Robert Weissberg is a professor emeritus of political science at The University of Illinois-Urbana.
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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How can professors be prevented from indoctrinating their students? And, how can it be done in ways that protect academic freedom? Trying to stifle classroom proselytizing is futile. Today’s ideologues are unstoppable. Instead, a more effective strategy is ensuring students know what to expect before enrolling. This prior knowledge serves as an implicit contract. If […]
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Scarcely a month passes without encountering yet one more new faculty group dedicated to promoting intellectual diversity on campus, yet one more manifesto celebrating campus free speech, and yet one more account of a canceled professor successfully suing those who canceled him. Then, add accounts of red states banning “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (DEI) from […]
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If economic rationality guided American universities, the recent Supreme Court decision declaring racial preferences unconstitutional should have been welcomed. The decision provides an off-ramp to costly failures at a time when higher education struggles financially. Given these fiscal strains, why fund diversity, particularly if this invites expensive litigation? Even those embracing the “diversity is our […]
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Outside of the sciences and engineering, today’s colleges and universities are producing nonsense on an industrial scale while, conversely, little emerges that might help America’s current tribulations. No sane person expects university professors to solve problems of crime, housing, education, and the like unless they have an appetite for jargon-laden ideological claptrap. This outpouring of […]
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Ignore the fancy rhetoric surrounding legacy admissions. Deep down, we all know that this newfound passion for merit is a punitive response to the Supreme Court’s recent ban on racial preferences in college admissions. It’s pure tit for tat: If whites want to keep blacks out of top schools, then racial preferences supporters will return […]
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“Diversity” is all the rage these days. It even attracts support across the ideological spectrum: demographic diversity on the Left and viewpoint diversity on the Right. For some, it has a magical quality. As Harvard’s president recently announced, to defend the university from those who claim it racially discriminates, “We write today to reaffirm the […]
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The Supreme Court has finally banned racial preferences in higher education. Alas, those familiar with the academy’s penchant for race-related chicanery know that the celebrations may be premature. Yes, few college and university presidents will announce their outright resistance, but many, perhaps most, will surreptitiously find a way to sneak racial preferences back in. Ideologues […]
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When it comes to civic literacy, the average American is hardly a rocket scientist—and the problem seems to be getting worse. This is, of course, not exactly news for experienced professors who regularly encounter students unable to recall even the most rudimentary facts, turning lectures into high school level remedial courses. Despite America’s massive spending […]
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There may be some good news for those concerned about today’s campus madness: the cavalry is on the way. We will, hopefully, be rescued! A recent Wall Street Journal editorial celebrated Harvard’s new Council on Academic Freedom. The organization proclaimed that “… free speech is also essential to human progress,” and that intellectual orthodoxy “is […]
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Affirmative action in today’s colleges and universities is a giant failure machine. Every year thousands of black and Hispanic students, who have been led to believe that a college degree is well within reach and a first step toward economic success, are admitted to schools for which they barely qualify. The inevitable consequence is failure, […]
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Paradoxes are excellent pedagogical exercises, and any professor worth his salt knows at least a few. To this storehouse of familiar examples, let me add a new paradox that is especially relevant to today’s academy: oikophobia, a term elucidated by Benedict Beckeld in his recently published Western Self-Contempt: Oikophobia in the Decline of Civilizations. As […]
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Imagine if a single law could simultaneously force colleges to drastically lower their costs and decimate the diversity, inclusion, and equity (DIE) bureaucracy. Happily, this is possible, and the solution can be summarized in a single word: unbundling. Almost overnight, the cost of college would fall precipitously, students would mature as they learned to manage […]
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Why do countless students willingly pay upwards of $50,000 a year for a degree in black studies, when the skills they learn are seldom sought in the marketplace? In fact, the opposite may be true: few employers want to hire angry activists who’ve spent years marinating in grievances while learning to write impenetrable, jargon-filled prose […]
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Has American higher education reached peak woke? Alas, probably not, given that activists can find almost anything to protest. While it may be difficult to predict the next campus absurdity, let me suggest what may soon arrive: importing the anti-police, pro-crime movement into our colleges and universities. In fact, the first outcroppings of this movement […]
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Benjamin Franklin once said, “nothing is certain except death and taxes.” Today, though, a third item may be equally inevitable: academia’s diversity, inclusion, and equity (DIE) bureaucracies. Scarcely a week passes without some school proudly announcing that it will now hire dozens of DIE functionaries and spend millions to promote racial justice. Oddly, many professors, […]
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Would it not be wonderful to be a Greek god? Imagine being Poseidon, god of the sea, who was able to create storms, earthquakes, and even horses. Or Ares, god of war, who possessed superhuman powers of speed and strength, allowing him to destroy his enemies, even entire armies, at will. This is pure mythology, […]
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The battle over racial preferences in college admissions usually focuses on universities and the courts, but no less important is what occurs among the applicants themselves. Gaining admission, particularly to elite schools, can be likened to a game, and it is hardly surprising that families lacking “diversity” often hire expensive consultants to give junior an […]
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Following the antics on today’s college campuses undoubtedly invites mental illness. It’s not easy watching a speaker at an Ivy League school get shouted down with chants of “No KKK, no fascist USA” or hearing about professors accused of bias for addressing students with the “wrong” pronoun. But, mental discomfort aside, must we really fear […]
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Decisions regarding the hiring and firing of professors seldom make headlines. At most, a tale about a professor suspended for using the N-word may appear in an academically oriented outlet. But headlines in big-city dailies? Not so much. Yet, this is exactly what occurred when New York University summarily fired Professor Maitland Jones, Jr., a […]
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The link between higher education and economic growth is well established: build the schools, attract smart students, and behold, a booming economy. There is, however, a less obvious but equally important link: build the schools, attract smart students, these smart students marry each other and eventually have super-smart children, and the economy will flourish for […]
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Descriptions of today’s campus politics often use a mental-health vocabulary: “crazy,” “insane,” “lunatic,” etc. This terminology is employed for literary purposes to highlight the disconnect between campus life and the “real world.” No one believes that it reflects clinical assessments by certified professionals of actual students and faculty. Nevertheless, this literary vocabulary may contain more […]
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Colleges and universities were once bare-bones places. Dorm rooms had all the charm of a Motel 6 and school-run cafeterias were comparable to those in high school. Recreation was, maybe, a TV room and a musty gym for pick-up basketball. No matter—education was about learning, not personal indulgence. But, as tuition soars and competition for […]
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The woke mob’s attack on academic heretics can be likened to hunting. Most hunts attract scant attention, often no more than shooting squirrels with a .22. Blocking the reappointment of a visiting instructor at Smallville Community College who mis-gendered a student is an example of this low-level hunting. But of far greater consequence is what […]
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Today’s assault on intellectual excellence in the academy will eventually end. Hopefully, an investigation will then commence on its causes, and all the usual suspects will be rounded up. This tribunal will, however, likely ignore one key culprit: ordinary faculty—people like me—who complained about the assault, all while enthusiastically aiding it. Yes, some criticized the […]
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Student activism has long been part of campus life. Recall the Berkeley Free Speech movement that began in 1964 over the school’s ban of on-campus political activities. The mid-1960s saw countless demonstrations protesting the war in Vietnam, which were followed by widespread agitation over racial issues. Nevertheless, current demonstrations differ fundamentally from past activism. The […]
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Is the battle to ensure an intellectually open campus winnable? Many would answer “yes,” but there are reasons for pessimism. To be blunt, the life of the mind, the veneration of truth over falsehood, and the pursuit of truth may not be the default option of human nature. Yes, that idyllic world may exist here […]
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The campus battle between proponents of intellectual merit and those of racial preferences in admissions has been a long and disappointing campaign. Nevertheless, victory now seems within reach thanks to the current Court’s likely opinion in Students for Fair Admissions Inc. v. President & Fellows of Harvard College. At long last, racial discrimination will—hopefully—end by […]
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Why is it that the more we do to promote diversity the greater the racial acrimony? It is as if a misguided patient took a medicine that only worsened his illness. This paradox is especially visible in higher education, and one can only wonder if a robust intellectual life can survive the seemingly endless quest […]
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Since the early 1960s, universities have sought to achieve racial equality. Initiatives have ranged from offering extra tutoring for struggling minority students to making them more comfortable on campus by providing segregated housing and black-only graduation ceremonies. Unfortunately, nothing has worked. Now, after over a half century of trying everything imaginable and sparing no expense, […]
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