Dark Times in Higher Education

Big changes in academia are on the horizon

Photo by Ruijia Wang on Unsplash

College admissions is serious business out here in the upper-middle-class suburbs. Parents hire college advisors and tutors to increase the odds that their child will get into a school with the “right fit.” Thousands are spent guiding their children through the admission process, even before the first tuition bill.

Yet, these decisions are being made without considering massive changes in the higher education landscape. Ongoing economic shifts are making it more difficult for graduates to find work. With a decrease in international students (they pay full freight for tuition) and a decrease in federal grants, universities will have to make major shifts in operations in the next year. Systems are rapidly changing, but parents haven’t noticed yet.

The first big change has been happening gradually over time. The economy cannot keep up with the number of college graduates. There are not enough good jobs for every BA. So, if you get a college degree in almost any subject, you only have a 50 percent chance of getting a good job. The other half manages a rental car franchise by the airport. (Great stats here.)

Eventually, the younger parents will learn what the older parents have been covering up for the past couple of years — Ivy League college grads are nannies, retail workers, and waiters. It’s tough out there. At some point, this reality will put a damper on the college rat race.

Meanwhile, Trump is gutting the research budgets at elite institutions. The cuts in the NIH, NSF, and other federal grant agencies will mean fewer research dollars in higher education. A recent article in Inside Higher Education details some of the cuts:

The proposed budget plan slashes nearly $18 billion from the National Institutes of Health, $12 billion from the Education Department and nearly $5 billion from the National Science Foundation. The skinny budget also eliminates funding for the Institute of Museum and Library Sciences, AmeriCorps, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the National Endowment for the Humanities. Trump has already made deep cuts at those agencies and put most—if not all—of their employees on leave.

These cuts in research funds will have a big impact on the bottom line at most universities. Colleges that have already announced “belt tightening” include the University of Oregon, the University of Washington, Michigan State University, the University of Maryland, Duke, and more.

That decline in research funds, combined with a decline in international students, the weak economy, and a decline in state funding, means that every university in the country will start making drastic cuts in services this year. Tenured faculty will be fired. Entire departments will be eliminated.

Trump is targeting elite institutions in particular for his cuts. Why? Because college professors don’t vote for him. His base isn’t beneficiaries of a college education, and they believe that the university system is an incubator for anti-American ideology. It’s revenge, pure and simple.

How Will Research Cuts Impact Higher Education?

What happens if Trump successfully guts the research from the university system?

It’s long irked me that universities have prioritized research over the education of undergraduates. They give six-figure salaries and tenure to faculty who teach two classes per year, and then put temporary professors who earn McDonald’s salaries in front of the lecture halls for freshmen.

At my son’s flagship college, his professors for his first two years were temporary, contingent faculty, known as adjuncts. One professor was fired in the middle of the semester. Others frequently vented to students during class about their low salaries. Those faculty members only stayed at his university for a semester or two, so he developed no relationships with them. He can never ask them for a recommendation for work or graduate school, because he has no idea where they are teaching now.

Colleges should prioritize education. Maybe if research is located outside the university at think tanks or foundations, colleges would do what they are supposed to do. Also, we should be honest — not all university research is ground-breaking work that benefits humanity and builds knowledge.

The biggest downside of removing research from the university happens at the upper level. Graduate students in microbiology need to be in labs working on projects with mentors and then collaborating on research papers. Those research projects provide hands-on education for scientists, economists, and policy analysts; those experiences can’t be replicated in a classroom.

Theoretically, universities have fewer competing interests and more transparent systems than outside entities and can conduct research without outside interference. Research should be about truth, not profit or ideology. What happens when research dollars are shifted to the Heritage Foundation?

The American university system is entering a new era of uncertainty and upheaval. Although parents haven’t figured it out yet, these changes are coming quickly. As someone who has been in the university system or studying it for decades, I have no idea what’s on the horizon. My advice to other parents is to simply be cautious right now and to make strategic decisions.