Ep. 161: Higher Ed’s Struggling Workforce

During the first half of the year, several colleges have announced hiring freezes and budget cuts in response to the Trump administration’s slashing of federal researching funding and general financial instability across the sector. 

And these cuts come after years of stagnating pay for faculty and staff. A recent CUPA-HR analysis of salary data shows that across higher ed, employees are still being paid less in inflation-adjusted dollars than they were before the pandemic.

To help us understand what this environment means for the future of the higher ed workforce, Sara Custer, Inside Higher Ed’s editor in chief, recently spoke with Kevin McClure, professor of higher education and chair of the Department of Educational Leadership at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington.

He says there’s no doubt the workforce is struggling and hasn’t totally recovered from the great resignation spurred on by COVID. McClure is also seeing what he calls ripple effects on working conditions. Can colleges hire students for summer jobs? Can faculty travel to conferences? Are there enough people on staff for colleges to keep doing what they’re doing? And one big question—will the sector be able to attract the next generation of faculty and staff?

McClure also talks about shared governance as a practice that people need to be trained to participate in and how one solution to some of the current workforce struggles could be right under our noses.

Find out more about Kevin and his work here. 

Thanks to Grammarly for sponsoring this episode.