Changing American attitudes towards higher education, according to Gallup

What do Americans think of higher education?

It seems that we are more supportive, or at least more sympathetic, than we have been lately, according to a new Gallup poll:

After worsening over the past decade, Americans’ confidence in higher education showed a modest reversal in that trend this year. The improved outlook has occurred across most societal subgroups. At a time when higher education confidence is improved but remains below the majority level, solid majorities of Americans still believe that higher education benefits individuals and society in a variety of ways, particularly by increasing knowledge, innovation and prosperity.

Gallup broke this up by subgroups, starting with race: “Confidence among Black and Hispanic Americans is slightly above the national average, at 49% and 50%, respectively.”  Additionally,

Increased confidence in higher education since last year is seen among most societal subgroups, including college graduates (up six percentage points to 48%) and those without a four-year college degree (up seven points to 40%). The major U.S. political party groups show similar increases, with Democrats up five points (to 61%) and independents and Republicans up six points each (to 41% and 26%, respectively).

We are a bit more pleased with community colleges than four-year institutions:

There is a noteworthy political divide over institutional types:

All party groups are more confident in four-year institutions than they were last year, with increases around 10 points for each subgroup. Still, significant party gaps remain: 66% of Democrats, 40% of independents and 26% of Republicans are confident in four-year colleges.

Confidence in two-year institutions has increased more among Republicans (up 12 points) than independents (6 points) and Democrats (no meaningful change). Party gaps in confidence in two-year colleges are smaller than the gaps for four-year institutions because Republicans and independents are significantly more confident in two-year than four-year colleges. Democrats now have similar confidence in each type of institution.

Gallup also asked respondents about different potential values of higher ed, and these results are interesting:

We are happier this year with quality of education and especially innovation, but less pleased with higher ed for fostering opportunities.

When asked why respondents were unhappy with higher ed, nearly 40% said it was for political reasons “political agendas.”

Note what people want to see from higher ed to improve it: “practical teaching” and ” be less politically biased” lead, along with lowering costs.

There’s more good discussion and analysis in Nathan Greenfield’s article.

My intuition is that we’re seeing responses to the Trump administration’s campaign against higher education (here’s my ongoing video series on the topic).  Some of those supporting Trump are pleased by the many actions against colleges and universities, but more people are horrified by international student deportations, budget cuts, etc. Perhaps protests against those actions have also boosted public support.

I do wonder if rising anxiety about AI and jobs is reflected here as well. Perhaps a solid number of Americans, fearing job losses due to the technology, are returning to old habits of viewing colleges and universities as ways to strengthen themselves on the job market.

Looking ahead, I hope this improved collective attitude persists.