Colleges And Universities Are Betting Big On Sports Gambling : 1A : NPR

Colleges And Universities Are Betting Big On Sports Gambling : 1A : NPR

March 19, 2023
Colleges And Universities Are Betting Big On Sports Gambling : 1A : NPR

Jordan Poole and teammates of the Michigan Wolverines celebrate Poole’s 3-point buzzer beater for a 64-63 win.

Jeff Gross/Getty Images


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Jordan Poole and teammates of the Michigan Wolverines celebrate Poole’s 3-point buzzer beater for a 64-63 win.

Jeff Gross/Getty Images

The NCAA College Basketball tournament kicks off Tuesday. Millions of Americans are expected to watch the games and bet on them.

According to a new survey from the American Gaming Association, 68 million Americans are expected to place over $15 billion in bets on the tournament this year.

As sports gambling becomes increasingly popular on mobile platforms, colleges and universities are getting in on the action through multi-million dollar partnerships that allow companies to advertise on campuses.

Investigations from The New York Times and the PBS Newshour found at least five major colleges (Michigan State, LSU, Maryland, University of Denver, and the University

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A Free Online University Has Grown to 126,000 Students. What Can It Teach Traditional Colleges?

A Free Online University Has Grown to 126,000 Students. What Can It Teach Traditional Colleges?

March 10, 2023

When Shai Reshef started a free online university called University of the People nearly 15 years ago, skepticism was high. Online education was viewed as a poor substitute for in-person study, and anyway, how could something free be financially sustainable?

Today, the college has won accreditation. It has grown to serve 126,000 students. And it has some 37,000 volunteers. Its student body comes from all around the world, though 51 percent are first-generation students living in the U.S. And it has worked to support students who have unique obstacles to higher ed, including more than 16,000 refugees.

The University of the People has found a way to keep going and growing — with a basic model of requiring fees for taking the final assessments, and offering financial aid for those who can’t afford to do even that. It has also come up with plenty of clever ways to keep costs

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Universities, Colleges Are Turning Into Real-Estate Hedge Funds

March 9, 2023

The most cutting jokes are the ones with a bit of truth behind them. While the increasingly popular quip that “colleges are just real-estate hedge funds with classes attached” may inspire eye rolls, recent moves are making the joke cut deeper. 

In January, the University of California system — one of the largest public-university systems in the world and where I teach — made a $4 billion investment in the Blackstone Real Estate Income Trust fund, one of the world’s largest real-estate funds. The massive investment came just weeks after the fund, known as BREIT, came under fire for limiting how much investors could pull out of it. But these liquidity concerns didn’t scare off UC, which committed to keep its investment with BREIT for at least six years.

And the University of California system isn’t alone in its ambitions — universities across the country have invested in or bought

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