Articles: Enrollment & Retention

A House bill, the Earnings Contingent Education Loans (ExCEL) Act of 2012, attempts to reduce complexity, improve default rates, and increase the effectiveness of federal student loan subsidies—and would dramatically alter the way federal student loans are paid back. On Dec. 17, Rep. Tom Petri (R-Wis.) introduced the bill, which would provide unsubsidized loans and require income-contingent repayment for all borrowers through a payroll withholdings system.

In President Barack Obama’s 2012 State of the Union address, he made it clear that increasing college graduation rates would be a main priority of his administration. In the months that followed, “MOOC” became the buzzword of the year, bringing online learning to the forefront of the education conversation.

As I noted in my previous column on the digital web in higher ed, digital analytics is bound to play an increasing role this year. Whether they call it big data, business intelligence, or analytics, many decision-makers on campus have been converted to the power of the data-driven approach. Make a difference with web analytics at your institution by taking these three steps.

Despite recent conversations that have been stirring about the value and return on investment of American higher education, there is still a strong public opinion in favor of it, according to a new Gallup/Lumina Foundation poll. The issue, the poll found, lies in how people feel about attainment and the current model of higher ed.

With families’ growing concerns about financing higher education, and the federal government’s increasing involvement in recommending and/or requiring certain communications regarding institutional costs, every institution should be taking a step back to review all of the tools currently being used to present affordability, explain the aid application process, and communicate the awards themselves.

Will residential liberal arts colleges follow the path of the wristwatch? I sure hope so. With all of the talk about MOOCs, online instruction, and game-based learning models, many of us working at residential liberal arts colleges are uncertain about our future. The reports are scaring us into conversations about fundamentally restructuring—perhaps even abandoning what we do and how we do it.