College Is Not a Theater
I am delighted to see that Asian-Americans are speaking out against racial preferences in admissions. That stands to reason, since their children are the big losers in the racial preferences game. But they should be joined by non-Asians who understand that the purpose of college is for students to maximize their learning, not for administrators to play at social engineering.
A Massive Book on the History of Higher Education Makes You Wonder If It’s Getting Better, or Worse
Writing a comprehensive history of American higher education from colonial times up to the Second World War is a monumental undertaking, but if anyone is up to the task it’s Penn State University professor Roger Geiger, perhaps the country’s leading scholar on the history of post-secondary education in America. Geiger’s new book The History of American Higher Education is the most fact-filled treatment of its subject to date, and will likely remain the standard work for years to come.
Two Conflicting Visions, Part II: Will Producing More Degree Holders Benefit Society?
Strong cultural momentum—strengthened over several generations by parents, teachers, guidance counselors, and elected officials—has fostered an unwarranted faith in college’s benefits, raised attendance to irrational levels, and yielded an oversupply of graduates.
A Supreme Court Case on Race-Based Admissions Has Produced Strange Bedfellows
On May 21, the Supreme Court held a conference to discuss whether or not to accept the Fisher<.i> case—again. At this time, I don’t know the decision, but I do know that a seemingly strange mixture of liberals and conservatives wants the Court to take the appeal.
Emote, Protest, Get Naked for Your Professor, and Get Credit
Such assignments do not prepare students for the world of work and adult responsibilities, where their emotions do not factor in performance reviews, where they are expected to communicate in a clear and logical manner, and where they will have to know certain facts in order to build a bridge, argue a legal case, treat a heart attack victim, or teach children to read. Nor do such assignments prepare them to participate as free and literate citizens in a constitutional republic.
A Liberal Calls Out Intolerant Leftists Who Smother Free Speech on Campus
The rise of intolerance on campus and beyond makes a new book by columnist and television commentator Kirsten Powers a must-read. If you do not yet believe that American higher education is smothered in intolerance of diverse ideas, read The Silencing: How the Left is Killing Free Speech.
With friends like these, the humanities needs no enemies
Do we still need the humanities? Yes, now more than ever. But the current academicization, politicization, and jargon mean that college may be the worst place to look for them. That’s where you go for Queerness, libidinal data, and negotiated flesh. On the bright side, it may be that the liberal arts and humanities will flourish once they escape the airless vaults of academia.
Brown University doubles down on "diversity"
Despite howls of denial, there can be no doubt that "diversity" hiring (i.e., hiring faculty who wouldn’t have been hired but for their race, ethnicity, gender expression, etc.) produces "diversity hires" with lower academic qualifications just as surely as lowering admission standards to enroll more underrepresented minorities admits students who have lower qualifications.
All diversity, all the time, everybody, right now
Diversity proponents are pushing an extreme agenda that will go far beyond academia’s already major commitment to the concept. An event at UNC-Chapel Hill illlustrates just how far they intend to go.
10 ways the Ivory Tower is eroding American values
Students are not actually trained to think for themselves. And radical professors and administrators simply replace one dogma with another instead of creating open-minded critical thinkers. In other words, professors spend their time tearing down American values only to replace them with alternate campus values.