A mission-preserving response instrument for university presidents and governing boards
The Public Trust Ledger™
A statement records what an institution wishes to say. A ledger requires it to account for what is true.
On August 3, 2026, the U.S. Secretary of Education asked every postsecondary institution to post, by the end of 2026, a public statement of its commitments across seven questions. It is the second such call since 1947, by a strict count. The Ledger is a method for answering. It sorts what an institution believes, has adopted, does, and can show, and it decides what may be published. It does not tell an institution what position to take.
- 2times since 1947 the federal executive has asked every institution to publish something voluntarily
- 300+institutions joined the sector's last voluntary answer, the 2007 VSA, which faded within a decade
- 7,000institutions the 2013 federal ratings plan would have scored, before it was dropped in 2015 for data without scores
- 57% → 38%American adults confident in higher education, 2015 to 2026 (Gallup)
- 1,900+institutions with unreported or under-reported FVT/GE data, per Federal Student Aid, August 11, 2026
Where to start
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About 10 minutes
Decide whether and how to respond
Eight questions produce a one-page posture memo for the board.
Decide the posture → -
About 30 seconds
Test a draft sentence
Paste one sentence, choose its evidence code, and receive one of three verdicts.
Run the Integrity Check → -
Opens September 15, 2026
See who has published
A neutral list of institutional statements, self-listed by institutions. No scores.
Visit the Registry →
Also: the board page, the full instrument, the workbook, and a worked domain.
Where this letter sits
The last time a Secretary asked the sector to publish voluntarily, in 2006, the sector built the Voluntary System of Accountability: more than 300 institutions by 2008, then a slow fade. Between those two calls the federal government proposed to rate every college itself, and in 2015 dropped the rating in favor of data without scores. The Ledger takes both lessons: it ties each of the seven questions to a filing the institution already owes, so the work does not fade, and it produces no score. The full record, 1947 to 2026, is on the history page.
Why now
The letter names December 31, 2026 for posting. Two facts make the evidence question immediate. Enforcement bodies now compare published institutional language with internal practice; the Department of Justice's findings of August 6, 2026 regarding a law school's admissions turned on that comparison. And Federal Student Aid reported on August 11, 2026 that more than 1,900 institutions had unreported or under-reported FVT/GE data for 2024 and 2025, with a final deadline of January 15, 2027; program-level cost, debt, and earnings are the evidence Question 4 asks about. Gallup found 38% of American adults expressing a great deal or quite a lot of confidence in higher education in July 2026, down from 42% in 2025.
Federal deadlines in the same window
Part of the evidence a public statement requires is evidence federal filings already require: program-level cost, debt, and earnings (FVT/GE and STATS), foreign gifts and contracts (Section 117), and campus safety (Clery). The other dates are milestones in the same window.
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September 2, 2026
Advance questions due for the Federal Student Aid office hours on FVT/GE and STATS reporting. Milestone.
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September 10, 2026
Federal Student Aid office hours, 3 to 4 p.m. Eastern time. Milestone.
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October 1, 2026
FVT/GE 2026-cycle data due; the STATS reporting-path election is made by what an institution reports. Clery Annual Security Report due. Shares evidence with Domains 4 and 2. The 2027–28 FAFSA also opens; that is a milestone.
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December 31, 2026
The date the letter names for posting a public statement.
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January 15, 2027
Final deadline for unreported or under-reported 2024 and 2025 FVT/GE data. Shares evidence with Domain 4.
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January 31, 2027
Section 117 foreign gift and contract reporting deadline. Shares evidence with Domain 6.
Sources: Federal Student Aid Electronic Announcement GENERAL-26-49 (August 11, 2026); the Department's letter of August 3, 2026; 34 CFR 668.41; 20 U.S.C. 1011f. Verify each date against its source before relying on it.
What the Ledger produces
Five outputs, for the president, the board, and the cabinet: a public statement; an evidence appendix listing every claim with its code, source, period, owner, and limitation; a board accountability docket of commitments with owners and dates; a governance memorandum recording why the posture was chosen and what was left out for lack of evidence; and a decision calendar. The instrument defines each; the workbook holds the fields.
Provenance
The Public Trust Ledger is an instrument by Sue Mukherjee, Ph.D., The Mission Preservation Strategist, Principal of Mukherjee & Associates LLC. It is free to use; the author advises institutions on these matters for a fee. Method, sources, corrections, and when the Ledger is the wrong tool are on the About page. It is not legal advice.