By Michael Stratford. President Obama sent Congress a budget request Monday that would increase federal spending on many higher education programs and also aims to reap savings for the government by changing some student loan and repayment options. Read more...

By Michael Stratford. The Obama administration revealed this week that extending its income-based repayment program to 5 million existing student loan borrowers will cost taxpayers more than $9 billion. Read more...

By Marc Bousquet. Three recent decisions by the National Labor Relations Board challenge lawmaking from the bench that has been hostile to faculty organizing at private universities ever since the decision in NLRB v. Yeshiva University, in 1980, established most tenure-track faculty members as part of "management."
The NLRB has required employers to permit the use of work email for union organizing and to provide organizers with email addresses and phone numbers for all employees. More...

By Kelly Field. The key theme for higher education in President Obama's 2016 budget plan, unveiled on Monday, is affordability. Through a combination of tax breaks and subsidies, the president aims to make the cost of college less of a barrier to attending. More...

By Katherine Mangan. Middle-class college students should have more opportunities to "get the best skills possible," as quickly and cheaply as possible, and making community-college tuition free would help achieve that goal, President Obama said on Friday during an address at Ivy Tech Community College in Indianapolis.
Speaking and answering questions from students at the headquarters of one of the nation’s largest statewide community-college systems, the president touted his free-tuition proposal and said that heading straight to a four-year college isn’t for everyone. More...

By Natalie Samson. Playwright, director and dramaturge Bruce Barton will be the first permanent director of the University of Calgary’s school of creative and performing arts. The school is a multidisciplinary research and performance hub formed in 2013 through the consolidation of the departments of dance, drama and music. More...

After more than a year, two professors at Memorial University of Newfoundland have calculated the university's economic worth in dollars and cents.
The president of the university asked economist Wade Locke to work on the project to help better understand the university's fiscal impact on the province. 
According to Locke, Memorial accounts for more than $1 billion in overall economic activity per year. More...