Higher Ed Now

Feb 25 2025 100 ep. 44 mins 56

Higher Ed Now Podcast artwork

Higher Ed Now is a production of the American Council of Trustees and Alumni. It is a podcast concerning issues and policy in America's higher education system.

Copy RSS

Subscribe on Podcast Addict

Juniata College: Embracing Debate from the Campus to Classroom

Feb 25 2025 68 mins

In this episode, Sadie Webb, ACTA's Associate Director of the College Debates and Discourse (CD&D) Alliance, discusses the Alliance’s extensive work with faculty and student leaders at Juniata College. Dean of Students Matthew Damschroder, Dean of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Derek James, and four students share how participating in classroom and campus debates has fostered fr

Jon Hardister: Theory and Practice of Excellent University Governance

Feb 12 2025 24 mins

ACTA’s chief of staff and SVP, Armand Alacbay, sits down with Jon Hardister, who once chaired North Carolina's House Education Committee, and now serves as a trustee at Western Carolina University. Hear his insider insights on the key role trustees play in university governance, student success, and protecting free speech on campus.

Ohio Senator Jerry Cirino: Fortifying Open Discourse in the Buckeye State

Jan 22 2025 33 mins

ACTA president Michael Poliakoff speaks to Ohio Senator Jerry Cirino, vice chair of the Senate's Higher Education Committee, on his promise to enact legislation to enhance the quality of higher education in the Buckeye State. Senator Cirino aims to safeguard open discourse and intellectual diversity for both students and faculty, mandate institutional neutrality at Ohio universitie

Mitch Daniels: The Heart of the Academic Enterprise

Jan 16 2025 29 mins

Focusing on the role of higher education in preparing young Americans for citizenship, ACTA's president Michael Poliakoff speaks with Mitch Daniels, former Governor of Indiana, who also served as president of Purdue University from 2013 to 2022.

Joshua Dunn: Intellectual Diversity and Informed Patriotism

Jan 09 2025 36 mins

ACTA's president Michael Poliakoff speaks with the distinguished scholar and education leader, Joshua Dunn, who took on leadership of the recently established Institute of American Civics at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville in June, 2023. Professor Dunn was previously the executive director of the Center for the Study of Government and the Individual at the University of Color

Aaron Sibarium - On the Record

Dec 20 2024 66 mins

ACTA's Paul and Karen Levy Fellow in Campus Freedom, Steve McGuire, interviews Aaron Sibarium, a journalist who writes for the Washington Free Beacon. Sibarium graduated in 2018 from Yale University, where he was the opinion editor of The Yale Daily News. Much of his reporting for the Free Beacon focuses on issues in higher education, and he has authored numerous blockbuster invest

Peter Skerry: Embracing Uncomfortable Campus Conversations

Dec 12 2024 43 mins

Higher Ed Now producer Doug Sprei interviews Peter Skerry, professor of political science at Boston College, who has served as a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and research fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. He has been featured in a variety of scholarly and national media publications, and is the author of Counting on the Census: Race, Group Identity, and the

Alumni Free Speech Advocacy at MIT: Wayne Stargardt and Peter Bonilla

Nov 08 2024 43 mins

For the past several years, ACTA has collaborated with the Alumni Free Speech Alliance (AFSA) to defend free expression, academic freedom, and viewpoint diversity on college and university campuses. With hundreds of alumni advocates across 27 institutions, AFSA represents a national movement empowering alumni to exert positive, meaningful influence on their alma maters. One of the

Core Texts in a Hispanic Context: a Special Spanish Episode of Higher Ed Now

Oct 03 2024 59 mins

In this episode of Higher Ed Now, the second of two conversations devoted to core texts, ACTA’s Academic Affairs Fellow Veronica Bryant speaks in Spanish with Clemente Cox, classics and philosophy scholar and the Academic Director of the Center of General Studies at the Universidad de los Andes. Their conversation includes the differences between Anglo-Saxon and Hispanic higher e

Core Texts and Enduring Questions for Today’s Students

Sep 03 2024 58 mins

ACTA’s Academic Affairs Fellow Veronica Bryant is joined by two distinguished educators and advocates for core texts in liberal education: Dr. Charlotte Thomas, Executive Director of the Association for Core Texts and Courses, or ACTC, and Dr. José María Torralba, board member of ACTC. Dr. Thomas is a Professor of Philosophy at Mercer University, where she is also the Director