Reported by Higher Ed Dive, Rutgers University was the first institution to announce a vaccine requirement for students to be able to return to campus this fall. While requiring vaccination for on-campus learning is common at most institutions, COVID-19 vaccines are only approved by the FDA under an emergency use authorization, which potentially opens a legal opportunity to protest the mandate.

Reported by Higher Ed Dive, The Presidents Forum composed of college and university presidents and chancellors has developed 10 guiding principles for reinventing higher education, including a focus on learner objectives, an embrace of lifelong learning, and signaling through skills.

Reported by Higher Ed Dive, California’s new budget includes nearly $49 billion in higher education investment, including $1 billion to establish a career development program to link campuses with employers.

Reported by EdSurge, while giant prize contests have been successful in accelerating innovation in other industries such as commercial space flight, will those same incentives work in the higher education learning sciences?

Reported by EdSurge, from Oculus, Google Glass, and Pokemon Go, the fad of virtual and augmented reality has always felt promising, but has yet to achieve super deep mainstream status.

Reported by EdSurge, raising $250 million at more than a $3.6 billion valuation implies massive growth hopes for the company that already serves 77 million registered learners. But how to scale? Because currently they only work with 150 selective colleges and universities, and seem to love living in that prestige brand lane.

Reported by EdSurge, more and more people are able to say, “I studied IT at Google.” “I studied computer science at IBM.” “I studied marketing at Hubspot.” There is a parallel credential track and pathway on the employer side flourishing before our eyes.

Reported by Higher Ed Dive, new California bills look to expand the number and options of bachelor’s degrees offered by community colleges (contingent on them not overlapping with public university offerings). The goals here are to provide more affordable bachelor’s degree pathways, and to prevent California students from transferring out-of-state in order to earn their bachelor’s degree more affordably.

Reported by Higher Ed Dive, Kansas state lawmakers are promoting a proposal that would require public institutions to refund half of student’s tuition dollars for any instructional days made virtual due to the pandemic, estimated at more than $150 million dollars.

Reported by Higher Ed Dive, the non-profit Education Design Lab has launched a new microcredentials platform that allows colleges and universities to badge their soft skills, including communication, collaboration, problem-solving, and critical-thinking.