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In this episode, Phil Hill discusses the evolving landscape of education policy under the Trump administration, focusing on the what to expect next based on negotiating tactics. The conversation delves into the emotional responses to these policies, the importance of transparency and accountability, and the need for a sector-neutral approach to education outcomes. Key themes include the political influences shaping education policy and the future directions that may emerge as a result of current trends.
Takeaways
- The Trump administration's education policies are complex and multifaceted.
- Emotional responses to education policy can cloud rational analysis.
- Transparency and accountability are crucial in education reform.
- Sector-neutral outcomes are a key focus for future education policies.
- The political landscape heavily influences education policy decisions.
- Higher education institutions must adapt to changing regulations and expectations.
- There is a need for critical thinking in response to education policy changes.
- The role of various stakeholders, including activists, is significant in shaping policy.
- Future education policies will likely focus on workforce alignment and outcomes.
Recommended
Transcript
Understanding Trump Administration Policies
00:00:10
Speaker
Hello and welcome back to Online Education Across the Atlantic. And we have a special episode for you guys. It's going to be slightly different format. So for all of our free podcast viewers and listeners, you're going to get your money's worth today.
00:00:24
Speaker
um And well the idea came up during the last podcast that we were talking about conferences. And I had mentioned that I had done a talk that seemed to go over pretty well about trying to understand what's happening with the Trump administration and is a way of interpreting what might happen next.
00:00:42
Speaker
So that's what we're going to try to cover today, but it's different.
Conference Experiences and Cancellations
00:00:46
Speaker
It's much more policy-based. It's not going to be directly tied to ed tech, per se, and it's going to be a little bit more of an informal presentation of ah what was shared ah um at a conference and is planned to be shared potentially at ASU GSB. We'll see how that goes.
00:01:04
Speaker
um But so we're we're going to have a different format for our listeners. But speaking of conferences, and I just saw this this morning, did you guys, and well, none of us have gone to South by Southwest for a while. Did you see they're canceling the music four-day session for South by Southwest?
00:01:22
Speaker
No. Yeah. What reason did they give? Well, you wouldn't you wouldn't visit them and go backstage. Yeah. No, true. They didn't really say. So keep in mind the way South by Southwest started was really a music festival. And then it grew into this big event. And then they separated out. And I think they had a four-day music thing.
00:01:45
Speaker
And the number of musical acts had gone from, first of all, 2,000 down to 1,000. So they still have a lot of people, but they're actually, 2026, they're not going to have the music portion. So conferences are changing. I'm not fully sure why it is. i just thought about that, Neil, when you were saying that you don't like going to events if you're not invited and have a backstage pass
Trump vs. Arnold Ventures: Policy Implications
00:02:07
Speaker
for it.
00:02:07
Speaker
Yeah, I'm very bougie like that. I just, you know, unless I can, you know, get in ahead of the queue, then, you know, I'm unlikely to invest. but I must say that one of the best conference experiences I've ever had ah came. i was at a Sakai conference a few years ago, like some years ago when I was still at California, and I was going to stay the weekend in in Austin,
00:02:33
Speaker
afterwards and as the supply people left they were replaced by all these musicians and it turned out that the the north american folk music festival was going to happen in the hotel which i stayed for and participated in and it was awesome but i just thought about that and uh because neil and i were talking online about the london ed tech week which he has not attended yet but um that they are on notice to invite you for next year you know Yeah, yeah.
00:03:02
Speaker
Hopefully that Access All Areas passes in the post. right, so um let's actually jump into it since we're we'll see how this conversation goes um and ah and with a different format. so And so I'll describe, ah essentially run through what I've presented, but things change so quickly. I've already been changing up for my next presentation, which is Wednesday, by the way. This is becoming my shtick, Morgan.
00:03:30
Speaker
um and I'd love to just get a discussion. It'll actually help me improve ah improve sort of the message and answer questions. So I appreciate the time to do this.
00:03:43
Speaker
i guess... Everything, if you're talking, particularly Trump administration in education in particular, i mean, that's a dangerous topic. That's where I was joking at the conference that ah when I agreed to do that, it was back on December 5th and it was not since the inauguration. So I didn't know just how dangerous that talk would be.
00:04:03
Speaker
But I think the right way to set the stage and sort of the underlying assumption or thesis behind what I'm presenting so that people can understand is to make a comparison to what we've been covering the past two to three years.
00:04:18
Speaker
So if you look at the Arnold Ventures Funded Coalition, we, Morgan and I, have covered that pretty extensively. um We wrote about how there's, it's a different set of behaviors. um These groups are highly coordinated. They seem to be driving policy. And so much of it was directed initially towards the OPM market. But then, and I keep calling out Morgan Seminole Post because it really was that online was the target.
00:04:46
Speaker
And so we
Impact of Policies on Online Education
00:04:47
Speaker
wrote about that a lot. One thing that was interesting is quite often i would have people privately talk to me saying, Phil, follow the money. See see how they're funding. Essentially, even suggesting that Arnold Ventures might be shorting 2U stock, that there was a financial incentive for them to be driving the policy that they were driving. And I had that in a number of ways. I'm not sure if you ever heard that line of argument, Morgan.
00:05:17
Speaker
and No, no, I never read that one. Yeah, well, i I heard it numerous times. And I get it. um I did some looking. It was nothing obvious, but I didn't pursue it too far.
00:05:32
Speaker
And part of the reason was, and by the way, I have to say, if it comes out that there was some hidden financial interest, that'll be a major story. I would have missed it and we'd write about it.
00:05:43
Speaker
But at the time, i couldn't find anything and I felt that it was a harmful way to look at the Arnold Ventures Coalition and the Department of Education. They were tightly together. Thought a better approach was to give them some credit and understand their motivations.
00:05:59
Speaker
So essentially, a lot of the way I portrayed it in the end this that this was a group that really had seen some real harm through online education, particularly in the early 2010s, particularly
Framework for Analyzing Policies
00:06:13
Speaker
with very large for-profit chains, the ITTs, the EDMCs.
00:06:18
Speaker
lot of students got left in the lurch when those shut down. So there were some real abuses and some real issues they saw. And they viewed online education, in my mind, as almost a metastasizing cancer.
00:06:33
Speaker
Essentially, this is the way that for-profit education that harms students metastasizes and harms the whole body of higher education. And so they viewed online that way.
00:06:46
Speaker
And so what we, Morgan and I, tended to do, although I don't want to put words in your mouth, is we sort of started with, that we think they do care about student debt and harm. However, when we saw their policies that were harmful, we directly looked at the policies, what they wrote, and what it meant, and analyzed that, as opposed to saying, they hate everybody. You know, we tried to take that stance. And there were times where we said, well, we actually think that's a good policy.
00:07:15
Speaker
that they're doing so ah So essentially, I'm applying that same type of framework towards the Trump administration with the same set of assumptions. But I, of course, need
Critiquing the Policy-Making Process
00:07:26
Speaker
to hear, Morgan, do you agree with that characterization of Arnold Ventures and the Biden administration's?
00:07:33
Speaker
Yeah, and then we approached it I think so. Sort of. Yeah. Yeah. I think it was an approach that they had forged in the early 2010s and they approached it. But ultimately, we boiled down to trying to say, OK, what is this policy? What are the implications of that?
00:07:49
Speaker
Yeah. So. And even and as I said, even giving them the benefit of the doubt sometimes, which might not have even been appropriate, but then saying they're bad assumptions they're using like they're we kept using the phrase unintended consequences because quite often, hey, this is going to cause harm, but it's not necessarily what they want.
00:08:09
Speaker
And so I'm stating up front that that's sort of my approach with the Trump administration as well. If you're a higher education leader and you want to understand what might happen in the next few years, what's going to happen next?
00:08:22
Speaker
It's far better to take this type of approach. Um, not do the hair on fire reaction that the vast majority of higher education is doing right now, but at least try to do some critical thinking and try to figure out what's happening next.
00:08:39
Speaker
Now, maybe your advocacy is going to be different. But if you want to know what's happening next, you have to... What I would say, you know you're not even playing chess. Could you at least play checkers and take two moves instead of one move?
00:08:53
Speaker
What I've been working on is I've been doing some of this research just by typical stuff we do, reading, going through the stuff, reading the source documents. But also I've been going to conferences and meeting with key players. So I've heard firsthand from the chair of the House committee,
00:09:10
Speaker
I've heard from the key education advisor to the Trump administration. I've heard the two key House congressional staff working on education issues.
00:09:22
Speaker
Bobby Scott, who's the leading Democrat on the House Education Committee, although he didn't really say much, unfortunately. But so I've been trying to hear from these people ah directly, directly.
Challenges in Higher Education Policy Interpretation
00:09:35
Speaker
I have not met with Secretary McMahon. um It might be my wrestling video I put in one of the blog posts where she got ah got dropped. I get where you're coming from and you're kind of, um correct me if I'm wrong, but it feels like you this is a ah a slightly more dispassionate analysis of what the different parties are doing. You mentioned Arnaventures and you kind of nodded to the fact that Arnaventures' motives are, you know, that you kind of evaluated some of their motives um as being kind of positive and stuff, but and i And I get that. I always think of education um as is a fundamentally contested space. And therefore, for me, whether it's the different agencies involved, government, or even just the news reporting websites or whatever, for me, identifying kind of what their agenda is in broad brush terms feels important as well in terms of evaluating what's happening. Now, I guess...
00:10:34
Speaker
By the way, that is part of what I'm going to be talking about. Okay, that's plus fine. I just wondered whether that that presented a particular issue in this case because it's a bit more, i don't know, emotive or a bit more extreme or...
00:10:50
Speaker
No, you want to know what it's tougher in this case is I think that vast the vast majority of people hearing me don't believe it, um even though it's in writing. It was easier with the Biden administration and Arnold Ventures to be able to say, you know, they do care about student debt and they aren't trying to kill online education. A lot of times they just don't know what they're doing.
00:11:14
Speaker
It was easier to say that than what I'm saying right now, not because... ah you can't pull out the themes.
Motives and Institutional Responses
00:11:22
Speaker
It's because ah people are so emotional right now and don't accept it or are having trouble accepting it.
00:11:29
Speaker
Okay. Yeah, that makes sense. That makes sense. And I guess, well, let's go to your question, first of all. One of the things that I find is that they are remarkably ah transparent, not just transparent,
00:11:44
Speaker
If you talk to the ah administration, the Department of Ed, congressional leaders on the Republican side, there's a remarkable consistency about things and what they want to get done.
00:11:56
Speaker
Like this team has been working together behind the scenes. It's completely different than 2017.
00:12:04
Speaker
But beyond a few non-negotiables and in those DEI, anti-Semitism, fraud, waste, and abuse, beyond a few non-negotiables, there's actually a lot of unknowns, but in a good way, as in we want to hear from schools to figure out how to implement this right way.
00:12:26
Speaker
So you're starting to get this yin and yang, like very organized and consistent, but a lot of things haven't been figured out. But you also have this yin and yang where you have, and I'm trying to figure out how to show it in one slide, you have the chaos coming from President Trump and Elon Musk, and everybody's reacting to that.
00:12:47
Speaker
But you had this other side that's more on the legislative and Department of Ed, although some of that's changed in the past week, that's much more calm and figuring out how how to get, you know, what should we do next, and we're not pretending we have the answers.
00:13:04
Speaker
And they're united, but people don't see that. They only tend to see the chaos. And here's another pop culture reference. I'm trying to look at, like, on one side, you have the ah the Tasmanian devil from the Bugs Bunny cartoon. On the other hand, you have Bugs Bunny, who's more calculating and...
00:13:22
Speaker
holding things back, but they're working together and everybody's focusing on the chaos, but missing the holistic picture. There's another thing, I guess, let me get this out here. And it's so key and it's, I'll be honest, I'm surprised that this isn't being taken into account.
00:13:39
Speaker
President Trump, he's written the art of the deal. He's all about negotiating. He's all about himself. He's about power politics. And he's written extensively about how he works.
00:13:51
Speaker
I have this quote from the art of the deal. My style of deal making is quite simple and straightforward. I aim very high. And then I just keep pushing and pushing and pushing to get what I'm after. Sometimes I settle for less than I sought.
00:14:04
Speaker
And then in most cases, I still end up with what I want. But he's got this thing of you negotiate by, you go too far, get everybody to react to that. And quite often, then you come in with a resolution And he said, if I had just gone for that in-state from the beginning, everybody would have complained about that. So there's an obvious two- or three-step negotiation that he always talks about.
00:14:29
Speaker
But he also doesn't care about details. Elon Musk is an engineer, and he does care about details, so they're an interesting team. But if you look, he's in the Walter Isaacson biography. They talked a lot about how he's got this algorithm he uses for organizations and how to simplify them, make them more efficient.
00:14:50
Speaker
Step number two, remove any unnecessary steps. Delete parts of the process that aren't necessary. Then he said, you may have to add back parts or processes later. In fact, if you do not ending If you do not end up adding back at least 10% of them, then you didn't delete enough.
00:15:11
Speaker
So the point is they very deliberately create a lot of noise, do things here, and then there's always a step two. You know, you accused me of being dispassionate. I'll be honest. I get really frustrated how much of higher education can at least focus on what step two.
00:15:31
Speaker
For this to be a healthy conversation, there should be a negotiation. Looks like second steps. I'm just interested on the last point that you made about the frustrations that you face with higher ed. And and but correct me if i'm interpreting this wrong, but their ability to kind of step back and not react, but actually think.
00:15:51
Speaker
But it feels like that's slightly at odds with the strategy that he's employing or that you suggested that he employs from the Art of the Deal, which is to kind of create that ferrari.
00:16:03
Speaker
So I feel like there a there's just an interesting tension there, isn't there, between you know that is the response that he's probably looking for and therefore...
00:16:15
Speaker
Whilst i and this I completely concur with your point and all of the stuff that i observe over over here in terms of just general commentary on what's happening politically in the US, it often says, you know, look look at what's happening, not what's said, essentially. It's the kind of yeah the mantra over here.
00:16:32
Speaker
But I've got a degree of sympathy with those people because that is an element of the strategy, isn't it? And it's what makes it so confusing that we people are you know perennially having this debate over here around you know the psychology and what's really going on. and And that seems an element of the strategy and therefore um you know some people might be forgiven for...
00:16:53
Speaker
for for going down that route but yeah i i i i am of your am of your mind on this but then i'm that's more my inclination anyway I wonder, though, whether you're underestimating the extent to which institutions are trying to play to step two.
Strategizing and Lobbying in Higher Education
00:17:09
Speaker
you know I know you said that you'd heard that they weren't doing a lot of lobbying and they should be doing lobbying, but um speaking to institutions, a lot of them are sitting down, trying to see the broader strategy, trying to see the opportunities, really working the refs.
00:17:25
Speaker
and and doing that kind of thing. So I think there's probably more of that step two kind of solution thing going on than maybe you give them credit for.
00:17:37
Speaker
ah Just to point out the the lobbying, that part I should share with listeners, the trend towards account of institutional accountability, which follows along the lines of a gainful employment type of rule.
00:17:52
Speaker
What you heard, if you had read the campaign rhetoric ahead of time, you would think that would already be rescinded once they came out. But really, it's both Republicans and Democrats that are both pushing for institutional accountability. What is the return on investment? Can students pay their debt off, et cetera?
00:18:11
Speaker
And what I've heard is since they're trying to figure out what is the next step of accountability, it was from regulators saying, we can't believe we're not hearing from schools.
00:18:25
Speaker
That's where some of that comes from. But I think you're entirely right. There could be a lot more step two positioning by schools. Working the refs, I like the way you describe that. There might be a lot more of it than I'm giving them credit for.
00:18:38
Speaker
the other The other sort of thing I i think um you need to think about is like there aren't just two parties here or or three parties. It's not just Trump and Musk and then um Congress and then the institutions. There's also a whole collection of activists as well.
00:18:57
Speaker
you know So Chris Ruffo and all those folks, the anti-DEI go, and they're they're they're playing a role in there. So you've actually got a four-way kind of interaction. you know A lot of like, um ah you know this today in the press, there was some articles about the PhD project, which is a very small nonprofit working with some business schools to get more students of color to take business degrees. And the that came to the attention of Chris Rufo, who lobbied the government to threaten to cut off all federal funds to 60 institutions because they participated in this.
00:19:33
Speaker
you know in some small way. And and so you've got and another project going on there. The other sort of thing that I keep thinking about, and it's of like a psychological thing. So if you read,
00:19:46
Speaker
counts of people experiencing poverty or really um financial hardship. Your decision-making capability goes down because you're so busy trying to keep the lights on and get keep your kids fed and stuff like that. So you don't make good decisions.
00:20:02
Speaker
you know You sign up for the so the payday loan or or something like that just because your decision-making capabilities are burdened by just and And I sort of see some of that in higher education, which contradicts what I just said. But I i think both things can be true. you know i think they're so busy trying to deal with the grant stuff and you know often they're dealing with the state as well. So now we have five actors as well. you know So the states are state governments are also an actor in this, even though largely allied with one side or the other.
00:20:36
Speaker
But you know I think it's just a lot to deal with, and and um especially for institutions that maybe aren't as nimble as we would like them to be. It's it's tough. On that point Morgan, you're also seeing, or has anything come to the surface in terms of um universities' bandwidth being taken up by just the general concerns of their staff and students that are kind of you know coming to the surface a lot more because the kind of maelstrom
Resource Management Amid Policy Changes
00:21:05
Speaker
that's happening? Presumably that's part of what you're describing as well.
00:21:09
Speaker
Yeah, no, absolutely, because of the threat of layoffs and and and and that sort of thing. So, you know, ah ah right now i'm i'm I'm doing a project which involves trying to talk to a bunch of universities and and stuff like that. And it's just like even people far removed from the decision makers, you know, relatively are just like,
00:21:31
Speaker
I'm stuck. I've got people worrying about their jobs. I've got to deal with a potentially 50% budget cut on top of the 10% budget cut that the state just put down. And you know it's a lot.
00:21:46
Speaker
Well, I'm trying to figure out how to boil all this stuff down so it's actually usable. And here you guys are, although this is part of our writing you know adding in multiple factors that we need to take into account.
00:21:57
Speaker
So you're not making this easy. But I agree with you on both those cases. But there's also an element of, okay, I sympathize, I empathize. But this is higher education. i've I mean, Morgan, you've worked here longer than me, but I've been working here almost 25 years.
00:22:13
Speaker
And there's sort of but damn it, if you're going to come through these changes, you need to do better. So yeah, maybe you're under the gun, but come on, do something that's reasonable. So I have a built-in frustration, even though I admit, obviously, higher ed institutions are slow to change, but we've got to do better than what's happening now to make it a productive conversation. And one other point.
00:22:39
Speaker
Keep in mind that turbulence diagram I've done, the airplane with everything going on. This is all happening and it regulations are not the only issue You're dealing with the beginning of the enrollment hill.
00:22:51
Speaker
You're dealing with fle questioning the value. Yeah, yeah, you're yeah, exactly. You're dealing with all these other issues anyway. So it's even tougher, but that requires some checkers at the very least, some chess, being aware of the different actions um that's
Reaction to Anti-DEI Policies
00:23:10
Speaker
there.
00:23:10
Speaker
One quick comment. I had a ah a really fascinating conversation with a friend on Friday about our frustrations um ah looking actually across the Atlantic at ah at at universities dealing with crisis. And you know there's there's sort of this one approach that let's cut everything.
00:23:26
Speaker
There's another approach that um let's ignore it all. and And actually, I read a great quote over the weekend, and I want to perhaps write about in my Saturday post about you know you you need to actually do both.
00:23:39
Speaker
You know, you need to invest and cut. And it's hard for higher ed sometimes to do that. They tend to be very black and white. And sometimes sometimes they're thinking that it's like we either need to cut or we need to invest. And they can't marry those two things together. It's like there's no Goldilocks option.
00:23:55
Speaker
Yeah, no, that is a good point. Neil, you had a point? Then I did want to describe the themes I'm hearing. Yeah, I mean, I was just reflecting a little bit on the context over here and some of my frustrations is that I think because higher education institutions are sort they are intertwined with government, but yet they are they do have a certain degree of autonomy. I think often my frustration is that they...
00:24:15
Speaker
They don't act enough on that autonomy um and they look to government too much. um And i ah it seems like you're saying similar things in relation to what's happening over there.
00:24:27
Speaker
yeah So there's an article that sort of captured some of my feelings. It was called The Deadline That Wasn't. It was an inside higher ed March fourth And it was a president of a college. I'd never heard of this guy before, but he the subtitle is Higher Ed Botched Its Response to the Anti-DEI Dear Colleague Letter.
00:24:48
Speaker
And I think this sort of points out some of what I'm trying to say.
Rational Analysis Over Emotional Reactions
00:24:52
Speaker
And so there're Valentine's Day, February 14th, there was a deal dear colleague letter that essentially was the one that was poorly written, didn't define EI, but essentially said, well, one of the key quotes, the department attends intends to take appropriate measures to assess compliance with the applicable statutes and regulations, but and going through this whole dear colleague letter.
00:25:14
Speaker
Everybody was up in our arms saying, well, there's a problem with it. You're just trying to kill anything with the word diversity and et cetera. And that everybody interpreted it as a deadline day.
00:25:25
Speaker
Like you had 14 days to change everything in your operations or the department of ed was going to do something. Well, then they came out with a frequently asked questions, 14 days later, that actually went through and described in fairly good detail what the department means by it and had things such as,
00:25:46
Speaker
question eight, are DEI programs unlawful? and And then they answered, well, you can't discriminate based on race, color, national, or origin. And it even goes on to say, whether it violates the code does not depend on specific terminology.
00:26:04
Speaker
and then it described, here's how we're going to interpret whether or not something is in violation. So it really clarified it. And it tied it back to case, whether you agree with it or not, it tied it back to case law.
00:26:18
Speaker
And his argument where he said higher ed botched it is he said, when they said there was 14 days to take measures, this is what they were talking about. They were saying the Department of Ed needed to clarify how they're going to treat this, and that will be a step towards doing things. But everybody treated it as some sort of, you have 14 days to pull all your DEI programs. And his argument going, putting words in his mouth, but he was saying,
00:26:45
Speaker
Now we have clarity that you can actually go through and look at all of your programs and you can defend saying, here's why we're compliant with what you're saying or here's why we disagree with the what you're saying.
00:26:57
Speaker
but he's arguing for this rationalist approach and that if you overreact, you're missing the game.
Five Themes in Education Policy
00:27:04
Speaker
So I think that type of view sort of captures a lot of what I'm seeing, or at least what i you know what I'm calling out, if you will, is let's actually think this through a little bit stronger.
00:27:17
Speaker
So with that in mind, let me now call out what I've heard of the five key themes. And like I said, I find these remarkably consistent. Everybody's singing off the same hymn book.
00:27:29
Speaker
It's basically anti-woke. remote remove DEI, diversity, equity, inclusion. By the way, I should have asked, is that terminology used in the UK when we say DEI?
00:27:41
Speaker
um It's usually EDI in the UK, but is it translates fine, yeah. And you don't put a U in there just to spell it differently? No, we don't. Not this time. All right.
00:27:53
Speaker
by So remove DEI, there's um anti-Semitism, um directly going after that very strongly, gender ideology, two genders, and cut the waste. Now, I realize cut the waste is not quite anti-woke, but these are sort of the non-negotiable We're going to do this no matter what, that you're hearing from every key player that I've talked to or heard from.
00:28:19
Speaker
Second thing is the go local. This gets to the department ah dismantle the Department of Education, push decisions back to the states, et cetera, et cetera. A third one is transparency.
00:28:31
Speaker
Students should know the costs and outcomes of their academic programs. This gets to that whole accountability and the whatever replaces gainful employment, assuming something does. and having that very transparent.
00:28:45
Speaker
Fourth is sector-neutral outcomes. It's not get rid of regulations. It is make the regulations apply to everybody equally. For-profits are not treated differently than the non-profits. And there's a lot of emotion when you hear people talk about this behind this one.
00:29:04
Speaker
So no more targeting, but but actually have a stronger focus on outcomes um and focus on the bait basics, if you will.
Sector-neutral Policy Impacts
00:29:15
Speaker
And then the fifth one is a workforce. They don't see education and the workforce separately.
00:29:21
Speaker
And it's not like you have vocational programs into workforce and then general education. So there's going to be a much stronger tie towards workforce outcomes. Post-secondary education should give you multiple paths, not just bachelor degree, but to well-paying career aligned with workforce needs.
00:29:39
Speaker
Those are the five key things that you hear from everybody. I don't know how many meetings they have or if they have talking points, but it's just remarkable how consistent they are on what they want to do at that level of abstraction.
00:29:54
Speaker
Now, I'll tell you where most people disagree with me or disagreed with me at the conference, and ah this really pulling our podcast into different territory, it's anti-Semitism.
00:30:07
Speaker
It's remarkable how many people come with the attitude that are basically saying, no, they don't mean that at all. It doesn't matter what they say and the dear colleague letter, frequently asked questions. It doesn't matter the actions they take.
00:30:21
Speaker
We know they 100% don't care about anti-Semitism. That one seems to be the touchpoint on the the anti-Trump coalition, if you will.
00:30:32
Speaker
On the Trump side, the one that I hear the most emotion about besides the DEI and stuff like that, they're just doing it. But the emotion is in the sector-neutral outcomes.
00:30:44
Speaker
That's where I hear people just get... So like there's a of weight coming off their shoulders that they've been feeling this way for 10 or 20 years. And there's sort of a fine way we're going to treat all schools the same.
00:30:58
Speaker
So it's interesting you have that emotion on different parts within there. But those are the five key themes that I've heard very consistently. It's just helped me outfill with the kind of sector to neutral outcomes. well What are the main things that they're kind of eyeing out? You mentioned the difference between kind private and public.
00:31:17
Speaker
providers, but are there some headline things that they're looking to kind of equalize there? Well, gainful employment is it was originally written in the first two or three versions, only applied to for-profit schools and a little bit to non-profit schools for certificate programs, but it was written to rein in for-profits.
00:31:36
Speaker
It didn't apply to state university and a bachelor. They're just completely exempt from it. The most recent version of the rules came out in 2023 had two parts, financial value transparency, and that's essentially where everybody's going to see your debt-to-earnings ratio, whether students ah supposedly get an earnings boost from a program. And that applies to everybody except for undergraduate bachelor's programs in terms of, like, if you have a failing program, a student will have to sign a waiver saying, I know I'm signing up for a failing program in order for that student to get financial aid.
00:32:18
Speaker
Gainful employment is different, and that's primarily the for-profits. That's saying, you, the school, you will lose your ability to accept financial aid. So it's a vic sign a waiver and have a disclosure versus you lose all financial aid and we're going to shut your program down.
00:32:35
Speaker
That's an example of targeting. There are other things like the 90-10 rule, um which is for-profit schools have to have less than 90% of their funding coming from federal sources.
00:32:49
Speaker
That doesn't apply to non-profit schools. um And noticeably, the rules actually exclude distance education tuition from students.
Confusion and Clarification in Policy Implementation
00:32:59
Speaker
So it's almost rigging the game to try to tried to catch them in a 90-10 rule that only applies. So we have a set of rules that are just for for-profits.
00:33:10
Speaker
And the underlying theme of everybody is to level that playing field now. if that answers the question. Yeah, it does. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's interesting to to have these themes laid out because I think the woke thing is is really interesting because I think it could just mean so many different things. I think, i think you know, I'm always interested in the tension between and and the manifestation of things that might be perceived as woke, like DEI initiatives versus the sense in which universities are kind of the, you know, the the breeding ground of, you
00:33:47
Speaker
of that ideology and therefore what does that mean is this about um the eradication of particular initiatives and policies within institutions or to what extent does that spill over in terms of people involved the things that taught that felt that feels like both in the uk and and where you are like more a bigger debate at a kind of a school level um around that kind of thing. But I'm just interested in, um yeah, that that um that that kind of big big cloud of cut that kind of woke and the kind of... fair Well, there's sort but some of that's intentional, by the way. I mean, the that ah the language that comes out politically and the not the initial measures, the step one, is always vague and unclear exactly what you mean.
00:34:39
Speaker
and it almost invites people to interpret it however they want to interpret it, or which tends to be the worst way possible. But then when you get the actual, not the initial Dear Colleague letter, but the DEI one on the frequently asked questions, once you get there, you actually have pretty specific, well-reasoned arguments. So if you wanted to ask that question, you could read that document, and they're telling you how they're interpreting it.
00:35:05
Speaker
And Now, a lot of that, interestingly, relies on we're going to have to do this on a case-by-case basis, which sort of implies the Department of Ed is going to be there to make that determination.
Budget Reconciliation and Education Policy
00:35:17
Speaker
But there's a different, this gets to that yin and yang. The initial language almost encourages that to be all over the place, but then the actual implementation, which people don't like talking about, is actually a lot more straightforward.
00:35:31
Speaker
So there's a reason it's confusing. um And I'm not saying 100% is because of that vague language, but I think it makes it much worse um as far as what's happening. I'm sort of a rookie commentator from across the pond here in terms of what I'm picking up on. But it feels like, from what I've heard, that the anti-woke stuff, the waste side of things and some other aspects, some of those are landing well more generally. And therefore, um well, i i I'm just picking up kind of maybe what people have said on news outlets that I've kind of listened to. But there's certain things that...
00:36:07
Speaker
There's certain things around the um kind of ideology side of things and the kind of government waste side of things that people are more sympathetic to. um And it's those things that are kind of powerful in terms of if they have a positive effect on how people perceive the institution, it's more the kind of the implementation of those things or what they mean that are kind of.
00:36:27
Speaker
challenging. And so that presumably is part of the strategy that if you kind of elevate the sense that you're against something that people broadly agree with, um without kind of providing the detail, then that's kind of also part the kind of PR ah strategy for the administration as well.
00:36:44
Speaker
Yes, I think a PR strategy, but most likely not from paying PR consultants. This is more gut feel type of PR strategy. I think that definitely is part of it. And I think that a lot of that's worked. I think they've gotten people arguing positions that are very unpopular where there would be a healthier argument in an implementation type of thing. I think that we could have a lot healthier argument.
00:37:13
Speaker
argument. So let me ah let me just add a couple of things, and then we'll do more of a general ah discussion. In the House and Senate, there's a huge issue that um impacts this, how it gets implemented.
00:37:26
Speaker
And in our Congress, we ah we have taken... Have you ever seen the... Did you guys ever see the Schoolhouse Rock over in the UK, those little singing cartoons that explain how the government works?
00:37:38
Speaker
We've got to send some of those to you. But there was one called, I'm just a bill on Capitol Hill, and here's how I become a law. and We took that little cartoon bill, and we murdered him a couple decades ago.
Budget Process Influence on Policy
00:37:50
Speaker
Now, when we pass things, we do legislative tricks. And the biggest one right now is Reconciliation. Reconciliation. is and if you want to get the funding, that if you want to do something, there's a procedural item where if it's considered budget reconciliation, then you don't have to override a Senate veto. So basically that means you can get 50 votes in the Senate and you get it where normally you would have to do 60 votes.
00:38:20
Speaker
Part of the rules of budget reconciliation is you have to set a budget target on what, so it has to be pretending to be all about a budget. So that's where you hear budget resolutions.
00:38:33
Speaker
Our House of Representatives say they have a ah resolution that will save $330 billion just education. billion dollars just an education And that's their budget resolution.
00:38:45
Speaker
The Senate has a version, and they said, you must save at least $1 billion. dollars So you have the House and the Senate, even the Republicans, going from $1 to $330. And so they're widely different.
00:39:00
Speaker
All of the legislative action this spring is about budget reconciliation. And it's about part of the other thing is the resultant bills that you pass have to meet those targets, at least with accounting gimmickry, as I call it.
00:39:17
Speaker
So what this means is that's where you hear very different approaches on, um, the accountability. The House has such an aggressive savings target that they're pushing that the only way to do it is to include um risk sharing.
00:39:34
Speaker
And what that means is schools would pay back a portion of the federal financial aid based on how many students default on their loans, don't meet their loans. There's some formula that's in there.
00:39:47
Speaker
Graduate. yeah don't grant Yeah, don't finish their degree. Exactly. And based on these formulas, they would owe money back to the government. That's part of the savings that helps them even say they can save $330 billion. dollars The Senate is pushing more of a pass-fail. Here's the standard, you pass or you fail.
00:40:09
Speaker
they Because they don't have the huge budget saving target, they're going with a very different approach for accountability. The reason I bring this up, if you want to know what direction that we're going to take accountability for the next pass in the United States, whether it's pass-fail or risk-sharing and schools giving money back to the federal government.
00:40:31
Speaker
So much of it is driven by this whole budget process, budget reconciliation. And best case, this gets signed by Memorial Day. Now, Morgan, this goes back to my point that you're not hearing lobbying from schools right now on this really crucial issue. They should be taking a stand.
00:40:54
Speaker
And I know that ACE, the American Council on Education, which is pretty broad-based, they are more into the risk-sharing approach. The American Association of Community Colleges said they refuse to support anything that has any amount of risk sharing.
00:41:13
Speaker
So the associations are sort of at odds, but what I'm hearing, and maybe this is getting resolved, is there's not a whole lot of lobbying going on around this. So there's a crucial issue right now about the future of education and what accountability means.
00:41:30
Speaker
And at least as of a couple of weeks ago, um It wasn't happening.
Impact of Risk-Sharing Policies
00:41:35
Speaker
It was being driven too much by pure budget issues and not by education outcomes issues.
00:41:43
Speaker
Something interesting for me is if we do land up with risk sharing, it is in effect not sector neutral. The sector that is going to suffer the most is the for-profit sector.
00:41:53
Speaker
Which is interesting, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah. I wonder, I mean, I'm guessing they all know this, but I think that the for-profits understand this, but they're going to be much more willing to shed programs that are problematic, whereas non-profit schools, that's a much bigger issue. And that might be part of the reason you're not hearing this talked about too much. That's speculation.
00:42:18
Speaker
I think this is important for us to us to understand, even though it feels quite different, because I think at one level, a lot of the things that you're talking about and discussing are sort of similar problems here in a way there's still the kind of question over how you manage student finance particularly when you know government budgets are strained and those kinds of things it's useful for ah to us to see because I've already seen aspects of policy have a bit of an influence over here. Our government certainly talks a lot about um a lot more about lack of efficiency in the public sector.
00:42:55
Speaker
um And, you know although it's not quite the same thing, you know, we've had an increase in our defence spending and that's been paid for by a decrease in our overseas aid budget. So, yeah, I think there is a degree of influence that's being that's being exerted probably indirectly and therefore if government's in a tricky place financially and looking at kind of funding around education, then inevitably they'll have a look at what others are doing, particularly if it's different.
00:43:25
Speaker
think that's true. Let me, um so a couple of other things I just want to list what to watch for. Reconciliation um and how that goes, and that's going to determine a lot of accountability movements moving going forward.
00:43:40
Speaker
Obviously, the big one is whether the Department of Education is going to get closed down. All the language is about closing them down. I've been writing, although I'm sticking my neck out, saying and that's not going to happen. And as a matter of fact, I don't think that's really what they're trying to do.
00:43:55
Speaker
I think they know. um They're creating a lot of noise right now. I think they want to drastically downsize the Department of Education, change ah focus it on a few core missions and get rid of a lot of other functions um and to save money.
00:44:12
Speaker
But everybody's talking about, can you dismantle the Department of Education? And then they're asking the question, Can you do it without Congress? My argument is ah much more relevant question isn't can you shut down the Department of Education?
00:44:27
Speaker
It's can you transfer a function from that agency to another one?
Future of the Department of Education
00:44:32
Speaker
That's the relevant question that that people should be focusing on right now. Don't have a simple answer, but i just want to point out that's what to watch.
00:44:41
Speaker
And I will point out this other one, even from a story. When I gave this presentation before, this is before the $400 million dollars withholding of funds to Columbia University happened.
00:44:53
Speaker
I had made the point. I said, listen, what's happening here? i do think the administration truly cares about anti-Semitism. So I'm one of the people saying this isn't fake. They truly believe about it. Whether you disagree with things or not, or their methods, but they care.
00:45:09
Speaker
And I said, what they're doing is they're scaring Columbia and they're doing power negotiations to get Columbia to change its behavior. I got pushback on that that was more along the lines of that written by Kevin Carey, which is, no, they want to destroy Columbia University and set an example.
00:45:30
Speaker
i And my argument is, no, they're trying to get them to change their behavior. And it's a power play. Well, they just came out where Columbia University is mostly yielding to the Trump administration, changing how they're doing policing, their rules, what they enforce, et cetera.
00:45:49
Speaker
Not very popular right now, but it that sort of gets again to why I care about this. If you want to know whether you agree or not what's likely to happen next, then we need to look at some of these broader pictures, and in particular right now, and then and all the chaos.
00:46:07
Speaker
Well, i I was just wondering on the the last point that you're making about Columbia, and I have to confess I don't know loads about the story, but I wonder if it's a symptom of how people have decided to determine Trump's psychology, because some of the things that you hear over here is that, you know, it's a very much a per personal angle, so whether it's commentary on other situations.
00:46:28
Speaker
And if you've determined that that's your understanding of their site ah psychology, and I think And you'll correct me if I'm wrong, but I think some people have pointed to something that happened in the past with him in Columbia. So I don't know the exact details. But I guess if you kind of determine that that's the way that you interpret the psychology of it, then, you know, that, I guess, plays into what you were saying earlier in terms of how you react and how able you are to kind of step away from it and sort of evaluate what's actually happening or not.
00:47:00
Speaker
I wouldn't deny that. I mean, there's I don't think there's any denying that he has a very personal angle on what
Negotiation Strategy with Columbia University
00:47:07
Speaker
he does. ah You know, narcissism is often a better used term in this case. So I don't deny that's true.
00:47:14
Speaker
However, I had the point of view that it was to change behavior. Other people have had the view, no, it's to destroy Columbia. watch what happens right now because columbia is given in if i'm writing in my interpretation that means the funding is going to be added back or at least largely added back because they've got what they wanted f they say nope that's not good enough or we're going to open up a whole new set of stuff to hurt you even further that would be a different story so i'm calling out yes
00:47:46
Speaker
i do think personal psychologys got to be part of it but that's you still have to watch what's actually happening yeah and i guess that's where the difference lies between the way you might react as an individual versus the way you might react as ah as a leader of an institution or ah leader in an institution ultimately yeah yeah and people have different roles i think what happened was ah with new college florida would be an indication that it's it's about changing behavior there's not a
00:48:20
Speaker
ah hatred of education per se it's it's education in a certain manner so the difference there is they took over the board yeah yeah but you know it's still it's still changing things fundamentally but keeping the institution i wonder if that's a you might even interpret that as a desantis versus trump methodology type of argument but you're right it's changing behavior um yeah and but how far what they accept so there's still a lot to watch there but again my main point is let's start at least playing checkers let's recognize how the negotiations are happening they'll give you a much better idea
00:48:57
Speaker
and pay attention to those thingses because i think they're very consistent that'll give a better idea to guess what happens next and what to expect but i definitely grant your i would like to grant your point even more morgan that there's more checkers being played on the institutional side than i give them credit for i'd like to believe that so maybe you should take this out but shouldn't we know whether baron trump applied to colombia and didn't get in and so lo went inwe you instead ah we're keeping that in okay
00:49:28
Speaker
well ah so that's the i appreciate by the way the questions and the discussion that' help me improve i'm presenting a version of this on wednesday and then possibly a version at asu gsv um so will definitely help me out there but ah itll deaf there will be so much news even in the next few weeks but hopefully at least we have more of a framework how to interpret it yeah wait for we we got to definitely end this in this podcasters i keep thinking of other groups that you need to put in your diagram like there's also the faculty who are not working in sync with the administration
00:50:02
Speaker
yeah yeah this will be well you're implying a mad max version of this diagram that we're going to need to get to so we' we'll see how to do it can i just ah finally at the ah in uk parlance you've gone from fillon attack to phil the policy won i don't know how to interpret this let alone what's happening in us iic case what's happened to you phil i don't know i don' trust me this is a internal this is a debate tried to figure this out we'll figure out how far to take it but right now i'm keeping it in podcasts
00:50:35
Speaker
and in conference talks so hey well thanks great seeing you guys and we will talk in a few weeks
00:50:44
Speaker
and a