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Colleges close and consolidate — 15 campuses shutter, 12 mergers reported in 2025
University Business catalogued at least 15 campus closures and 12 mergers or acquisitions in 2025 as small private regional colleges and financially strained public campuses reorganized. Leaders...
Student aid overhaul: loans, repayment and grants reshaped for 2026
Federal financial aid rules are due to change in July 2026 after Congress’s recent legislation and Education Department rulemaking: access to some student loans will be narrowed, repayment terms...
UVA names interim Darden dean — Lenox declines permanent search
The University of Virginia named longtime Darden strategy professor Michael Lenox as interim dean after Scott Beardsley became UVA president on Jan. 1. Provost Brie Gertler announced the...
Career prep goes central — colleges push co‑ops and employer ties to boost placement
Top institutions are reconfiguring curricula and services to accelerate graduate employment: co‑ops, mandatory internships, employer partnerships and embedded career coaching are becoming core...
Food insecurity surges on campus — two in five students report basic needs strain
Campus food pantries and basic‑needs programs are seeing sharp increases as surveys show roughly 40% of college students face food insecurity. Penn State Harrisburg reported a jump from...
Retracted glyphosate study renews calls for EPA review — research integrity under scrutiny
A landmark 25‑year paper on glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, has been retracted, prompting scientists and public‑health advocates to urge the EPA to reassess the herbicide’s safety...
Five bets for 2026 — short‑term credentials, state funding and credential quality in focus
Higher‑education leaders and policy groups outlined five key predictions for 2026: deeper investment in short‑term workforce credentials, stronger state and federal coordination on quality...
Tech giants push AI into classrooms... governments and schools race to deploy chatbots
Major technology firms and national governments are accelerating rollouts of AI chatbots and tutoring tools in classrooms worldwide, embedding automated instruction and conversational agents into...
Student aid reboot — loan access curbed, repayment rules rewritten
The federal financial aid system is being overhauled with rules set to take effect in July 2026 that will limit access to certain student loans and reshape repayment options. The Department of...
Career pipelines sharpen — co-ops, microcredentials and employer ties
Colleges are intensifying efforts to translate degrees into jobs by embedding co-ops, internships and employer partnerships into curricula while states and institutions pour money into short-term...
Campus hunger crisis: 2 in 5 students face food insecurity
Colleges report a sharp rise in student demand for basic needs supports: an NPR-backed survey and campus case studies show roughly 40% of students face food insecurity. Campus food pantries and...
Glyphosate paper retracted: Calls grow for EPA review
A landmark 25-year-old study on glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup, has been retracted, prompting scientists, regulators and public-interest groups to call for the Environmental...
Schmidt stakes West Texas: Data centers meet energy plans
Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt launched Bolt Data & Energy and has aligned with Texas Pacific Land to assemble land, power and water resources for AI-scale data center campuses in West Texas....
AI in classrooms... Tech firms push chatbots into schools
Major technology companies are rolling out AI chatbots and automated tutors in K–12 classrooms and district pilots, scaling tools that promise personalized help but draw warnings about erosion of...
Public domain expands: Classic cartoons enter free-use pool
A new tranche of 95-year-old works — including early Betty Boop shorts and Blondie comics — has entered the U.S. public domain on Jan. 1, opening material for teaching, research and creative reuse...
Skip college? Founder argues degree taboo is constraining Gen Z
A serial founder who bypassed college to launch startups argues the cultural taboo against questioning traditional degrees is holding back a generation of students. The piece cites surveys showing...
CTE climbs — educators call for investments; districts revamp recruiting
Career and technical education programs are expanding at secondary schools as demand for job-ready skills grows; educators identify facilities, employer partnerships and instructor capacity as top...
B-schools sharpen priorities — human judgment, AI and facilities
Business school leaders published 2026 resolutions emphasizing human judgment, leadership under uncertainty and AI integration across curricula. Poets&Quants collected dean statements calling for...
Mamdani names Kamar Samuels — U-turn on mayoral control
Zohran Mamdani has moved to steady New York City’s education landscape by selecting Kamar Samuels as chancellor and reversing his pledge to end mayoral control of the public schools. The...
School shootings fall to five‑year low — Tracker shows fewer incidents
Education Week’s tracking shows the number of school shootings that produced injuries or deaths fell sharply in 2025, recording 17 incidents and seven deaths—the fewest since 2020. The tracker...