This week’s episode of Voices of Student Success features Jody Greene, associate campus provost for academic success at the University of California, Santa Cruz, on the relationship between faculty and student success, how UCSC is empowering faculty to practice equitable course design and the future of academic success. Hosted by Inside Higher Ed Student Success Reporter Ashley Mowreader. This episode is sponsored by InsideTrack ....
Feb 07, 2024•18 min•Ep. 104
This week’s episode of Voices of Student Success features Adelí Durón, the inaugural director of the Latinx Resource Center at the University of California, Irvine, on its mission and how she works to ensure student voices inform programming, engagement and center leadership. Hosted by Inside Higher Ed Student Success Reporter Ashley Mowreader. This episode is sponsored by InsideTrack ....
Jan 24, 2024•18 min•Ep. 103
Three years ago, Inside Higher Ed created a podcast to try to give its audience insight into how the COVID-19 pandemic was affecting colleges, employees and students, with a particular focus on the more “invisible” students who too often fly under the radar of journalists and campus leaders. This week’s episode, The Key’s 100th, features a discussion with Paul Fain, who as Inside Higher Ed’s news editor launched the podcast and nurtured it through its first year. Paul, whose newsletter The Job e...
Oct 11, 2023•25 min•Season 3Ep. 102
“Gateway courses” are supposed to clear the path to fields of study, but for millions of students who struggle in those key classes, they often shut the door prematurely. This week's episode of The Key digs into early efforts to develop courseware for 20 high enrollment courses that can make or break whether students from all backgrounds persist and ultimately complete their educations. The goal of the initiative, funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, is to bring together colleges, ...
Sep 26, 2023•35 min•Season 3Ep. 101
The complex, confusing process by which students move between colleges has been an acknowledged barrier impeding postsecondary completion, particularly for underrepresented students. The issue is drawing increasing attention from policy makers, given rising concerns about value and equity. This week’s episode of The Key looks at some of the transfer work being done by the major college and university systems that enroll a majority of today’s learners. Two experts participate in the discussion. D...
Sep 12, 2023•32 min•Season 3Ep. 100
The Key continues to share Inside Higher Ed’s latest collaboration with Times Higher Education – Campus Podcast . Eve Riskin, dean of undergraduate education at Stevens Institute of Technology, talks about the power of mentorship, diversity in excellence and what she, as an electrical engineer and computer scientist, thinks about the emergence of generative AI. Episode sponsored by Stevens Institute of Technology ....
Aug 21, 2023•32 min•Season 3Ep. 99
The Key shares Inside Higher Ed’s latest collaboration with Times Higher Education – Campus Podcast . This interview features Montclair State University President Jonathan Koppell as he discusses how universities can be more proactive in rebuilding public trust in higher education. It’s tied to accessibility and degree completion, he argues, and universities need to acknowledge their failures in meeting those objectives. Meanwhile, service learning and supporting minoritized groups are central t...
Jul 24, 2023•45 min•Season 3Ep. 98
This week’s episode of The Key, Inside Higher Ed’s news and analysis podcast, builds off a great conversation that took place earlier this month at Digital Universities U.S. , an event Inside Higher Ed co-hosted in Chicago with our partners from Times Higher Education. The conversation featured leaders from three very different institutions talking about how their institutions create online or blended educational experiences that build a sense of community and belonging for students, prepare fac...
May 25, 2023•36 min•Season 3Ep. 97
As public support belief in the value of higher education has steadily declined in recent years, most of the attention for turning that around has been on improving the career readiness of graduates and making college more affordable. But an emergent group of college leaders believes the real key may be to ensure that all learners, regardless of background, have experiences in college that help them develop identity, agency and purpose with the goal of improving their well-being 30 years down th...
May 10, 2023•33 min•Season 3Ep. 96
Are we in the midst of a mental health “crisis” for college students and other young people? How should campus administrators and faculty members be thinking about the mental health of their students and their roles in addressing it? And do we perhaps need to reframe the discussion around what “mental health” even is? This week’s episode of The Key explores an issue that has been at or near the top of the worry list for those who work in and around higher education, as learners report record lev...
Apr 25, 2023•40 min•Season 3Ep. 95
Terry Hartle retired last fall after 30 years as the chief government and public affairs officer at the American Council on Education, where he had a front-row seat to virtually every important higher education policy discussion. In this week’s episode of The Key, Hartle talks about the partisanship and inertia that afflicts today’s politics, politicians’ increased questioning and oversight of higher education, and the implications for colleges, their employees, and their students. Hosted by Ins...
Mar 22, 2023•35 min•Season 3Ep. 94
Does the possible sale of the University of Phoenix to a public university system signal the demise of the for-profit higher education sector that Phoenix once epitomized? This week’s episode of The Key analyzes the implications of recent news that a nonprofit affiliated with the University of Arkansas System might buy the former giant among for-profit colleges. Joining the discussion are Kevin Kinser, who heads the department of Education Policy Studies at Pennsylvania State University; Julie P...
Feb 08, 2023•34 min•Season 3Ep. 93
In 2010, a book called DIY U: Edupunks, Edupreneurs and the Coming Transformation of Higher Education envisioned a wholesale shift in how people learned. More than a decade later, how has that panned out? This week’s episode features a conversation with Anya Kamenetz, the author and journalist who in 2010 tapped into an emerging set of issues around student debt, rapid technological change and political upheaval to lay out a portrait of a world in which individuals could learn when and how they ...
Oct 26, 2022•22 min•Season 2Ep. 92
During the pandemic, many colleges and universities embraced a form of blended learning called HyFlex, to mixed reviews. Is it likely to be part of colleges’ instructional strategy going forward? This week’s episode of The Key explores HyFlex, in which students in a classroom learn synchronously alongside a cohort of peers studying remotely. HyFlex moved from a fringe phenomenon to the mainstream during the COVID-19 pandemic, and the experience was imperfect at best, for professors and students ...
Oct 20, 2022•36 min•Season 2Ep. 91
Colleges are under growing pressure to prove their “value” to students, parents, legislators and others. The scrutiny can be uncomfortable, but more institutions are responding with serious efforts to measure and explain their value. This week’s episode of The Key, the last in a three-part series on value in higher education, examines the data and metrics we’re using now – and those we might use going forward – to gauge the value colleges and universities are providing to their students and othe...
Sep 29, 2022•46 min•Season 2Ep. 90
As recently as a decade ago, the concept of “value” rarely found its way into discussions about federal and state policymaking about higher education. Now it’s unusual to hear a meaningful conversation that doesn’t raise the issue. This week’s episode of The Key, the second in a three-part series on the value of higher education, examines how politicians and policy makers are responding to growing public doubt about the value of colleges and credentials by defining and trying to measure whether ...
Sep 21, 2022•37 min•Season 2Ep. 89
For decades, colleges and universities enjoyed almost unquestioned public support as some of America’s most important institutions. Like most institutions, they’ve been knocked off that pedestal in recent years, amid growing questions not about whether higher education remains important but whether it’s available, affordable and valuable enough. This week’s episode of The Key is the first in a three-part series on the concept of “value” in higher education, made possible by the Bill & Melind...
Sep 15, 2022•27 min•Ep. 88
Most business officers are upbeat about their colleges’ financial future. Why is that so, and are they right to be so optimistic? This week's episode of The Key features a discussion about Inside Higher Ed’s 2022 Survey of College and University Business Officers , which generally found college chief financial officers feeling pretty good about how their institutions are faring and how they’re positioned for the future. The episode explores the survey’s results, but also digs into whether financ...
Jul 28, 2022•31 min•Season 2Ep. 87
Many people in higher education recoil at the idea of merging institutions, and it’s little wonder: in most such arrangements, one institution swallows the other, which virtually disappears. But that doesn’t mean the alternative is for every college to remain an island unto itself. Recent events – last month’s merger between Saint Joseph’s University and University of the Sciences in Philadelphia, and last week’s news that Antioch University and Otterbein University are teaming up to create a ne...
Jul 20, 2022•44 min•Season 2Ep. 86
College and university enrollments – particularly at community colleges – continue to plummet. Have they bottomed out? Will they recover if the economy cools off as expected? Has enrollment dropped to a new lower plateau that’s likely to be the baseline going forward? This week’s episode of The Key explores the 7.5 percent decline that college enrollments have suffered since the pandemic, with a focus on community colleges that enroll working learners and first-generation students, which have be...
Jun 22, 2022•35 min•Season 2Ep. 85
How are colleges and universities going about rethinking their teaching and learning strategies in the wake of widescale experimentation with digital instruction? This week’s episode is the last of a three-part series on digital teaching and learning, supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The first two episodes explored how the COVID-19 pandemic reshaped what researchers and practitioners know about the role of technology in learning, and how well the hundreds of ed-tech companie...
Jun 01, 2022•28 min•Season 2Ep. 84
The last two years disrupted many aspects of higher education, and the educational technology market -- and the relationship between colleges and companies – are no exception. This week’s episode of The Key explores how well the many hundreds of ed-tech companies that work with colleges, professors and students actually meet the needs of the institutions and their people, where they fall short, and how they can do better. The discussion includes two guests who’ve sat at the intersection of where...
May 25, 2022•29 min•Season 2Ep. 83
This week’s episode of The Key explores whether and how the landscape of digital teaching and learning has been changed by the last two years of global pandemic, recession, upheaval over racial justice, and more. Participants in the conversation are Shanna Smith Jaggars, assistant vice provost of research and program assessment in Ohio State University’s Office of Student Academic Success, and Jessica Rowland Williams, director of Every Learner Everywhere, which pursues equitable outcomes in hig...
May 18, 2022•34 min•Season 2Ep. 82
Student loan debt forgiveness. Free community college. Pell Grants for short-term programs. Those are just some of the higher education issues occupying the federal policy landscape in Washington. This week’s episode of The Key features a conversation with Under Secretary James Kvaal, the Education Department’s senior official on higher education. He discusses the administration’s current thinking about those and other issues, including the challenges of operating in a highly partisan era. Hoste...
May 11, 2022•18 min•Season 2Ep. 81
Has higher education’s forced experimentation with remote learning changed how students, professors, colleges and the public view online education? And will it make them more or less likely to participate in it? This week's episode of The Key explores Inside Higher Ed’s recent report, The Evolving Conversation About Quality in Online Learning.” The report examines a wide range of issues around the current and future state of technology-enabled learning to try to help administrators and faculty m...
May 04, 2022•23 min•Season 2Ep. 80
This week's episode of The Key explores why some institutions use those policies and why consumer advocates think they're pernicious, even though they're only a small fraction of the $1.7 trillion student debt problem in American higher education. Martin Kurzweil, director of the institutional transformation program at Ithaka S+R, discusses research on what it calls “stranded credits” that colleges sometimes hold hostage from former students and a promising experiment that could offer a way out ...
Apr 29, 2022•34 min•Season 2Ep. 79
Last month the State of Maryland announced that it would no longer require a bachelor’s degree in the hiring process for nearly half of its jobs, joining a growing number of companies and other employers. Some people in higher education might view steps like that as a slight, since Maryland and other employers are responding in part to questions about the value of degrees and growing concerns about the cost – and opportunity cost – of earning one. But in this week’s episode of The Key, Bridgette...
Apr 20, 2022•37 min•Season 2Ep. 78
Employers of all kinds are struggling to hold on to their employees in the wake of the pandemic and amid a white-hot job market. Data recently released by the University of North Carolina system, for instance, shows that faculty and staff turnover in the first half of this academic year was about 40 percent higher than the average of the last four years. Are colleges and universities just dealing with the same issues other industries are facing? Or are there unique problems in higher ed that cam...
Apr 14, 2022•36 min•Season 2Ep. 77
In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, student academic misconduct spiked, and an episode of The Key explored the reasons why and steps colleges and professors might take to combat it. The issue hasn’t gone away, even though a lot of instruction has returned to the physical classroom. So this week we revisit the February 2021 conversations, which remain timely and relevant. First up is Bradley Davis, associate director of the office of student conduct at North Carolina State University, who disc...
Apr 07, 2022•45 min•Season 2Ep. 76
How has the COVID-19 pandemic and the other upheaval of the last couple of years changed the outlook for colleges, their students and their employees? Bryan Alexander is a writer, author, teacher and “futurist.” He wrote the 2020 book Academia Next and hosts his own series of video conversations, The Future Trends Forum. In this week’s episode of The Key podcast, he first explains the work of professional futurists, and how they differ from other kinds of analysts who operate as if they owned cr...
Apr 01, 2022•22 min•Season 2Ep. 75
