Amid ongoing battles between the Trump administration and various colleges and universities ostensibly over campus antisemitism, the new president of Yale University, Maurie McInnis, recently announced the convening of a “Committee on Trust in Higher Education
A fair assessment, but does not explore the role that faculty has played in creating this issue. Presidents of universities often have their hands tied by faculty who are driving a lot of these issues.
I 'liked', however I would omit the 'presidents have their hands tied'
get back to insisting on having a balanced faculty, keeping politics out of the classroom, or at least not having the instructor's/professor/s political beliefs very evident
The faculty is absolutely the problem, and one that will be difficult to fix. The extreme left (including factions such as the Palestine lobby) has had a specific, conscious, intentional plan for 30 years now to infiltrate the collegiate faculty. They reasoned, correctly, as we have seen, that doing so would allow them to indoctrinate American youth with their beliefs and religious fervor. We are now suffering the consequences of their assault on our universities.
I don't accept/believe any of this "Bad Faculty" nonsense. I know dozens of college grads and NONE of them complained about being "indoctrinated". This is fantasy.
The dominant “culture” of a university is driven by a combination of administration, faculty, students, and alumni, all of whom tend to be leftist in the most academically prestigious universities. Being mostly centrist, but conservative on law and order and national defense, I felt that my professors in college some 50 years ago were sufficiently objective in the classroom, but that campus culture outside of the Greek system was dominated by leftist students accompanied to some degree by leftist outsiders who hung out at the student union.
College tuition has increased at 3x the rate of inflation for the past 40 years as the ratio of administrators to students have skyrocketed.
Textbooks have increased at the same rate, despite the fact that technology has decreased the cost of the written word. Colleges blame new editions, but basic derivative calculus hasn't changed since Issac Newton.
Meanwhile, higher education is a negative-NPV financial transaction for most non-STEM majors.
When you say admistrators, people visualize the vice Dean for DEI or some such. However, if you look at the actual data what you see are big increases in staff to comply with Federal regulations, other increases in staff to run the tech infrastructure, big increases in physical plant which takes staff to do plumbing and HVAC, a lot of the physical plant added is of the student health club variety which takes additional staff to provide the services. There is normal administrative bloat like adding secretaries for faculty. Finally, many big universities have a medical school and hospital attached. Really a separate problem but it shows up in University data.
The dirty secret about textbook costs is that it is driven by faculty requiring the new editions. In some cases, they get royalties.
Couple of points. First, I think the compliance piece is a result of Federal regulations around DEI. IMO the left has spent the past 20 years creating a WPA for liberal activists, not just in government and academia, but also corporate HR departments.
Second, 1 $300k DEI apparatchik costs as much as 6 maintenance guys.
There are federal reporting standards about absolutely everything. Environmental issues, accounting, labor relations, financial aid, OSHA, crime on campus and don't even get me started on stuff related to hospitals. These are constantly changing and expanding. I am not disputing your point about DEI but the problem is much bigger.
I remember taking a course on 12th Century Chinese history. The textbook was written by the professor (who was a nice guy and the subject was interesting to me at least) but I couldn’t help but think: “Who the hell else is going to buy a book on 12th Century Chinese history?”
Our media outlets seem to be at the forefront of promoting the Ivy League schools. When referring to a person in the news, how many time have I heard "he is a Harvard graduate or she is a graduate of Yale or the Wharton School." I don't hear the media promoting our great state universities where young people get excellent educations. We need to minimize the elitism.
In my experience with higher education, the main difference between elite universities and others is in the academic abilities of the “average” or “typical” student or faculty member. All universities have some students and faculty who are brilliant (at least in certain fields) but the elite ones have a higher percentage of them and thus more reliable credentials.
The Democrats lost the working class and replaced them with the Academic Class. Until we purge these lunatics from the Democratic Party, the Republicans will continue to win at the state and national levels. Dems will keep their little Blue pockets of control, but the GOP will have a lock on the presidency, the Senate, many governorships, and the courts. It's the ideology, stupid. Defund Harvard.
Who is saying they can't have free speech? Chant "death to America" and take over the entire school for all I care. But the American taxpayer doesn't owe them anything.
Would you have felt the same way had Biden or Obama frozen assets to private schools that refused to endorse transgender athletes? That would be the parallel, wouldn’t it? It makes sense as an argument until you understand that this all rides on someone’s ideology, and the peril isn’t in freezing funds but using freezing of funds to stifle dissent. It’s not about antisemitism it’s about authoritarian control
I honestly don't think your comparison is similar/parallel.
I'll c/p what I posted prior to today's:
“The University will not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights,” Harvard President Alan Garber said in a letter to the school’s community.
so, let them not take any taxpayer Fed $$ & be independent. Do not be hypocritical. Columbia is willing to accept the conditions & the Fed funding, but not Harvard so let Harvard use the endowment $ they have, let them tap into the $ of the millionaire alumns. They shouldn't have any problems being independent. Of course, this is after Columbia faced the nation w/ their totally embarrassing presentation by their DEI hired University President who then was also a proven plagiarist.
Now, for Harvard not accepting giving up DEI - DEI is racist. Letting a less qualified student be enrolled rather than a more qualified Asian or white male is discrimination. I work w/ an agency that gives scholarships, 4 full-ride scholarships, based only on merit & need. We pay no attention to gender of any kind or race. We have a wonderful mix every year.
Try to get a conservative-leaning professor to apply to Harvard or the other left-leaning 'elite' universities & see how far they'll get. Do you think there will ever be a balanced staff????
& the racism being identified is because of the lack of action during the protests that Jews on campuses WERE being threatened w/out any action being taken by the campus administration. Jews were afraid to go to class. A janitor was afraid to leave the building. Not all protestors were acting in a threatening manner, but they were on camera, wearing masks, hiding their identities, circling 'fellow' Jewish students, taunting them, & more examples... IF ANYTHING LIKE THIS HAD HAPPENED TO BLACKS OR MUSLIMS, THERE WOULD HAVE BEEN IMMEDIATE ACTION ON THE PART OF THE ADMINISTRATION. YOU KNOW IT. EVERYONE IN THE LIBERAL MEDIA KNOWS IT.
Yes, propose to fund a KKK chair and see what happens. Sponsor a Koran burning (Bible burning is A-OK) and see what happens.
The hypocrisy of these institutions is breathtaking.
Everyone gets an A at Harvard: "A report revealed that 79% of grades at Harvard College in the 2020-21 academic year were in the A-range, up from 60% a decade earlier."
Any employer now knows an Ivy League grads are entitled, 'everyone gets a trophy' students who believes they don't have to follow the rules. What employer would want a employee like that?
Hillsdale College does not accept any Federal student aid funds due to a past dispute about Title IX which is the exact law upon which the current dispute about transgender policies is centered.
Lie down with dogs, get up with fleas. If you chose to take money from the government, then you follow the government rules. We chose private schools because of this.
Good faith question, truly not a leading one—are you MAGA? If so, are you concerned about the overall trajectory of the use of power by the executive branch? If not, would you be concerned if these same decisions were being made by Biden?
I was concerned about overall trajectory A LONG TIME ago. What does Congress even do any more? Biden's EOs were almost never covered in the press, but they were far-reaching; unelected bureaucrats and judges now run the country. He thumbed his nose at the Supreme Court. I voted for Trump because the best you could do was Kamala, who was hand-selected by the oligarchs (now Dem phonies like Bernie are funding raising off them). And it looks like the Dem platform is again going to be DEI, open borders, protecting illegal criminal immigrants, and firebombing businesses.
So forgive me, a multi-BILLION dollar institution like Harvard, a playground for the rich and elite, can go fund themselves.
...except you would not be saying this if this was Biden going after Brigham Young or Liberty University's public funding, saying "no public money until you [insert woke cause]."
Then you'd call it out as stealth ideological warfare...because it is, and I think we both know it.
I'm surprised credit transfer didn't make it on the list of concerns they found in surveys. I bet every state legislature in the country has had a bill at some point trying to get public institutions to make credit transfer easier. It's not a politicized or incendiary issue, but it does contribute to the public perception that social mobility via higher education is a game that is stacked against them.
No institution with an endowment of more than $10 billion should be tax exempt. There should be no further deductions for contributions to any of these institutions. Any institution with more than $25 billion in endowments should not receive any federal funds at all. These places are not nonprofits, they charge exorbitant prices and pay their administrators and the so-called tenured professors sit around and pontificate and write books. Outrageous salaries.
If they could just make a start with ending racial discrimination and following the law I think much of the rest would evolve.
The civil rights act prohibits discrimination based on race, etc. The Supreme Court told Harvard it had to change its ways. The Trump administration asked for data to see if they had. This is very similar to enforcing the voting rights act. We want universities to provide us, the general public, with the very data that they already collect.
DEI is intentionally an innocuous sounding acronym for a program that in practice has been extremely racist. The Trump folks have been right in my opinion to seek to eliminate anything with that name. I think they would do well to explain why discrimination is wrong and the advantages of a society that aspires to color blindness.
Artificial Intelligence and demographics suggest a declining enrolment in universities, they should consider offering value.
I don't like the idea that if your skin is a touch too light, you are perceived to be an easy target to teach against. However, that's not my major concern. Conservatives have and still do bite their tongues and get their degree. It's possible. What I'm most concerned with is the lax grading standards, not holding everyone to the same measurable standard, and dumbed down curriculum. And, my worry extends beyond college.
Think about this: We have study after study saying that a huge percentage of students can't read and comprehend beyond a 3rd grade level. If that holds, where are the students? Are they in 10th grade? How about 12th? Are we seriously graduating tons of people from high school with a diploma who can't read and comprehend? Logic says there should be large rates of failure or retention in schools. There aren't.
So, we are graduating students, handing them a degree, sending them into colleges or the workplace. They assume they are prepared. We all assume they are prepared. What if that person is in charge of something important? Is it any wonder we have college students who are behaving more like 14 year olds? If you think too hard about it, you will become anxious. I'm not sure when we decided blanket standards were a bit too much to ask, but at some point this happened. We can't ask for a well-ordered, responsible world when this is what we are comfortable providing.
Interesting that this is the angle you’ve thought most about, when it is a default authoritarian playbook move to cripple universities. Do you have concerns? I am not an alarmist but this week is ringing all the alarm bells.
While I share your concern about the current regime’s authoritarian playbook, the article helps explain how the regime is able to use it. By losing the public trust, universities have made themselves more vulnerable to attack.
Thanks! I get that and appreciate your insight , but it still felt disorienting to read the article given how quickly things have escalated. I’m not saying the article isn’t accurate or thoughtful, just that the premise doesn’t seem helpful for the direness of the moment we’re in
The 'direness of the moment' was present 25 years ago. Associating the loss of freedom in this country to Trump is shortsighted in the extreme. He is a symptom not a cause. The prior administration was just as authoritarian in its own way.
I have this conversation with a good friend on a regular basis. It was obvious from before 2016 that the totalitarian moment had arrived. We're on a slide downhill. I think even if people were prepared to die to subvert this, we'd still not stop the slide. I'm loath to use Hitler analogies, but here goes: assume that the powers that be in Weimar Germany could have stopped from making him into a cause celebre. Assume he'd been disqualified somehow, perhaps by revealing his affair with his niece (Geli Raubal) who subsequently committed suicide. I believe we'd be talking today about a KPD-led (Communist) German totalitarian takeover. It was what the Nazis feared most. It would have been different in nature, certainly, but it would have been totalitarian for certain. It might have lasted longer than the Nazis did, or not.
So without having a choice about the nature of the direction the world is moving, we can affect the nuance. But any guess as to which totalitarian regime to fight is fraught. Also, keeping our heads down might result in a better life for ourselves and our descendants. So it is a very tough call.
& the report indicates the "public's" view of upper education, especially the 'elite' universities have been declining steadily - not just because of Trump. The universities should feel vulnerable. They need to take action. Perhaps Trump or his minions read these same fact sheets & decide the times are ripe to help things along. Much to the misery of folks like you - or much to the pleasure of folks like you who can then blame Trump, not the universities who have not seen the writing on the wall
"this week is ringing all the alarm bells" folks who read this & alarm bells are going off. When in fact, the 'alarm bells' should have been going off when the elite universities were declining steadily already, & showing obvious left-leaning culture & strong possibility of trying to indoctrinate vs teach a well-rounded class of graduates
No, it’s not exactly a mystery why universities have lost public trust—or at least why people say they have. But maybe it’s time for the sometimes smug Liberal Patriot to drop “Liberal” from its name. You point to polls as “clear evidence” of declining confidence in higher education. But tell me: is there any institution that hasn’t lost public trust? The media? Congress? The Supreme Court? Justice System? Law firms? Even Disney? State news agency, Fox News, has shifted the ideology and partisan identity of Americans rightward, promoting conspiracies and eroding trust in institutions.
And how seriously should we take Republican skepticism toward higher ed, anyway? Nearly 70% of Republicans still claim Biden’s 2020 win was illegitimate. When will you run a piece on Americans losing faith in fellow Americans who cling to conspiracy theories?
Let’s not ignore the facts: in fall 2024, 19.1 million students were enrolled in U.S. colleges—not a record, but a strong rebound from the COVID years. Total college enrollment rose 4.5% from fall 2023 to fall 2024, with first-year student enrollment up 5.5%.
Not everything is broken, Liberal Patriot. American universities remain among the most respected institutions globally, renowned for academic rigor, research leadership, and program diversity. Schools like Harvard, MIT, and Stanford consistently rank at the top worldwide. They draw talent from around the globe, and their innovation continues to shape the future in a profound way.
I agree w/ much of what you said... however, like Brandy implied, our education system before the college level does not compete against much of the other world's high school graduates. Many of our students entering college/university have to take what would be considered 'remedial' for those 2-year requirements before actually getting to their chosen field of study. While those wanting to enroll from other parts of the world enter already outpacing them.
Those #'s you quoted about enrollment for US students in colleges. Perhaps many high schoolers should be guided towards community or vocational vs 4 yr right out of high school. Much less expensive, & can go on towards 4 yr if it 'fits'. I would like to see what degrees many of these lower performing students are selecting & what the job market is for them when/if they graduate.
You seem to be bashing "Liberal Patriot". I've voted independent many, many times, especially the last 3. I started reading LP, then finally joined when I read a piece that, imo, was reaching out to try to figure out how to fix things, rather than keep the blame-game going. I don't think LP has changed in that regard at all. --- eta, btw, the edition I read that pulled me in was "Citizenship Without Partisanship", March 19
Everyone calls it an attack. I believe it is holding the institutions accountable while receiving tax monies. And no one is coercing them to do anything. They can say no to the peoples money. After all, Harvard has $53 billion in the endowment fund. change a few rules about the fund and then access it as needed. Just like everything in the world today, they either adapt to the new system or perish. I vote for perish.
It's not just higher education, it is the whole notion of expertise that is experiencing a loss of confidence and it is not just in the US. This makes the problem larger and more intractable. As a retired member of the PMC, this is of great concern to me. Recognizing that a lot of this is deserved, doesn't make fixing it any less urgent lest we wind up with a Yezhov or Robespierre.
Fixing it from the top down, is likely to fail, however. In the case of higher education, Yale needs to fix itself but a national effort needs to be led by the community colleges. They can make a more plausible case on cost and relevant skills which can then be expanded to things like medicine. Ideological imbalance is the most difficult as it is so deeply embedded in the faculty. A witch hunt is highly undesirable (See Yezhov) not just on moral grounds but for its long term effects. So it needs to come from within the faculty. Recruitment is too slow so existing faculty need to be convinced. Perhaps a high profile demolition of a chosen victim would make them reassess or would it make them dig in.
President Biden proposed expanding free community college across the U.S. It still makes sense. Flogging elite institutions may be good political theatrics but it won't improve economic well-being or inequality in the U.S.
Worth examining beyond the alarmingly distrust in higher education is the commensurate, call it spinoff, distrust in the growing numbers of professions that require college degrees.
Let's see, many if not most federal-level government employees and elective officeholders are college graduates, as are the journalists-- notably Legacy media journalists -- who cover them.
Then their are the law school graduates, the lawyers, who fill the federal judgship posts, federal prosecutors offices and a disproportionate percentage of seats in Congress.
I almost forgot unionized public school teachers, college graduates all, bearing the greatest responsibility for the distrust and failure that is public primary and secondary education today.
The trend should be apparent. Higher education and its diminishing numbers of proponents like to assert that academic ans speech freedom is jeopardized when politicians threaten their funding or method of doing things. Yet these same partisan academics and their proponents are either unmindful of how they have become intolerant of dissenting or independent speech and inquiry, and that intolerance and shared political mindset is being reflected in the professions filled by the vast majority of their graduates.
People are pissed because of the crazy escalation in prices. Also, colleges and Universities are posters for DEI. Therefore, MAGA hates them. I hope they all follow Harvards lead and tell Chump to pound sand.
A fair assessment, but does not explore the role that faculty has played in creating this issue. Presidents of universities often have their hands tied by faculty who are driving a lot of these issues.
I 'liked', however I would omit the 'presidents have their hands tied'
get back to insisting on having a balanced faculty, keeping politics out of the classroom, or at least not having the instructor's/professor/s political beliefs very evident
The faculty is absolutely the problem, and one that will be difficult to fix. The extreme left (including factions such as the Palestine lobby) has had a specific, conscious, intentional plan for 30 years now to infiltrate the collegiate faculty. They reasoned, correctly, as we have seen, that doing so would allow them to indoctrinate American youth with their beliefs and religious fervor. We are now suffering the consequences of their assault on our universities.
I don't accept/believe any of this "Bad Faculty" nonsense. I know dozens of college grads and NONE of them complained about being "indoctrinated". This is fantasy.
The dominant “culture” of a university is driven by a combination of administration, faculty, students, and alumni, all of whom tend to be leftist in the most academically prestigious universities. Being mostly centrist, but conservative on law and order and national defense, I felt that my professors in college some 50 years ago were sufficiently objective in the classroom, but that campus culture outside of the Greek system was dominated by leftist students accompanied to some degree by leftist outsiders who hung out at the student union.
College tuition has increased at 3x the rate of inflation for the past 40 years as the ratio of administrators to students have skyrocketed.
Textbooks have increased at the same rate, despite the fact that technology has decreased the cost of the written word. Colleges blame new editions, but basic derivative calculus hasn't changed since Issac Newton.
Meanwhile, higher education is a negative-NPV financial transaction for most non-STEM majors.
When you say admistrators, people visualize the vice Dean for DEI or some such. However, if you look at the actual data what you see are big increases in staff to comply with Federal regulations, other increases in staff to run the tech infrastructure, big increases in physical plant which takes staff to do plumbing and HVAC, a lot of the physical plant added is of the student health club variety which takes additional staff to provide the services. There is normal administrative bloat like adding secretaries for faculty. Finally, many big universities have a medical school and hospital attached. Really a separate problem but it shows up in University data.
The dirty secret about textbook costs is that it is driven by faculty requiring the new editions. In some cases, they get royalties.
Couple of points. First, I think the compliance piece is a result of Federal regulations around DEI. IMO the left has spent the past 20 years creating a WPA for liberal activists, not just in government and academia, but also corporate HR departments.
Second, 1 $300k DEI apparatchik costs as much as 6 maintenance guys.
There are federal reporting standards about absolutely everything. Environmental issues, accounting, labor relations, financial aid, OSHA, crime on campus and don't even get me started on stuff related to hospitals. These are constantly changing and expanding. I am not disputing your point about DEI but the problem is much bigger.
And it is the graduates of these oppressed schools who create those regulations.
Shed no tears for them. As they say, they made their own bed, now sleep in it.
I remember taking a course on 12th Century Chinese history. The textbook was written by the professor (who was a nice guy and the subject was interesting to me at least) but I couldn’t help but think: “Who the hell else is going to buy a book on 12th Century Chinese history?”
Our media outlets seem to be at the forefront of promoting the Ivy League schools. When referring to a person in the news, how many time have I heard "he is a Harvard graduate or she is a graduate of Yale or the Wharton School." I don't hear the media promoting our great state universities where young people get excellent educations. We need to minimize the elitism.
In my experience with higher education, the main difference between elite universities and others is in the academic abilities of the “average” or “typical” student or faculty member. All universities have some students and faculty who are brilliant (at least in certain fields) but the elite ones have a higher percentage of them and thus more reliable credentials.
The Democrats lost the working class and replaced them with the Academic Class. Until we purge these lunatics from the Democratic Party, the Republicans will continue to win at the state and national levels. Dems will keep their little Blue pockets of control, but the GOP will have a lock on the presidency, the Senate, many governorships, and the courts. It's the ideology, stupid. Defund Harvard.
Free speech until it’s speech you don’t like?
Who is saying they can't have free speech? Chant "death to America" and take over the entire school for all I care. But the American taxpayer doesn't owe them anything.
Would you have felt the same way had Biden or Obama frozen assets to private schools that refused to endorse transgender athletes? That would be the parallel, wouldn’t it? It makes sense as an argument until you understand that this all rides on someone’s ideology, and the peril isn’t in freezing funds but using freezing of funds to stifle dissent. It’s not about antisemitism it’s about authoritarian control
I honestly don't think your comparison is similar/parallel.
I'll c/p what I posted prior to today's:
“The University will not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights,” Harvard President Alan Garber said in a letter to the school’s community.
so, let them not take any taxpayer Fed $$ & be independent. Do not be hypocritical. Columbia is willing to accept the conditions & the Fed funding, but not Harvard so let Harvard use the endowment $ they have, let them tap into the $ of the millionaire alumns. They shouldn't have any problems being independent. Of course, this is after Columbia faced the nation w/ their totally embarrassing presentation by their DEI hired University President who then was also a proven plagiarist.
Now, for Harvard not accepting giving up DEI - DEI is racist. Letting a less qualified student be enrolled rather than a more qualified Asian or white male is discrimination. I work w/ an agency that gives scholarships, 4 full-ride scholarships, based only on merit & need. We pay no attention to gender of any kind or race. We have a wonderful mix every year.
Try to get a conservative-leaning professor to apply to Harvard or the other left-leaning 'elite' universities & see how far they'll get. Do you think there will ever be a balanced staff????
& the racism being identified is because of the lack of action during the protests that Jews on campuses WERE being threatened w/out any action being taken by the campus administration. Jews were afraid to go to class. A janitor was afraid to leave the building. Not all protestors were acting in a threatening manner, but they were on camera, wearing masks, hiding their identities, circling 'fellow' Jewish students, taunting them, & more examples... IF ANYTHING LIKE THIS HAD HAPPENED TO BLACKS OR MUSLIMS, THERE WOULD HAVE BEEN IMMEDIATE ACTION ON THE PART OF THE ADMINISTRATION. YOU KNOW IT. EVERYONE IN THE LIBERAL MEDIA KNOWS IT.
Yes, propose to fund a KKK chair and see what happens. Sponsor a Koran burning (Bible burning is A-OK) and see what happens.
The hypocrisy of these institutions is breathtaking.
Everyone gets an A at Harvard: "A report revealed that 79% of grades at Harvard College in the 2020-21 academic year were in the A-range, up from 60% a decade earlier."
Any employer now knows an Ivy League grads are entitled, 'everyone gets a trophy' students who believes they don't have to follow the rules. What employer would want a employee like that?
Hillsdale College does not accept any Federal student aid funds due to a past dispute about Title IX which is the exact law upon which the current dispute about transgender policies is centered.
Lie down with dogs, get up with fleas. If you chose to take money from the government, then you follow the government rules. We chose private schools because of this.
Good faith question, truly not a leading one—are you MAGA? If so, are you concerned about the overall trajectory of the use of power by the executive branch? If not, would you be concerned if these same decisions were being made by Biden?
I was concerned about overall trajectory A LONG TIME ago. What does Congress even do any more? Biden's EOs were almost never covered in the press, but they were far-reaching; unelected bureaucrats and judges now run the country. He thumbed his nose at the Supreme Court. I voted for Trump because the best you could do was Kamala, who was hand-selected by the oligarchs (now Dem phonies like Bernie are funding raising off them). And it looks like the Dem platform is again going to be DEI, open borders, protecting illegal criminal immigrants, and firebombing businesses.
So forgive me, a multi-BILLION dollar institution like Harvard, a playground for the rich and elite, can go fund themselves.
...except you would not be saying this if this was Biden going after Brigham Young or Liberty University's public funding, saying "no public money until you [insert woke cause]."
Then you'd call it out as stealth ideological warfare...because it is, and I think we both know it.
Most private, religious?, schools who have such beliefs, don't accept or ask for the Federal money.
I'm surprised credit transfer didn't make it on the list of concerns they found in surveys. I bet every state legislature in the country has had a bill at some point trying to get public institutions to make credit transfer easier. It's not a politicized or incendiary issue, but it does contribute to the public perception that social mobility via higher education is a game that is stacked against them.
No institution with an endowment of more than $10 billion should be tax exempt. There should be no further deductions for contributions to any of these institutions. Any institution with more than $25 billion in endowments should not receive any federal funds at all. These places are not nonprofits, they charge exorbitant prices and pay their administrators and the so-called tenured professors sit around and pontificate and write books. Outrageous salaries.
If they could just make a start with ending racial discrimination and following the law I think much of the rest would evolve.
The civil rights act prohibits discrimination based on race, etc. The Supreme Court told Harvard it had to change its ways. The Trump administration asked for data to see if they had. This is very similar to enforcing the voting rights act. We want universities to provide us, the general public, with the very data that they already collect.
DEI is intentionally an innocuous sounding acronym for a program that in practice has been extremely racist. The Trump folks have been right in my opinion to seek to eliminate anything with that name. I think they would do well to explain why discrimination is wrong and the advantages of a society that aspires to color blindness.
Artificial Intelligence and demographics suggest a declining enrolment in universities, they should consider offering value.
I don't like the idea that if your skin is a touch too light, you are perceived to be an easy target to teach against. However, that's not my major concern. Conservatives have and still do bite their tongues and get their degree. It's possible. What I'm most concerned with is the lax grading standards, not holding everyone to the same measurable standard, and dumbed down curriculum. And, my worry extends beyond college.
Think about this: We have study after study saying that a huge percentage of students can't read and comprehend beyond a 3rd grade level. If that holds, where are the students? Are they in 10th grade? How about 12th? Are we seriously graduating tons of people from high school with a diploma who can't read and comprehend? Logic says there should be large rates of failure or retention in schools. There aren't.
So, we are graduating students, handing them a degree, sending them into colleges or the workplace. They assume they are prepared. We all assume they are prepared. What if that person is in charge of something important? Is it any wonder we have college students who are behaving more like 14 year olds? If you think too hard about it, you will become anxious. I'm not sure when we decided blanket standards were a bit too much to ask, but at some point this happened. We can't ask for a well-ordered, responsible world when this is what we are comfortable providing.
Interesting that this is the angle you’ve thought most about, when it is a default authoritarian playbook move to cripple universities. Do you have concerns? I am not an alarmist but this week is ringing all the alarm bells.
While I share your concern about the current regime’s authoritarian playbook, the article helps explain how the regime is able to use it. By losing the public trust, universities have made themselves more vulnerable to attack.
Thanks! I get that and appreciate your insight , but it still felt disorienting to read the article given how quickly things have escalated. I’m not saying the article isn’t accurate or thoughtful, just that the premise doesn’t seem helpful for the direness of the moment we’re in
The 'direness of the moment' was present 25 years ago. Associating the loss of freedom in this country to Trump is shortsighted in the extreme. He is a symptom not a cause. The prior administration was just as authoritarian in its own way.
I agree wholeheartedly . What are we going to do about it now?
I have this conversation with a good friend on a regular basis. It was obvious from before 2016 that the totalitarian moment had arrived. We're on a slide downhill. I think even if people were prepared to die to subvert this, we'd still not stop the slide. I'm loath to use Hitler analogies, but here goes: assume that the powers that be in Weimar Germany could have stopped from making him into a cause celebre. Assume he'd been disqualified somehow, perhaps by revealing his affair with his niece (Geli Raubal) who subsequently committed suicide. I believe we'd be talking today about a KPD-led (Communist) German totalitarian takeover. It was what the Nazis feared most. It would have been different in nature, certainly, but it would have been totalitarian for certain. It might have lasted longer than the Nazis did, or not.
So without having a choice about the nature of the direction the world is moving, we can affect the nuance. But any guess as to which totalitarian regime to fight is fraught. Also, keeping our heads down might result in a better life for ourselves and our descendants. So it is a very tough call.
& the report indicates the "public's" view of upper education, especially the 'elite' universities have been declining steadily - not just because of Trump. The universities should feel vulnerable. They need to take action. Perhaps Trump or his minions read these same fact sheets & decide the times are ripe to help things along. Much to the misery of folks like you - or much to the pleasure of folks like you who can then blame Trump, not the universities who have not seen the writing on the wall
Out of curiosity, who do you think “folks like me” are?
"this week is ringing all the alarm bells" folks who read this & alarm bells are going off. When in fact, the 'alarm bells' should have been going off when the elite universities were declining steadily already, & showing obvious left-leaning culture & strong possibility of trying to indoctrinate vs teach a well-rounded class of graduates
I don’t disagree with you. Do you disagree with me that the trajectory has picked up the pace towards authoritarianism?
not cripple, but perhaps use the word "strip" them of the most left-leaning used "playbooks"
No, it’s not exactly a mystery why universities have lost public trust—or at least why people say they have. But maybe it’s time for the sometimes smug Liberal Patriot to drop “Liberal” from its name. You point to polls as “clear evidence” of declining confidence in higher education. But tell me: is there any institution that hasn’t lost public trust? The media? Congress? The Supreme Court? Justice System? Law firms? Even Disney? State news agency, Fox News, has shifted the ideology and partisan identity of Americans rightward, promoting conspiracies and eroding trust in institutions.
And how seriously should we take Republican skepticism toward higher ed, anyway? Nearly 70% of Republicans still claim Biden’s 2020 win was illegitimate. When will you run a piece on Americans losing faith in fellow Americans who cling to conspiracy theories?
Let’s not ignore the facts: in fall 2024, 19.1 million students were enrolled in U.S. colleges—not a record, but a strong rebound from the COVID years. Total college enrollment rose 4.5% from fall 2023 to fall 2024, with first-year student enrollment up 5.5%.
Not everything is broken, Liberal Patriot. American universities remain among the most respected institutions globally, renowned for academic rigor, research leadership, and program diversity. Schools like Harvard, MIT, and Stanford consistently rank at the top worldwide. They draw talent from around the globe, and their innovation continues to shape the future in a profound way.
I agree w/ much of what you said... however, like Brandy implied, our education system before the college level does not compete against much of the other world's high school graduates. Many of our students entering college/university have to take what would be considered 'remedial' for those 2-year requirements before actually getting to their chosen field of study. While those wanting to enroll from other parts of the world enter already outpacing them.
Those #'s you quoted about enrollment for US students in colleges. Perhaps many high schoolers should be guided towards community or vocational vs 4 yr right out of high school. Much less expensive, & can go on towards 4 yr if it 'fits'. I would like to see what degrees many of these lower performing students are selecting & what the job market is for them when/if they graduate.
You seem to be bashing "Liberal Patriot". I've voted independent many, many times, especially the last 3. I started reading LP, then finally joined when I read a piece that, imo, was reaching out to try to figure out how to fix things, rather than keep the blame-game going. I don't think LP has changed in that regard at all. --- eta, btw, the edition I read that pulled me in was "Citizenship Without Partisanship", March 19
Everyone calls it an attack. I believe it is holding the institutions accountable while receiving tax monies. And no one is coercing them to do anything. They can say no to the peoples money. After all, Harvard has $53 billion in the endowment fund. change a few rules about the fund and then access it as needed. Just like everything in the world today, they either adapt to the new system or perish. I vote for perish.
It's not just higher education, it is the whole notion of expertise that is experiencing a loss of confidence and it is not just in the US. This makes the problem larger and more intractable. As a retired member of the PMC, this is of great concern to me. Recognizing that a lot of this is deserved, doesn't make fixing it any less urgent lest we wind up with a Yezhov or Robespierre.
Fixing it from the top down, is likely to fail, however. In the case of higher education, Yale needs to fix itself but a national effort needs to be led by the community colleges. They can make a more plausible case on cost and relevant skills which can then be expanded to things like medicine. Ideological imbalance is the most difficult as it is so deeply embedded in the faculty. A witch hunt is highly undesirable (See Yezhov) not just on moral grounds but for its long term effects. So it needs to come from within the faculty. Recruitment is too slow so existing faculty need to be convinced. Perhaps a high profile demolition of a chosen victim would make them reassess or would it make them dig in.
President Biden proposed expanding free community college across the U.S. It still makes sense. Flogging elite institutions may be good political theatrics but it won't improve economic well-being or inequality in the U.S.
Worth examining beyond the alarmingly distrust in higher education is the commensurate, call it spinoff, distrust in the growing numbers of professions that require college degrees.
Let's see, many if not most federal-level government employees and elective officeholders are college graduates, as are the journalists-- notably Legacy media journalists -- who cover them.
Then their are the law school graduates, the lawyers, who fill the federal judgship posts, federal prosecutors offices and a disproportionate percentage of seats in Congress.
I almost forgot unionized public school teachers, college graduates all, bearing the greatest responsibility for the distrust and failure that is public primary and secondary education today.
The trend should be apparent. Higher education and its diminishing numbers of proponents like to assert that academic ans speech freedom is jeopardized when politicians threaten their funding or method of doing things. Yet these same partisan academics and their proponents are either unmindful of how they have become intolerant of dissenting or independent speech and inquiry, and that intolerance and shared political mindset is being reflected in the professions filled by the vast majority of their graduates.
People are pissed because of the crazy escalation in prices. Also, colleges and Universities are posters for DEI. Therefore, MAGA hates them. I hope they all follow Harvards lead and tell Chump to pound sand.
US education started going to crap beginning in 1979 when Carter signed the order to create the federal Department of Education.