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

In my experience, too many workforce partnerships are built on individual relationships and personalities that mesh, as opposed to being systematized and formalized, striving for shared outcomes. So what happens is one of the partners moves on, and the program between organizations falls apart. This hurts students and institutions. You start from scratch every time. The goal should be scaled sector-focused partnerships that deliver measurable returns. State workforce councils

This came up in my LinkedIn feed. https://walterwendler.com/2026/03/ideas-not-ideology-a-line-universities-cannot-afford-to-blur/ I wanted to respond on LI, but it was way too long. So here it is. To start, the author is clearly a long-time academic leader, and only those who have sat in the seat understand how hard it is. He has clear and firm convictions, and nothing I say here is meant to offend the author or attack his positions and values in an ad hominem manner. Also, t