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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 21/09/2026

The public comment period for the Department of Education's proposed accreditation rule closes today, September 21, at 11:59 p.m. EDT. Submit a comment to protect higher education before the period closes. We at the Alliance have created guidance on how to effectively submit public comment:

allianceforhighered.org

Public Comment Regarding the Education Department's Proposed Rules for Accreditation

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 09/09/2026

The Education Department’s efforts to change accreditation standards are blatant attempts to weaponize financial aid and embed the administration’s political priorities into higher education. Submit public comment before Sept. 21. This is our chance to make our voices heard.

allianceforhighered.org

Public Comment Regarding the Education Department's Proposed Rules for Accreditation

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

In its piece on the IRS's new proposed rule, Politico features quotes from Alliance Board Member Todd Wolfson and CEO Mike Gavin. Around 750,000 students who qualify for scholarships tied to race, ethnicity, or national identity could be impacted by the rule. www.politico.com/news/2026/09...

politico.com

New IRS proposal threatens universities' tax-exempt status over diversity programs

The proposed regulations could affect up to 18,000 high schools, universities and trade schools, the agency said.

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 04/09/2026

Alliance CEO Mike Gavin was quoted in this Associated Press story on the administration’s proposed rules threatening the tax-exempt status of private schools and colleges if they provide targeted help to students based on their race. Read the full piece here: apnews.com/article/tax-...

apnews.com

Trump administration pushes to remove tax exemption for private colleges with DEI policies

The Trump administration is proposing a rule that would strip private schools and colleges of their tax-exempt status if they provide targeted help to students based on their race.

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 03/09/2026

The administration’s new rules threaten the tax exempt status of schools that aid minority students. It’s the latest effort to keep working class Americans and people of color from college and a better life. Read: www.nytimes.com/2026/09/03/b...

nytimes.com

Trump Moves to Strip Tax Exemption From Schools That Aid Minority Students

The Treasury Department released rules that would prevent schools with race-based programs from qualifying for tax-exempt status, a threat to both higher education and other private schools.

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 26/08/2026

The Education Department seeks to stifle the freedom to teach, learn, and research through a process not often paid attention to: accreditation rule changes. As CEO and president Mike Gavin told @insidehighered.com: “defining academic freedom is a role the government should not take." Read more:

insidehighered.com

3 Key Changes in Trump’s New Accreditation Rule

The administration accused accreditors of neglecting their “positions of public trust.”

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 20/08/2026

The Education Department proposed changes to the accreditation system. Read the proposed rule and ask yourself: who really benefits when academic freedom is in the hands of political partisanship? Make your voice heard before the public comment period closes on Sept. 21:

regulations.gov

Regulations.gov

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 17/07/2026

"Rebuilding public trust in higher ed goes beyond saying more positive things more frequently to more audiences" says Alliance President @michaelhgavin.bsky.social. We have to also reject the false narrative that access and inclusion are bugs, instead of assets. www.theeduledger.com/institutions...

theeduledger.com

Americans’ Confidence in Colleges Continues Long-Term Slide

A new Gallup-Lumina survey shows faith in higher education has dropped sharply since 2015, especially among Republicans and, more recently, Democrats.

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

Affinity housing is legal. Student success initiatives are legal. Ensuring students are able to vote is legal. The Education Dept. exceeding its authority to further define professional degrees and limit access to education is not.

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Reposted by Alliance For Higher Education

Mike Gavin @michaelhgavin.bsky.social · 26/06/2026

As usual, higher education leaders shouldn't change operations. The rhetoric in this letter is meant to incite fear based on false accusations. If only there was a place in America where deep study of race and institutions would reveal best practices. 🙃 www.insidehighered.com/news/governm...

insidehighered.com

Dear Colleague Letter Asks Colleges to End Affinity Housing

The Trump administration alleges that housing that caters to minority students violates the Fair Housing Act. Experts say the guidance is unlikely to withstand legal challenges.

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 22/06/2026

This is what the politicization of research, and access to it, looks like. OMB's proposal to require political appointee approval of any federal grant award will codify this practice. To submit public comment: fight2win.standupforscience.net/campaign/omb... hechingerreport.org/proof-points...

hechingerreport.org

HHS removes nearly one-fifth of sessions from early childhood research conference

Researchers fear political screening after abrupt cancellations

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 22/06/2026

Federal accreditation policies are being re-written and some professional program accreditors have removed reqs that encourage teaching about structural inequities in their fields. Join us and a panel of experts to discuss these changes and their consequences. 📅 7/13/26, 4 PM ET 🔗 bit.ly/43KAAwD

Images of Linda Alexander from the Association of Schools and Programs of Public Health; Erwin Chemerinsky from the UC Berkeley School of Law; Timothy R. Cain from the University of Georgia; and Liliana M. Garces from the Alliance for Higher Education.

Webinar description: This webinar brings together leading voices from law, public health, and higher education to examine how authority over professional training is being contested and redefined via political control of accreditation standards related to diversity, equity and inclusion, with potentially life-threatening consequences.

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Stand Up for Science! @standupforscience.net · 18/06/2026

Want to submit your public comment about the OMB Grant Proposal but not sure how? Join TOMORROW at 2 PM ET for advice on how to submit a public comment! Register at the link in our bio, or go here: zurl.co/soKX3 #StandUpForScience #OMB #Vought #SaveScience #Science

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 18/06/2026

On the Future Trends Forum, @edufuturist.bsky.social and @michaelhgavin.bsky.social discussed the new OMB proposal: "It's bad for the country. It's bad for knowledge. It's bad for democracy." Join us and @standupforscience.net to submit pub comment: fight2win.standupforscience.net/campaign/omb...

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Dominique Baker @bakerdphd.bsky.social · 17/06/2026

"...the answer is not simply a matter of courage or cowardice. The answer is shaped by politics: specifically, which institutional interests higher education leaders advance as legitimate, and which they frame as expendable, ideological, and risky." www.theeduledger.com/opinion/arti...

theeduledger.com

Will Universities Pledge Allegiance or Draw a Line?

Universities clearly know how to fight when they decide to, but how institutions frame the fight determines whether resistance can take hold.

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 12/06/2026

OMB's latest rule proposal replaces peer review with political authority. Public comment is open now! Please join us and @standupforscience.net to stop the weaponization of federal funds to control knowledge and the freedom to teach, learn, and research. bit.ly/4uxLAbA

fight2win.standupforscience.net

Stand up for Science

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 09/06/2026

There are no workarounds to higher education's contemporary authoritarian challenges nor the sector's shortcomings. The only way out is through. By building coalitions in defense of and in the advancement of knowledge, democracy, and the freedom to teach, learn, and research.

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 08/06/2026

"The proposed budget by this administration eliminates access to programs like TRIO, GEAR UP, child care for college students funding for MSIs, Medicaid, federal work student grants... and research funding focused on DEI. The hardest part of college should be in the classroom, not outside of it."

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Bryan Alexander @edufuturist.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

On the Future Trends Forum just now @michaelhgavin.bsky.social says we should expect a major conservative push on general education this fall. @alliancehighered.bsky.social

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Mike Gavin @michaelhgavin.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

There are no workarounds against the multi-decade, multi-billion-dollar movement to dismantle higher education. The harm is indeed to democracy and our students. For example, the state-level assaults on higher education began prior to the current substack: substack.com/home/post/p-...

substack.com

There are No Work-arounds to Authoritarianism

Institutions that seek to keep their head down have not found success; our work needs to be recast

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 04/06/2026

New research shows how institutional preemptive and over-compliance with anti-DEI laws allow policies to surpass their original goals, amplifying a chilling effect that harms students, faculty, and the freedom to teach, learn and research. www.insidehighered.com/opinion/view...

insidehighered.com

How Universities Expand the Reach of Anti-DEI Laws (opinion)

Colleges and universities amplify the impacts of anti-DEI laws through the processes they use to (over-)comply with them.

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Stand Up for Science! @standupforscience.net · 02/06/2026

📣Leave public comment ☎️Contact Congress 🚨Register for the @standupforscience.net Emergency Science Meeting tomorrow at 4pm et ONE STOP SHOP: fight2win.standupforscience.net

fight2win.standupforscience.net

Stand up for Science

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 01/06/2026

This new OMB directive continues to weaponize federal funds. People, and especially underserved communities, will suffer without the benefits of new knowledge, cures, and treatments produced. @standupforscience.net continues to lead in opposition to the politicization of science. bit.ly/4uIosYR

scientificamerican.com

White House proposes new rules giving political appointees final say on research grants

These proposed Office of Management and Budget regulations would render the federal research grant review process opaque

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 29/05/2026

"So let me say it as clearly as I can: Without basic scientific research, supported by the kind of farsighted public investment that allows large-scale, undirected, curiosity-driven inquiry, the scientific pipeline will run dry." www.statnews.com/2026/05/27/s...

statnews.com

MIT president: Why so many optimistic scientists are losing heart

“This erosion of our strength is a loss for the nation,” writes MIT President Sally Kornbluth.

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Dominique Baker @bakerdphd.bsky.social · 27/05/2026

"'The fragility of academic freedom is the distance between our soaring rhetoric and the harsh realities of trying to put them into practice,' said panelist Dominique Baker, associate professor of education and public policy." I gotta transcribe my portion of this talk www.udel.edu/udaily/2026/...

udel.edu

Shining a light on academic freedom | UDaily

Constitutional scholar and UD experts discuss principles, protections and responsibilities

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 27/05/2026

"Higher education is a public good. And if we are serious about restoring trust, we must be equally serious about strengthening and transforming the system so that it serves students, workers and communities alike."

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Randi Weingarten 🖇️📚✊🇺🇸 @rweingarten.bsky.social · 27/05/2026

Our universities are among the most powerful engines we have for research, innovation & economic growth.They foundational to our democracy. We must strengthen these institutions for generations to come. My op-ed with @aaup.org President @proftwolf.bsky.social. www.highereddive.com/news/higher-...

highereddive.com

Higher education must be rebuilt to restore public trust. Here’s how.

The heads of the American Association of University Professors and the American Federation of Teachers lay out their vision for overhauling the sector.

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 22/05/2026

Following the conclusion of the AIM Committee and Dept. of Education negotiated rulemaking meetings, Alliance President and CEO @michaelhgavin.bsky.social issued the statement below:

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 21/05/2026

The AIM Committee and Education Department are considering proposals to limit the freedom to teach, learn, and research. We asked experts about the potential impact. Spoiler alert: long-term prosperity, intellectual diversity, democracy, and access to knowledge are at risk.

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 14/05/2026

Insightful commentary from Alliance Knowledge for Democracy Collective member @cantb.bsky.social on the future of our public research universities, which serve as essential economic and civic engines for the nation

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Scholars Strategy Network @scholars.org · 13/05/2026

In this @usnews.com op-ed @garceslm.bsky.social (@alliancehighered.bsky.social), Eliza Epstein (@utaustin.bsky.social) and @jackiepedota.bsky.social (@umassboston.bsky.social) draw on forthcoming research to argue that anti-DEI laws narrow what students and communities are allowed to know.

usnews.com

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 13/05/2026

"And while it makes sense that college administrators are hesitant to push back, Cain, of Georgia, hopes the data reminds them they cannot shy away in fear. Rather, if higher ed leaders want American academia to survive, they must prioritize a coordinated response to the criticism." bit.ly/42QWBcV

insidehighered.com

Decline in GOP Support for Higher Ed, 30 Years in the Making

The political polarization of lawmakers’ views on higher ed may be at an all-time high, but it didn’t come out of nowhere. One researcher says it’s been brewing since the late 1980s.

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Mike Gavin @michaelhgavin.bsky.social · 12/05/2026

Big thank you to @modernlanguage.bsky.social, @historians.org and ALCS who won a case on the side of knowledge, and fair opportunity. Because when we talk about the humanities and diversity, equity, and inclusion, we are talking about the infrastructure of a multiracial democracy.

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Chancellor John B. King @sunychancellor.bsky.social · 12/05/2026

Proud of our SUNY Maritime cadets for charting a course that powers both opportunity and national service. They’re taking what they’ve learned at SUNY and turning it into high-impact, high-demand careers right out of the gate. www.npr.org/2026/05/09/n...

npr.org

They graduate to six figure salaries, and grueling work

Cadets from the nation's Merchant Marine academies are finding lots of demand and great salaries because of a shortage of licensed mariners.

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 12/05/2026

In order for democracy to thrive higher ed needs to be free from partisan influence, students must have the freedom to learn, and for all people to thrive as a result of better access to college. Read more of @michaelhgavin.bsky.social interview: collegewatch.substack.com/p/seeking-st...

collegewatch.substack.com

Seeking Strength in Numbers

Sixty schools have joined an alliance to push back against the Trump administration

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Mike Gavin @michaelhgavin.bsky.social · 11/05/2026

Avoiding identity in curriculum is segregationist, and what the Trump administration called its 'secret weapon' in on its way to being deployed. Consider following @alliancehighered.bsky.social for details on what you can do.

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 08/05/2026

“This victory belongs to the scholars, students, colleges, universities, associations, state humanities councils, libraries, and local organizations in all 50 states..." said @acls1919.bsky.social President Joy Connolly. “[The humanities] are how a democracy understands itself.” 👏 bit.ly/4w7C5ls

acls.org

Federal Judge Rules to Restore National Endowment for the Humanities Funding In Historic Case

April 2025 termination of grants by the NEH ruled unlawful and unconstitutional.

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 07/05/2026

The WH's budget proposal is a non-starter, but as the federal budget process moves ahead, institutions will need to quickly understand potential threats and opportunities and share those with stakeholders and boards. We've developed a toolkit to help. allianceforhighered.org/resources/me...

allianceforhighered.org

Messaging Tool to aid Stakeholder Communications Regarding Fiscal Year 2027 Federal Budget Proposals

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

When scholars are pressured to scale back, reframe or hide their work, students inevitably feel the consequences... [They] lose access to the intellectual knowledge and personal support systems that help them understand and succeed within a racially diverse society..." www.usnews.com/opinion/arti...

usnews.com

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 06/05/2026

"I have so much hope for this country.... There's a lot more people who believe in students, who believe in the mission of higher ed than you may feel." Thank you @stuaffairsnow.bsky.social for hosting @michaelhgavin.bsky.social and Liliana M. Garces for this timely conversation about our work!

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 04/05/2026

Attacking the NSF, one of the nation's most powerful sources of knowledge creation and innovation, is anti-democratic and will throttle freedom, opportunity, and life-saving discovery.

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Mike Gavin @michaelhgavin.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

@bmckib.bsky.social Bryce McKibben and I offer an analysis of the next way in which financial aid is being used as a weapon. The @alliancehighered.bsky.social has many resources and toolkits explaining other ways federal funding is being weaponized and what you can do.

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Alliance For Higher Education @alliancehighered.bsky.social · 30/04/2026

"Our sector would be wise to ask why, in other areas of our institutions, we place mistakes and innovation in the continuous improvement lens, but with equity, we have been quite willing to let it be thrown out."

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Mike Gavin @michaelhgavin.bsky.social · 28/04/2026

When organizations fight against re-segregation and for democracy, they win. Thank you Democracy Forward, @aaup.org, and National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education for you leadership--my statement in support. #highered #edusky #DEI #academicfreedom #democracy

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