This academic year has been punctuated by a series of high-profile campus protests. Many student grievances have, as in previous years, centered on claims of racial injustice. If next academic year is to be about education rather than protest, faculty and administrators must explore the role they play in both politicizing college life and racializing … Continue reading “How Colleges Themselves Bring About Racial Protests”
Academics often point out that diversity is good, in part, because it brings different perspectives and experiences to the table. I agree. In fact, this is one reason many argue that higher education needs to also promote viewpoint diversity. Diversity based on identities such as race does not necessarily reflect a deeper diversity of life … Continue reading “Colleges Are Rejecting Our Common Humanity and the Science That Reveals It”
One of the worst features of America in the 1940s and 50s was the persistent demand for national loyalty oaths. In those days, people were expected to declare their support for the U.S. and if they didn’t, they could be blackballed, expelled, or otherwise punished. The ideological fervor for conformity abated for decades, but has … Continue reading “Loyalty Oaths Return with Faculty “Diversity Statements””
Nowhere is the adage “personnel is policy” truer than in the federal education bureaucracy. With nothing more than a few Dear Colleague letters meant to provide “guidance” to nearly all colleges and universities, during the Obama administration officials in the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) made dramatic and harmful changes in the … Continue reading “Sweeping Change at the Office for Civil Rights Is Imperative”
James Gates Jr. is a theoretical physicist renowned for his work with supersymmetry, supergravity, and string theory. The University of Maryland professor says he prefers to shun publicity, but his curriculum vitae boasts of many accomplishments and honors, including service on former President Obama’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. He also is an … Continue reading “Citing Genetics and Power of Rock Music, Physicist Says Diversity Crossbreeds Excellence”
The number of non-academic administrators at colleges and universities has more than doubled in the last 25 years, far outpacing the growth in students and faculty. According to a report from the American Institutes for Research, between 2000 and 2012 the average ratio of full-time faculty and staff per administrator declined 40 percent, to around … Continue reading “Universities Are Churning Out the Next Generation of Higher Ed Bureaucrats”
After three decades in higher education as student and teacher, this year I begin a new role, as parent. My eldest daughter will attend a small liberal arts college in Iowa. Like many schools, her college asks incoming freshmen to read a common summer reading. Its choice for the incoming students this year is Claude … Continue reading “Summer Reading Questions and What They Reveal About Faculty”
Hamilton College has for years had an open curriculum, allowing students the freedom to shape their education as they think best. Whether that’s a good idea is debatable, but the college is about to move in the opposite direction by instituting a “diversity requirement” for all students. As a resident fellow at the Alexander Hamilton … Continue reading “The Ugly Truth Behind a College’s “Diversity” Requirement”
A professor doesn’t agree that it should be the top priority.
The University of California’s new admissions policies are an end-run around the state’s race-blind laws.