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I want to cautiously wade into this week’s big question: what do the midterm results mean for higher education and EdTech? These are initial observations, focused on topics we’ve been covering at On EdTech and several implications I’m not seeing enough of in the education trade press. The election changed the political landscape, but how much it changes the conditions facing institutions is another matter.

Democrats winning control of the House and Senate will change Washington’s agenda. My expectation for the next two years, however, is plenty of hearings and headlines, with relatively little change to the core education legislation already passed. President Trump retains his veto, and the administration retains substantial executive authority. Legislative gridlock does not mean an end to disruptive federal actions.

As I argued last year in “It’s Not Loan Limits or Accountability or Pell, It’s the Combination,” much of the policy affecting institutional planning is now in statute. The new borrowing limits, phaseout of Grad PLUS, and earnings-based accountability framework cannot simply disappear through another turn of regulatory ping-pong. Institutions should stop building plans around the hope that Congress will undo these financial constraints.