Everyone Is Talking About Higher Education, and I Couldn’t Be More Thrilled

I was at my desk, reviewing the transcript of an interview with Melody Rose, NACD.DC, Ph.D. , Former Chancellor of the Nevada System of Higher Education , when the news was announced — President Biden is cancelling $10,000 in student loan debt for more than 40 million Americans, and making meaningful changes to the way federal student loans are administered and discharged. Here I was, nearly finished with the research for a new book I’m authoring with Joe Sallustio, EdD and Elvin Freytes about the future of higher education, and the future was blowing up my phone and blaring from my television speakers in the next room. For the past several months, my colleagues and I have been working to complete a book that reveals what today’s higher education leaders — more than 100 college and university presidents first interviewed for The EdUp Experience Podcast — are doing to chart a new course for an industry that was founded hundreds of years ago and that serves learners with drastically changing needs.

Suddenly, everyone is talking about higher education, and I couldn’t be more thrilled.

For me personally, the August 24th news is consequential; my husband and I hold a combined total of six college degrees and we each carry some federal student loan debt for two of those academic experiences. The announcement was the equivalent of receiving a check for $20,000 — this is big. Color me happy. And from a wider-angle lens that sees far beyond what’s in it for me, I immediately saw how this long-awaited news is poised to lift more people out of poverty and provide welcome relief to so many. Color millions of us happy. For nearly a third of borrowers, the $10,000 in loan forgiveness will wipe out their educational debt entirely. I took to social media to share my thoughts and to hear what others were saying.

As with any complex sociopolitical, socioeconomic, or sociocultural change, this decision by the Biden administration brought out every possible emotion from Americans. Those of us who are strongly supportive of this move were cheering together. Others were asking questions about what it all means. And yet others were slinging arrows about “but how will the government pay for this?” and displaying some sour grapes via comments like “but I already busted my ass to pay off my loans ... this isn’t fair.” I’ve done my best to answer some of the questions from the vantage point of a higher-education consultant and passionate supporter of the industry, and to offer a different perspective to those who are disappointed that the financial relief didn’t come in time to help them when they needed it most. All the emotions are valid. Some of the harsh words, not so much.

Our book — Commencement: The Beginning of a New Era in Higher Education — offers candid conversations with more than 100 of the nation’s brightest and most influential minds in post-secondary education about precisely the issues that are giving Twitter’s server farms a run for their money today: affordability, access, equity, career outcomes. The citizenry wants colleges and universities to offer programs that deliver practical workforce skills and competencies, instead of just prestige. We want trustworthy, approachable higher-education leaders. We want education delivered in flexible formats that fit our lives. We want student services (and alumni services too!) that provide the kind of customer service excellence that we’ve come to expect from all institutions. We want to get in, get out, and get on with our lives (and careers) and we want colleges and universities to provide frictionless pathways to the goals we’ve set for ourselves. We’d also like to be able to afford it. Joe, Elvin, and I could not be more thrilled to be introducing our future book readers to dozens of college and university presidents, chancellors, and other leaders who are working on these very issues and making breakthroughs that are already revolutionizing higher education as we know it.

Dr. Scott Pulsipher , President of Western Governors University , told us candidly: “The reality is that we fundamentally need to reinvigorate the promise of education. How do we provide great post-secondary pathways that create ample opportunity for all of us in the U.S., especially for those who’ve been disadvantaged or disenfranchised? If we want individuals to have progress, we need to make education — and all of its pathways — work for so many more than those for whom it’s currently working.” He’s absolutely right. And on the issue of cost, he’s turning heads with his refreshing take: “We have tackled the affordability issue, not by making more financing and funding available for an ever-increasing cost. We just fundamentally believe that you could lower the cost.”

Dr. Rich Schneider , President Emeritus of Norwich University , told us: “Going forward in the future, higher education institutions have to be affordable, flexible, and relevant. If you can't offer those three things — affordability, flexibility, and relevance — you will be out of business. You might have the greatest campus and the greatest idyllic faculty members and Ivy-covered everything. And in this beautiful rural domain, and you’ll be out of business.”

These types of themes came up in every single interview, with presidents offering refreshingly honest assessments of where the higher-education industry stands and where it needs to go.

Indeed, higher education is a time-honored tradition .... but traditions change.

It’s no longer enough for colleges and universities — or other institutions that offer meaningful learning beyond high school — to only be available if you fit a certain demographic or have a lot of money in the bank. And it’s no longer viable for institutions of higher learning to count on their students to foot the entire bill. Dr. Melik Peter Khoury , President of Unity Environmental University , when asked about his predictions for the future of higher education, told us: “The future of higher education is right now uncertain. I think many institutions are clinging to an outdated model that is not being funded appropriately, hoping to find that major donor who is going to keep them afloat for a few more years. I think if we are serious about education and higher education, we need to put the students in the first position in every sense of the word. And I don't mean we do that by diminishing our rigor, but by really looking at how students want to learn, where students want to learn, looking at what it is to be an educated society, and rethinking how we deliver this. And we must really think about accessibility, affordability, and flexibility, because I think the world has changed.”

As for Dr. Melody Rose, whose voice I was listening to when I received the first text about the breaking news on student-loan forgiveness, she has a lot to say about what matters at today’s colleges and universities, suggesting that the values that will drive innovation and opportunity are transparency, trust, and inclusion — that without that foundation, higher education finds itself stuck on an outdated model. “My vision for higher education,” she explained, “is that the folks who come to learn with us don’t just come and learn with us once. We have historically had this kind of quirky thinking in higher education that our customers are only customers once — they come, they get their degree, they leave, they never come back. I think the future of work is going to demand something different from that. I think you're going to see continuous learning ... upskilling, reskilling, and a kind of dipping in and back out of higher education multiple times across the span of your life. We want to be prepared for that and we want to serve that population.”

Yesterday, the vast majority of my friends and family — who do not work in or around higher education — had only the vaguest idea of what my new book is about, who it’s for, and why it’s important. But today, at the height of the manuscript development and just two months from the book’s release, suddenly everyone is talking about the industry that Joe, Elvin, and I love so very much.

Today, the relevance, affordability, and value of higher education became national and global news with the announcement of broad-based federal student loan forgiveness measures in the US, reminding us once again that the stories told by the presidents in our book contribute to a passionate, ongoing national and international conversation that includes stakeholders of all kinds — prospective students, former students, parents, higher education employees, higher education consultants, educational technology innovators, industry experts and workforce developers, economists and financial professionals, and Facebook-posting armchair economists too.

Our book is, we believe, important and timely because, in new ways and old, the higher education industry is important and going through evolutions and revolutions whose time has finally come.

This is a moment like no other in higher education, and we’re honored to bring new insights, perspectives, and data to bear on a conversation that’s infinitely consequential. We look forward to hearing your thoughts on all of it. And we can’t wait to put a book in your hands later this fall.

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To learn more about Commencement: The Beginning of a New Era in Higher Education by Kate Colbert and Dr. Joe Sallustio, and with contributions by Elvin Freytes and a foreword by Francisco Marmolejo , visit www.CommencementTheBook.com . It’s not too late to participate in the survey research and the time is now to pre-order your book on Amazon.