Regional Public Universities

Enrollment and demographic declines are leading some regional public colleges to entice students from neighboring states, stoking tensions and spurring competition.

The newly minted university is just the latest institution attempting to reframe its image at a time of enrollment declines and public skepticism about higher education.

A mandated curriculum long sought by Virginia Commonwealth students and faculty members was set to take effect this fall. The university delayed it late last month, and advocates don’t buy its reasoning for doing so.

The gaps in resources between flagships and regional comprehensive universities raise serious equity concerns and are at odds with commitments to diversity, equity and inclusion, Doug Eskew writes.

Frontiers in Psychology retracted a paper by Priscilla K. Coleman. The British Journal of Psychiatry declined to retract another, after which editorial board members resigned. It’s a fight over abortion research in the post-Roe era.

Prospective students view regional public colleges as more affordable but also as having less stature and academic rigor than the national public universities now recruiting those students, new report says.

Enrollment in the state has plummeted, but it has one of the highest ratios of institutions to students in the country. The result is fierce competition over a dwindling pool of applicants.