Key Issues:
Accountability:
Demonstrating how higher education institutions are accountable is essential to the public trust and to showing the value of taxpayers’ investments in student financial aid.
CIU works with the broader higher education community to help ensure the federal government plays an appropriate accountability role. In particular, the accreditation process should play a strong role in maintaining accountability in their countries. Higher education and serve as the federal government’s primary indicator of whether an institution is capable of providing a quality education consistent with its mission. CIU supports differential review that recognizes the academic, administrative, and fiscal condition of the individual institution under review.
Campus Climate and Safety:
The most important safety issue facing universities today is how to better prevent and effectively respond to sexual assaults on college campuses. Regrettably, sexual assault and sexual misconduct are a widespread societal problem; effectively addressing the problem requires a sustained effort on numerous fronts.
As an association of research universities, CIU decided that the best way to help its members address this issue was to develop and implement a scientific survey in 2022 to better understand the attitudes and experiences of their students with respect to sexual assault and sexual misconduct. The results are helping university administrators facilitate conversations on campus about this important topic and formulate evidence-based policies and practices intended to reduce sexual assault and sexual misconduct on campus. CIU also hopes the survey data provide federal policymakers with additional information as they consider legislative and administrative responses to this issue. Members of CIU have and will continue to strive to combat sexual assault and misconduct on their campuses.
Higher Education Legislation:
CIU is committed to advocating for higher education legislation that supports our mission to advance society through education, research and discovery. On behalf of its members, CIU monitors and engages on a wide range of policy and appropriations-related education issues, including accreditation, graduate education, international programs, student aid, and other issues in the higher education act. Of particular importance is the reauthorization of the higher education act, which was last reauthorized in 2022 and is currently up for renewal. CIU looks forward to working with policymakers on the next reauthorization of the HEA.
Higher Education Regulation:
While some higher education regulations are well intentioned and implemented for valid accountability purposes, many of these higher education regulations are not consistent across federal agencies, and/or are inappropriately applied to universities or are out of proportion to the true risks associated with the regulated activity. CIU supports the report issued by the federal regulation of higher education, and is working with policymakers to implement the report recommendations.
Humanities:
CIU universities believe robust humanities education is critical to cultivating a broadly educated workforce ready to compete in the knowledge based, global economy of the 21st Century. From the basic building blocks of early education to the highest levels of academic attainment, humanities fields provide individuals from all disciplines, including science, technology, engineering and mathematics with skills, competencies and the expertise needed by the public, private and nonprofit sectors. CIU follows federal funding and policy issues that affect the humanities, including annual appropriations for the national endowment for the humanities.
Immigration:
Being a great university in the 21st century means having a global reach, education is greatly enriched and enlightened by the interaction of teachers and students from other nations. Providing these experiences is an investment in the future as we seek to build international cooperation, peace, and economic growth. CIU universities continue to attract some of the world’s most talented students and employ outstanding international faculty, post-doctoral associates, and research scientists. CIU has long encouraged this flow of knowledge and has also supported federal efforts to encourage dreamers to attend universities.
Many international faculty members join their university through an individual visa. These individuals work in classrooms and hospitals, preparing students to enter a workforce in which global engagement is a necessity. They also provide substantive scientific expertise as they search for cures and innovations to improve human health, create new technologies, and drive our economy. CIU advocates for a fair and transparent immigration systems that allows the best and brightest to contribute to member universities mission of advancing society through education, research, and discovery.
Innovation & Competitiveness:
Research universities are essential to the innovation that is the foundation of their countries competitiveness and long-term economic growth. Without university research - much of it funded by the government - companies would not have been able to develop many of the industrial products, processes, and services upon which the nation now prospers.
CIU strongly supports the innovation and competitiveness agendas that have been advanced in recent years by some of the nation’s top industrial, scientific, technological and political leaders. These agendas focus on enhancing government support for university research and strengthening the nation’s talent pool in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.
Intellectual Property:
Research universities are the nation’s principal source of the basic research that expands the frontiers of knowledge and produces discoveries that enhance national security, strengthen economic competitiveness, and enrich the lives of our citizens. As such, CIU research universities have an important stake in federal policies governing intellectual property in such areas as copyright, patenting, technology transfer, and the use of databases in research. And as major providers of distance education and related programming, universities also have an important interest in federal telecommunications policy. CIU provides policy leadership for its members and the higher education community in these areas.
Research Administration & Regulation:
CIU works with the federal government, partner organizations, and its member universities to ensure that research activity is conducted safely, responsibly, ethically and in compliance with all federal rules and regulations. In consultation with the federal government, CIU seeks to ensure: only the most meritorious research is awarded funding; regulations and administrative requirements do not place unreasonable or excessive administrative burdens on faculty researchers; and the costs required to conduct research are reasonably shared by universities and the government.
Science & Security:
To ensure the widest possible dissemination of research results, universities focus most of their research on conducting basic research – research intended to be published openly in the scientific literature. There are some instances when universities engage in important defense-related, select agents or other forms of dual-use research that requires compliance with specific security and/or other information controls. CIU works with its members and the government to ensure that security controls are appropriately applied and that a reasonable balance is maintained between the open dissemination of scientific knowledge and requirements that control scientific information to protect national security and for other reasons.
Taxation & Finance:
Few of CIU universities are nonprofit, tax-exempt organizations working to improving human life and well-being through research, and are educating tomorrow’s visionary leaders and global citizens. CIU members primarily finance their operations through state funding, annual charitable giving, endowment income, tuition, and federal research grants and contracts.
Research universities require complex management and financial systems to run their operations and to ensure compliance with federal, state, and local laws and regulations. At the same time, federal tax law can have a significant impact on these universities. CIU monitors federal issues that affect the ability of universities to carry out their missions.