An article fromDive Brief What do college students think of their institutional leaders?

Students at top-ranked colleges were less likely than others to say campus leaders mostly act in their interests, per a Gallup and Lumina Foundation poll.

Published Aug. 13, 2026Natalie Schwartz Senior Editor

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Getty ImagesListen to the article 3 min This audio is auto-generated. Please let us know if you have feedback.Dive Brief: 

• Over half of surveyed college students, 55%, say their institutions’ leadership makes decisions in their best interests “all” or “most of the time,” according to a poll released Thursday by Lumina Foundation and Gallup. 

• Students at top-ranked universities were less likely to say the same. Among students attending one of the top 100 institutions in U.S. News & World Report’s national universities ranking, 45% said they trusted their leaders to act in their best interests most of the time. 

• But campus leaders aren’t the only ones calling the shots. The majority of students, 58%, said their campus policies have been influenced “a great deal” or “a moderate amount” by state or federal lawmakers.

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Policies and proposals from campus leaders enjoy higher approval ratings from students than those from state and federal lawmakers, the poll found. 

Seventy-nine percent of surveyed students said they approve of the policies and proposals from their college leadership. That’s compared to 56% who say the same about policies from state lawmakers and only 45% who approve of policies from federal government leaders. 

The poll found political divides in approval ratings, with Republican students tending to have more favorable views of policies from their campus, state and federal leaders than Democratic or independent students. 

That divide was especially stark for policies from federal lawmakers. Seven in 10 Republican students said they approve of federal legislation or proposals, compared with only 36% of Democratic students and 38% of independent students. 

The results come as the Trump administration has pressured several high-profile colleges to make numerous policy changes, such as tightening protest rules and nixing diversity statements in hiring, to restore their access to federal research funding or end government investigations. President Donald Trump also signed sweeping tax and spending legislation in July 2025, called the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, that tightened federal student lending. 

Other recent Gallup polling shows college graduates tend to have positive views of their education. 

Three-quarters of currently enrolled students and 71% of college graduates say their degrees were worth the cost, according to Gallup polling released in February. Despite this, the poll released Thursday shows that 45% of students overall have doubts that their institution is mostly acting in their best interests. 

“The disconnect between the value students place in their degree and the trust they have in their institution’s administration may be contributing to negative perceptions of college among their friends, family members and peers,” Gallup said in a Thursday post. 

Thursday's poll results come against the backdrop of low levels of confidence in higher education among the overall public. Only 38% of surveyed adults said they have high confidence in the sector, according to survey results released last month. That’s down from 57% in 2015. 

“Restoring that lost confidence will almost certainly require an increase in trust among those who know higher education best: its students,” Gallup said. 

Researchers based their analysis on 3,801 responses to Lumina Foundation and Gallup's annual study on higher education, polling for which was conducted in October.

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