Higher Ed

A month since several regents and lawmakers criticized Iowa’s public universities for keeping too close to the vest details on their progress to pare down diversity, equity, and inclusion functions, the University of Iowa has shared a campuswide update on its new “Division of Access Opportunity & Diversity.”

After 20 years leading Loras College – the state’s oldest campus, founded in 1839, seven years before Iowa became a state in 1846 – James E. Collins next year will retire as the college’s longest-serving president and one of the longest-serving of any president to have led any college or university in Iowa.

An Iowa City man — with an accumulating history of protest-styled political activism — is suing the University of Iowa, its police, and a public records officer for a lack of what he characterized as legally-required transparency around his December police encounter.

The day University of Iowa administrators announced women’s gymnastics head coach Larissa Libby had resigned — more than a month after placing her on paid administrative leave following an external program review — they signed a settlement paying her a total $449,000, plus a final payout of her $173,349 salary.

“The grounds asserted for just cause termination included failure to make satisfactory improvement in areas of expectations identified in the evaluation and performance action plan,” a news release stated.

The executive assistant to Iowa State University’s senior vice president for operations and finance — a recently-hired top administrator who left in December after signing a $124,000 separation agreement — has agreed to settle harassment and retaliation allegations for the same amount.

The University of Iowa’s longest-serving dean, heading toward retirement after 17 years, now has a successor — with a six-month search landing University of Kentucky research professor Jill M. Kolesar.

One-third of Grinnell College’s campus is now running on renewable energy with a new 9,000-panel solar array, the largest private solar installation in the state.

The number of Free Applications for Federal Student Aid filed across Iowa still is well below previous years – including last year, when the state’s FAFSA numbers on May 10 were 16 percent above where they were on that date this year.

A group of pro-Palestinian protesters removed from University of Iowa property earlier this month while setting up a prohibited encampment are asking a court to intervene and declare them constitutionally entitled to assemble and voice their demands and grievances on UI grounds.

After a national search that brought to campus last month a parade of finalists from across the country, Iowa State University this week announced Mississippi State University College of Engineering Dean Jason Keith will serve as its new provost.

On the wings of an ongoing pilot and aviation staffing shortage threatening airlines, aircraft, and the flights they schedule, Coe College is stepping into the flight school fray in collaboration with The Eastern Iowa Airport.