College Uncovered

The story of America’s founding comes with a familiar cast and setting: young white men in powdered wigs, animated by Enlightenment ideals, pacing college greens and tavern floors, debating liberty into existence.  Colonial colleges emerge as engines of revolution – hotbeds of radical thought that helped give birth to the nation.  It’s a compelling story. It’s also incomplete.  In this special Ame...

Harvard faculty have approved a controversial plan to overhaul the college’s grading system, including new limits on how many A’s professors can award. The goal: make an A mean something again. But the debate goes beyond transcripts and GPAs. At a moment of deep skepticism toward elite higher education, some supporters say tougher grading could also help restore trust in institutions like Harvard....

Artificial intelligence is booming in Boston and beyond, and economists warn that it could throw thousands of people out of work. College seniors nearing graduation are often asked what they’ll do next. How will they put their new degree to use? Or will they end up working at their neighborhood coffee shop?  Underemployment among recent graduates has been a persistent concern. Many degree holders...

GBH recently took College Uncovered on the road to the University of Massachusetts Boston, in the city’s Dorchester neighborhood, about eight miles from some of the nation’s well-known Ivy League institutions.  We chose UMass Boston not just because it’s in our backyard, but because campuses like it represent where most students in the U.S. actually go to college. Roughly 80 percent of students at...

Millions of Americans have left college before earning their degrees. Some schools are trying to re-engage those so-called “stop-out” learners to bolster their classes amid growing uncertainty about enrollment. In this episode of College Uncovered, GBH’s Kirk Carapezza explores how local institutions are partnering with national organizations like ReUp Education to reconnect with former students. ...

Recent graduates are facing a tough job market. Young people – and even colleges – are asking fundamental, existential questions: What does it mean to be educated? And will an expensive college education help set in motion a future career?  As enrollment declines, costs rise, and political pressure intensifies, some colleges and universities are rethinking the liberal arts. They’re restructuring a...

College football bowl season is underway, with wall-to-wall games on TV, packed stadiums and multi-million-dollar broadcasts dominated by a few dozen powerhouse programs. In Amherst, Massachusetts, it’s quiet. That’s because the University of Massachusetts Amherst Minutemen just finished the 2025 season without a single win, the only team in the Division I Football Bowl Subdivision to do so. Over...

Artificial intelligence is still new on college campuses, but it’s already transforming how professors teach and how students learn. Surveys show most students now rely on generative AI for everything from applying to college to getting through it. Some educators are leaning in, treating AI as a teaching partner. Others are leaning out, doubling down on in-person, discussion-based learning. Either...

Across the country, public universities are being flooded with requests for syllabi, reading lists, course materials, and data on international students. One company is behind many of those requests - Metric Media . Part of a growing network of conservative-led groups, Metric Media says it’s enforcing civil rights laws and holding taxpayer-funded institutions accountable. But critics see something...

The government rescinded billions in federal research grants during Trump’s first few months in office — cutting fellowships, scholarships, and postdoc programs that support the next generation of scientists. A federal judge recently ordered the restoration of some National Institutes of Health grants . A battle over National Science Foundation funding is still playing out in court. So what do the...

Harvard just did something it hasn’t done in decades — it fired a tenured professor. Francesca Gino built her reputation studying honesty. Then she was accused of faking data. In May, Harvard’s top governing board revoked her tenure and ousted her from the Business School. But why is stripping tenure so rare — not just at Harvard, but anywhere? How common is research fraud? And why are colleges so...

Is the four-year college degree losing its grip on the American Dream?  Just as American colleges reach the demographic cliff in 2026, higher education in the U.S. is facing mounting pressure from all sides. President Donald Trump has targeted several highly-selective, wealthy universities, slashing federal research funding and questioning their tax-exempt status – painting them as overpriced and...

Here’s a milestone you might not have heard about: It’s projected that this year, for the first time, more college students will take all of their courses online than will take all of their courses in person. Online higher education has come a long way since its predecessor, the correspondence school. The universal shift to remote learning during the pandemic only accelerated that momentum. It has...

The single fastest-growing group of students in college? This may come as a surprise — they’re still in high school. So-called “dual enrollment” — also known as “early college” and “concurrent enrollment” — seems a win-win.  Institutions get students, at a time when demographic shifts are making that more difficult; that’s especially true at community colleges, whose enrollment has declined the mo...

U.S. colleges have long relied on international students – and the big tuition checks they bring – to hit enrollment goals and keep the lights on. But now, just as the number of American college-aged students starts to fall – a trend known as the “demographic cliff”– global tensions are making international students think twice about coming to the U.S. for college. In this episode, hosts Kirk Cara...

American higher education is approaching a sharp drop in college-aged students — a trend known as the demographic cliff. At the same time, following decades of declining enrollment, humanities programs are being forced to adapt or risk disappearing altogether. In this episode of College Uncovered , hosts Kirk Carapezza and Jon Marcus explore how some colleges are rebranding liberal arts as “applie...

Something has been happening on college campuses that’s as surprising as it is dramatic: The number of women enrolled has overtaken the number of men. Women now outnumber men by about 60 percent to 40 percent, and that gap keeps getting wider. And men who do enroll are also more likely to drop out. There are a lot of reasons for this. Boys get lower grades than girls, on average, in elementary and...

Most Americans would probably rather forget the Great Recession that began in 2007. But as long ago as it may seem, it triggered something that is about to become a big problem: Americans started having fewer babies, and the birth rate hasn’t recovered since. That means a looming decline in the number of 18-year-olds. Since those are the traditional customers for universities and colleges, enrollm...

The anxiety-inducing college admissions game is changing – what if colleges started applying to you instead of the other way around? With declining birth rates and growing skepticism about the value of a degree, higher education is facing an enrollment cliff, set to hit hard in 2026. That’s 18 years after the Great Recession when many American families stopped having babies. As competition for stu...

College Uncovered Season 4 is here!  We’re standing on the precipice of a “demographic cliff” threatening higher education. A drop in the number of 18-year-olds that are alive right now – triggered by a decline in birth rates after the  2008 Great Recession – is forcing colleges to rethink everything. Schools across the country are changing admissions, restructuring financial aid, rebranding the h...

Throughout the 2024 presidential campaign, President-elect Donald Trump railed against colleges and universities for being too expensive, too partisan and too “woke.” Trump’s anti-elite, anti-immigration tone channeled the frustrations of many working-class Americans — and led him to a decisive win at the polls.  So, with Trump returning to the White House for a second term, how much of his higher...

Greater Boston – a region famous for its sheer number of colleges – is also home to an underground network that helps women receive abortion pills. Every week, a group including many Boston-area college and medical students meets to put together abortion pill care packages to send to women who need them. While the founders call them “pill packing parties” the work is not without risk. Women in Tex...

College presidents serve for less than six years on average. For women and people of color, that tenure is even shorter – a full year shorter. So what’s going on? College presidents are under fire for what they say about issues like systemic racism, abortion access and war in the Middle East, as well as what they do — or don't do — about campus protests. So why would anyone want to be a college pr...

Colleges that embraced diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives (DEI) in the wake of the 2020 murder of George Floyd by police are now fearing litigation and quietly eliminating their DEI programs. North Carolina is one of the latest to do so. At least 20 states have Republican proposals aimed at limiting DEI programs at public universities. State schools in Wisconsin and Alabama are preemptive...

Delta State University in rural Mississippi eliminated it’s highly regarded music department. It’ also cut English, math, chemistry, and about a third  of the courses that it used to teach. And Delta State’s far from alone. Arkansas State, the University of North Carolina – Greensboro, Youngstown State in Ohio, West Virginia University have all made significant course cutbacks. That’s a problem. P...