College leaders reflect on the future of higher education

American universities are facing some of their steepest challenges in decades, including funding cuts, eroding public trust, political controversies and an AI revolution that is transforming how students learn.

But at Stanford’s SIEPR Economic Summit on March 6, leaders from several prominent U.S. universities argued that the moment could also be an opportunity to rebuild trust, discard outdated practices and focus on what universities do better than anyone else.

“It’s a time for universities to go back to first principles — what are we good at? What is our distinctive role in society?” Martinez said at the summit. “We’re places of discovery and places of learning, and those are critical functions for society.”

Martinez was joined by a panel of university leaders for a discussion about the future of higher education in which they addressed declining public trust, threats to academic freedom, AI and the increasing competitiveness of China’s universities, among other topics.

The panel included UC Berkeley Chancellor Rich Lyons, Brown University President Christina Paxson and University of Oregon President John Karl Scholz. The discussion was moderated by former Stanford President and Chairman of the Board of Alphabet John Hennessy.

The Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR) Economic Summit is an annual campus event that brings leading experts together to discuss urgent issues facing the U.S. and global economies, and to explore the policies needed to mitigate the risks and to capitalize equitably on the opportunities.

Making connections

Public trust in universities has declined in recent years, with some Americans questioning both the education they provide and campus culture. Scholz cited data showing fewer than half of Americans now believe universities are playing a positive role in society — what he called an “existential challenge.”

Paxson pointed to a recent Gallup-Lumina poll showing that about 2 percent of college students feel unwelcome on campus because of their political views. She also said students increasingly choose schools with peers who share their politics.

But data alone won’t solve the problem. “Trust doesn’t get built through facts,” she said. “It’s feelings-based.”

Trust is built through connections, she added. At Brown, that includes workforce development programs and free summer programs for local residents. “You want your local communities to say, ‘I love my local university,’” she said.

Panelists also emphasized expanding access to higher education. At Stanford, that could include growing the size of the undergraduate population and offering more education later in life.

“The world is changing so rapidly that people are going to need those different skills at different points in their careers,” Martinez said. “How do we adapt the way we deliver education to do that?”

Freedom of speech and thought

As the nation has become more polarized, universities are experimenting with ways to encourage constructive dialogue among students.

Last year, Berkeley launched a course called Openness to opposing views, which Lyons said has been taken by thousands of students.

Stanford has also expanded its own efforts, including the ePluribus Stanford civic engagement initiative and courses like Democracy and Disagreement and a first-year requirement called Citizenship in the 21st Century, taken by nearly 1,200 students annually.

“If people aren’t sharing their views and learning to engage with those they disagree with, we can’t have the kind of functioning democracy that America has benefited from over the last centuries,” Martinez said.

She also emphasized the importance of academic freedom — the ability to consider ideas that might seem unorthodox or controversial.

Without it, she said, “you’re not going to get to the discoveries that are so foundational to the progress of science, of technology, of the economy and society.”

The AI cheat code

Artificial intelligence is evolving rapidly and already reshaping higher education. Hennessy said many students who rely heavily on AI tools struggle with critical thinking and basic math while falsely believing they’ve mastered the material.

Martinez said Stanford is carefully studying and rapidly responding to how AI is changing student learning. In an introductory computer science class, for example, students are using AI rather than visiting their teaching assistant at office hours.

“The scores on their problem sets and homework have gone up,” she said. “[But] the scores on the exam when they don’t have the AI have gone down. So, they’ve actually learned less.” Creative approaches to curricula are needed to ensure students still master foundational material and that AI plays a constructive role in augmenting learning.

Given the pace of technological change, Paxson said universities cannot predict the exact skills students will need decades from now. Instead, she said, schools should focus on the basics.

“It’s communication, it’s critical thought, it’s the fundamentals of a liberal education that are probably more important than learning how to code in Java right now,” she said.

“I agree that the humanities are going to be more important than ever,” said Martinez, adding that employers like McKinsey & Company are hiring more humanities majors because they have strong critical thinking skills.

“A great liberal education should be the cheat code for AI,” Scholz added.

A new economic model

Much of the discussion focused on how universities can sustain their missions of teaching, learning and research amid changes to the economics of higher education, including taxes on endowments and reduced public funding.

A common criticism of college today is that it’s too expensive. But Paxson said that over the last 10 years, the net cost of four-year public and private colleges, adjusted for inflation, has stayed flat or declined. Much of the nation’s student debt, she added, is largely attributed to students who don’t complete their degrees and to for-profit schools.

Lyons said universities may need new funding models. One possibility is for institutions to take equity stakes in companies created through campus research. “We really do need to participate more — in ways that are consistent with our values — in the economic and societal value that we’re creating,” he said.

A version of this story was originally published March 10, 2026 by Stanford Report.

Photos by Ryan Zhang.