EAB experts reflect: The conversations that defined higher ed in 2025

As 2025 draws to a close, higher education leaders are facing a crossroads. From navigating demographic shifts and budget pressures to reimagining student success in an era of AI and workforce disruption, this year’s conversations have underscored one thing: the challenges ahead demand both creativity and courage.

Across hundreds of conversations for senior higher ed leaders, EAB’s experts have heard firsthand how institutions are rethinking their strategies—finding new ways to serve students, strengthen operations, and plan for an uncertain future. These discussions have shaped not only our research but also our collective understanding of where higher education is headed next.

To reflect on the past year, we invited seven of EAB’s research experts to share the trends, questions, and breakthroughs that defined their work with higher ed leaders in 2025. We hope these reflections offer both insight and inspiration for the year ahead, and we look forward to continuing these conversations in 2026.

Perspectives on the year from EAB’s higher ed research experts

Reflections on leadership team cohesion
Khadish O. Franklin

Reflections on academic program revitalization
David Attis

Reflections on dynamic strategic planning
Jennifer Latino

Reflections on evolving enrollment strategy
Vashae Dixon

Reflections on budget model redesign
David Vuletich

Reflections on opportunities and risks in advancement
Holly Chatham

Reflections on turning data into action
Dawn Ressel

Recalibrating leadership for a year of intensifying pressures

Khadish O. Franklin, Managing Director, Head of EAB’s Global Advisory Division

Across the sector this year, I’ve heard growing urgency from boards and external stakeholders pushing institutions to make faster, bolder decisions in response to intensifying financial, market, and political pressures. Yet inside institutions, faculty and staff are experiencing profound change fatigue—still managing the aftershocks of the pandemic and the unrelenting pace of operational disruption since.

Leadership teams themselves are often collegial but fractured, struggling to align around enterprise-level priorities and motivate their units without tipping into toxic positivity that ignores the lived realities of their teams. This tension, between an external demand for acceleration and an internal craving for stability, will only sharpen as we enter 2026 and demographic contraction, cost shocks, and political scrutiny converge.

More and more, cabinets and boards are recognizing that their traditional approaches to decision-making, communication, and cross-campus coordination cannot keep pace with the current environment. Many institutions feel stuck in a pattern where inaction feels safer than action—where overlapping committees, blurred decision rights, and inconsistent communication slow momentum. At the same time, leaders recognize that delaying difficult decisions now will leave their institutions significantly more vulnerable as financial and enrollment pressures intensify over the next 18-24 months.

This year, EAB has been helping senior leadership teams confront this challenge by galvanizing them to operate as one enterprise—moving away from siloed protectionism and toward shared decision hygiene, transparent communication norms, and mechanisms that sustain momentum even when change fatigue is high. Through tested frameworks, facilitation, and hands-on advisory support, we help leaders clarify decision authority, move from healing to execution, and communicate with discipline across diverse audiences.

For leadership teams looking to orient themselves around the realities of the coming year, contact [email protected] or your Strategic Leader to request an engagement with your board or cabinet centered on EAB’s State of the Sector: Navigating Upheaval on Four Fronts. I look forward to continuing to share this important research with partners in 2026 and working together to strengthen institutional agility and leadership cohesion.

Innovating within constraints to revitalize academic offerings

Davis Attis, Managing Director, Research Advisory Services

While provosts this past year have been overwhelmingly concerned with budget deficits, they also recognize that, as the saying goes, you cannot cut your way to success. Revitalizing existing programs and launching new programs is critical to attracting, retaining, and preparing students to thrive after graduation. But in an environment of constrained resources, innovation has to make creative use of existing resources.

EAB has long supported academic leaders with real-time labor market data to identify not only which degrees are likely to be in demand, but also the specific skills employers are seeking. To help our partners identify the best practices that will work for their institutions, we’ve gathered and shared a variety of examples of how institutions are integrating academic and career development into existing programs, ensuring that students build valuable skills and competencies regardless of major.

In 2025, senior leaders leveraged our new research on designing interdisciplinary programs, gaining insight into how to build on existing courses and co-curricular experiences to meet growing student demand and provide broader sets of competencies. In 2026, we will introduce a suite of tools to help campuses revitalize existing programs with this same cost-conscious, market-aware approach.

To help leaders strengthen programs in a financially sustainable way, our Interdisciplinary Program Starter Kit outlines the six hallmarks of successful interdisciplinary program design and provides insights, examples, and checklists for refreshing programs that respond to evolving student and labor market needs. These resources are designed for institutions to use in 2026 and beyond, offering guidance on how to create programs that are compelling to students, aligned with employer expectations, and feasible to deliver within existing constraints.

Making strategic planning stick

Jennifer Latino, Senior Director, Research Advisory Services

Recently, I’ve seen too many cabinets approach strategic planning as a “check-the-box” exercise—one centered on extensive listening tours but not on making the hard choices that truly differentiate their institution. As a result, leaders struggle to convert broad campus input into a focused set of strategic bets that reflect market realities, financial pressures, and the institution’s actual competitive strengths.

This issue is especially top-of-mind heading into 2026 because demographic, budget, and political pressures are forcing institutions to recognize that incrementalism is no longer enough. Leaders know they need a strategic plan that guides resource allocation and investment decisions, not just a document that satisfies shared governance expectations.

Now more than ever, higher ed leadership teams must shift from a traditional, consensus-driven planning process to a truly dynamic one that is grounded in differentiation, disciplined prioritization, and strategic tradeoffs. EAB supports institutions with this imperative by identifying their comparative advantages, pressure-testing them against market opportunities, and translating these insights into a small number of strategic imperatives that guide decisions, investments, and organizational behavior over the next five to 10 years.

Over the past year, I’ve found that focusing on the six attributes of a thriving institution is especially powerful in helping teams build the organizational muscles they need to transform strategy from a document into a durable operating model:

For guidance on this strategic approach, contact [email protected] or your Strategic Leader to learn more about our workshop, Resilient Future Planning for Cabinets, and our Dynamic Strategy Framework. In the new year, I’m excited to continue working with leadership teams to ensure that strategic planning is purposeful, not performative, and meaningfully shapes how institutions allocate time, attention, resources, and leadership capacity to help them thrive in the years ahead.

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Embracing a holistic enrollment strategy

Vashae Dixon, Senior Director, Research Advisory Services

Over the past year, higher education leaders have been grappling with an increasingly competitive enrollment landscape shaped by shifting demographics and a declining college-going rate. This pressure is being felt across the sector, whether at institutions working to reverse enrollment declines or those facing new competition for top-achieving students.

Compounding these challenges is a longstanding erosion of public confidence in higher education, often rooted in questions about return on investment. Recent data makes clear that this concern is no longer anecdotal; rising rates of underemployment among college graduates are now showing up in national datasets and influencing family perceptions and enrollment behavior. Many leaders are acknowledging that the traditional “if we build it, they will come” mindset is no longer sustainable and that demographic, behavioral, and economic shifts carry significant implications for long-term financial sustainability.

In my conversations, I have seen a growing need for a holistic and integrated approach to enrollment, one that connects recruitment, retention, student success, career outcomes, and academic program strategy. Institutions are increasingly recognizing that enrollment strength is not driven by a single tactic but by alignment across the entire student lifecycle, supported by high-quality data and cross-functional decision-making.

EAB is helping partners meet this need with resources that offer a clear structure for SEM planning, rigorous analytics to assess market position and student demand, and guidance to interpret the large-scale forces reshaping enrollment. Our work with partners focuses not only on attracting the right students, but also on ensuring they persist, complete, and enter the workforce with outcomes that reinforce institutional value and strengthen public confidence.

As we move into 2026, I encourage senior leaders to take a long view of their enrollment context. EAB’s Enrollment Analytics Portfolio can help institutions evaluate enrollment performance over the past decade, visualize the dynamics driving growth or contraction, and model the potential impact of demographic and behavioral trends through 2035. Because enrollment remains central to institutional financial health, the insights generated through this analysis provide leaders with a clearer understanding of both strategic enrollment choices and the financial consequences associated with those choices. With this level of clarity, campuses will be better positioned to make intentional, forward-looking decisions that strengthen resilience in an increasingly volatile enrollment environment.

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Confronting the limits of legacy budget models

David Vuletich, Managing Director, Research Advisory Services

A theme that has come up repeatedly in my conversations with provosts and chief finance officers this year is the growing pressure to rethink institutional budget models. I’ve spoken with numerous campus leaders who are questioning whether their current model can drive the behaviors they need: strategic growth, cost discipline, cross-campus collaboration, and transparent decision-making.

This concern is becoming increasingly urgent as we head into 2026. Volatile enrollment, rising costs, and heightened expectations for accountability are exposing the limits of legacy budget structures. Leaders worry that their current model either distributes resources too slowly, incentivizes the wrong growth, or fails to surface true costs. At the same time, they’re wary of launching a redesign process that could be politically fraught or stall due to a lack of campus trust.

EAB is helping partners navigate this challenge with a structured approach to budget model redesign. Contact [email protected] or your Strategic Leader for guidance on clarifying the financial and operational problems your institution is trying to solve, quantifying where incentives are misaligned, and practical alternatives based on models from peer institutions. Equally important, we help leaders create faculty-informed processes that build credibility and momentum for change.

For leadership teams preparing to revisit their budget model in the new year, EAB’s research study on Aligning Budget Models to Strategic Goals provides a strong foundation. The brief outlines three strategies executives should adopt in their redesign efforts:

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  Create unit-level financial accountability

  Allocate some revenues and costs to align unit-level operational responsibility with institution-wide financial imperatives

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  Incorporate institutional strategic goals

  Align stakeholders with strategic goals through performance funding, seed funding, and governance policies

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  Preserve mission-critical activities

  Protect mission-critical but financially dependent units from harm in the new model to protect the institution’s brand, and build central reserves for major investments

These insights help leaders design a budget structure that directs resources to the institution’s most important goals while improving transparency and decision-making across campus. In 2026, I look forward to continuing to support partners in building budget models that promote financial discipline, encourage shared ownership of outcomes, and ensure that strategic goals—not legacy structures—guide institutional choices in the years ahead.

Navigating opportunity and risk in today’s advancement landscape

Holly Chatham, Managing Director and Principal, Advancement Advisory Services

This past fall, as I’ve presented EAB’s State of the Advancement Sector to chief advancement officers (CAOs) at our Advancement Roundtables, I’ve been encouraged by the lively and forward-looking conversations that emerged. Beginning with a high-level overview of what is happening across higher education has helped senior leaders anchor today’s advancement realities within their broader institutional context. With that foundation, we’ve then been able to engage in thoughtful discussion about the opportunities and risks advancement leaders must consider as they make decisions that will shape their institutions for years to come.

On the opportunity side, CAOs have been especially focused on principal gifts, technology integration, and strengthening corporate and foundation relations. The conversations around principal gifts have been particularly robust, as success at the top of the pyramid continues to grow in both importance and urgency. Though there is no shortage of wealthy prospects given the growing concentration of wealth, many institutions leave a significant number of qualified prospects unassigned. EAB is working with advancement leaders to close that gap through our Principal Gift Maturity Assessment, which helps assess team capabilities, strengthen prospect strategy, and build the infrastructure needed to compete for transformational gifts.

The risk landscape has been just as dynamic. Leaders are grappling with how to strategically differentiate campaign pillars to grab donor attention, engage Gen Z as future donors, and calibrate investments in pipeline development. One of the most pressing concerns is the decline in advancement investment at a time when institutions can least afford to lose fundraising momentum. Through Advancement Benchmarking, EAB has enabled leaders to benchmark advancement ROI and fundraiser performance against peer institutions and make the case for sustained investment (partners who engage with our benchmarking initiative see a 7% increase in advancement investment year-over-year). Data collection for Advancement Benchmarking is now open, and I strongly encourage partners to participate to gain visibility into where to focus limited resources in the new year.

As CAOs shape their 2026 strategy, EAB can help leadership teams understand the state of higher ed advancement through the lens of their institution, identify the greatest opportunities for growth, and strengthen the structures that support principal gift success and long-term pipeline development. To explore these conversations with your cabinet, board, or advancement team, contact your Strategic Leader or [email protected].

Turning data into action

Dawn Ressel, Senior Director, Research Advisory Services

Throughout my conversations this year, it has become clear that higher ed leaders are placing renewed emphasis on using data to guide strategic academic and financial decisions. Many institutions see the need to better align faculty resources, course offerings, and program portfolios with student demand—but lack the systems and structures to do this confidently. With new financial and enrollment pressures on the horizon for 2026, campuses are recognizing that better data use isn’t just about dashboards; it’s about making smarter, evidence-based choices that sustain both mission and margin.

It has been encouraging to see EAB’s partners begin to bridge that gap between data and decision-making. Through our Financial Performance Collaborative for Provosts, leaders are building much-needed momentum for academic efficiency and translating analysis into concrete action—assessing program performance, optimizing faculty workload, and uncovering opportunities for reinvestment.

Complementing this, our Enterprise Data Management Collaborative is helping campuses strengthen the data infrastructure and governance practices needed to make these decisions consistently and with confidence. I’m excited for senior data leaders to develop a comprehensive data strategy with their peers during our next collaborative, starting in March 2026 (save your spot here).

Partners who engage with us across these collaboratives will make meaningful progress by drawing on this combination of stronger analytics, clearer decision pathways, and institution-specific support to drive real change with lasting academic and financial impact. We’re excited to see even more campuses participate in the year ahead.