Student Experience

Reflections on the University of California From the Free Speech Movement to the Global University by Neil J. Smelser (2010)

Neil J. Smelser
2010

These invaluable essays offer an insider’s perspective on three decades at a major American university during a time of political turmoil. Neil J. Smelser, who spent thirty-six years as a professor of sociology at the University of California, Berkeley, sheds new light on a full range of the issues that dominated virtually all institutions of higher learning during the second half of the twentieth century. Smelser considers student activism—in particular the Free Speech Movement at Berkeley—political surprises, affirmative action, multiculturalism and the culture wars, and much more...

John Aubrey Douglass

Senior Research Fellow

John Aubrey Douglass is Senior Research Fellow - Public Policy and Higher Education at the Center for Studies in Higher Education (CSHE), and is a faculty member in the Goldman School of Public Policy, at the University of California - Berkeley. His research focuses on the forces and politics of globalization, the future of Democracy, the role of universities in economic development and socioeconomic mobility, the student experience and institutional self-improvement, and the history of higher education. He has written extensively on the rise of neo-nationalism and the impact on...

Student Experience in the Research University (SERU)

Igor Chirikov

Senior Researcher and SERU Consortium Director

Igor Chirikov is the Director of the Student Experience in the Research University (SERU) Consortium and Senior Researcher at CSHE. SERU Consortium is an academic and policy research collaboration based at Center for Studies in Higher Education at the UC Berkeley working in partnership with Etio and member universities. The Consortium is a group of leading research-intensive universities that increase student success by generating and analyzing comparative data on the student experience.

As SERU Consortium Director Igor Chirikov has broad responsibilities for overall SERU Consortium...

Rahul Choudaha

Senior Researcher - SERU Consortium

Dr. Rahul Choudaha is a Senior Researcher affiliated with the SERU Consortium. As a scholar-practitioner, Choudaha’s applied research focuses on mobility, experiences and enrollment of international students and its implications for internationalization and global engagement strategies. He has worked for nearly 15 years in global education services organizations and held cross-functional leadership roles including Executive Vice President at Studyportals and Chief Knowledge Officer at World Education Services. Choudaha is a co-founder of...

Anne MacLachlan

Senior Researcher and Visiting Scholars Coordinator

Anne J. MacLachlan is a retired senior researcher at CSHE who continues to be devoted to increasing access, persistence, and success in postsecondary education for underrepresented groups (URM) including domestic minorities, women, and those from uneducated/poor families with an emphasis on those in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM). Her research areas cover the spectrum of postsecondary populations including community college and transfer students, undergraduates in general, graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and faculty. Among these, doctoral...

Gary Matkin

Former Dean of Continuing Education, University of California, Irvine
Former Dean, Continuing Education, Distance Learning, and Summer Session Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley, 1989, Education M.B.A., University of California, Berkeley, 1970, Political Aspects of Business B.S., University of San Francisco, 1966, Accounting Certified Public Accountant (inactive), 1966, California License E14426 Other Experience Associate Dean, CE, UC Berkeley 1990-2000 Director, Admin Services, UC Berkeley 1975-1990 Business Officer, UC Berkeley 1973-1975 CPA, Various 1966-1973 Professional Societies California Alumni Association Association of Public...

Aashish Mehta

Associate Professor, Global Studies, UC Santa Barbara

Aashish Mehta is a development economist who studies globalization and structural change, and how they influence the role of education in labor markets. He also studies the political-economy of public services provision, and the role of education in social stratification. His publications cover many other aspects of development policy, and appear in a wide variety of economics and public policy journals.

Born and raised in India, he trained in economics and energy policy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he completed his PhD in Agricultural and Applied Economics. Prior...

Krista M. Soria

Institutional Research, Assessment, and Policy Analysis and Office for Student Affairs, University of Idaho

Dr. Krista M. Soria (she/her) is an Assistant Professor of Leadership and Counseling at the University of Idaho. She is a critical quantitative researcher seeking to investigate the most equitable and inclusive programmatic practices and institutional conditions to prepare students to engage in the complexities of social change. She examines how higher education institutions can create a more supportive campus climate for students from diverse backgrounds, whether programs are equitably accessible and beneficial to all students, and how we can create structural conditions to support...

SERU Report: The Equalizer: How Internships Close the Post-Collegiate Earnings Gap for Pell Grant Recipients

Ronald L. Huesman
Olena Horner
Valera Hachey
2026

A baccalaureate credential from the University of Minnesota (UMN) is a valuable investment that provides significant returns in post-collegiate earnings. However, our own internal analyses have shown that inequities in initial earnings and salary growth exist, particularly for students from disadvantaged economic backgrounds. This brief summarizes new longitudinal research that answers a critical follow-up question: Can work-based, integrated learning experiences, specifically internships, reduce or eliminate earnings inequities for students who come from disadvantaged backgrounds? This...