Weekly Briefing: 4 Trends Taking Over Higher Ed

Legacy in admissions comes under scrutiny; wealthy colleges are buying and merging with smaller institutions; and big endowments prompt bigger demands. ADVERTISEMENT [Weekly Briefing Logo]( Did someone forward you this newsletter? [Sign up free]( to receive your own copy. What are the trends shaping higher ed? Higher ed is always changing, even if you don’t immediately notice the shifts. Luckily, The Chronicle’s annual Trends Report is here. Our reporters found out what’s going on beneath the surface at colleges across the country and discovered trends that you may soon see (or already notice) on your campus. Here are four to watch out for: 1. Legacy preferences in admissions face close scrutiny. In 2018, Harvard University’s admissions policy [was revealed in court](. Though that trial focused on race-conscious admissions, legacy preferences also stole the spotlight. Harvard officials said that qualified children of alumni get a boost during the admissions process. Documents filed by the plaintiffs showed that though Harvard’s acceptance rate was in the single digits, about 33 percent of legacy applicants were accepted to the Classes of 2014 through 2019. Calls to end the practice followed the revelation. Some institutions are making changes: Amherst College said that legacies would no longer be given a preference, and the Johns Hopkins University said that since 2014 it had been doing away with legacy preferences. This month, two U.S. lawmakers introduced legislation to stop colleges from giving preferential treatment to applicants with legacy or donor status. However, some observers don’t think that eliminating legacy preferences will help much to diversity student bodies. The change is mostly symbolic. But as more colleges eliminate legacy preferences, keeping the practice may feel increasingly antiquated. 2. With mergers and acquisitions, wealthy colleges keep growing. Colleges’ varying financial outlooks during the pandemic have made way for acquisitions, mergers, and takeovers. Private colleges may acquire colleges in high-growth areas or close to their main campuses. Public colleges may acquire different markets, like in remote areas of the state or online-learning platforms. Colleges that have less capital may want to work with even smaller institutions. Take Emerson College, in Boston, which in 2020 acquired Marlboro College, in Vermont, and created the Marlboro Institute for Liberal Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies at Emerson College. One expert said this trend will probably continue, especially as smaller, tuition-dependent colleges’ growth remains slow. 3. Growing endowments meet broad demands. Some college endowments saw a boom year in 2020-21. Washington University in St. Louis got a 65 precent [return on its endowment](. By the end of the 2021 fiscal year, the endowment was at $15.3 billion. This individual result, and others, is different from the [returns of the past](. The new wealth follows a time when some well-endowed institutions have been under more scrutiny, or even faced a [tax on endowment earnings](. When campuses made cuts because of the pandemic, some upset students and employees questioned why endowment-generated income couldn’t be used to ease those problems. Now, some colleges are using their endowment funds to better support students and employees. For example, [the Massachusetts Institute of Technology]( said it would use its nearly 56-percent gain in endowment returns during the 2021 fiscal year to allocate about $286 million for graduate students, campus infrastructure, and research. But one expert said that colleges should be cautious when funding new polices with endowment returns. Seemingly watershed plans can still fail if they are not properly calibrated with the specific needs of current and former students. 4. Research preprints signal a boost in both science and misinformation. In the first 10 months of the Covid-19 pandemic, scientists posted more than 30,000 preprints about the coronavirus online. Preprint papers are written as standard journal articles but are not yet peer-reviewed. Through October 2020, these paper accounted for about a quarter of Covid-related publications across the globe, according to a PLOS Biology [study](. The surge of open science helped researchers quickly learn about the virus and spread information. Here’s the problem: Preprints can be misused to spread misinformation. Preprint servers allow people to post anything that has the components of a scientific paper — an abstract, methods section, and data and tables. In April 2020, for example, a preprint argued that the coronavirus’s fatality rate was low. That paper went viral. Still, even peer reviews don’t always ensure that papers won’t spread misinformation. And it’s unclear how many inaccurate beliefs about the virus began in preprints. But these papers are part of a bigger misinformation universe. The remedy will have to go beyond scientific literature. One expert suggested that students need to be better prepared with early media literacy. You can read about all these developments and more in our [Trends Report 2022 package here](. SPONSOR CONTENT | Rowan university [Built 'from scratch' Rowan University engineers fly drone swarms around the world]( ADVERTISEMENT Lagniappe. - Learn. If you’re still eating leftover Valentine’s Day candy, here’s something to chew on: Europeans think American chocolate,[like Hershey’s, tastes off](. (Grid) - Read. Last weekend, I finished two tight, emotional novellas: [Senselessness]( Horacio Castellanos Moya (translated by Katherine Silver) and [Sweet]( of]( by Fleur Jaeggy (translated by Tim Parks). They couldn’t be more different, but they’re both great. (Publishers Weekly) - Listen. 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