Office of Planning & Budgeting

future


July 23, 2019

2019 Higher Education Trends

As the higher education landscape continues to change and evolve in the United States, below are some select national and state trends driving higher education policy and innovation in recent years. The Office of Planning & Budgeting (OPB) continues to monitor these, and other, trends. This list was curated using multiple sources, including recent news…


April 25, 2016

New Report Examines Challenges Facing Public Research Universities in 21st Century

The Lincoln Project, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences’ study of public research universities (PRUs), has recently come out with its fifth and final report, which examines the challenges facing PRUs and recommends strategies for addressing them. The recommendations are threefold: Address Financial Challenges: The sharp reduction in state funding for PRUs—down 30 percent…


May 7, 2014

Stanford Announces It Will Divest from Coal Companies

On Tuesday, Stanford’s Board of Trustees announced it “will not directly invest in approximately 100 publicly traded companies for which coal extraction is the primary business, and will divest of any current direct holdings in such companies.” Furthermore, Stanford stated it would encourage its external investment managers to avoid investments in such companies. The decision…


April 21, 2014

International Graduate Applications Increase, But Countries of Origin Shift

The Council of Graduate Schools (CGS) released its annual survey of international student applications on Thursday, which revealed that the number of international student applications to U.S. graduate schools increased by 7 percent in 2014 and, for the second year in a row, Chinese applications fell slightly, while those from students in India soared. Chinese…


March 3, 2014

“Pay It Forward” Is really “Pay It Yourself and Pay More Than Ever”

On Thursday, The Equity Line, a blog by The Education Trust, posted a critique of Pay It Forward (PIF) that discusses some of PIF’s major flaws. As a reminder, under PIF, instead of paying tuition and fees upfront, students would pay back a certain percent of their adjusted gross income for 25 years. For more…


December 10, 2013

Research Suggests MOOCs Primarily Serve the Well-Educated

Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania recently surveyed students who had taken at least one of Penn’s twenty-four MOOCs and viewed at least one online video lecture. Findings from the responses of 34,779 students revealed that 80 percent of the MOOC-takers already had a 2- or 4-year degree and that 44 percent already had some graduate…


September 19, 2013

Higher Education and Career-Ready Graduates: New Surveys Offer Insight into America’s Opinions

The results of two new surveys released Tuesday reveal some of America’s views on both the future of higher education as well as its role in producing desirable outcomes, particularly career-ready graduates. Under Northeastern University’s sponsorship, FTI Consulting surveyed 263 hiring managers in July as well as 1,000 adult Americans in August.  Here are some…


September 9, 2013

Oregon Passes Bill to Implement “Pay Forward, Pay Back” Pilot Program

(This piece was originally posted on 07/11/2013, however it was lost due to technical issues and is therefore re-posted here.) Last week, the Oregon legislature passed a bill that, if signed by the governor, will implement a pilot program to study the effects and feasibility of substituting upfront tuition payments with income-based, post-graduation payments. For 24 years after…


June 18, 2013

Washington’s June Revenue Forecast Shows Small Improvements

On Tuesday, June 18, the Washington State Economic & Revenue Forecast Council (ERFC) released its quarterly update of General Fund-State (GFS) revenues. Compared with the March forecast, expected GFS revenues are up $110 million for the current biennium (2011-13) and $121 million for the next biennium (2013-15), meaning legislators have an additional $231 million to factor…


June 10, 2013

Senate Releases Revised Budget Proposal

On Saturday, the Senate released a revised budget proposal, which closely resembles the budget they passed in April. For the UW, the two budgets differ in just a few ways: Unlike the original Senate budget, the revised budget does not include a $12.5M transfer away from the UW Hospital Account; The revised budget does not cut the…



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