Colleges and universities have found themselves facing new challenges over the last year, a sentence we’ve written — in one form or another — about higher education several times over the last several years. The forecasted demographic cliff is starting or soon to hit. To boost enrollment, some schools are cutting tuition. Others are revamping their offerings, like Brandeis University, which is attempting a reinvention of the liberal arts and taking various measures to appeal to career-focused prospective undergraduates. In our latest survey for Winning the Issues (September 12-16) we took a look at the latest brand images for colleges and universities, Ivy League universities, and community colleges.
Over seven in ten have a favorable view of colleges and universities, with about one in five having an unfavorable view (72-21 favorable-unfavorable). This is an improvement from where they were about a year and a half ago, when our April 2025 survey for Winning the Issues had them at 65-24. It is also an improvement from their relative nadir in our April 2024 survey, when they stood at 53-34 amid the swirling campus controversies following the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. Among Republicans, that number is over six in ten who are now favorable (62-31), while among independents it is about two-thirds favorable (66-25). Democrats are, not surprisingly given historical norms, the most favorable (89-6).
As for Ivy League universities, which here can be understood as a proxy term for all elite universities, it remains the case that they are seen in a separate, more negative light compared to the colleges and universities as a whole. By party affiliation, Democrats remain the only positive group (69-16), while Republicans (38-41) and independents (37-41) remain negative. They, too, had their nadir in the spring of 2024 (38-41).
Community colleges, however, are a different story. Theirs are overwhelmingly positive numbers across Republicans (79-13), Democrats (91-4) and independents (81-9).
In the last several months, the Ivy League has seemed to take steps to grapple with their role in an era defined by skepticism of higher education’s value. Yale, Vanderbilt, and now Cornell have all released reports in an attempt to confront these issues and chart what they must do to thrive in a new academic age. Colleges and universities and the Ivy League have very different brand images, which is a major positive for the former and a significant challenge for the latter. That the elite universities have taken these steps clearly indicates the knowledge that they need to resolve this.
As for community colleges, these are very positive numbers, helping to shape a positive story that leaders can take to the legislatures in their states. As state lawmakers must determine how to allocate their education budgets every year, community colleges can be bolstered the electorate’s overwhelmingly favorable view of them.
