Trump’s vision for higher education

We all have heard the stories that reflect real problems in higher education, including coffee house baristas with master’s degrees and young “adults” moving back in with their parents. Things will only get worse as demographic trends see a shrinking pool of 18-year-olds. Conservatives further recognize that the left’s decades-long dominance of universities has given it tremendous influence on successive generations of educated Americans, corrupting our culture and our kids. That deep rot was exposed in epic fashion by campus unrest after the 2023 Hamas attack on Israel.

The Trump Administration’s proposed Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education addresses many of these longstanding problems: ending consideration of race in admission, defining sex in line with biological reality, and committing to a climate of civility that does not allow a heckler’s veto. Other provisions have drawn greater pushback, including a five-year tuition freeze, a cap on international student enrollment, and a commitment to ideological diversity.

Many middle-class families are frustrated with the high cost of college, and price tags easily exceed $60,000 per year at elite private colleges. A recent article from Yahoo Finance notes that inflationary tuition “consistently outpaces general inflation, averaging eight percent annually compared to the general inflation rate.” Professor Richard Vedder of Ohio University argues much of this increase comes from outside the classroom—such as money spent on athletics, bureaucrats, and buildings. Though many smaller colleges must fight such bloat to stay afloat financially, most colleges are sprawling campuses spending aggressively to win the facilities arms race with new dorms and world-class fitness centers.

Some colleges are balancing tight budgets on the backs of international students, who are willing to pay full freight to attend an American university. The compact puts the screws to this cash cow by pushing colleges to serve American students first. And the compact focuses on the particular danger posed by Chinese graduate students, who may be assets of the Communist government to steal intellectual property or national security secrets.

I understand concerns about academic freedom and intellectual diversity. Some colleges pursue a mission that creates a particular community that largely agrees—whether religious or otherwise (think of a secular great books college, women’s colleges, historically Black colleges, or environmental colleges). As former Catholic University of America president John Garvey has emphasized, institutional pluralism creates its own kind of diversity between and amongst institutions, even if specific institutions hold to a common creed. At the same time, the compact rightly points out that most colleges and universities set out to serve students writ large, yet end up as propaganda camps for the left.

Leaders from the Council of Christian Colleges and Universities (CCCU) are alarmed at the precedent that the compact could set, worried it will pave the way for a future Democratic administration to tie federal funding to its ideological priorities. I don’t find the objection persuasive because we’ve already seen recent Democratic administrations impose their will on Christian colleges without any precedent from Trump. Obama imposed an abortifacient insurance mandate on Christian colleges and interpreted Title IX’s ban on sex discrimination to require colleges to assign dorm housing in line with a transgender student’s preferred identity. Biden, meanwhile, read Title IX to protect abortion access for college students while pursuing fines and lawsuits against Liberty and Grand Canyon universities.

The objection reflects a larger debate within conservatism—should Trump hold back from bold actions because a future Democratic administration could misuse the same tools? An economic “emergency” on tariffs or a national security “emergency” at the border could be used to justify a future “emergency” on climate change. An FCC chair who pushes for greater balance from ABC, NBC, CBS, and PBS could open the door to pressure on Fox when the pendulum swings.

I understand—indeed share—the concerns but am confident Democrats will do these deeds regardless of Trump’s actions. Biden tried to use a post-9/11 statute for emergency responders to cancel all student loan debt for everyone, and his FCC chair pressured Fox through an unusually intensive licensing proceeding.

At the end of the day, the higher ed compact is written at a high level to target many very real industry-wide problems that deserve to be addressed, even if they’re not present at every school. And as of now, there’s no “stick” associated with it—for that matter, there’s no real carrot either, but rather a vague suggestion connecting federal support with compact support. That’s always the other option—schools that don’t want to accept the strings can refuse the federal funds, and a few brave schools take that principled course.

Trump has shown his willingness to play hardball with Columbia, Harvard, and UVA. The compact lays out a vision for a better higher ed future, and schools would be wise to consider it without immediately adopting a defensive posture.