The World of Higher Education

Host Alex Usher speaks with Katherine Isaacs, a former professor of history at the University of Pisa and former vice chair of the Bologna Follow-Up Group of the European Higher Education Area, about Italy’s higher education system, its distinctive characteristics, and the challenges it faces.

They discuss the structure and funding of Italian higher education, the role of the state in university governance and academic careers, and recent reforms intended to address concerns about academic hiring and nepotism. The conversation also explores graduate employment outcomes, regional inequalities, and the ongoing brain drain as talented Italian graduates seek opportunities abroad.

Isaacs also examines the expansion of private and online universities, including how these institutions are regulated and quality-assured, and the growing role of lifelong learning in Italian higher education. She reflects on the system’s often-overlooked strengths, including its high academic standards and relatively affordable tuition, and considers how Italian universities might evolve over the next two decades.

👉 Episode Links:

• The Bologna Process and the European Higher Education Area
• AlmaLaurea — Graduate Employment Data
• ANVUR — Italy's Higher Education Quality Assurance Agency
• Higher Education Strategy Associates | The State of Postsecondary Education in Canada 2026

Host Alex Usher speaks with Roger Smyth, a tertiary education consultant and former senior official at New Zealand’s Ministry of Education, about the country’s recent higher education policy changes and what the upcoming election could mean for the sector.

They discuss the government’s reforms to research funding, including a shift towards metrics-based assessment and greater centralization, the end of the fees-free tuition policy, and New Zealand’s relatively successful recovery in international student enrolments. The conversation also explores the government’s efforts to align research more closely with economic priorities, and the implications for funding in areas such as the social sciences and humanities.

Smyth also examines the higher education platforms of the major parties ahead of the November election, including competing proposals to reduce graduate student debt and the potential influence of smaller parties on international education policy. He considers whether a change of government is likely to bring meaningful changes to New Zealand’s higher education system, or whether the fundamental policy settings are likely to remain much the same.

👉 Episode Links:

• University Advisory Group — Final Report
• NZ Tertiary Education Strategy 2025–2030
• The State of Postsecondary Education in Canada 2026

Host Alex Usher speaks with Jan-Martin Wiarda, one of Germany’s leading education journalists and bloggers, about the rise of the Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) and what its growing political influence could mean for German higher education.

They discuss the AfD’s origins and political agenda, its views on universities, science and academic freedom, and the reasons for its growing support across Germany. The conversation also explores how the country’s federal system could affect higher education policy, including the ability of state governments to influence universities through funding and the potential for political pressure to lead to institutional self-censorship.

Wiarda also considers how German universities might respond if the AfD gains further power at the state level, and whether the country’s consensus-based higher education system can adapt to a political force that rejects consensus.

👉 Episode Links:

• Der Wiarda Blog
• The State of Postsecondary Education in Canada 2026

Host Alex Usher speaks with novelist, Randy Boyagoda, about his new novel, Lords of Serendipity.

They discuss what distinguishes Boyagoda’s novel from the traditional campus fiction genre, including its focus on multiple universities, international students, and the global higher education system. The conversation explores the pressures and incentives that shape universities, from international tuition and admissions to the ways students, professors, and administrators can become caught in systems of competition, ambition, and financial pressure.

The episode also considers the moral compromises that can emerge within higher education, and what fiction can reveal about the people and institutions navigating those pressures.

👉 Episode Links:

• Lords of Serendipity by Randy Boyagoda

Host Alex Usher speaks with Alma Maldonado-Maldonado, an education researcher at CINESTAV and a member of the independent commission that investigated UNAM’s 2026 entrance exam, about the cheating scandal that followed the university’s first fully online undergraduate admissions test.

They discuss how unusual patterns in the exam results raised concerns about widespread cheating, the various ways students may have circumvented the online testing system, and the challenges of determining individual responsibility when the integrity of the exam as a whole has been called into question.

Alma Maldonado-Maldonado also explains the commission’s recommendation for a partial retest, the protests and consequences that followed, and what the episode reveals about the challenges universities face as admissions testing moves online.

Host Alex Usher speaks with William Whyte, professor of social and architectural history at Oxford and author of The University: A History in Stone, Silk, and Blood, about the material history of the university.

Rather than tracing the institution chronologically, Whyte examines universities through the materials that have shaped them, from the stone buildings that anchored medieval universities to the concrete campuses of the postwar era and the silicon of today’s digital age. They discuss why universities became landowners, how physical spaces shaped institutional power and identity, and the complex relationship between universities, their communities, and the state.

The conversation also considers what the university’s material history can tell us about its future: as technology makes online education increasingly possible, do universities still need campuses and face-to-face communities?

👉 Episode Links:

• The University: A History in Stone, Silk, and Blood, by William Whyte: https://www.hup.harvard.edu/books/9780674495180
• Focus Friday Sept 18 | Student Experience This Year: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/dal5wpbRQ4aeCbC68WW9mA#/registration

Host Alex Usher speaks with Brendan Cantwell, co-author of The Post-Liberal University: Governance, Leadership, and Partisanship in Higher Education, about the changing political landscape of American higher education.

They explore the shift from the postwar “liberal accord” to the neoliberal model of recent decades, and Cantwell’s argument that American higher education is now entering a post-liberal era in which partisan priorities are playing a much greater role in university governance.

The conversation examines growing political intervention in universities, the erosion of institutional autonomy and academic freedom, whether the trend is uniquely American or reflects broader approaches to the role of government in higher education, and what university leaders and governing boards can do to navigate this new environment.

👉 Episode Links:

• The Postliberal University: Governance, Leadership, and Partisanship in Higher Education by Barrett J. Taylor and Brendan Cantwell
• Focus Friday: Sign up to the One Thought to Start Your Day newsletter

Host Tiffany MacLennan speaks with Alex Usher for a mid-year review of the major trends shaping higher education around the world in 2026. Revisiting themes from HESA’s World of Higher Education Year in Review report, Usher reflects on the growing influence of political interference, financial pressures, artificial intelligence, and shifting global centres of research and innovation.

The conversation explores funding crises in countries including the United Kingdom, South Africa, and Kenya, the rise of private universities in emerging economies, and the challenges facing Canadian institutions as they adapt to declining international student revenues. Usher also offers his predictions for the months ahead and highlights the stories higher education watchers should be following as the new academic year approaches.

👉 Episode Links:

• The World of Higher Education — Year in Review 2025: Read the free report

Host Alex Usher speaks with Javier Botero about the state of higher education in Colombia as the country heads into a pivotal presidential election. They explore the legacy of President Gustavo Petro, whose government has significantly increased public funding for higher education while continuing to face criticism over institutional finances, funding mechanisms, and its often-tense relationship with private universities. 

The conversation examines ongoing debates around university funding, student admissions, and the role of the private sector, as well as the unusual political and legal dispute surrounding the leadership of the National University of Colombia. 

Botero also reflects on the strengths and shortcomings of Petro's higher education agenda and considers what may lie ahead under Colombia's next government, including how different election outcomes could reshape the balance between public and private provision in the country's higher education system. 

👉 Episode Links:

• Focus Friday | June 5, 2026: Community Chat. Register for Free

Host Alex Usher speaks with Gerard Postiglione, one of the leading experts on Chinese higher education, about the dramatic transformation of China’s university system over the past half-century. Drawing on his new book, Higher Education in China, Postiglione reflects on the country’s rise from the upheaval of the Cultural Revolution to becoming a global higher education and research powerhouse. The conversation explores the evolution of the Gaokao, the push for world-class universities, Hong Kong’s changing role within China’s higher education landscape, and the challenges China faces around skills, equity, governance, and artificial intelligence. 

👉 Episode Links:

• Higher Education in China: Domestic Demands and Global Aspirations by Gerard A. Postiglione
• WorldEd S4 E8: Inside the Gaokao: China’s Defining Test with Ruixue Jia
• Focus Friday: Sign up to the One Thought to Start Your Day newsletter