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, enrollment is projected to fall dramatically and campuses to close. In this episode, we tell you the surprising benefits of this for students and their parents — and the scary prospects for the economy, which will suffer shortages of workers just as baby boomers retire. Come with us to a college fair where recruiters line up to compete for applicants, and hear from enrollment consultants, economists, and the president of a school that has already closed.

“College Uncovered” is made possible by Lumina Foundation.

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Credits:

Hosts and Producers: Kirk Carapezza & Jon Marcus

Editor: Jonathan A. Davis 

Fact -checker: Ryan Alderman

Executive Editor: Jenifer McKim

Executive Producer: Lee Hill  

Mixing and Sound Design: David Goodman & Gary Mott

Artwork: Matt Welch 

Theme Song and original music: Left-Roman

Project Manager: Meiqian He

Consulting Producer and Head of GBH Podcasts: Devin Maverick Robins

"College Uncovered" is a production of GBH News and The Hechinger Report.

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 students intensifies, more states desperate for workforce talent and schools dependent on tuition dollars are turning to direct admissions – a system where students receive college acceptance offers and scholarships before they even apply.

In this episode, hosts Kirk Carapezza and Jon Marcus break down how we got to this point where the college admission process requires students to spend a ton of time and money with no guarantee of success. And they ask whether direct admissions is the solution colleges and students need – or just a Band-Aid on a bigger enrollment crisis. 

“College Uncovered” is made possible by Lumina Foundation.

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Credits:

Hosts and Producers: Kirk Carapezza & Jon Marcus

Editor: Jonathan A. Davis 

Fact -checker: Ryan Alderman

Executive Editor: Jenifer McKim

Executive Producer: Lee Hill  

Mixing and Sound Design: David Goodman & Gary Mott

Artwork: Matt Welch 

Theme Song and original music: Left-Roman

Project Manager: Meiqian He

Consulting Producer and Head of GBH Podcasts: Devin Maverick Robins

"College Uncovered" is a production of GBH News and The Hechinger Report.

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 humanities, and finding new ways to recruit and educate young men, whose numbers are dropping even more precipitously on many campuses. We’ll uncover how these changes affect students, families, higher education, the economy, and our society at large.

College Uncovered is hosted by Kirk Carapezza and Jon Marcus, two skilled multimedia journalists with decades of experience in covering higher education in the United States. They offer students, their families, and anyone curious about the business of college, an unvarnished look at a uniquely American system – and help you make better informed choices. New episodes of College Uncovered drop each week through May and are available wherever you listen to podcasts.

“College Uncovered” is made possible by Lumina Foundation.

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Credits:

Hosts and Producers: Kirk Carapezza & Jon Marcus

Editor: Jonathan A. Davis 

Fact -checker: Ryan Alderman

Executive Editor: Jenifer McKim

Executive Producer: Lee Hill  

Mixing and Sound Design: David Goodman & Gary Mott

Artwork: Matt Welch 

Theme Song and original music: Left-Roman

Project Manager: Meiqian He

Consulting Producer and Head of GBH Podcasts: Devin Maverick Robins

"College Uncovered" is a production of GBH News and The Hechinger Report.

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 education message is rhetoric and how much is potential policy? And what comes next for students and colleges?

 As they wrap up this election year season, Kirk and Jon explore how college may change under a new Trump administration and ask a simple question: what comes next on campus?

 We hear from Michael Brickman, who worked as a senior advisor in the U.S. Education Department during Trump’s first term, and Ted Mitchell, president of the American Council on Education, the nation’s biggest association of colleges and universities.

 Then, Jennifer Thornton with the Business Higher Education Forum and Maria Flynn with Jobs For the Future explain why on-the-job training through apprenticeships is one policy likely to move forward quickly in a second Trump administration.

We also hear from students who backed Trump and those who fear his return to the Oval Office, including Jenson Wu with The Trevor Project, who tells us a second Trump term could have a significant impact on LGBTQ college students.

“College Uncovered” is made possible by Lumina Foundation.

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 Texas, Mississippi and other states where abortion is illegal or restricted can be prosecuted for aborting a fetus.

College students have long been active in the abortion movement, but the activism looks very different today than it did in the 1960’s. College Uncovered takes you to a “pill packing party” at an undisclosed location in Greater Boston and talks with college students mobilizing to help women get abortion medication wherever they live. We also look at the re-energized anti-abortion movement in the wake of the Dobbs ruling two years ago and hear from a leader of the “Post-Roe Generation.” 

GBH’s Andrea Asuaje, senior producer for “Under the Radar with Callie Crossley” hosts this week’s episode, taking a deep dive into the sweeping ways medication abortion and the Internet have changed college activism.

“College Uncovered” is made possible by Lumina Foundation.

Correction: A prior version of this episode misinterpreted Kristan Hawkins’ comments at Harvard Law School and erroneously said she had an abortion. In fact, Hawkins’ comments were referring to what other women have told her about having an abortion. We have updated the episode and GBH News regrets the error. 

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Credits:

Guest Host: Andrea Asuaje

Supervising Editor: Megan Woolhouse

Editor: Jeff Keating

Executive Producer: Ellen London 

Mixing and Sound Design: David Goodman & Gary Mott

Theme Song and original music: Left-Roman

Artwork: Matt Welch 

Project Manager: Meiqian He

Consulting Producer and Head of GBH Podcasts: Devin Maverick Robins

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 president? And, as a student, does it even matter who your president is? What questions should students and their families be asking of a colleges’ top brass? We talk to former Colorado College president Song Richardson, who left her dream job because she wanted to speak freely about hot-button issues, and the current and former presidents of Macalester College, Suzanne Rivera and Brian Rosenberg, to learn more about what's driving people away from jobs at the top of the academic ladder.

“College Uncovered” is made possible by Lumina Foundation.

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Credits:

Hosts: Kirk Carapezza & Jon Marcus

Supervising Editor: Megan Woolhouse

Editor: Jeff Keating

Executive Producer: Ellen London 

Mixing and Sound Design: David Goodman & Gary Mott

Theme Song and original music: Left-Roman

Artwork: Matt Welch 

Project Manager: Meiqian He

Consulting Producer and Head of GBH Podcasts: Devin Maverick Robins

"College Uncovered" is a production of GBH News and The Hechinger Report.

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 preemptively banning DEI after threats by lawmakers to withhold money and raises. Even colleges in left-leaning states are no longer asking applicants to provide diversity statements for new faculty positions.

So how is DEI defined and what’s lost when it goes away? How has a “DEI bureaucracy” gone out of control? Will colleges increasingly eliminate scholarships designed for historically marginalized students?

Special guest host and GBH Investigative Reporter Phillip Martin joins this week’s podcast to talk about what’s behind the changes.

“College Uncovered” is made possible by Lumina Foundation.

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Credits:

Hosts: Kirk Carapezza & Jon Marcus

Supervising Editor: Megan Woolhouse

Editor: Jeff Keating

Executive Producer: Ellen London 

Mixing and Sound Design: David Goodman & Gary Mott

Theme Song and original music: Left-Roman

Artwork: Matt Welch 

Project Manager: Meiqian He

Consulting Producer and Head of GBH Podcasts: Devin Maverick Robins

"College Uncovered" is a production of GBH News and The Hechinger Report.

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. People in rural America already have far less access to colleges and universities than people in cities and suburbs. Nearly 13 million people in the US already live in higher education desserts, places well beyond commuting distance to a college.

But now many of the schools that exist to serve rural students are cutting programs and majors.
We talk about this trend, and how it exacerbates the already wide economic, social and political divisions between many rural and urban Americans.

“College Uncovered” is made possible by Lumina Foundation.

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Credits:

Hosts: Kirk Carapezza & Jon Marcus

Supervising Editor: Megan Woolhouse

Editor: Jeff Keating

Executive Producer: Ellen London 

Mixing and Sound Design: David Goodman & Gary Mott

Theme Song and original music: Left-Roman

Artwork: Matt Welch 

Project Manager: Meiqian He

Consulting Producer and Head of GBH Podcasts: Devin Maverick Robins

"College Uncovered" is a production of GBH News and The Hechinger Report.

More than 40 million Americans have student loan debt, but should the government forgive all or part of it? It’s a debate that’s a source of extreme political division. Opponents call it a transfer of wealth from the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder to the top and people with college degrees; supporters say forgiveness gives some breathing room to graduates who are being crushed by the costs of repayment, in some cases without ever even having graduated. The cost of college is also forcing people to put off marriage, starting families, or buying a house and fuel the American economy. We’ll hear from student loan holders and get advice on how to avoid going into debt in the first place.

“College Uncovered” is made possible by Lumina Foundation.

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Credits:

Hosts: Kirk Carapezza & Jon Marcus

Supervising Editor: Megan Woolhouse

Editor: Jeff Keating

Executive Producer: Ellen London 

Mixing and Sound Design: David Goodman & Gary Mott

Theme Song and original music: Left-Roman

Artwork: Matt Welch 

Project Manager: Meiqian He

Consulting Producer and Head of GBH Podcasts: Devin Maverick Robins

"College Uncovered" is a production of GBH News and The Hechinger Report.

Following intense, sometimes violent protests on college campuses last spring, colleges are taking new steps to encourage more civil dialogue and debate among students who disagree. Some schools are offering new guidance and coursework around how students should speak to one another in an effort to bridge deep differences. At the same time, colleges are tightening restrictions on campus protests related to the war in Gaza, and cracking down on protest tactics with heightened enforcement. We’ll explore the new approaches and talk with experts about the efforts to help students speak across their differences.

“College Uncovered” is made possible by Lumina Foundation.

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Credits:

Hosts: Kirk Carapezza & Jon Marcus

Supervising Editor: Megan Woolhouse

Editor: Jeff Keating

Executive Producer: Ellen London 

Mixing and Sound Design: David Goodman & Gary Mott

Theme Song and original music: Left-Roman

Artwork: Matt Welch 

Project Manager: Meiqian He

Consulting Producer and Head of GBH Podcasts: Devin Maverick Robins

"College Uncovered" is a production of GBH News and The Hechinger Report.