagogy, equity and even academic freedom. And, while Dragan is right that there is more to do on this front—and that data tracking around these pieces becomes a bit trickier—what we have seen is the Open Textbook Initiative serve as a launchpad for steering committee members to have those conversations. “Everyone! Listen up! The state has this challenge to save students money. Now that I have your attention, let me show you all the other reasons why open matters—and all the ways open can complement and support your own academic and pedagogical goals.”

Gumb: What has been the Steering Committee’s biggest challenge to date, and how are you working through it?

Gill: As a committee of librarians, we all have to balance our work on the initiative with the responsibilities we were hired for. To respect that this is different for each library, we have set very few hard deadlines and work with each campus to create their own goals towards supporting Open Education for the semester. But to leverage the strengths of the group, we use retreats to foster collaboration among committee members working on similar tasks or with members who have had successes in a problem area for others. Additionally, we have had some turnover in committee membership, which has brought in fresh ideas, but has made sustaining work and processes harder. In addition to having a call or meeting with each new member, we share outreach and training materials in a collection for all committee members to adapt and use.

Fairchild: I agree with Dragan … the natural cadence of steering committee turnover and the lack of dedicated time to support the work has been challenging, but we’ve been working through these things. And continuing to think through ways we can automate processes so they can endure even through steering-committee-member shifts. Longevity and sustainability are relevant issues too. Across campuses, we have leveraged the challenge to elevate open textbooks, but also open more broadly—and we’ve seen a lot of interest and excitement from faculty who are “early adopters” of open textbooks. As we continue, we will need to start connecting to the “early adopter” and “late adopter” faculty; this will require different communications tactics and different supports. We have begun this strategizing through the twice-annual steering committee retreats. And we plan to use the culmination of our current challenge phase to launch phase 2 and reinvigorate that engagement.

Gumb: Public and private institutions often embrace OER in different ways. How has your Steering Committee, which is composed of both, navigated these differences together?

Gill: By focusing on the value of open education, we are able to build our individual efforts based on a shared core understanding. For some campuses, equity and access are more important; for others, there’s more room to discuss creative pedagogy. But ultimately, all of us are working toward offering the best education to our students and, by working with a range of campus partners, we’re able to address both visions at each institution. One thing I’ve found interesting is how the conversation on each campus shifts. When the challenge began, equity and access resonated on my campus. But in sustaining our work, we’ve added exploring OER-enabled pedagogy. Conversely, I know my colleagues at Roger Williams University began their work heavily focused on faculty creation of OER, but in response to results from a student survey have been including more information about the impact of textbook costs on their students in their outreach efforts.

Unfortunately, there have also been inequities. Rhode Island’s Office of Postsecondary Council has funded the state’s three public institutions’ membership in the Open Education Network (OEN), an active community of higher education leaders who work together to build sustainable open education programs. But as the governing body for the public institutions, it cannot do the same for our private partners. Two private institutions have also advocated for funding and joined the OEN, but if we were to start over, having the funding for each institution to join the OEN or SPARC (the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition) would be high in my priorities.

Gumb: What makes you most proud when you look back on the past four years of this challenge?

Gill: In addition to being on track to meet our goal, I am most proud of our ability to quickly find and work with partners. National organizations like OEN, SPARC and Student PIRGs have all been collaborators since the start, but locally, we have also worked with: the Governor’s Commission on Disabilities for a training session and guidance on accessibility; Providence Public Library’s Tableau User Group, through the Data for Good Initiative, to visualize our data; the Rhode Island Teaching and Learning Consortium (RITL) to share our work and see how they can better help engage faculty; and the Office of Library and Information Services to co-sponsor a two-day “Copyright Bootcamp” for the steering committee and librarians across the state. In return, we provided an overview of OER and Open Access for public libraries through OLIS’s professional development workshop series, provided the first large dataset to the Tableau User Group, opened the Copyright Bootcamp to all librarians in the state, and with the background knowledge to do so, are advocates for more accessible teaching and learning materials on our campuses. This showcases the best of librarianship’s ability to bring experts and networks together to benefit all.

Fairchild: Hear, Hear! Now, my much more bureaucratic answer. I’m proud of co-creating something that has legs. In government (as with all systems and large institutions), change is hard. Status quo processes (whether explicit or not) are difficult to change. Initiatives launched by one administration are rarely kept alive through subsequent administrations—either because they are overtly reversed, or because they just fade after losing their executive branch champion. The Open Textbook Initiative has been messy and imperfect, but it has diffuse champions, including those who officially represent our work through the steering committee most notably, but also the faculty our committee members have worked with and the many partners. I think a lot about how to ensure the “stickiness” of innovation in public systems. And I am proud of how so many partners and people have come together to give this work one of the best shots at organic stickiness that I’ve seen.

Gumb: What’s one piece of advice you’d like to share with legislators in the Northeast who might be considering issuing an open textbook challenge such as Rhode Island’s?

Gill: Plan ahead! Scan each institution for existing campus leaders and develop your steering committee or leadership before you announce the challenge. Define your goals and what measures you’ll use to assess progress before you start, but leave room for new ideas.

Fairchild: Just one? If you will permit me, here are three (they are short!) 1) Allow for creativity: Don’t regulate or regiment Open work so much that it stifles new thinking or doesn’t allow for those who you have tasked with the work to actually do the work—especially as the landscape and knowledge base around this is continuously maturing; 2) Foster collaboration: This shouldn’t just be a public institution thing, or something run through one school (even your flagship!), so be mindful of how you’re writing legislation to allow all institutions to see themselves as productive partners and supporters of your goals; 3) You don’t need money, necessarily (we did this without very much at all), but consider how and when targeted, smart investment can help. Dragan mentioned consortia memberships above: Those carry a small-dollar price tag and go a long way with securing buy-in at the outset (it shows that you are investing in the people who are going to make this happen for you) and that you care about the sustainability of this work. We additionally supported faculty with micro-grants to review and adopt open textbooks—which was important at the outset to show that leadership cared about this, but also is important later in any challenge for incentivizing the early or late adopters.

Sheridan Miller: N.E. economic recovery amid COVID-19 uncertainty

BOSTON

From The New England Journal of Higher Education, a service of The New England Board of Higher Education (nebhe.org)

Takeaways from NEBHE’s Legislative Advisory Committee …

The economic fallout of the layoffs and business closures caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has wreaked havoc for many New England workers—especially those who were already facing a structurally vulnerable workforce and employment system before the pandemic. What can state governments do to stimulate job creation and make New England’s economy more resilient in the future?

This was among the questions explored at NEBHE’s virtual Legislative Advisory Committee (LAC) meeting held via Zoom on Sept. 22. LAC members representing all six New England states met with a panel of experts to explore strategies for economic recovery in the region: Osborne Jackson, senior economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, Livia Lam, director of workforce development at the Center for American Progress, and Garrett Moran, chair of Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont’s Governor’s Workforce Council. Here are four takeaways from the discussion.

1. Economic recovery will depend on states’ ability to identify and support the region’s most vulnerable workers.

Jackson’s latest research suggests that the overall unemployment rate in New England is expected to grow through the end of 2020 and into the beginning of 2021, albeit more slowly than the overall U.S. rate . The region’s “non-essential” workers who are unable to work from home (like home repair technicians) who represent 36 percent of all U.S. workers, as well as those “essential” workers who have likewise been unable to work from home (home healthcare aids and childcare workers for example), who represent 38 percent of all U.S. workers, have been the most vulnerable to losing their jobs during the health crisis. This group disproportionately comprises marginalized or oppressed populations, with higher rates of termination among women and workers of color. Policymakers and employers must solicit feedback regarding the needs of non-essential employees, and those who are unable to work from home, in order to help mitigate and try to slow the projected rises in unemployment.

2. New England’s most vulnerable employees can be best supported through business-led partnerships that focus on job quality.

A new Center for American Progress framework for protecting employees at high risk of unemployment calls for:

• Increasing employer responsibility for training and employment

• Rewarding partnerships that have a track record of increasing job quality

• Incentivizing the use of data analytics to measure job quality

• Rebalancing decision-making between workers, businesses and communities.

Policymakers may consider ways to incentivize measures to help support both employees and employers during these trying times. Connecticut, for instance, has started taking steps to encourage the state’s businesses to better support employees by creating business-led community partnerships. New England states might follow Connecticut’s lead, and help support their current and future employees by providing job training programs for incumbent workers, as well as recruiting new and unemployed members of the community through free education courses or virtual job fairs.

3. Increased state support for the child-care sector will be critical for the future of New England’s economy. 

Members of the LAC agreed that a priority for the region as it emerges from the pandemic will be providing affordable, high-quality childcare, delivered by professionals earnings a living wage. Childcare workers are some of the least valued, lowest-paid professionals in New England. However, after preschool and daycare centers were shut down in March due to the pandemic, many parents realized how important early childhood caretakers and teachers are. In addition to the positive long-term impacts that high-quality preschool and childcare have on children’s socio-emotional and cognitive development, these programs provide important benefits to working parents, especially working mothers. To provide more affordable childcare for New Englanders while better compensating the region’s childcare providers, policymakers should consider launching programs that incentivize work-sponsored child care as well as refundable tax credits for preschool centers or for parents and employees to use.

4. Broader recognition of prior learning could help accelerate the region’s economic recovery.

Most jobs that provide financial stability require a credential beyond a high school diploma. Preliminary findings from a survey conducted by NEBHE and Maguire Associates for NEBHE’s All Learning Counts initiative highlights the importance of increasing access to completion of credentials.

In New England, 39 percent of residents have a bachelor’s degree. While that’s generally higher than in other regions, it is still important to increase this number especially as states strive to meet postsecondary attainment goals. It is therefore imperative that New England states recognize all forms of prior learning (such as through work experience or military service) in order for residents to advance professionally, therefore improving the greater economy.

Just as there are equity gaps in employment, there are racial and ethnic gaps in the level of postsecondary attainment in New England. We can increase equity in higher education and work by granting credit to adult learners for their validated life and work experiences. Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, New Englanders with a household income of less than $100,000 annually have changed their opinion to reflect the importance of higher education in job success, according to a survey by Maguire Associates and NEBHE. Yet many of the same survey respondents say they can’t afford to further their education without financial assistance. Broader recognition of learning can accelerate the completion of postsecondary credentials and make it more affordable to do so.

With all of this considered, policymakers should ask themselves the following questions in order to best support their constituents:

• What barriers exist to developing and implementing recognition of learning (ROL) and credit for prior learning policies in your state?

• How can states support institutions in developing low- or no-cost ROL programs?

• How can states ensure that ROL is used to bridge equity gaps and help economic recovery?

Sheridan Miller is NEBHE’s state policy engagement coordinator.

Neeta P. Fogg/Paul E. Harrington: Taking a ‘gap year' can be disastrous

From The New England Journal of Higher Education, a service of The England Board of Higher Education (nebhe.org)

BOSTON

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused elected officials to shut down large segments of the U.S. economy, within 30 days of President Trump’s National Emergency Proclamation in mid-March, putting more than 26 million American payroll workers out of work and shuttering countless small businesses, thereby shutting down the self-employment option upon which workers frequently rely in times of economic trouble.

The initial shutdown is already having substantial secondary effects in sectors of the economy that have not been closed by state officials. The college labor market —largely composed of employment in professional, technical and managerial occupations—was mostly insulated from the early effects of the shutdown. One exception was healthcare, which experienced substantial employment losses as delivery of non-essential healthcare services was sharply curtailed is now shedding workers at an accelerated pace as employer revenues decline precipitously.

Putting the world’s largest economy into a sort of induced coma means two important things for higher education consumers. First, family incomes and wealth are declining, and this results in reduced consumption, including reduced enrollment in higher education programs. Second, a cloud of uncertainty  remains around the virus, and this uncertainty results in a more conservative approach to family finances led by increased savings and reduced consumption, including college consumption.

During the Great Recession of 2008-09, undergraduate and graduate enrollment rates skyrocketed as students sought shelter from the very weak labor market conditions of mass employment losses and rising unemployment among college graduates. However, it appears unlikely that this sort of enrollment surge will occur in this unprecedented economic decline, particularly as options for a “full-college experience” (stereotyped as an 18-year-old going off to a campus with all its social, sports, travel and cultural amenities) seem to be narrowing, by state mandate

Rethinking college decisions

Declining income and wealth and rising uncertainty mean that families are rethinking their college-enrollment decisions. Indeed, several new surveys suggest that among the prospective freshman class, a lot of consideration is being given to alternative ways to reduce spending on higher education, without giving up on it altogether.

Surveys of college-bound seniors find that substantial shares of students who were intent on starting at their first-choice four-year college are thinking about lower cost four-year college options. One recent survey by the Arts and Science Group estimates that about two-thirds of graduating seniors are considering some type of alternative to their first-choice option, with about 20 percent reporting that such a change is likely. Similarly, shifting from a four-year residential college to a two-year community college is now on the radar for many college-bound seniors who would not have considered a community college prior to the pandemic. A third option for students is to delay enrollment for a year until family income has had time to recover and the uncertainty about future possibilities is reduced as the pandemic abates over time.

The first two adjustments may be sensible for some families but does that third scenario, taking a so-called “gap year” make sense?

We believe that taking a gap year is not a good option. Delaying college for most college-bound seniors is disastrous. Delayed enrollment sharply reduces the likelihood of earning a degree.

Our large-scale longitudinal research of a cohort of 9th graders in Philadelphia found that after controlling for demographic and socioeconomic traits as well as in-school behavioral traits and measures of academic performance, delaying college enrollment after high school and subsequently enrolling in a community college reduced the likelihood of earning a college award (including certificates) by a massive 39 percentage points, compared to their counterparts who had enrolled in a four-year private college immediately after high school graduation. Among those who delay and then enroll in a four-year public college the completion rate is reduced by 20 percentage points. (This study tracked students for seven  years after the expected date of high school graduation. Only a handful of students in the study remained enrolled at the end of the period. Because these students had not dropped out and were continuing their study, we counted them as completers in our study, although they had not yet earned an award.)

Other researchers have also found substantial negative effects on college completion associated with the gap year.

If students don’t earn a degree, the investment returns to their college education are essentially zero. Almost all the employment and earnings advantages to higher education are associated with an academic award of a degree or a certificate.

Despite the image created by the popular press about the benefits of a gap year between high school and college, the typical delayed-enrollment student is not the stereotypical high-income bon vivant touring the continent. Rather, delayed-enrollment students are about six time more likely to come from families in the bottom 20 percent than the top 20 percent of the nation’s socioeconomic distribution, according to research by Sara Goldrick-Rab and Seong Won Han. This suggests that delay in college enrollment is much more likely to be associated with less ability to pay than perhaps has been assumed in the past.

Income and wealth changes

The prevailing income and wealth developments in the U.S. will have an adverse impact on the college-going decisions of high school seniors. The closing of much of the nation’s college housing facilities and lingering uncertainty about their fall opening means that the “college experience” of living away from home and leading the idealized life of a resident undergraduate has become more distant to many newly minted high school graduates preparing to start their next phase of life.

Much of the “college experience” that many students desire is not an investment in higher education insofar that the campus experience doesn’t contribute much to post-graduation success. It is really just another form of consumption. (Indeed, when economists measure the cost of higher education, room and board costs are not included, as they are part of normal consumption of the individual. However, it is useful to note that the cost of forgone earnings as student allocate their time to schooling is included in economic measures of college costs.) College investment comes in the form of course-taking and study that leads to growth in the knowledge, skills and abilities of students that are valued in the labor market and yield large and sustained employment and earnings advantages.

The opportunity cost of a gap year is very high. The proficiency and human capital gap between those who enroll and those who do not will widen. The cost is essentially a lost year of investment, during a time in life when human capital investment should be at its greatest.  Students who take a gap year will find it very difficult to secure paid work. The labor market is awash with massive numbers of job-seekers and this will continue as economic re-opening begins in a phased and cautious manner. New high school graduates, not especially welcome in the labor market in the best of times, will struggle to find employment. Even for students with strong financial resources, the opportunity to engage in the sort of gap year experiences such as cultural or environmental travel will likely be greatly diminished. A gap year for many young people will just mean an extension of the lockdown; in this instance, it will mean being locked out of work and school.

School and work are the two primary ways in which individuals build their stock of human capital. Students who opt for a gap year will find themselves left behind as their peers continue their education and develop their productive capacities. College-bound seniors are right to think carefully about adjusting to the COVID-19 environment, but one adjustment that is almost guaranteed to lead to financial failure is that of doing nothing—the gap year.

Neeta P. Fogg is research professor at the Center for Labor Markets and Policy at Drexel University, in Philadelphia; Paul E. Harrington, formerly of Northeastern University, is director of the center.

John O. Harney: News and random thoughts from the region

“If Wishes Were Horses (For Dad)”, by Timothy Harney, a professor at the Montserrat College of Art, in Beverly, Mass. He’s the brother of John O. Harney.

From The New England Journal of Higher Education, a service of The New England Board of Higher Education (nebhe.org)

FICE-y conditions. MIT recently alerted its staff that federal immigration officials would be checking the status of foreign postdoctoral students, researchers and visiting scholars in the sciences, and urged them to cooperate. … Meanwhile, an Iranian student, returning to study at Northeastern University, was detained at Boston’s Logan International Airport then deported, despite having a valid student visa and court order permitting him to stay in the U.S. The stories reminded me of Politico’s report on “5 ways universities can support students in a post-DACA world” by Jose Magaña-Salgado, of the Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration. And of own NEJHE piece by Harvard attorney Jason Corral, whose job is advising undocumented students in the age of the Trump administration.

Caste away. Brandeis University announced it will include “castes” in its non-discrimination policy. Discrimination based on this system of inherited social class will now be expressly prohibited along with more familiar measures such as race, color, religion, gender identity and expression, national or ethnic origin, sex, sexual orientation, pregnancy, age, genetic information, disability, military or veteran status.

Institution news. Massachusetts approved new regulations on how to screen colleges and universities for financial risks and potential closures. … The University of Maine System Board of Trustees adopted a recommendation from Chancellor Dannel Malloy to transition the separate institutional accreditations of Maine’s public universities into a single “unified institutional accreditation” for the 30,000-student University of Maine System through the New England Commission on Higher Education (NECHE). One institution the UMaine System is likely to collaborate with according to Malloy’s office: Northeastern University’s planned Roux Institute for advanced graduate study and research to open in Portland, Maine. … In Connecticut, meanwhile, Goodwin College became Goodwin University. Such rebranding has been something of a trend in recent years. … In other institution news, monks at Saint Anselm College challenged the New Hampshire Catholic college’s board of trustees over a move the monks say could lead to increased secularization. The college’s charter dictated that the monks have the power to amend laws governing the school. Saint Anselm College President Joseph Favazza said in a letter that the board was not trying to change the mission of the college, but rather aiming to meet the standards set by NECHE, the accrediting body.

Cold War chills. Primary Research Group Inc. has published its 2020 edition of Export Controls Compliance Practices Benchmarks for Higher Education with this grim reminder: “Increasingly, U.S. universities and their corporate and government research partners are under pressure to demonstrate compliance with U.S. export control and other technology transfer restriction and control policies. The deterioration of U.S.-relations with China and Russia threatens the return of export control philosophies common during the Cold War. Major universities in the U.K., Australia and Canada, among other countries, are experiencing similar changes.”

Media is not the enemy, but … The free Metro Boston newspaper ended operation after 19 years, following the sale of the New York and Philadelphia Metro papers. One explanation offered by a columnist at The Boston Globe, which is a part-owner of the Boston Metro: more commuters using their phones to catch up on news.

Latest from LearnLaunch. Watch NEJHE for reports from the 2020 Learn Launch Across Boundaries Conference, including an exclusive Q&A with the new LearnLaunch president, former Massachusetts Gov. Jane Swift.

John O. Harney is executive editor of The New England Journal of Higher Education.

David R. Evans: How is Bulgaria like New England?

Graduating seniors at the American University in Bulgaria

From The New England Journal of Higher Education, a service of The New England Board of Higher Education (nebhe.org)

This question in the headline above probably seems like a lead-in for a funny non-sequitur, but bear with me for a moment.

The American University in Bulgaria (AUBG), in Blagoevgrad, where I currently serve as interim president, was founded in 1991, soon after the fall of communism in Eastern Europe, originally as a branch campus of the University of Maine. Like several other international institutions, AUBG is accredited by the New England Commission of Higher Education, so we’re at least an honorary New England institution. This strategy streamlined initial accreditation and provided us with a base of institutional resources to start from scratch in a country that had no tradition of American-style undergraduate education. We have long since become completely independent, but our roots in New England remain fundamental to our institutional identity.

Our mission was, and remains, to promote democratic values and open inquiry and to provide opportunities for students to experience the freeing—liberating—benefits of the liberal arts. We strive to create engaged, effective citizens, critical thinkers and excellent communicators empowered by their education to take an active role in their professions and communities and always work to make the world better.

In this respect, AUBG embodies a modern version of the ethos that founded so many colleges in New England and spread across the U.S. in the 18th and 19th centuries. While unlike many such institutions, we have no history as a training ground for the clergy, the parallels remain clear: Our founders envisioned a better world and hoped, through establishing this institution, to play a definitive role in bringing that better world into being. In a country where, for nearly a half-century prior to our founding, the absolute last thing the communist government wanted was engaged, empowered democratic citizens who had learned and been encouraged to question and critique everything, our project and mission to bring the outcomes of a good liberal arts education to Bulgaria have been genuinely revolutionary.

AUBG also shares with many small New England colleges some significant challenges. Most importantly, Bulgaria, like many parts of New England, is in a serious demographic crisis. Bulgaria is a small country with a population of just under seven million people. Its population peaked at nearly nine million in about 1985, and has been declining ever since. Moreover, its fertility rate has been below replacement since about 1985 and is now at only 1.6 live births per woman, while the replacement rate is about 2.1. Because AUBG, like most private colleges, is significantly dependent on tuition revenue, and because our primary market is Bulgaria, the steady decline in our national population is something to take very seriously. We are, in short, deep into the worst nightmares that Nathan Grawe has recently articulated in his indispensable book, Demographics and Demand for Higher Education

Unlike institutions in the U.S., we face another specific enrollment challenge. When AUBG was founded, Bulgaria was not a member of the European Union, and the university quickly became an—if not the—institution of choice for Bulgarian young people seeking a top-quality education conducted in English. However, since Bulgaria joined the E.U. in 2007, such young people have a range of options throughout Europe at very favorable prices and have chosen particularly to pursue higher education in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. Because of generous public support for higher education in the E.U., there are some parallels with the challenges the “free public college” movement poses to private institutions in the U.S., but the complexities of language and culture further complicate these situations.

In Bulgaria and most of our primary markets extending throughout Eastern Europe, we face another issue in that we proudly promote American-style liberal arts undergraduate education (though honestly more in philosophy and educational practice than in our majors, which are highly weighted toward careers in our service region in business, IT, journalism and communications, and politics).

Where in the U.S., comparable institutions face increasing skepticism about the “liberal arts” in general, in our area, the question is more about what a liberal arts education actually is, and how it differs and adds value to the undergraduate experience. The public universities of Bulgaria, of which there are many, tend to follow the European model of institutional specialization, with strong specific emphases rather than a deep investment in broad liberal education. (The technocratic and often applied focus of many of these universities is also surely a relic of communist practices as well.) In that context, as sadly often in the U.S. as well, our stress on general education is often seen as alien and unhelpful, a useless distraction from the actual business at hand. In many cases, our programs require an additional year to accommodate our curriculum’s required breadth, as we follow the traditional American four-year bachelor’s model, and this added time requires a real commitment on the part of our students and their families.

I bring a very particular, painful experience to my work here, because I was the president of the private Southern Vermont College when it closed last spring as a result of declining enrollment and the associated financial stress. I have seen first-hand the challenges that face private colleges in a highly competitive market, with a product not fully understood or appreciated by its clientele, and presenting a value proposition that is not always evident to the people who most need to embrace it. There, our mission was to provide a strong, broad education to a student body comprising mostly first-generation students and students from diverse and high-need backgrounds. Over time, and exacerbated by the broad declines in high school graduates across our region, it became increasingly difficult to manage institutional finances to support affordable access for them and thus to convince them to invest in our institution despite our evident success in supporting students to graduation and successful careers.

At recent professional meetings back in the U.S., in conversations with colleagues, I have been struck by how comparable, if not similar, our challenges are. Like many colleagues, I take strength from the power and importance of AUBG’s mission and from the tremendous success of our alumni, and work constantly to ensure that this mission can endure in the context of unprecedented challenges to a basic model that has, as New Englanders know, developed and supported exceptional leaders for over three centuries.

David R. Evans is interim president of the American University in Bulgaria.

RIP: Seal of Southern Vermont College, in Bennington, 1926-2019

The past and future of young people in politics

The replica of the U.S. Senate Chamber in the Edward M. Kennedy Institute. in Boston

In the following Q&A, New England Journal of Higher Education Executive Editor John O. Harney asks Mary K. Grant, president of the Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the United States Senate, about the institute’s work connecting postsecondary education to citizenship and upcoming elections.

(Last month, NEJHE posted a similar Q&A with Nancy Thomas, director of the Institute for Democracy & Higher Education at Tufts University’s Jonathan M. Tisch College of Civic Life.)

Harney: What did the 2016 and 2018 elections tell us about the state of youth engagement in American democracy?

Grant: We are seeing a resurgence of interest in civic engagement, activism and public service among young people. From 2014 to 2018, voter turnout among 18- to 29-year-olds increased by 79%, the largest increase among any group of voters.

The 2016 election was certainly a catalyst for galvanizing renewed interest. Since 2016, we have seen increases in people being more engaged in organizing platforms, messages and movements to motivate their peers and adults. The midterm elections brought a set of candidates who were the most diverse in our history, entering politics with urgency and not “waiting their turns” to run for office. One of the most encouraging findings was that those who felt most frustrated were more likely to vote.

While young-voter turnout in the 2018 election was historically high, it was still just 31% of those eligible to vote. Democracy depends on the voice of the people. And a functioning democracy depends on participation, particularly in polarized times. Senator Kennedy said “political differences may make us opponents, but should never make us enemies.” He envisioned the Edward M. Kennedy Institute as a venue for people from all backgrounds to engage in civil dialogue and find solutions with common ground.

As a nonpartisan, civic education organization, the institute’s goal is to educate and engage people in the complex issues facing our communities, nation and world. Since we opened four years ago, we have had more than 80,000 students come through our doors for the opportunity to not only learn how the U.S. government works, but also to understand what civic engagement looks like. All of us at the Kennedy Institute see how important it is to give young people a laboratory where they can truly practice making their voices heard and experience democracy; our lab just happens to be a full-scale replica of the United States Senate Chamber.

Harney: How else besides voting do you measure young people’s civic citizenship? Are there other appropriate measures of activism or political engagement?

Grant: Voter turnout is one measure, but civic engagement is needed every day. Defined broadly, activism and civic citizenship are difficult to measure. We engage in our local, state and national communities in so many ways.

Our team at the institute values reports like “Guardian of Democracy: The Civic Mission of Schools” that discuss how the challenge in the U.S. is not only a lack of civic knowledge, but also a lack of civic skills and dispositions. Civic skills include learning to deliberate, debate and find common ground in a framework of respectful discourse, and thinking critically and crafting persuasive arguments and shared solutions to challenging issues. Civic dispositions include modeling and experiencing fairness, considering the rights of others, the willingness to serve in public office, and the tendency to vote in local, state and national elections. To address the critical issues and make real social change, we need a better fundamental understanding of how our government works. And we need better skills for healthy, respectful debate

Harney: What are the key issues for young voters?

Grant: The post-Millennial generation is the most racially and ethnically diverse generation in our history. Only 52% identify as non-Hispanic whites. As they envision their future livelihoods in an increasingly automated workplace, they are concerned about climate change and how related food security may affect the sustainability of daily life and they are concerned about income inequality, student debt, gun violence, racial disparities, and being engaged and involved in their communities.

The institute’s polling data indicated that interests for 18-34-year-olds were reflective of society as a whole, but gun rights and gun control, education and the economy would be among the most important as they are deciding on congressional candidates in the next election.

Young people are focused on the complex global issues that concern us all but with added urgency. A Harvard Institute of Politics Youth Poll this spring found that 18-29-year-old voters do not believe that the baby boomer generation—especially elected officials—“care about people like them.” And, they expressed concern over the direction of the country.

Harney: Are there any relevant correlations between measures of citizenship and enrollment in specific courses or majors?

Grant: In a democracy, we need all majors. And more importantly, we need students and graduates to know how to work together. In a global economy, people in the sciences, business and engineering work right next to people in the fields of social sciences. I had the privilege of leading two of the finest public liberal arts college and universities in the country. I am a firm believer that regardless of disciplinary area, problem-solving requires us to ask questions, to be curious and open-minded, to think critically and creatively, incorporate a variety of viewpoints and work in partnership with others. We need to understand how you take an idea, move it along and make it into something that can improve the common good.

Harney: Are college students and faculty as “liberal” as “conservative” commentators make them out to be?

Grant: From my own work in higher education, I can say that there is diversity of perspectives and viewpoints on college campuses, which is encouraging and exciting. Liberals and conservatives are not unique in the ability to hold on quite strongly to their own viewpoints. Anyone who has ever witnessed a group of social and natural scientists discuss research methodologies can attest to that. We all need to learn how to listen to ideas other than our own

Harney: What are ways to encourage “blue-state” students to have an effect on “red-state” politics and vice versa?

Grant: Part of the country’s challenge in civil discourse is that we stop listening or we are listening for soundbites to which we overreact. One of the most important skills that we can develop is the ability to listen actively. It’s truly remarkable what can happen when students have an opportunity to get to know and work and learn with their peers across the country and around the world

What we’re finding in our programs is that people are hungering for conversation, even on difficult matters. It’s similar to the concept of creating spaces on college campuses where you can intentionally connect with people. This coming fall, we’re using an award that we earned from the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania to pilot a program called “Civil Conversations.” The program is designed to help eighth through 12th grade teachers develop the skills necessary to lead productive classroom discussions on difficult public policy issues. We’re starting in Massachusetts and plan to expand to all the blue, red and purple states.

And for those coming to the institute, we convene diverse perspectives through daily educational and visitor programs where people can talk with and listen to others who might be troubled or curious about the same things you are. Our public conversation series and forums bring together government leaders with disparate ideologies and from different political parties who are collaborating on a common cause; we host special programs that offer insight into specific issues and challenges facing communities and civic leaders, and what change-makers are doing about it.

Harney: What role does social media play in shaping engagement and votes?

Grant: Social media have fundamentally changed not only how we get our information, but how we interact with each other. According to a Harvard Institute of Politics Youth Poll, more than 4-in-5 young Americans check their phone at least once per day for news related to politics and current events.

As social media reaches more future and eligible voters, and when civic education is lacking, those who depend on social media platforms are at risk of consuming inaccurate information. This underscores not only the need for robust civic education programs, but also those in media literacy.

Harney: How can colleges and universities work together to bolster democracy?

Grant: Anyone who spends time around young people or on a college campus feels their energy and can’t help but come away with a renewed sense of hope. Colleges can continue to work together and advocate for unfettered access to higher education for students in all areas of the country. More specifically, they can engage with organizations like Campus Compact, a national coalition of more than a thousand colleges and universities committed to building democracy through civic education and community development.

Harney: How will New England’s increased political representation of women and people of color affect real policy?

Grant: The increasingly diverse representation helps to broaden and deepen the range of perspectives, ideas and viewpoints that influence public policy. There is also a renewed energy that is generated and it encourages next generation leaders to get involved, run for office, work on campaigns and make a difference in their communities. The institute has held several Women in Leadership programming events that highlight the lack of gender equity and racial diversity in public office and provide opportunities for women to network and learn more about the challenges and the opportunities.

Harney: Do young voters show any particular interest in where candidates stand on “higher education issues” such as academic freedom?

Grant: Students may not be focused on “higher education issues,” per se, but they do have a lot to say about accessibility and affordability. This generation is saddled with an enormous amount of student loan debt. That is certainly one of their greatest concerns, particularly when it comes to the 2020 presidential race.

Academic freedom is important in making colleges and universities welcoming to the exchange of differing ideas, which is a bedrock of democracy. As a former university chancellor, I believe that it is essential to create an environment where we welcome a diversity of opinion. We need to model the ability to listen to and consider viewpoints that may be very different from our own. We need to show students that we can sit down with people who think differently, find common ground, and even respectfully disagree. That’s a key part of what the Edward M. Kennedy Institute is all about.

John O. Harney: Getting ready for the sixth mega-extinction

BOSTON More than 250 higher-education leaders from campuses across the U.S. met last week in Boston for the 2014 Presidential Summit on Climate Leadership.

The summit was organized by Second Nature, the supporting organization for the American College & University Presidents' Climate Commitment (ACUPCC). Almost 700 colleges and universities have signed the ACUPCC and committed to achieve carbon neutrality by balancing the amount of carbon released with an equal amount offset or buying enough carbon credits to make up the difference, but boosters voiced frustration that the number hasn’t been growing in recent years.

Registering at the Revere Hotel (still the 57 to me) I was greeted with a questionnaire that Emerson College students are using to track the summit's carbon footprint. I was proud to declare that I came by train and on foot.

On the way into town, I had tweeted about a new finding that global warming (recently sanitized as ‘’climate change’’) is wrecking havoc on fall colors. Also that day, papers were reporting on 35,000 walruses coming ashore in Alaska due to melting sea ice. Just two weeks earlier, 400,000 people marched in New York City and elsewhere to call for action on climate change. The summit seemed timely, if not late.

At the conference, Kate Gordon, executive director of the Risky Business Project, outlined her no-nonsense research focusing on climate change’s impacts on energy, agriculture and extreme heat. She and her co-authors wanted to speak in the language of business so they framed the issue as a “risk assessment” and delivered their report in the backyard of Wall Street.

Assessing economic risk of climate change is complicated. Louisiana’s gross state product fell slightly after Hurricane Katrina, but the rest of the country’s grew based partly on storm-related recovery activity.

More importantly, some of the risks of climate change will cascade. For example, there’ll be more “heat stroke days” when the body cannot cool itself off by perspiring. That will mean lost labor productivity (especially in states with lots of outdoor work, led ironically by North Dakota) as well as more air conditioning and therefore demand for more power plants, which incidentally are mostly built along rising seas.

The Southeast will be hit especially bad. And that’s where much of American manufacturing, including green manufacturing, is increasingly based. There was dark joking about moving football’s hot (in more ways than one) Southeastern Conference to the Northwest, where warming with make the weather better suited for outdoor sports. But dead seriousness about how Cargill (whose exec is among the veritable rogue’s gallery of backers who advised the work) could move its corn farming from Iowa to Manitoba to keep up with the weather, but Iowa farm families would be left high and dry.

Among other things, Gordon urged a more interdisciplinary look at sustainability. Why not make it a case study for first-year business students, she asked.

In a separate session, George Washington University President Steve Knapp and American University President Neil Kerwin explained how their campuses are meeting more than 50% of their energy needs with solar energy from North Carolina.

D.C. is promoted among the best college towns in America, but Knapp and Kerwin agreed that colleges in other places could forge collaborations for this purpose. Though some experts are skeptical about locking in rates because energy costs could go down, Kerwin said the ability for the colleges to come together allowed their supplier Duke Energy Renewables company to go to capital markets for better deals. Knapp and Kerwin also credited politically savvy students with the success and urged other higher ed leaders to prepare the ground with trustees in advance.

A panel moderated by New England Board of Higher Education President Michael K. Thomas explored how sustainability champions can get their message to national audiences. Portland State University President Wim Wiewel suggested more emphasis on foundation support in the face of a tight federal government as well as forming a committee to focus on “partnership creation.” Millersville University President John Anderson noted that he is using his appointment to a hospital board to advance AAUPCC's message by reminding them how hurricanes Sandy and Katrina clobbered hospitals.

The audience provided solid observations about building national action. Cal State Chico reps observed that student associations are key. A former Second Nature employee said she previously worked at NACUBO, where staff listen most attentively to advice when it comes from presidents. Penn State's sustainability director said he gets together with counterparts via the Big 10 athletic conference. The president of Cal State Northridge noted that she is a member of the NCAA, and pondered what might happen if the national athletic association turned to sustainability. A staffer from Illinois State University asked how can colleges can leverage their alumni on behalf of climate efforts. A GW sustainability official called for more positive stories and more group purchasing. An official of the American Meteorological Society said his group has courses at universities across the nation. Another campus official noted that federal policy on sustainability is out of touch with newer thinking. Sustainability guru Tony Cortese, formerly of Tufts and a co-founder of the AAUPCC, said the time is right now for climate action, as it was when AAUPCC started.

One non-scientific observation (a rarely acknowledged qualifier on this subject) is that the audience revealed a remarkable lack of diversity, even for a meeting of New England “thought leaders.” Also some communication contamination … lots of diagrams and terms like programs and ideas being “birthed” … perhaps because these folks know the end is nigh with, as another sustainability hero, former Unity College President Mitch Thomashow warned, the human-caused sixth mega-extinction knocking at the door.

John O. Harney is executive editor of The New England Journal of Higher Education (nebhe.org).