The Key with Inside Higher Ed

IHE editor in chief Sara Custer speaks with Devin Duncan, the student body president at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and an incoming junior.  Duncan is passionate about making higher ed a better place for the next generation of students and wants to see colleges do more to support students’ complex needs. In this episode, he shares his thoughts about free speech on campus, tenur...

As we approach the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, an old historical narrative of American exceptionalism is taking hold. Meanwhile, evidence-based historical research is disappearing. The federal government has shuttered museum exhibits, politicized federal funding and removed any monuments seen to disparage Americans past or present.  In this episode of The K...

An update on the higher ed headlines from Inside Higher Ed's newsroom.  Inside Higher Ed’s editor in chief Sara Custer and news editor Katherine Knott discuss the latest higher ed headlines: the proposals to change accreditation, the latest from the Office for Civil Rights, the GOP’s plan to plug the hole in Pell grant funding and how the administration is redirecting grants that support low-incom...

In this episode of Voices of Student Success, Inside Higher Ed’s podcast series exploring what really shapes students’ experiences, Zoe Ragouzeos, vice president for student mental health and wellbeing at New York University, joins IHE’s student success reporter, Joshua Bay. As institutions face growing demand for mental health support, rising rates of loneliness and new questions about where stud...

In this episode of Voices of Student Success, Inside Higher Ed’s podcast series exploring what really shapes students’ experiences, Alison Lee, chief research and development officer of The Rithm Project, joins IHE’s student success reporter, Joshua Bay. As colleges struggle to meet growing mental health needs, they explore how more young people are opening up to chatbots and conversational AI too...

Policy makers and higher ed institutions have worked to provide better opportunities and resources for underserved communities, but access to affordable education and supports for rural students remains challenging. Meanwhile, threats to federal funding for TRIO programs could make it even harder for rural students to get into college and when they get on campus, few institutions understand their...

In this episode of Voices of Student Success, Inside Higher Ed’s podcast series exploring what really shapes students’ experiences, Carson Domey, a fourth-year student at the University of Texas at Austin, and Adaora Lee, a graduate student at Meharry Medical College, joins IHE’s student success reporter, Joshua Bay. They discuss student loneliness and what social isolation looks like in a post-pa...

In this episode of The Key, we’re digging into the minds of college presidents and how they’re dealing with the chaos of the current moment. Colleen Flaherty, Inside Higher Ed’s special content editor joins editor in chief Sara Custer to share some key findings from IHE’s 2026 survey of college and university presidents on what leaders see are the immediate and long-term risks to their institution...

In this episode of Voices of Student Success, Inside Higher Ed’s podcast series exploring what really shapes students’ experiences, Dr. Katie Hurley, vice president of community initiatives at The Jed Foundation (JED), joins IHE's student success reporter Joshua Bay. They discuss the state of student mental health on college campuses, including what's driving increased demand for support, how coun...

Sara Custer, editor in chief at Inside Higher Ed, speaks with Andrew Delbanco, the Alexander Hamilton Professor of American Studies at Columbia University and the president of the Teagle Foundation, about how humanities-based general education courses can provide short and long-term benefits to students – from ethical questions on the job to deeper self-reflection throughout life. He also argues t...

In this episode of The Key, Inside Higher Ed’s news and analysis podcast, IHE’s student success reporter Joshua Bay joins editor in chief Sara Custer. They discuss the trends in student success that have caught Joshua’s eye including libraries and AI literacy, workforce readiness and tackling loneliness. He shares case studies from programs that are making a difference for students in and outside...

Inside Higher Ed’s editor in chief Sara Custer is in the studio with news editor Katherine Knott and federal policy reporter Jessica Blake to hear the latest about movements on The Hill and in the White House affecting higher ed. On the agenda:  the interagency agreements between the Department of Education and agencies across the federal government are the latest efforts by officials to close the...

Sonya Christian is chancellor of California Community Colleges, the largest higher ed system in the country with 116 institutions and 2.2 million students. The sheer size of the system makes every initiative an exercise in scale. In this episode of The Key, Sonya speaks with Inside Higher Ed’s editor in chief Sara Custer about the governor’s proposed $15 billion investment in the system as well as...

Last month the Congressional Budget Office projected an $11.5 billion shortfall in Pell funding by fiscal year 2027. The program provides need-based federal financial aid for more than 30 percent of American college students. Part of the funding problem is that Congress made getting aid easier without appropriating more money to cover the increase in students gaining access. Finding a solution req...

Robert Zemsky is a pioneer in market analysis of higher education and served as the founding director of the University of Pennsylvania’s Institute for Research on Higher Education, one of the country's leading public policy centers specializing in educational research and analysis. In this episode of The Key, Zemsky speaks with Inside Higher Ed's editor in chief Sara Custer about his biggest proj...

News editor Katherine Knott joins editor in chief Sara Custer for an IHE newsroom updated on federal policy. Katherine shares what she expects will be on the agenda in the negotiated rule making for accreditation and how the department will run the process. At the time of recording the government was shut down, but Katherine explains how the budget bill awaiting passage in the House is far more ge...

Best-selling author, Inside Higher Ed columnist and educator John Warner joins IHE’s editor in chief Sara Custer to discuss how institutions can continue to help students learn and grow when AI threatens to do everything for them. Read John’s IHE column “ Just Visiting ” Check out John’s latest book More Than Words: How to Think About Writing in the Age of AI

Collecting and analyzing student data and then acting on any findings to support student success is a struggle for many institutions. Often data is in the wrong format, inaccessible to the right teams or there are so many analytics colleges don’t know where to start. Many administrators also lack the data literacy needed to make accurate, data-informed decisions. In this episode, we’re sharing a d...

In the final Key episode of 2025, IHE’s news editor Katherine Knott and federal policy reporter Jessica Blake join editor in chief Sara Custer to discuss the three stories that encapsulate the year in state and federal policy.

In her final episode of Voices of Student Success, Inside Higher Ed reporter Ashley Mowreader walks through some of the latest trends in student success in higher education including generative artificial intelligence tools, mental health resources for students, affordability in higher education and internship requirements for students. Later, hear from Joshua Bay , Inside Higher Ed’s new Student...

This series of Voices of Student Success focuses on the use of generative artificial intelligence in higher education and how technology can support student success goals.  Central New Mexico Community College is deploying a new AI-powered predictive analytics tool,  CampusLens , part of CampusWorks, to improve data visibility in student retention, early alerts and career outcomes.   In the latest...

This series of Voices of Student Success focuses on the use of generative artificial intelligence in higher education and how technology can support student success goals.  Since 2022, there’s been a surge in the number and types of applications using generative AI, but not all tools are the same. So how can faculty, staff and students learn to identify the differences and determine when it’s appr...

In this episode, Katherine Knott, Inside Higher Ed’s news editor, is back to help us unpack the latest higher ed news out of Washington. She speaks with editor in chief Sara Custer about the Trump administration’s higher ed compact—who’s said no, who’s said yes please and who’s artfully dodging the question. We’ll give you the latest on the current round of negotiated rule making. Plus: the TRIO f...

This series of Voices of Student Success focuses on the use of generative artificial intelligence in higher education and how technology can support student success goals.  A 2025 Inside Higher Ed survey of college provosts found that nearly 30 percent of respondents have reviewed curriculum to ensure that it will prepare students for AI in the workplace, and an additional 63 percent say they have...

Public scholarship is about more than just getting published. It’s about joining the public conversation at a time when expertise matters more than ever. In this episode of The Key, Philip Gray, Op-Ed Editor at The Los Angeles Times, and Susan D'Agostino, mathematician-turned-writer and columnist behind The Public Scholar at Inside Higher Ed join IHE’s editor in chief Sara Custer to pull back the...