Lumina Foundation is working to increase the share of adults in the U.S. labor force with college degrees or other credentials of value leading to economic prosperity.
President Donald Trump issued an executive order last month instructing federal officials to “reach and surpass” a million new active apprenticeships. It was an ambitious target that apprenticeship advocates celebrated, anticipating new federal investments in more paid on-the-job training programs in new industries and via a more efficient system.
But the excitement for an expanded apprenticeship model in the United States might be short-lived. Apprenticeship enthusiasts now worry that Trump’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2026 doesn’t reflect the executive order’s vision.
Immigration attorney Rekha Sharma-Crawford has filed a federal lawsuit against President Donald Trump’s attempts to block five international students from their college educations—and so far, she’s winning.
In a recent podcast, Sharma-Crawford claimed that those who lost their legal status as students received no justification or explanation. She says it was done to ultimately harm international students and the universities. She explains more in this interview.
Some 600 college leaders recently signed a letter opposing the Trump administration’s interference in higher education. The only Ivy League president who did not sign the letter was Sian Beilock, president of Dartmouth College.
Instead, she wrote a letter to her campus, saying that higher education institutions should strive “to be trusted beacons for knowledge and truth.” It is the kind of message, her critics and supporters say, that has so far helped keep Dartmouth out of the Trump administration’s crosshairs.
The teaching evaluation, as it’s commonly known, is a time-honored tradition in higher education. After all, who is better positioned to say whether a professor did a good job than the students who took the course? However, upon closer examination, it's reasonable to question whether colleges should rely on teaching evaluations to make significant decisions about an instructor's promotion, pay, or even their continued employment.
So what’s wrong with this system? And why do colleges continue to rely on it even though research indicates that it has significant flaws?
Congressional Republicans are quietly working toward one of the most consequential overhauls in the history of the federal student loan program—one that would affect the lives of millions of borrowers.
At the center of that overhaul is an effort to sunset most of the current student loan repayment plans and offer future borrowers a simple binary: pay the same amount every month or tie your payments to your income.
A recent study from the Center for Social Development at Washington University in St. Louis introduces a powerful metaphor for credentials. It says they act like elevators, escalators, or walkways. Some (like doctoral and master’s degrees) provide a fast lift followed by sustained upward earnings—elevators and escalators. Others, like associate degrees or school-based certificates, offer a short boost and then level out—a walkway.
Understanding these trajectories is crucial for students, advisors, and institutions. It’s not just about the size of the earnings bump—it’s about how long that growth continues and whether it aligns with a learner’s goals, writes Lumina Foundation's Wendy Sedlak in this op-ed.
