Daily Lumina News 082620

Zoom went down Monday morning—the first day of classes at many colleges across the country.
The issue, which seemed to be concentrated on the East Coast and in parts of the Midwest, was small in comparison to other events in the spring. But it did raise questions about what contingency plans colleges have to address such technical difficulties in the age of "Zoom University."

The small-college business model that worked for more than a century has become strained these days. Even before the pandemic, finances were tough at hundreds of colleges.
Now, small schools with names you might not know, with green quads and brick buildings, are closing.

Working through college is nothing new for college students. About 70 percent have some type of job, a Georgetown University analysis found. When the pandemic hit in the spring semester, about a third of students lost their jobs, according to Temple University’s Hope Center for College, Community and Justice.
Many of them have had to get creative, taking advantage of a digital economy that grew up around them while college was still a far-off dream.

COVID-19 tests, online classes, socially distanced dorms. This fall, students, parents, faculty, and administrators will experience college literally like never before. But what will going to school in Boston look like five, 10, or even 15 years from now? What are the higher-education industry’s toughest challenges and reasons for hope?
Five Boston-area college leaders peer into their crystal ball—and what they see might surprise you.

As students return to college campuses this month, several higher ed leaders have already criticized them for violating pandemic health policies with “selfish and reckless behavior.”
A new report from the American College Health Association takes a different view of the situation. It makes the case that many college students are “vulnerable” to health and safety threats right now, and it calls on student affairs and college health officials to protect them.

Purdue University's Mitch Daniels made the case as far back as April that reopening Purdue amounted to a civic duty. Since then, Daniels has become a national face of higher ed’s hopes to return to the classroom.
This week, his plans are being put to the test.