@billingsmer
Assistant Professor in Higher Education, Adult Learning, & Organizational Studies at UT-Arlington. Research interests: college affordability, higher ed funding, ed politics and policy, college access, and educational governance. Avid tennis player 🎾
Thank you to our editors for the special issue - Wesley Henry, Meredith Wronowski, and Bryan VanGronigen who made this all possible! Also special thanks to my co-author for working on this project with me. It was a joy to work with you!
Our article is part of a special issue called Education in the Public Square: Educational Leaders’ Responses to Today’s External Challenges, Influences, and Politics. Check it out here: journals.sagepub.com/toc/JEL/curr...
The case discusses the 2023 budget standoff between Universities of Wisconsin (UW) system and state legislature over DEI initiatives and analyze the case using advocacy coalition framework or strategic leadership. We also have cool suggested activities and discussion questions!
Check out Ashley Clayton’s and my new pedagogical case just published in Journal of Cases in Educational Leadership. It’s a great case for higher ed finance, higher ed policy, and higher ed leadership courses. #edusky #highered #academicsky
journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....
I am co-coordinating a *virtual* book club with Paul Eaton and Ric Montelongo on Beverly Daniel Tatum’s new book - Peril and Promise. Come join us Tuesday nights to discuss leading HEIs in the current climate staring Jan 2026! #edusky #highered
Register: utaedu.questionpro.com/perilandprom...
We also provide several recommendations for policy and practice.
Thank you to our participants for sharing their time and expertise with us and to @kresge.org for supporting our research.
(3) One out of the 7 programs that we studied changed their design from last-dollar to first-dollar to better support the financial needs of their students. We discuss the successes and challenges of that decision.
(2) Multiple participants counseled students against taking out student loans because “loan debt is scary” and/or they interpreted that CC students had lower financial need than their four-year counterparts and they should only take out loans when they transferred to four-year institutions.
Some highlights from our research: (1) Even with financial support from promise programs - students still struggle with basic needs such as housing, food, transportation, and childcare.
New pub with Amy Li on the financial needs of students in CC promise programs. We examined 7 local programs - interviewing 32 practitioners and analyzing 43 docs on program resources and financial challenges that promise students face. #highered #newpub
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
Congratulations and welcome to Texas! 😊
Special thanks to the @kresge.org who funded this work. #highered #freecollege #promiseprograms
Free college/promise programs have been around for two+ decades. Admin who work with and implement the promise have learned a lot. Amy Li, Denisa Gandara, and I asked them about their recs for policy and practice. Here’s what they said with commentary from us: www.brookings.edu/articles/adm...
Any recommendations for software programs that will create a publishable-quality figure for a journal article? (Think creating a figure to describe a process or a figure to describe your conceptual framework.) Ideally free or inexpensive - but will take other recommendations too! #academia #pubs
You have three days, starting today, to leave a public comment with the FDA about, say, why COVID-19 boosters should remain available to everyone and also free. "Individual consumer" is the category you most likely want (unless you are one of the other categories; if so, choose that).
He is out at Michigan - they just announced the interim president!
The Council on Public Pouch in Higher Education at ASHE (Association for the Study of Higher Education) has a webinar on Monday, May 5th at 12:30-1:30 mountain time (2:30-3:30 eastern). Summary of the session: Join us for an urgent and insightful conversation as we take a deep dive into the state of higher education 100 days into the Trump administration. In this pivotal moment, a distinguished panel of scholars and policy experts will analyze the early effects of federal and state policies on key issues like student access and affordability. We’ll also explore the alarming implications of budget cuts to the Department of Education, the dismantling of federal data systems, and the erosion of DEI initiatives on campuses nationwide. As public perceptions of higher education continue to shift, our panelists will discuss what lies ahead for institutions, policymakers, and researchers facing an increasingly complex and challenging landscape.
Me, @robertkelchen.com, Diane Cheng of IHEP, and Kyle Southern of TICAS bout to have a real depressing chat on Monday. You can register if you want to join us: www.ashe.ws/events/cpphe...
Brownstone buildings at Teachers College looking west toward Riverside Church. Creative Commons photo by Bohao Zhao
#edusky colleagues, higher ed or K-12, please share. We are at Columbia, but we know that this struggle matters for education across the lifespan.
A Statement from Teachers College Faculty on the Attack on American Education
docs.google.com/document/d/1...
Also thank you to the @spencerfoundation.bsky.social who funded this research.
Thanks again to my two wonderful co-authors and happy to see that this article is out in the world!
This quote inspired the title of our article and hopefully stresses the importance of how policy advocates also need to consider the political ideologies, beliefs, and values of the policymakers when arguing for their preferred policy action.
One legislator said “there’s something ennobling and uplifting and gracious about struggling and overcoming” when discussing why states shouldn’t offer free college because it sets up a system where folks are “content with being a dependent of the state.”
Some Republicans framed these same recipients as less deserving of support because they were more likely to drop out of college without their degrees or take longer to complete their degrees.
Democrats discussed the main recipients of NMOS as adult learners, part-time, and student parents who are deserving of support because they are hardworking and disciplined to juggle their multiple responsibilities.
Support and opposition tended to fall along party lines with Democrats supporting NMOS and Republicans opposing NMOS. We also examined how state legislators framed the NMOS recipients as deserving or undeserving of support.
Drawing on 9 hrs of legislative meetings - we found that state legislators who support the NMOS focused on individual benefits and the state legislators who oppose the NMOS focused on state burdens.
New pub with @itspgr.bsky.social & Denisa Gandara examining how state policymakers in New Mexico frame their support or opposition to the New Mexico Opportunity Scholarship, a statewide promise program that has a flexible and generous design. #edusky #highered
epaa.asu.edu/index.php/ep...
A flyer advertising a rally to support the department of education public servants who have been laid off this week. The rally will be 8am-10am outside the Lyndon b Johnson building in Washington DC.
Folks at #AEFP25 I know you all worked incredibly hard on the research you are sharing this week, but if you can spare an hour, come and join the rally at ED on Friday 8am.
I’ll be there with other folks, happy to meet people who don’t want to go alone.
DMs open, darfin.81 on signal
#EduSky.