This week, I am returning to the University of Colorado Boulder campus for the first time since I retired from the university in 2024. I was invited to participate in the university’s Conference on World Affairs, where I’ll participate on two panels tomorrow — both livestreamed: one on climate change (9:30AM MT) and one of federal funding for research (2:00PM MT). Today, I’ll guest lecture in an upper-level atmospheric science course (buckle up students!).
I appreciate the invitation, surely a positive sign of an intellectual thaw. At the same time, the university gave in to a demand that I be removed from the original climate panel I was assigned to — so they created a new panel for me to be on. But any progress is good progress. If you come to my panels tomorrow, please do say Hi!
Returning to campus prompted me to take a look back at my posts here at THB on problems in U.S. universities, in the context of recent data indicating that public confidence in U.S. higher education has rebounded a bit off the lows of recent years, as shown below.
Over the past few years I’ve had the good fortune to visit more than a dozen universities, to meet with university leaders in public and private institutions, and to participate in AEI’s new Center for the Future of the American University. The small rebound in public opinion reflects what I’ve observed firsthand: there are indeed some positive signs that university leaders are correcting course. There is much work still to do.
I have updated and integrated my writings on ‘the university problem’ into a report — the first in what will become a continuing THB feature: Deep Dive Reports. The idea: synthesize a series of arguments and data into a single accessible document — more in-depth than a single post, less sprawling than a long series. All reports will have updated data and figures that THB readers are free to use and share.