In this week’s roundup:
Many students head home for Thanksgiving, facial recognition on campus stirs controversy and international students want to return to China to complete their studies.
Stay tuned for our weekly roundup on what trends we’re seeing across institutions, how individual colleges and universities are responding to them and what national policy changes are affecting higher ed.
November 19 – 25
- Predictions continue for what the Biden Presidency could mean for higher education.
- With Kamala Harris’s forthcoming ascension to vice president, the drive to break barriers for Black women who want to assume leadership roles in higher education and other professions is increasing in power and ability.
- Future First Lady Jill Biden plans to continue teaching at her current community college in addition to taking on duties as the first lady.
- Between the pandemic and a record-breaking year for tropical storms, students in Louisiana are dealing with more mental health stressors than ever before.
- Colleges and universities used different testing protocols as students went back home for Thanksgiving, raising major concerns over the prospect of viral spread.
- Learning from mistakes made in the fall, some larger institutions are implementing more COVID-19 testing for the upcoming spring semester.
- International students are pushing to go back to China before the year ends to complete their studies, but stringent policies meant to protect the health of Chinese residents and reduce the risk of “imported infection cases,” make these efforts unlikely to succeed.
- With no end of the pandemic in sight, colleges and universities are asking Education Secretary Betsy DeVos to extend the student loan break from repayment for another year.
- One positive outcome of the pandemic for some institutions is that moving their courses online enabled more stopped-out students to reenroll than ever before.
- Students at the University of Miami paired with Fight for the Future to urge their campus not to use facial recognition technology, following a protest where participants believe they were identified using that technology.
- An assistant professor at Ferris State University was placed on leave after making racist, homophobic, and other offensive comments during a faculty and staff meeting and on his social media.
- Utah residents with intellectual disabilities can now earn a certificate from Utah Valley University after the institution developed a three-year certificate program using federal grant money.
Have a safe, healthy and happy Thanksgiving from the RW Jones family to yours!
