A Look Back and Ahead, with Mike Bilfinger, Assistant Director of Public Policy (AACRAO)

In this episode, HEARD welcomes  Mike Bilfinger, Assistant Director of Public Policy at AACRAO, for a look back at what went down in the first year of President Trump's second term, and what is coming up in 2026 and beyond. We discussed Project 2025 details that came to fruition, changes to the Department of Education that are likely to last beyond this administration and the impact to diversity, equity, and inclusion, and new ways we will all be asked to measure the value of higher education. We round things up with how we can (and currently do) make a difference in affecting positive change for students and our institutions. 

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Hi everyone. It's 2026 and Heard is back after another absence in the fall. Up top, I want to make sure that you know that the wonderful Tashwna Curtis has stepped away from the Heard podcast as our co-host. We will miss her contributions which made this show possible. And Portia and I are planning for the future and how we can best meet the needs of the community going forward, given that we now have a missing piece to our herd puzzle. OK. In this episode, we spoke with Mike Bilfinger, Assistant Director of Public Policy at ACR. Portia and I wanted to get Mike's take on the last year of the Trump administration. What went down as expected, what was different, and what comes next. One important note about this episode, around 45 minutes in or so, you will hear me pop in with an edit to summarize the new earnings premium accountability metric, which should take effect in July 2026. After we recorded with Mike, uh, we realized that we had some slight errors when we discussed that complex topic. So you'll hear me giving you the download with the details and then it'll switch back to Mike. Finally, as I write this on January 14th, sitting in downtown Minneapolis, it is difficult to put together this introduction and keep it succinct and focused. Like many of you, I am distracted and devastated by what is happening in my literal backyard, and it is taking a toll. That is the truth. And what is also true is that having the opportunity to create this podcast for all of you with Portia is keeping me sane and reminding me that we have a very special opportunity to communicate to our Acro family, hoping that what we share is helpful in some way right now. We don't always know if we're meeting your needs, and Porsche and I talk a lot about what real diversity even is, especially since there is so much ground we haven't covered, that weighs on us. We're always talking about how we can do it better, but the gift of trying to figure that out in real time, of being vulnerable and not quite right all the time, makes us feel like we are part of your work and your world, where we're all just trying to figure it out every day. So, as we move forward into 2026, P Porsche and I will do our best to keep our conversations relevant, actionable, and we hope that they serve as a way to build community with you. Tell us what would make this better and make this matter for you, and Portia and I will show up and do our best. Thanks for being out there. All right. Let's get started. Hi everybody. Welcome to another episode of Heard. I'm Ingrid Nuttall. I'm Portia Lamar, and joining us today is Mike Bfinger, assistant director of public policy for ACR Mike. Thank you so much for coming on Heard. Yeah, thank you for having me, guys. I, we were just joking. I'm kind of excited to have my click and clack moment here on, on the podcast. It's real. It's real. We can't wait for all of the, uh, diagnosis you're gonna give us about what's happening in higher education. So, um, The, the way that we like to start before we kind of dive into our questions is, can you introduce yourself to her listeners and talk about just who you are, um, any details about yourself that you're willing to share about your background? A little bit about myself. So my educational background, I was a double major in political science and philosophy at Stony Brook University in New York, which is where I'm originally from, born and raised. Um, I was one of those kids, didn't go very far for school, but that then meant, um, for grad school, I did want to go away. And I graduated from undergrad right in the middle of the pandemic. So I had all these plans, like I Maybe I, I'm gonna start a job and do that for a year or something and then go to, to grad school. The plan was always grad school though. Um, my father would, would not allow otherwise. God bless him, right? I'm, I'm, I'm happy that I have the degree now, don't get me wrong. Um, But, you know, graduating in the middle of the pandemic, it was like, job market, nothing's there. The other thing that I was considering was Peace Corps. That was totally shut down. So the natural thing was, we'll just keep being a student. So I got accepted to American University and their Master's of Public Policy. or master's of Public Administration. That's when I moved to DC and as part of that program, there was an internship requirement. You had to have, you know, 400 hours or something in an internship related to your field of study. And that's how I got engaged with Agro. I initially joined as their marketing and communications intern. And that did that for about a year. And then I transitioned to the membership department where I was, um, an associate director for membership and awards, did that for about a year, and then, uh, finally landed in this position, the assistant director of public policy. So it's, it's been a bit of a circuitous route, but I, my goal has always been policy. I, I knew from a, I don't want to say from a young age, but certainly when I was picking my, my courses of study. Um, I've, I've loved policy, but I distinctly, I didn't want to be an elected official. Right? There, there's this great quote by uh JFK. Everyone, every mother wants their son to be president. No one wants him to be a politician. Right, and I think that highlights something to a degree like I want to, I really do believe that politics is the way to make collective, collective action. I do believe in The power of the political system to make wide sweeping change to improve lives, but I also value my privacy, right? Like I, this is a job. I want to be able to walk away come 5 o'clock. Like I can, I can log out and I don't get followed by reporters or there's this constant kind of awesome manicuring of your public image. Um, that was really unattractive to me, but I do want to be the person who's like standing behind the politician, giving them the facts, giving them the information so they can make an informed decision. Um, um, oh, sorry, I'm interrupting you, just with an observe with an observation because you, the manicuring of your public image, and this is something we can talk about later. I actually kind of feel like that is becoming more and more a very real expectation of higher education institutions and even individuals of like constant refinement, con constant trying to, to manage that above and beyond who you want to be to the students you serve, but also like who you wanna be to. Your state or your govern, the federal government, I think, so maybe we can talk about that later, but I interrupted you and I wanna hear more. Sorry. Beyond, uh, my educational background, my, my involvement with Acro, I, I'm an avid bike commuter. I originally, when I moved here, I moved down with my car and very quickly realized how just nonsensical it is to own a car with my lifestyle. Um, so, have loved, sold it. There was some initial kind of pain there for a little bit. I don't look back anymore. Like occasionally when moving stuff, I, I think it would have been nice to have a car. I am so grateful that I, that I made that jump and I'm pro like we just had our holiday Christmas party and everyone got a little um superlative, and mine was most likely to rant about public transit or or bike free living. Like I, I am that guy. Um, I love music. I played the saxophone for 12 years. I still own my saxophones. I don't play them anymore, but that very much influences my music taste. I, we just had our Spotify wrapped for anyone that's a Spotify wrapped user, and I'm very proudly beat both of my sisters yet again in the number. They both listen to like 10,000 minutes. This is a competition, OK? I want to listen to the most music. I'm in the 40,000 plus category, which I'm very proud to, third year running, say. Um, and I also like to, uh, when I have the time to, to go bouldering indoor, I should preface cause I'm sure there's going to be some people that'll, that'll ask, um, and, and computer games. I'm a bit of a nerd for, for a good strategy game. So when we wrap up the formal part of this interview, we're gonna stay on and Portia can choose to leave if she wants, but we are going to have a, uh, bike, a cycle, a cycle path, uh, conversation. Behind me are my mountain bikes. I have my wet tires downstairs, and I have my, uh, city bikes. In, uh, someplace else, so we're gonna do that after, after you lost me with bike. You lost me with bike and traveling. I don't, it's so many questions that I have like I just feel like, so I'm coming to work smelling like outside like I, I can't,-- it doesn't vibe well with my you wanna go-- from inside to inside to inside. Also, me and elements don't get along, OK. Unless it's well air conditioned, not too cold, not too hot. You, uh, I've got issues. I'm fine with bear, your baby bear. Porsche baby bear. So, Mike, this time last year, I cannot believe it was last year, um, but right around now we spoke with Acro about the immediate perceptions of where we might be headed in President Trump's second term with regards to higher education, everything that was happening, all that anticipation. And so here we are. A year later, and we wanna ask you how things have played out. What was confirmed, what has been unexpected, um, where are we at, uh, versus where we thought we would be. So this one, I, I told this to Portia already, but I, I got to extend the, the gratitude to you as well, Ingrid. Fantastic job with this little prep document, having the questions in advance, but also it, it really does do a lot to kind of put at ease like, OK, you'll go over to Zincaster, all of that. This question though, as I was kind of looking through them and doing prep, was one that I quickly spiraled on because there is There's so, I feel like we could spend an hour just on this one, to be frank, um. I'm going to start with some things that were said on the campaign trail either explicitly in Project 2025, which I know the president has tried to distance himself from, but it is clear that that is a was an indicator at the time of what the administration is thinking about its reforms for higher ed. So things that were said either rhetorically or literally in the campaign trail that we've seen actualized in some way now a year into Trump's second term. So first and foremost, I, we've got to start with abolishing the Department of Education, right? This was a big, big piece of his campaign rhetoric, and continues to be a priority for the administration. And although myself and I think anyone else in the higher education space will say like, The Education department still exists. They have, it, it is not the same institution as it was 9 months ago, right? It, it has been. Entirely altered, and I don't know that we'll ever get. A full get back what it was, right, even if a new president comes along, funding priorities change, some of the institutional knowledge that has been lost as a result, and some of the The way that they've been able to push the Oh, I'm gonna forget the word that Oriobiners, um. I'm thinking of, I, I'm the accurate, the window, the Overton window, the Overton window. Thank you. I was gonna say Schrodinger's cat, but that's not what you're talking about. Sorry, Overton window. The way that they push the Overton window, like priorities of the department are vastly different, and I, I think we're always going to kind of live in a post-Trump world when it comes to how we talk about. Uh, higher education and the education department. So when you, well, when, when you say that, what, what are you like? Do you think in saying that, are you, uh, are you saying? We would adapt to these ideologies that he has, that he has had or in removing the Department of Education or we'll just adjust and make it better without having the Department of Education the way we knew it. I, I think you're about uh All the rhetoric about affordability, regardless of where you fall on the political spectrum, affordability is an issue, and I think Trump, to his credit, has done a fantastic job bringing that to the forefront, right? That is a central part when we talk about higher ed reform. He's also elevated conversation around workforce development. I think even post-Trump workforce development will be a continuing priority in how we set up grants at the federal level, of how we give money to institutions, but also how we talk about higher ed. I think there's going to be a continuing a persistence, and we want to see strong connection between if the taxpayer gives money to an institution, we want to see what is the workforce. ROY on that. I don't foresee that going away, even a post-Trump. I think that's going to stick with us. Um, as a nation, we've kind of, the, the conversation around higher ed has been shaped by this administration. I don't think you can undo that molding, so to speak. Um, so, I, I know we wanna get into kind of what else has changed, but I just wanna ask a question about that. So before Trump was ever president, we were talking about gainful employment, right? We were talking about other kinds of, of measures of the same. So what makes this different? I don't think the public was aware of those conversations, right? And I said we need to, this is a bit tricky because ACRA members are the higher up, we are the public as well. But for Amongst the community, certainly, yes, there was conversations going on about gainful employment, about return on value. By no means is this a new Congress. I mean, before even Trump's first term, right, we were talking about public perceptions of, of higher ed. Our public confidence was decreasing, right? That, that's not a new thing. What I do think is new this time though is, is layman. Lay people are picking up on that as well, and it's, it's not just, it's no longer isolated to, well, those people who are reading the news or are really looped in on this issue are aware of it. The grandparent who doesn't read The New York Times, right, could tell you about, well, Cornell had that really big settlement with, with higher with the administration, like it has become so kind of pervasive that even people outside of the industry are are. Tracking these conversations and are engaged with them. That sounds like a good thing to me. Like I, I say that with, um, like looking at the lens of not living inside, it's higher education, I mean, I've been in it my whole career. It's a very beauti, it can be a very beautiful bubble to be in, um, particularly because you're dealing with People coming, you know, obviously people are coming at all stages of their life, but so many people are coming in for the first time thinking about what they're going to do and how they're gonna make a difference and how they're going to capitalize on their own interests, and it's just, it's a special, special thing, and that special thing can have this sort of bubble around it, right, that can be disconnected from what happens after the fact. And so I'm interested in your thoughts as someone operating in like the public space, right, with public policy and trying to get Politicians to understand for their communities, for their laypeople, why, what the value of higher education is. Do you see value in that kind of transcendence of, uh, of these conversations from gainful employment besides higher education and all of us kind of knowing what it is and what everybody just out there in the country understands about what's happening in higher education. I, I, I fully agree with you. I think this is a positive thing, uh, in a certain, right, not to, I'm trying not to be cliche, you miss 100% of the shots, you don't take.-- I-- know, yeah. Oh yes, one of my favorites. But like if you don't have the conversation, right, if, if, if discussion isn't happening, you're not going to find a solution, right? You need to, like, I think as a, as a prerequisite or step one, you've got to show up and engage in the conversation, and the fact that that's happening at a broader level, I think is a good thing. Um, and I would argue even to some degree here, something like Trump's compact, while Not to be confused, right, not an endorsement of the compact by any means. It is a really disastrous agreement for institutions, but it does raise issues that I think the public has kind of been. Hinting at in Gallup polls, in public perceptions, but just hadn't been shouted loudly like affordability, right? The compact asks demand schools to freeze tuition for 5 years. Practically speaking, that's, that's like some institutions might be able to do that. That is not reasonable as a demand for all institutions, but it does raise the question we have an affordability crisis. How are we going to address that? Institutions are more tuition dependent than ever. And this recognition, while the solution being proposed here of freezing tuition or limiting international student enrollment, while those aren't going to address the issue, they do raise the question, and that, I think, is kind of in a certain sense, step one of a good thing, right? The public is becoming engaged and aware we are giving a lot of money through research funding, through tuition assistance, like public money is flowing to these schools. Where's our value for that? And I think that's a perfectly legitimate question for the public to ask and demand answers on. So in that sense, I think it's a Good, not necessarily the solution, but like the awareness of this is a good thing to be having these conversations, right, and there are alternative solutions, right, to those, to those. So what are some of the Are there different solutions, conversations, negotiations that you're aware of or can think of that the community, the acro community might like to know about that they can kind of get behind or conversations they could start at their institution rather than, um, or in addition to like, we have all been in reactive mode. Um, how can we, how can we have a balance or where can we put our energy from being reactive to being like, actually, you want to solve the affordability crisis, here's some things that we could do.-- I wish I was a genie-- because I want answers now, Mike. We are done.-- Either-- check GPT it or figure it out, Mike. I'll answer this in a few ways. One, I do think whatever, there is a role for the federal government here, but I think it, it needs to, the federal government needs to recognize institutions. Part of the strength of the American system is the diversity of institutions. And with that diversity come one solution is going to fit all. Some institutions might be able to do 5 year tuition freeze. For others, that's completely out of the question, right? And so it can't be a blanket solution. I do think it has to be kind of at the institutional level to some extent. But again, there is a role for the federal government. The federal government can give cover for schools to, to buy into these things. It can give support, right, through, through appropriations, through funding, um. A few areas that I'll, that I'll highlight for folks. I'm skipping ahead a little bit here. I'm kind of starting to think of um question three, right? Some of the things of what we're paying attention to. Um, We, so ACR, we have a project called the LER Accelerator. LER stands for Learning Employment Records, and this is, I'm probably doing a disservice if Mike Simmons or anyone else who's in the LER world is listening. Please forgive me here, but it's kind of like a, a, a digital transcript resume experience all wrapped in one that the individual owns, not the institution, and it's There's a few standards, right, interoperable, stackable, you know, some, some buzzwords there that I'm probably not the best person to define, but there are some important standards to these systems, and the goal is that it is reflective of an individual's totality of their experience. So if I was In the military and I was a mechanic in the military, and I come back and I'm now going to go to engineering school and they, as a prerequisite for my classes have mechanics 101. I might have to take that, that, that mechanics 101 class, despite the fact that my experience being a mechanic in the military, I already know this, right? I don't need to take this course and LER would be able to Validate that experience and display that to the schools. The school could say, OK, we're going to waive your mechanics 101, but also to an employer. You could imagine an employer might have a similar, like, before you're in the interim period for your job, we need you to do X credential or whatnot. Based on your experience, you might be able to show to that employer, hey, I've already, I already have that experience actually. You can waive that requirement for me. What I think is significant about this, and this is a priority for ACR, but it has huge potential to better align if we think about schools as kind of supply side and employers as demand side in classic economics, it better aligns these two. So I need 10 doctors in this state. Great. Here's 10 doctors in that state being prepared for you in our, in our school pipeline. If those two sides, right, really, really closely connect to one another, I It's better for the, for the students. They know, right, with, with a higher degree of certainty, when I graduate, there's going to be demand for whatever degree I'm going to get, so I, I'm more likely to get a job. It's easier to transfer or to take, uh, credits or experiences with you from one state to another, from one employer to another, from one institution to another, um, and it I believe really strongly is also going to help people who maybe have stopped out. It's going to allow for an easier reentry into the higher education ecosystem. The reality of things like AI and other technologies, we are likely going to need to reskill, or I should say for myself, right, I will likely need to reskill at some point during my 50 year career ahead of me. And LER makes that much more. Much easier of a lift for that individual looking to go back to school, you know, in their 40s perhaps, right now they have kids. They don't have to go back to that. What was that institution from 20 years ago? I need a transcript, a copy of that. Oh, you don't have it. OK. What provider do it could potentially eliminate all of that. So I'm going to apply to school. Here's my digital. It could be as simple as a PDF, right? Like, here's the file, just email it to you. Let me know what else you need, and that's all my, my admissions materials right there in a sense. Um, I'm, I'm oversimplifying a, a little bit here, but There was recently a congressional hearing on LERs where ACRA sponsored one of the, one of the witnesses who testified, and just a few days after that, the, the Education Department announced a $15 million grant to support states developing talent marketplaces, which is one of the big, uh, one of the big tenets of LERs, right? Talent marketplaces is, is that place where you connect the employer and the the school more closely. Um. So, I I think that very much aligns with the administration's priorities around workforce development that gets to in some way I think that it starts to kind of address affordability. Maybe we'll have less stranded credits, more likely for people to actually finish a degree, even if they stopped out to reenter, and it's going to make it an easier time for people to to be mobile, to move around from employers, from schools, from states. All of this, I think, ultimately makes a stronger workforce. So, um, I think Portia and I would be remiss if we didn't kind of Think through that like the promotion of a strong workforce with an eye towards the origins of the podcast of um equity and diversity and who it's serving and what that workforce looks like um. So I, I mean, I think it, I, I don't think I'm being particularly political when I say that there is a, you know, targeted attempt towards making, um, not just the workforce, but the country at large fit one particular kind of mold or at least only providing services and support to individuals that fit a mold that um does not include people who We were born in other countries, who are trans, who are uh black, who are any number of things, right? So it's very specific, um, and so I'm curious about how ACR is thinking about these types of really, these well-funded initiatives and, and what, how to make sure that they are, that what ACR has control over is serving and being mindful of how to make that, um. As as broad of a reach for as many people as possible. I do think LERs, so LERs are agnostic or that they should be, right? Just like a, a Any other kind of document showing experience, right? It it The tenets of an LER 2 stackable, interoperable, right, particularly the use of interoperable there, it means that And again, probably not doing the best job defining it, but my understanding is that um you It's not going to be Jargon that is specific to a particular field or a file format. Well, you need our very expensive platform in order to open up this file format, right? It should be open access, um, you, the individual, own it, so it. There isn't a It eliminates some barriers perhaps to accessing. I was talking about the example of having to like 20 years later go back to get a transcript from the school. Sometimes you have to pay for that transcript. There would be no cost to this, right? In LER, you're the owner of, you don't pay to access it. You don't pay to take it with you when you move somewhere else. So I do think an LER. would do a lot to lessen barriers that exist for folks. I don't know that that was. The intention when, you know, I don't know how much that was that was embedded into the birth of the idea of an LER, but I do think that that would be an undeniable consequence of an LER. I was not trying to um dig a deeper hole with the LER because clearly I do understand that it is, you know, still. In that manner of figuring it out. And I wanted to try to uh backtrack to your question, Ingrid, and figure out what Mike thought was unexpected that happened with this administration and higher ed that you didn't see happening, like something that you just did not see coming and it, and it happened. The reality is a lot of this, a lot of the stuff that happened. You know, perhaps I'll speak for myself, kind of read about it, but surely that's not going to come to fruition, right? I'm, I'm a little in denial or I'm, I'm going to will myself to ignore this thing, stick my head in the sand. But the reality is I, I think a lot of what we've seen with higher ed was either explicitly stated or heavily hinted at. Um, we should not be surprised by much of what This administration is doing right comes to abolishing Department of Ed. They said that loud and clear, reforming accreditation or this, this general view that accreditors are woke and force DEI onto onto schools. They said that during the campaign trail, sure enough, they're taking steps to reform the accreditation system, immigration crackdown, right? All that we're seeing about H-1B visas, social media vetting. Duration of status rule that's going to be really disruptive to international student exchange, rescinding in-state tuition for undocumented students. Like maybe they didn't say those specific things, but his position on, on immigration was clear during the campaign trail. His attacks in higher ed, they started in his first term, right? That's not a new thing. His general scrutiny of, of science and established facts that we then see play out in NIH cuts, NSF cuts. I, this is a really potentially, you know, depressing list, but I, I, I, I hope it. You know, proves my point to some degree that unfortunately a lot of what we're seeing happen from the Trump administration, they were saying, Bright and clear six months ago. How do we get over that though? Like how do we get over that, uh, oh, it's not gonna, or they're not gonna like. Perhaps a little bit of a brute example, but like if I say, hey, I'm going to I'm going to slap you, Porsche, and then I slap you. What did you like, it didn't change the fact. How do you prepare for that? What do you do to stop the slap from coming? You, you don't. You can't, you know, you maybe tense a little bit or whatnot, but like, Portia would knock you out.-- Is-- our pen. I'm a mama, Mike, right? And I, to farther the analogy, I, I think to a degree that's kind of what you've seen with higher ed when you, the lawsuits coming out challenging NIH and NSF cuts, the reaction of, um, Oh, was it Cornell, right, and other institutions, their investigations. Like it is the slap and then the, I'm coming with my frying pan, right? Like I'm not going to let you get away with it being a little brutish here, but that's that's what I think of.-- And-- that and that's, I'm glad you brought that up and clearly this has nothing to do with it, but this is just my, because I'm not fully in the weeds of things and obviously sometimes in media they don't show the ending of the story, the completion. But I'm like, what is going on with these schools that are suing the administration? Like, is, has it, is it still up in the courts or has there been a solution or, or anything? What, like, I mean, and also does this Does every school get to do this or not? Like, are, are you, do you, do you foresee schools maybe following in other schools' footsteps or still being reserved in their decision on what to do? So Two-part question, right? Part one, most of, when we're talking about those anti-Semitism investigations, Title IX investigations, Title 6, all of those, uh, for the most part, those are wrapped up. There's still a few that kind of have some pending court cases and whatnot, but Northwestern, Penn, Cornell, um, The list goes on, escapes me, but those, those have all been finalized. Um, and actually I recently was, had to do some hunting to specifically track down like where did the money go for all of those. So happy to talk about that a little more if you, if you are curious. The, the 4 that I dug into was Cornell, Brown, Columbia, Northwestern, UPenn. That's 5 actually. I promise I can count. Um, Cornell. Right. They paid $30 million to the US Treasury. We're very, very explicit. This is not a fine. This was not as a result of any wrongdoing. We are voluntarily paying $30 million to restore our funding. Then separately, they paid, they agreed that they were going to spend $30 million in agricultural research, um, that the school gets to come up with. So this is the school. gets to decide over what time period, what specifically they want to do, but they just had to make that concession, we will spend 30 million on agricultural research in the future. Brown agreed to pay $50 million in grants over the next 10 years to workforce development organizations in Rhode Island. No financial payments were made to the federal government as part of that agreement. Um, Colombia had a much broader, as part of a broader agreement with the Trump administration, they made They agreed to. Basically set up a $21 million fund that is going to pay out EEOC claims. So students, uh, Columbia students who uh kind of like class action lawsuits when um Apple, for instance, right? You'll get a congrats, you're eligible. Did you know that Apple actually did something that they shouldn't have with your data? Click here to redeem your, you know, you're eligible for $100. That's what Columbia agreed to set up with the administrations. It's going to be a $21 million fund, and if you were a victim of anti-Semitism on Columbia's campus, you can access those funds. Northwestern agreed to pay $75 million over the next 3 years. It's unclear where, like specifically what entity in the federal government they're paying. So is that $75 million to the Treasury, to Department of Ed, to DOL? It's unclear which entity receives that and for what purpose, right? With juxtaposed that Cornell, we knew $30 million was going to Treasury and the stated purpose. Um, they, they were clear that it wasn't a fine. It was going back to to to pay reciprocity in a sense, back to the treasury. Um, and lastly, UPenn, they made a lot of concessions in terms of their hiring practices and and different oversight that they were going to have on campus, but there was no financial penalty as part of that particular agreement. It is such a fascinating gamut of Responses, um, from these different institutions and I'm, I feel like I need, I would need to Like, chew on that a little bit more to try to make meaning of, of it, or, or like perhaps the meaning doesn't matter, like, perhaps chaos is the point. Um, I, I don't know, but it is a, I, I really appreciate you giving us those details. I do think that that is really helpful, those specific examples like Portia said of how the story Ends, or at least has evolved, is something that we might all be, or at least I can speak for myself and say I am missing, even with what I follow, and I think it is so telling, um, when the answer is many, many different, um, like there are many different endings, Mike, right? Like it's not just one, Are there other particular topics that you all are paying really close attention to right now? Like what is most top of mind, what's consuming your workday? Whew, uh, what's consuming my workday is a daunting, daunting thought. It's a lot. Uh, top of mind though, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the interagency agreements that we recently saw. So several weeks ago, the first one was announced where they were going to move ACTA, that's the Office of Career and Technical Adult Education, from Department of Ed. They're going to move that over to the DOL.-- And that was the first clear example we saw of-- outsourcing. DOL, Department of Labor, just to be clear, yes, DOL, Department of Labor. Keep me honest on those acronyms. I will throw them out there and not define them, which is a bad habit. Oh,-- but it's-- such a higher ed characteristic. Yeah, you're in good company. So that was the first example we saw clear cut, and there were rumblings at the time, OK, what is it, what's going to come next? Where's, you know, this is clearly them fulfilling the goal of diminishing the department in all ways possible, but we weren't sure what's going to come next. Sure enough, I think now like 3 weeks ago, 2 weeks ago, there was a slew of 6 interagency agreements that moved. I believe it was actually 5 interagency agreements that moved 6. 6 functions one of those two, it's either it was 5 agreements that moved 6 functions or 6 agreements that moved 5 functions to different to labor, aid, health and human services, those types of departments. So the big question now is, No staff were eliminated during that announcement. No programs were eliminated during that announcement. But what's going to happen to the Education Department's service delivery when we took something from one place and plopped it down somewhere else, even if we assume it's the same exact staff that are administering it. Imagine if your boss tomorrow suddenly changed. Your functions the same. Your, you know, your work is the same, but when you have a question, and you typically would go to your boss, now it's a new bot, how are they going to answer that question? So that's a big one is we're watching for what's actually going to happen to these programs and shout out to or for any people listening, for all, I was going to say viewers, but I guess they can't see us. For all the listeners, uh, please, I, I think it's really important now to document and communicate with ACR when you do see changes, right? So I'm not saying you are necessarily going to, like I said, no staff at this time have been eliminated, no programs have been eliminated. But It seems unlikely that a move of this magnitude would not cause some changes in Ed's service delivery. It's really important that we document those and are made aware of them, because that's going to be the piece that I can go up to the hill on, or we can raise those issues is if we say, hey, I represent 18,000 people in the US, right? 3000 of them have all said that your wait times for a phone call have gone from 10 minutes to 50 minutes. That like clear examples like that really, really become significant when it advocating for, for a change like this and proving like it, you're saying that it was seamless. Here's proof to the contrary. It was not a seamless transition. How, how can people communicate those impacts to Acro? So I'd say two main ways. Um, at the risk of inundating myself with emails, please send emails to gr@acro.org if you do have specific examples. But the other big one is, I, I think now more than ever, and this is kind of a larger point, the Acro Exchange is a really, really important source of community, and as As federal guidance becomes more sporadic and debatably less reliable, I think it's more important than ever to have a professional community that you can still rely on. And sharing those, uh, any observations you make about changes in the department's service delivery, uh, I think the exchange communities would be another really great place to note that. I think you're saying exchange is really a really good idea, but I would also challenge ACro staff if, if, if possible to post those questions and then have people comment, cause sometimes people just don't feel comfortable in coming out, but Yeah, I think that's a good idea to, to have it in exchange. I'm making my own notes here, cause that's, that's a good one. Um, some other things that you're paying attention to. Another big one, so, Actually, before I move on about these interagency agreements, what we have not seen is FSA moved that still resides within the Department of Ed. Big asterisk on that because the FSA has been a longtime goal of this administration to to do something with. There's been a lot of talk about moving it, um, and in fact there's even been some rumors that they're considering selling part of it, part of the student loan portfolio to the private sector. That in particular is really concerning, right? Just to be clear, when we talk about the student loan portfolio in raw numbers, this is $1.67 trillion for, I think it's 42 to 43 million borrowers. That's more,$1.67 trillion. That, that's more than America's largest bank, JPMorgan and Chase, has in mortgages out on their balance sheet. The Department of Ed has given more student loans than JPMorgan and Chase has given mortgages in the entirety of its existence. Yes, when you say it like that, my goodness,-- it-- is an astronomical amount,-- the-- size of this portfolio we're talking about, including international, because they can't get financial aid, right? So yeah, correct, it is a huge pot of money we're talking about. And when we say selling off part of the portfolio to the private market. This comes from a Politico article that I'd be happy to share with you too if you have any interest afterwards where they specifically talk about selling off the parts of the student loan portfolio that are that are doing poorly. What does that mean? That means we're going to sell, or excuse me, the parts of the student loan portfolio are doing well. So the people making their payments, what we sell off the parts of the portfolio in good standing, what does that leave the federal government and the taxpayer with? The parts of the portfolio that are in delinquency. Who wants that? Like you're going to stick us with only the part that is in delinquency. Yeah Need I say more? Like it, it is such a, such a concerning, um, I, I won't even get into what I think that selling off part of the student loan portfolio or this, some of the general pushes towards private lenders means for, um, for her higher education, real diversity, what it means for Uh, individuals of certain groups, but, but there are some really, really worrying implications for, because if, if we couldn't get the mortgage for the home, then that means what for our education, yeah, right. So that, that's the last one. We haven't seen movement on that yet, but that's kind of all eyes are watching. OK, you've now done. You know, a 6 dozen or so interagency agreements with the big hint of there's more coming. Is FSA going to be the next one? What are you doing with FSA? So certainly watching that in the new year. And FSA is federal student aid, yeah. Yes, thank you. That's fine. That one, that one almost everybody probably knew, but just to be sure. Beyond the interagency agreements, um, there's been a ton happening in the regulation space as of late. So, as I'm sure, uh, many listeners are aware, the one big beautiful bill was passed on July 4th earlier this year. It's one of these big omnibus bills. It does a ton of stuff, everything from EV tax credits to tax cuts to provisions that are specific to higher ed. And, uh, The provisions that affect higher ed are equally as broad as the, you know, the larger bill, but they, we're now seeing those changes made real implemented through regulations. So earlier this year there was the RISE committee met and they addressed student loan repayment options, right? So without going too much into detail, all the existing student loan repayment options will be expiring in the coming years. Uh, and will be replaced by only two options. There'll be a standard repayment plan and a payment assistance plan that's dependent on an individual's income. So save, pay as you earn, all these other ones going away. There will only be those two options. So the rise committee met and they hammered out the details. What are these two options going to be? More recently, just Last week or the week before, um, Just last week, God, time flies. There was the round one of the Ahead Committee. The Ahead committee, this first round addressed workforce Pell. So for the first time ever, the One Big Beautiful bill opened up Pell to now programs as short as 8 weeks up to 15 weeks, depending on a few other other things, are now eligible to receive Pell funding for those programs. So this is going to be really, really significant for a lot of players, particularly community colleges, but super, super something that ACRA actually is supportive of was opening up Workforce Pell. OK. This is where I, Ingrid Nuttall, I am going to jump in with an edit. In this section, Mike talked to us about a new metric that will be used to judge academic programs called an earnings premium. All institutions receiving Title IV funds will be assessed by this metric which will compare the median earnings of college graduates program by program to working adults who did not complete a comparable post-secondary degree in the same state. This affects both undergraduate and graduate programs, but the calculation of the metric is a little different across those levels. So, let's start with undergraduates. For example, the median earnings of English major undergraduates who graduated from the University of Mars and who received Title IV funds must exceed the median earnings of those who have a high school diploma or equivalent and who didn't enroll in college in the same state where the University of Mars is located. The metric will be measured for 3 years. If the University of Mars English majors median earnings do not exceed the median earnings of folks who didn't graduate for 2 out of the 3 years measured, the institution risks revocation of its Title IV funds. For graduate programs, including graduate certificates, the median completer earnings of Title IV recipients must exceed the lowest of the median earnings of those who only completed a bachelor's degree in the same state and work in the same fields as the graduates anywhere in the country. And there won't be variables to account for differences in income, to make up for the cost of living differences. So, University of Mars English majors living in an area with a high cost of living will be compared with people living in an area with a lower cost of living in the same state. I know that's a lot. I am gonna sum it up, but I also wanna encourage you to go out there on the interwebs and do your own research. Search for earnings premium. There's information out there from the end of last year, and there's even stuff from just a few days ago here in the middle of January. So, do your research and get this information into your own hands. But, OK, let me sum it up the best I can. The earnings premium metric will be used to assess whether or not college graduates fare better financially than non-college graduates in the same state. Failure to exceed the median for 2 out of 3 years means an institution could risk losing its Title IV funds. All right, that's my edit. Let's get back to Mike. As part of the RISE committee, that, that first negotiated rulemaking earlier this year that addressed the two new student loan repayment options, um, that also was just larger student loan conversations. So also student loan caps on how much lifetime lending you can have, how much annual lending, and one of the things, uh, in the One Big Beautiful Bill, the One Big Beautiful Bill, henceforth OB3. Sets up that graduate and professional programs have different levels. A professional program essentially has double the lifetime and annual loan limit as a graduate program. So if I'm a school, it's in my interest to have my programs considered as professional, and the RISE committee, when it concluded, they found that only 11 programs that they identified were considered professional. These were, were generally your doctors, your lawyers, strangely enough, theology was included, um. But also, I, I know this, look, I feel like you're gonna take a lot of the brunt of this anger, but I just feel like, how is the doctor considered professional, but a nurse isn't when sometimes the nurse has more, not more skill, but can match the doctor a little bit in the way the degrees, like if, you know, you have a nurse practitioner, doctorate in it, that is very close. Oh, this is, and but You know about all the forms of the Lord, Professional. So, some good news on this one. There You're not the only one to be upset specifically, specifically about the nursing thing. Some of the nursing associations and other professional groups kicked up a ruckus, as they should, and there is a bill that's going to be introduced by Representative Mike Lawler that would amend OB-3, the language in it, rather than as OB-3 is written currently, it says professional degree to be defined by the department and regulations. Mike Lawler's bill would say professional degree as defined as this, so it would take away the Education Department's authority to regulate the definition of professional and would bind the department to these. His bill includes is much more extensive. So you also have For instance, audiology, clinical psychology, public health, nursing, physical therapy, business administration and management, architecture, engineering degree, it is, it is much closer to what we kind of colloquially when we use the term professional, what we tend to think of versus the definition that negotiators. Came to consensus on back during the Rise Committee was based on an old regulatory definition, hence why theology was still considered, it was literally a regulatory definition from the 60s that they were using this based off of um without really the consideration of like what You know, how have things changed since the 60s perhaps. Um, so a little bit of, you know, that has not passed yet, but people have taken note of how potentially harmful this professional definition is with it being so. So kind of narrowly defined and I, the other point I want to raise here is I think this is a great example of what advocacy can do, of what where you can make a change. Again, this bill hasn't passed yet, but nurses saw this definition, saw they were excluded. Knowing that we're at a time when we already have a nursing shortage, they went out, did a grassroots advocacy, sent letters to their congressional representatives, and sure enough, now there's legislation addressing this that's going to be introduced. So there is hope, right, to change things. There is hope for, for advocacy. I'm kind of thinking here about your last question, some examples of like how do you How do you see the actual impact of advocacy? I think this, this bill being introduced is a great example of that. Yeah, let's, let's go there. I, um, so I saw you in the summer at the Acro leadership team meeting. Portia didn't because she was thwarted by thwarted by travel. Travel's ridiculous. Apparently the hour. I couldn't use the hour plane ride to get to DC. They canceling it. It was, it was so wild, but we, um, I. Got to talk to you for another episode really briefly, and I asked you as a part of that, if you thought you could make a difference, and you immediately replied, yes. Um, you believe you can make a difference and you believe you do make a difference, and you, you talked about why at the time. So I just, I'm wondering how have you made a difference over the last year? Um, and how have you seen the acro community at large respond to the challenges facing higher ed to let you know that we can all make a difference? What's your evidence? So the definition of professional, I'm going to raise this as one example of that. Another more recent one was the, just last week there was that congressional hearing by the subcommittee on Education and the Workforce that was about LERs, those learning Employment records. ACRA sponsored one of the witnesses that testified at that hearing. Just a few days that that hearing took place on Wednesday, I think it was just Friday of last week, the Education Department announces a $15 million grant for creating state-led talent marketplaces, which is one of the key tenets of an LERs, that's a talent marketplace. So Right, I'm, I'm trying to draw examples of like Acro engages on an issue, we see a change come out, right? I, I, I can't, unfortunately, I don't have like the statistical evidence. The P value was significant, so it, it's the causation, not coincidence, but Clearly the timeline shows that ACRA's involvement with LERs and our sponsoring of that testimony did do something to push the needle towards that eventual grant being announced, and nurses raising the issue of professional degree did do something to push the needle towards Rep Mike Lawler introducing this bill. Another example is Around advocacy on the Education Department's funding. So in earlier this year in July, ACR had our annual Hill Day event, and one of the big things at the time that we were going up there to talk about was appropriations bills, was how are we going to fund the Department of Education, and the, the president had just unveiled his skinny budget, which Is that like a skinny margarita? I just want to ask. It's not OK, unfortunately, it's not as cool. margarita. Skinny here kind of is, is, is doing double work. Skinny, uh, it was called the skinny budget, one, because of how small his budget request was relative, it, it included a lot of cutting, right? And, and two, it's skinny because it was just a proposal, right? He's not giving you all the details. He's just. I'm trying to give you the rough, the rough sketch that then appropriators will actually outline. So skinny in terms of like lacking fully fledged details, a concept, right, which, which to be fair, is, um, is consistent. That is typically how the budget, the president's budget proposal is. It is just a rough stretch. And it really is used more so as a as a signaling tool to show what the president's priorities are, but rarely does a president propose a budget, and Congress gives them everything that's in that budget. That almost never happens. So things were not, this was not atypical this cycle in that regard. The The president's budget proposal though for the Education Department proposed cutting it from roughly $78 billion to $67 billion. That's a little over a 15% cut, and some, some. Where that money comes from is like basically they propose zeroing out the TRIO program. Um, they would cut maximum Pell grants from 7400 a year down to $5700 a year. It pretty much zeros out funding for GEAR Up and any supports for international students or language competency programs. Uh, so it, it achieves this top line 50% cut with some really steep like zeroing out trio, right? It's almost a $2 billion program just poof, gone, um. We were really concerned by this, and in particular the president proposes this their budget. The House comes out with their proposal, which very closely mirrored the House maintains that 15% overall cut. It maintains things like cutting to Trio, to Pell. The Senate though Fast forward, right, we had a government shutdown. A lot of things changed between then, between July and now. Fast forward to today, we're operating under a continuing resolution till January 30th. Uh, and Labor HHS is the, the appropriations bill that also funds the Department of Ed. So for any of you listeners, as you're reading the news, if you see stuff about Labor HHS, that's ears perk up a little bit, that's the appropriation bill we all care about here. The Senate's proposal in many ways rejects the cuts that the president was proposing. So it maintains Department top line Department of Ed funding at $79 billion. It maintains the maximum Pell Grant at$6400. It maintains funding for TRIO. So. Again, I don't have the statistical evidence to show ACRA members went up and advocated, and then we got this, but I do think all of the discussion that ACRA members had on the Hill, the subsequent member letters, community letters that ACRA signed on to, letters that members have individually sent, and just the general public has been enough of a pressure campaign that the Senate is not comfortable with the cuts that the president is proposing, nor that the House proposed. And the Senate right now is the chamber that has a lot of the, a lot of the motion around appropriations right now is happening in the Senate. They are gearing up to, like, they are the more active chamber right now, um, which gives me some hope. Typically, right, the active kind of the person who comes up with the first proposal forces, the other chamber now has to react to that, right? They can't set the tone. The tone's already been set by the Senate. Um, so another, another area where I think we, we can see through grassroots advocacy, we have pushed the needle ever so slightly. We're not getting an increase to Department of Ed funding, but if we can maintain that funding, oh, and the last thing I'll mention on this point is the Senate. has included some language in there that would seek to protect Uh, the Department of Ed from offloading any functions. So like it, it has some language there like if I give you. I'm going to be a little silly here with my example, but if I give you $10 to buy apples, don't come back from the grocery store with milk. I want to see you with apples, right? It has some language in there like that. If I appropriate funds for X program, you need to spend it on X program. If I give you money for grants, you need to make those grants in a timely manner, as defined as X. Like there's some language in there to kind of curtail Russell Vaugh, who's the the director of the Office of Management and Budget. He's been doing a lot of these kind of You know, taking money from one bucket, dropping into another bucket, or, uh, kind of playing these legal gray areas of, well, I, I, I don't have to disperse snap in the instance of a, of a government shutdown. It directly kind of is a response to that of saying we are going to put explicit language in our appropriations bills to prevent this type of behavior in the future. And that still has a long way to go, right? This is just the Senate's proposal. The House ultimately would need to vote to approve this as well, but that proposal on the Senate side has been, has been passed out of committee, and I believe it also has passed on a floor vote. So it really is up to the House now on where that's going to land. And given just the timing. Right, they have until January 30th, is when the continuing resolution will expire to pass this, but the congressional calendar, there's some recesses in there. They realistically actually have until January 15th. It may just be a timing thing that the House gets this proposal and doesn't have enough time to come up with an alternative. They don't want to see another shutdown fight. They might just, you know, their hand is forced and they'll they'll vote for this. It's me speculating here. I don't know how that'll, that'll actually play out. It's such a It's such a chess. Three dimension, it's both like three dimensional chess, but also incredibly simple, being like, we're going to write things down and try to make them clear. And I, I, I think like most science is correlation and not causation, um, p value that we don't have. So I, I think it is encouraging to be able to draw those conclusions through the, the work that Your office has done and that the community has done at large with, with their engagement. Um, well, Mike. New Year's, New Year's are the beginning of new resolutions, um, so I'm told. What are sorry to say that, so they say, so they say, um, what are you resolved to do differently this next year to In your work, um, I think in the question I said to support the acro community, but I mean, it can come even from just a, a personal place of this is how I'm gonna show up based on my values and my, my beliefs. I, I'm interested in hearing that, um, from you. So I, I kind of bifurcated this question, right? What, what do I want to do differently, um, and the recommendations for members if you haven't already done so. What's, what's some stuff that, that I want to encourage listeners to do? Uh, for the first part, what do I want to do differently? First and foremost, I'd love to provide more opportunities for sign-on congressional letters. So for those that may not be aware, ACR has an advocacy center where you can go and see what bills we're tracking at the federal level as well as state bills. So you can, there's a little map that you can click on if you're in Texas, you know, click on Texas and see what's going on there. And that'll show you, you know, has a bill been passed out of committee? By what margin? Is it scheduled for a floor vote? Has it been read in the Federal Register? All of these types of things so you can see where it's at on the process. Think like Domino's Pizza Tracker. It is a little bit like that here. Um, and you also, the other big thing about the advocacy center is you can go there and we have Kind of pre-populated templates for letters that you can send to your congressional representative based on certain issues. So you give the system your address. Um, based on your address, it's able to look up who your, who your two senators are and who your representative is. Um, and then, you know, you'll get this pre-populated letter. For most of them, you can change the language as you'd like, uh, and then the system will automatically, once you're ready, send that off. We, this past year, did a few of those and had a Really, really positive response when we did them, but I'd love to do more of them. We really only did like 2 or 3 this past year, and we were largely reactive, right? So when, for instance, the reconciliation package was going on, we felt it was really important that Legislators were made aware of what some of what they were discussing in the reconciliation package, how it would affect higher ed. We put up a letter and we had almost 600 members sign on and send that. I I want to just emphasize on this point, kind of related to the previous question, those letters really do matter. I, I know I myself as the person who makes litter can somehow, I'm, I'm guilty of the feeling of like, well, Is anyone really going to read it? A, and even if they do, what difference is this really making? You know, a letter is not. Wars weren't run with letters. They were run, run with muskets, you know, like this isn't enough.-- That's-- not what Hamilton said. Exactly. The First World War was all about the muskets, Mike. That's right. I mean, I remember the song egg burr, egg ham, so those were letters. Um, well, to Hamilton's point, I, those letters really do, so they make a real difference in two ways. One, when offices get those letters, they are I don't know if it's actually a requirement, but every office I've ever spoken to, they treat it as if it's a legal mandate to track what constituents are saying, because think about it from a member perspective, right? I'm Senator X. I'm going to go in today and vote on a controversial issue. I want to know how the people that elected me are going to react to my vote on that issue. Short of polling, you know, the whole state that I'm representing, how do I get that input? Letters. And also, so a, it helps inform the representative's vote, but b, the second thing that I think that's really important about those letters is The way that congressional offices are broken out is there's a staffer generally assigned to different areas. So like you might have a staffer assigned to education, a different staffer assigned to the environment, a different staffer to public health, and their whole job is like they just live, breathe that area, right? They are all about whatever it is related to that particular topic. The idea of this is to allow like a really wide level of expertise, but the reality is that means that there's one person at Senator X's office who's trying to track all education issues for the entire nation and the entire state. One person. That's not realistic. So the second thing that these, these letters do is it helps raise awareness cause we could have a debate, should it function this way, um, probably not, but it does function. The, the loudest issue is the one that gets the attention. Yeah, and I, and I, I, I, I thank you for breaking that down, but also the other half of that, if you want a more of a Bite-size breakdown of all of this. I can't talk about Hill Day enough. Like that was something that I was super scared about, but the learning up until Hill Day like helped a lot. And um if you could, what small, small, small suggestion you can give to someone who feels like they're afraid to share their voice in that manner? Especially in these times. So I I think that that's perfectly understandable. I think we need to kind of recognize the humanity of like it is OK to be anxious. It is OK to have apprehension about this. I The fact that you're thinking about it to me is already admirable, right? You, you can't engage in the issue if you don't know what's going on, right? If you don't show up to the table, so you've already kind of done the prerequisite work. Um, you can edit those, those letters for the most part. So if you're not comfortable with what we're suggesting, please like write what you are comfortable with. Um. It is coming from you, not from your institution, right? So you, and it also is coming under kind of the, the guise of ACR. So use us as a cover. Use, use your fact that you're an ACRO member as cover for these things. You're not speaking on behalf of your institution. You're speaking on behalf of you as an individual, and you can say as much or as little as you want to in those letters. So I, I would encourage you to still consider doing those. We don't have any, we do have some up right now, but none of them are new. So I'm, I'm not necessarily gonna highlight any of the existing ones we have up, but that, a big goal for myself is to be more aggressive about those, provide more opportunities. Um, and if, for listeners, if you haven't, uh, already done so, I would really encourage you to, to subscribe to Acro Transcript. It is our weekly newsletter covering everything federal, state, and industry news. Um, It's what I'm a little snippet of what I'm reading, but it gives you kind of a breakdown of like, OK, through all the noise, what actually do I need to focus on versus what is, what is noise, right? Is it news or is it noise? Yes, you know, You know what, thank you, because yes, yes, yes, and yes, with all the noise, and I just want to know what, especially us in higher ed, we're just trying to get to the details. So, yeah. My last thing, I, I, I said it earlier, but I, I, I want to just emphasize, I really do think now more than ever, it's important to be part of a professional community. So please get involved with ACro. Get involved with your state and regional involvement can mean a variety of things, right? I know when I say involvement that just, I'm not asking everyone to go write a whole CNU article or lead on your own, your own presentation at a big national conference, but join the Acro Exchange, right? See if there's a caucus that maybe you'd be interested in joining, because It can be really overwhelming, and I think that's kind of by design, to use Steve Bannon's words, it is flood the zone is the strategy. It is to make people feel overwhelmed, uh, intentionally so, so that people zone out and. If you're not at the table, you can't be part of the solution. So come like join your professional communities. I, I think that's really, really important now more than ever. One of the things we've talked about a lot on all the episodes of this podcast is the importance of finding community and finding commu finding new community and developing relationships, even if it's just us, even if it's just one person, um, and sort of like expanding your perspective. So I cannot I would, I would, yes, and you and say put your, it is worth putting yourself outside your immediate comfort zone, even with one person or one group or one thing. It is worth doing it because the more you will find solidarity where you least where you least expect it. That has 100% been my lesson this last year, agreed. Mike, you're a delight, a wonderful guest, a, a true professional, um, you're even a little funny. We do appreciate that for you and for us, um, and we cannot wait to have you on the podcast again. Thank you so much for spending time with us today. Thank you. Thank you guys. It was a pleasure. Thanks for listening to another episode of Heard. We'd love to hear from you. Please send us an email at heard@acro.org with any feedback you have for us or show ideas. This episode was produced by Doug Mackey. Thanks, Doug.