Higher Education Policy Resources

Keeping AALS members up to date on rapid developments in legal education

The federal administration continues to launch unprecedented attacks on higher education, law schools, the legal profession, courts, and the rule of law itself. This resource hub brings together news stories, organizational statements, legal analysis and discussion, toolkits, and more to keep you informed about current events.

A variety of resources regarding federal higher education policy are linked below on this page, and a news feed of relevant articles is linked above. You will find information and resources related to the rule of law in the Clearinghouse linked above, maintained in partnership with the ABA. Guidance and toolkits for taking action are gathered and linked above in our advocacy resources.

This hub will be updated regularly.

Resources

AALS Letters and Statements

The Critical Continuing Importance of National Accreditation of Law Schools, April 8, 2025.
Standing Together in Support of Higher Education and the Legal Profession, March 25, 2025.
Statement of the Association of American Law Schools on Executive Branch Compliance with Court Orders, Feb. 18, 2025.

Federal Government DOE Announcements & Executive Orders

Responses to DOE Announcements & Executive Orders

Massachusetts Governor and AG, Joint Guidance on Lawfully Promoting Access to Educational Opportunity, Feb. 26, 2025 
Memo to University General Counsel from Law Professors, DEI Programs Are Lawful Under Federal Civil Rights Laws and Supreme Court Precedent, Feb. 20, 2025.

EdTrust, Eliminating DEI programs in Schools and Universities is an Economic and Educational Disaster in the Making, Feb. 17, 2025

Pen America, PEN America Condemns Education Department’s Threat to Defund Schools Over DEI Programs, Feb. 15, 2025

AGs Memo, Multi-State Guidance Concerning Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility Employment Initiatives, Feb. 13, 2025

Statements from Organizations on Federal Education Policy

Statement of Law Professors and Law Teachers, We Are in a Constitutional Crisis, February 2025 (statement signed by more than 1,000 law professors).

Jonathan R. Cole, Columbia’s Capitulation Will Hurt Us All, The New York Times, March 24, 2025. 
Open Letter in Response to Federal Funding Cuts at Columbia, Jewish Faculty, Scholars, and Students at U.S. Universities, March 23, 2025 (signed by over five hundred faculty, scholars, and students on how “harming U.S. Universities does not protect Jewish people”).

AAUP Chapters, Joint Statement of AAUP Chapters Regarding the Ongoing Crisis at Columbia University March 20, 2025.

Federation of Law Societies of Canada, Statement on Threats to the Rule of Law, the Independence of the Bar and Judicial Independence in the United States, March 21, 2025. 
Knight Institute, Knight Institute Condemns Trump Administration’s Effort to “Subjugate Universities to Official Power,” March 14, 2025.

American Association of University Professors, Political Attacks on Higher Education (resources and list of events).

Law Firm and Legal Analysis and Discussion

Jackson Lewis, Trump 2.0 and Higher Education: Your Questions Answered, Feb. 28, 2025 
O’Melveny, Department of Education Issues Dear Colleague Letter Interpreting Scope of Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard (SFFA), Feb. 21, 2025 
Husch Blackwell, U.S. Department of Education Releases Dear Colleague Letter Addressing the Use of Race in Education, Announces Enforcement Forthcoming, Feb. 20, 2025 
Venable, This is Not a Drill: Trump Administration ‘Dear Colleague’ Letter Virtually Eliminates Consideration of Race in Higher Education, Feb. 20, 2025 
Crowell, Executive Orders Relevant to Institutions of Higher Education, Feb. 19, 2025

Education Counsel, Overreaching and Misleading: An Analysis of the U.S. Department of Education’s February 14, 2025, “Dear Colleague” Letter on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Policies and Programs, Feb. 19, 2025

Jenner & Block, Client Alert: US Department of Education Issues Dear Colleague Letter Interpreting Students for Fair Admissions: What Colleges and Universities Need to Know, Feb. 18, 2025

Littler Mendelson, U.S. Department of Education’s New “Dear Colleague” Letter Targets DEI Programs and Signals New Era of Title VI Enforcement, Feb. 18, 2025

Reed Smith, Department of Education Dear Colleague letter foreshadows Title VI enforcement priorities, Feb. 17, 2025

Other Coverage and Analysis

Tracking Trump’s Actions on Student Visas, April 9, 2025.

Tracking Trump’s Higher-Ed Agenda, April 9, 2025.

Tracking Higher Ed’s Dismantling of DEI, April 8, 2025.

American Immigration Lawyers Association, Policy Brief: Immigration Enforcement Actions Against International Students, Apr. 8, 2025

Bloomberg Law, Sam Skolnik, California, Pennsylvania Students Sue Over Revoked F-1 Visas (2), Apr. 7, 2025

ACLU New Hampshire, ACLU of NH files suit on revoked student status of Dartmouth College student, Apr. 7, 2025

Colleges Must Stand Together to Resist Trump, April 4, 2025.

U.S. Department of Education, U.S Department of Education and U.S. Department of Justice Announce Title IX Special Investigations Team, Apr. 4, 2025

U.S. Department of Education, U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Postsecondary Education Announces Negotiated Rulemaking, Apr. 3, 2025

Reuters, Karen Sloan, US House probes Northwestern’s law clinic over representation of pro-Palestine protestors, Apr. 1, 2025

MARCA, If the Department of Education is closed, what happens to the FAFSA?, Mar. 23, 2025

Steptoe & Johnson, Jim Newberry, Kalynn G. Walls, and Ryan G. Stevens, Trump’s Executive Order to Dismantle the US Department of Education: What It Means for Higher Education, Mar. 21, 2025

Eugene Volokh et al., A Statement from Constitutional Law Scholars on Columbia, The New York Review, March 20, 2025 (eighteen constitutional law scholars from across the ideological spectrum explaining how “the government may not threaten funding cuts as a tool to pressure recipients into suppressing First Amendment–protected speech”).

The New York Review, A Statement from Constitutional Law Scholars on Columbia, Mar. 20, 2025

Christopher L. Eisgruber, The Cost of the Government’s Attack on Columbia, The Atlantic, March 19, 2025.

Meghan O’Rourke, The End of the University as We Know It, New York Times, March 16, 2025.

Kate Andrias et al., A Title VI Demand Letter That Itself Violates Title VI (and the Constitution), Balkanization, March 15, 2025 (scholars of constitutional law, administrative law, and antidiscrimination law explaining how the demands of Columbia University are unlawful).