American colleges and universities are hothouses of hypocrisy and the principal exhibit is the fact that while their spokesmen talk endlessly about their commitment to openness, tolerance, critical thinking, diversity, … Continue reading “Free Speech on College Campuses”
Paul Krugman is a columnist who never passes up an opportunity to throw jabs at those Americans whom he dislikes, a set that comprises anyone who doesn’t accept his big-government philosophy. All the jabbing would be fine if Krugman limited himself to serious arguments, but serious arguments might be too boring for his New York Times editors, so he often resorts to cheap shots and fallacious reasoning. His April 5, 2005 column “An Academic Question” is a case in point. (Site requires registration.)
CHAPEL HILL — A group of female college administrators has begun a grassroots effort to overturn a recent Title IX clarification that makes it easier for college and universities to comply with Title IX regulations regarding athletics.
According to NCAA News, the National Association of Collegiate Women’s Athletics Administrators has sent an email to its members asking them to contact their congressmen and other political leaders to get the Department of Education’s Office of Civil Rights decision overturned. The Women’s Sports Foundation is also joining in the effort.
They promised 500 and delivered … a handful.
CHAPEL HILL — While protesters can still be heard in front of the post office on Monday evenings protesting the War on Terror, some students are attempting to prove that not everyone in this college town agrees.
The Carolina Troop Supporters is a group of college students from UNC-Chapel Hill, North Carolina State, and other colleges that have formed a bond to work together to support U.S. troops fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. This is not a group concerned about the politics of intervention or the United Nations. Instead, the students want to do more to support the troops than place a yellow ribbon magnet on their car.
The group was started by club President Ashley Weeks and came through a discussion that originated in an anthropology course. Weeks said the professor discussed the sacrifices soldiers made to fight and she wanted to do something other thanb to simply say “thank you.”
CHAPEL HILL — Rep. Robin Hayes, R-N.C., was among the leaders of a recent House resolution to express support for the continuation of a federal law that denies federal funding to colleges that do not allow military recruiters on campus. The resolution is in response to U.S. District Court of Appeals ruling in November that struck down the law.
CHAPEL HILL — Though most of the State of the Union address Feb. 2 dealt with reforms to Social Security and spreading freedom throughout the world, President Bush also focused attention on his higher-education goals.
During his fifth State of the Union address, Bush advocated increasing Pell Grant funding as well as providing more funding for workforce training initiatives for community colleges. Both proposals were ways, Bush said, “to make our economy stronger and more dynamic.”
The Dionne article anticipated last week’s big Edwards news. He now has an issue: the alleviation of poverty. Dionne doesn’t write that Edwards has no idea about how to accomplish it; instead, as he graciously puts it, Edwards is “planning to set up a center to study ways to alleviate poverty.” That would be UNC’s new Center on Poverty, Work and Opportunity, of which Edwards will be director.
RALEIGH — In June 2003, the Supreme Court heard two cases concerning racial preferences in Michigan higher education, Gratz v. Bollinger (on preferences used by the University of Michigan) and Grutter v. Bollinger (on preferences used by its Law School). The Court ruling against outright racial preferences in admissions while ruling in favor of considering race in admissions so long as it is used as only one of “pertinent elements of diversity.”
For more than 30 years, Title IX of the Education Amendments has been heralded as the reason for the increase in the number of women’s athletic programs across the country and providing opportunities for women like Mia Hamm to compete on the college level.
While Title IX has provided more opportunities in athletics for women, it has done the opposite for men. A federal guideline intended to prevent discrimination among the sexes in education has done just the opposite in college athletics. Title IX requirements have been used to cut athletic opportunities for men, while at the same time increasing opportunities for women.
