The damage that “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (DEI) policies are doing to American colleges and universities is increasingly well-known, thanks largely to efforts of the National Association of Scholars and Minding the Campus, but the harm done to U.S. intelligence agencies has not been assessed—until now. My study of the operational effects of DEI policies […]
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Editor’s Note: This article was originally published by the Law & Liberty on November 5, 2024. With edits to match Minding the Campus’s style guidelines, it is crossposted here with permission. Arguments about the Electoral College are often shallow. Opponents claim it is a relic of slavery and the product of the Founders’ distrust of democracy. They cite […]
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Editor’s Note: This article was originally published by the College Fix on November 6, 2024. With edits to match Minding the Campus’s style guidelines, it is crossposted here with permission. Proponents of “racial equity” training have received $5 million from the National Institutes of Health to “generate evidence” in support of their program at the University of Pittsburgh. […]
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For a time, I worked at a South African university, where my department still upheld the civilized practice of morning tea. One morning, I happened to arrive a few minutes late but found an open seat at a table just as a senior professor was opining—in very orotund tones, naturally—to some Honours students, “Wouldn’t it […]
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Editor’s Note: This article was originally published by the National Association of Scholars on November 4, 2024, and is crossposted here with permission. Higher education has lurched from crisis to crisis over the past five years. The COVID-19 pandemic kept many would-be students from attending college while seriously straining university budgets. Colleges continue to face demographic declines, with one million […]
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In modern higher education, students hold unprecedented power over faculty and university governance. This influence, shaped by the combined forces of cancel culture, student consumerism, and administrative bloat, has shifted the traditional power dynamics, leading to significant consequences for how universities function and how faculty engage with students. Although student empowerment can sometimes drive positive change, […]
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Editor’s Note: This article was originally published by Liberty Unyielding on November 1, 2024 and is crossposted here with permission. It has been edited to fit Minding the Campus’s style guidelines. Kamala Harris will make campus censorship worse through her judicial appointments as president. Progressive judges appointed by Joe Biden have upheld punishment and investigation of moderate, conservative, and libertarian […]
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Editor’s Note: This article was originally published by RealClear Science on November 4, 2024. With edits to match Minding the Campus’s style guidelines, it is crossposted here with permission. The latest research fraud scandal concerns one Eliezer Masliah. He’s one of the world’s leading researchers into Alzheimer’s and it looks as if he fabricated a good deal of his data. […]
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Editor’s Note: This article was originally published by RealClear Education on November 4, 2024. With edits to match Minding the Campus’s style guidelines, it is crossposted here with permission. Over the last 60 years, there has been unconscionable neglect of civics and American history at both the K-12 and university levels. Surveys by the American Council of […]
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Editor’s Note: This article was originally published by RealClear Politics on November 2, 2024. With edits to match Minding the Campus’s style guidelines, it is crossposted here with permission. On the eve of a big national election, it is easy to get swept up in the excitement of presidential politics. The White House, after all, is often […]
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The issue of toxicity in American culture runs the gamut. From sexist accusations toward men to the haughty denunciations of so-called elites of those not as fortunate, it is prevalent and problematic. Toxicity is prevalent because it seems to be pervasive in all corners of American society. It is problematic because American culture has rapidly shifted […]
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The University of Austin (UATX) differs from other elite universities in several ways. Yet, on many of those dimensions, UATX is similar to other individual schools. The University of Chicago is just as committed to free expression. Caltech is just as dismissive of intercollegiate athletics. UATX’s Polaris Project, on the other hand, is like nothing […]
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Having witnessed profound political changes under America’s first “Common Man” president – Andrew Jackson, Alexis de Tocqueville issued stern warnings against the “tyranny of the majority” in his otherwise glowing account of American Democracy: If liberty is ever lost in America, it will be necessary to lay the blame on the omnipotence of the majority […]
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In today’s academic hiring process, “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (DEI) statements are a common requirement for faculty hiring across the United States. As seen in a rubric obtained by Minding the Campus through a public records request, the University of Oregon evaluates DEI statements by awarding points to applicants based on their demonstrated “knowledge” of […]
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Postmodern philosophers once hailed “the death of the author,” which was part of their strategy to decenter meaning in texts and free culture from the tyranny of metanarratives. Meaning cannot be found in a text without discerning the author’s intentions. All such controls and stipulations should be rejected as authoritarian. Objective meaning must give way […]
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The decline of civic education in this country has led to an alarming lack of understanding among young people about how our government works. Pair that failure with the leftwing voices in media, government, and academia constantly clamoring about “our democracy,” and it’s easy to see why so many young people today embrace potentially destructive […]
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My street in the Upper West Side of New York City takes Halloween seriously. A week or more before the kids go trick-or-treating, our block features an abundance of ghoulishly carved pumpkins, life-sized plastic skeletons, and enough gauzy cobwebs to set the stage for a dozen Boris Karloff movies. My forays to the suburbs and […]
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Americans think George Ticknor (1791–1871) was their nation’s first Hispanist. They’re wrong; and they overrate the intellect of the Harvard professor. Like his admirers, Ticknor had a linear and encyclopedic mind. We should be grateful—he collected and collated the major texts of the modern history of European literature. But his analysis was buggy, handicapped by […]
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Happy Halloween! The National Association of Scholars—which you should join—held its annual board meeting this past weekend in Denver. It was a delight to finally have that long-anticipated conversation about artificial intelligence (AI) with my colleagues—in person. AI is everywhere these days. It makes headlines in higher education as students turn to it for everything […]
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The fight over student loan forgiveness has consumed most of the attention of the higher education policy world, and as a result, other policies are receiving much less attention than they should. One such neglected topic is borrower defense to repayment, which is a method of waiving repayment requirements for student loan borrowers who were […]
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The case for vigorous, free-wheeling intellectual debates seems to be making a comeback on today’s campuses. This awakening is particularly evident in the growth of organizations dedicated to building a robust marketplace of ideas ruled by logic and evidence, not violent intimidation. Examples include the Academic Freedom Alliance, the Committee on Open Expression, North Carolina’s […]
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Editor’s Note: Below is an excerpt of the article “Hochul Report Whitewashes Teachers Union Antisemitism,” originally posted on American Spectator on October 29, 2024. It has been edited to match MTC style guidelines. The full essay can be found here. When New York Gov. Kathy Hochul commissioned a report on the City University of New York’s rampant […]
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“What kind of a friend could pull a knife When it’s him or you and his kids need shoes? What kind of friend would do you in When the bomb goes off and the shelter’s his? … What kind of friend would tell you lies To spare you from the bitter truth? And what kind […]
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Editor’s Note: Below is a short excerpt from Michelle Kamhi’s essay posted on X. The full essay delves into the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, particularly the author’s response to a friend’s pro-Palestinian viewpoint. With permission, this excerpt is crossposted here, as readers of Minding the Campus may find it valuable in addressing campus anti-Semitism and pro-Palestine protests. […]
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I have always been contemptuous of professors who complain that their students aren’t doing the readings. It is easy to ensure that your students do the reading. Just cold-call them and ask basic questions about the content. My students read the first book of Plato’s Republic last week. Here are some of the questions I asked: […]
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As a medical practitioner applying for a faculty position at the University of Massachusetts (UMass) Chan Medical School, it is no longer satisfactory to demonstrate a curriculum vitae of excellent merits in research and medical practice. One must also be actively involved in promoting “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (DEI) to a level that penalizes individuals […]
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Editor’s Note: This article was originally published by the American Postliberal on October 23, 2024. With edits to match Minding the Campus’s style guidelines, it is crossposted here with permission. In the aftermath of Hurricanes Helene and Milton progressives have jumped on the climate change rhetoric to explain the disaster. Nowhere do they mention the draining of […]
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Eastern Nazarene College. Clarks Summit University. The University of Saint Katherine. What do these universities have in common? They were all private Christian colleges. And they were among the latest victims to succumb in the college closure crisis. The recent trend of faith-based university closures is troubling. Young adulthood is an incredibly formidable era, characterized […]
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An article in the Atlantic about college students not reading books got a lot of circulation this month. Even at top schools such as Columbia University, undergraduates struggle with works of more than short-story length. Some of them tell their professors that in all their high school years, they never had to read a hefty book from […]
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On what was likely a crisp autumn day in Philadelphia in 1774—before muskets and Minutemen—the American colonies chose diplomacy. They sent a carefully crafted petition to King George III, born out of frustration and hope, as a final effort to mend a relationship that had been fraying for years. Their grievances? Numerous. Following the French […]
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