The easy take in public higher education is that if a system is struggling financially, you can safely blame “administrative bloat.” The headline riles up boards and faculty alike, gives elected officials an out, and avoids the hard, messy math of demographic collapse and legacy debt—and the tough discussions and decisions that must be made. But when you actually run the numbers, this narrative falls apart. Let’s look at Connecticut.
 Leaving UConn out of it, let’s focus onl

In July 2025, as Special Advisor to the Board of Regents, I was asked to provide “strategic guidance and research-driven insight to inform Board deliberations and long-term planning.” It was meant to be a year-long project focusing on four areas: 1) workforce development, 2) public higher education funding models, 3) early college models, and 4) system office structure, function and alignment. I delivered the final analysis in late June 2026, and I am proud to say that the ye

Around the country, legislatures are intensely debating funding for public higher education. For #faculty, #staff, #administrators and #boards, It’s important to understand the nuance of public higher education funding, which I have been studying for the past year. Here goes… More and more, states are transitioning from their historical approaches, to models that prioritize ROI and workforce alignment. Driving this narrative, some states argue that they have invested a great