When We Allow Higher Education to Fall

There comes a moment in the life of a people when silence is no longer neutrality. It becomes consent. And today, higher education stands at such a moment.

Across America, colleges are struggling with declining enrollment, rising costs, financial deficits, and changing public policy. At least 16 nonprofit colleges announced closures in 2025, according to Inside Higher Ed. And from 2008 through 2023, nearly 300 colleges and universities offering associate degrees or higher closed their doors.

Yet we must ask a harder question: Where is the leadership?

The Trump administration has pursued sweeping changes in higher education, including investigations of universities, changes to federal funding, and new accountability policies. The administration says these actions are intended to address institutional accountability, costs, civil-rights concerns, and student outcomes. Critics argue that the use of federal funding to pressure universities threatens institutional independence and academic freedom.

But regardless of where one stands politically, Black leaders in higher education cannot afford to watch from the sidelines.

Too often, Black people are invited into the room when the money is declining, when the institution is struggling, or when the organization is already failing. We are asked to rescue what others were permitted to build. We are called upon to stabilize the sinking ship, but rarely given the authority to redesign the vessel before it begins to sink.

There is wisdom in the Buddhist concept of Prajna—the discipline of seeing reality as it is, rather than forcing reality to fit the story we have already told ourselves. Higher education needs that kind of courage. We must look honestly at enrollment, finances, demographics, technology, public trust, and leadership. We cannot protect institutions simply because we love their history.

History gives us another lesson.

The Provincial League provides an instructive example. In the 1930s, baseball organizations faced changing economic realities. As the league operated more independently and teams increasingly depended upon gate receipts, winning and entertainment became more important. Economic pressure encouraged innovation. Black players also began entering the league in 1935, although integration remained contested and incomplete.

The lesson is not that crisis automatically creates justice. It does not.

The lesson is that necessity can force institutions to innovate—and leadership determines what kind of innovation follows.

Black leaders must not wait until colleges are closing to become visible. We must be present when budgets are written, strategies are developed, presidents are selected, technologies are adopted, and the future of the institution is imagined.

For if higher education is allowed to collapse without a meaningful Black leadership response, the consequences will not fall equally upon all communities.

We have inherited too much. We have fought too hard. We have opened too many doors to now stand silently while others decide which doors will remain.

The hour calls not for fear, but for vision.

Not for spectators, but for leaders.

And not for nostalgia about what higher education was, but for the courage to build what it must become.