Higher Ed
What’s happening in higher education.
Stanford Law School Dean Letter on Free Speech
After an explosive shout-down at Stanford Law School, its dean defends free speech in a long, now seminal letter that should stand as a model for all university leaders in articulating and enforcing a commitment to the principles of free speech and freedom of association. Below are a couple of excerpts. We strongly encourage our members and all Harvard’s faculty and leadership to read the full letter.
My Struggle Session at Stanford Law School
Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Duncan provides a firsthand account of his “struggle session” with Stanford Law School students. “The most disturbing aspect of this shameful debacle is what it says about the state of legal education. Stanford is an elite law school. The protesters showed not the foggiest grasp of the basic concepts of legal discourse: That one must meet reason with reason, not power. That jeering contempt is the opposite of persuasion. That the law protects the speaker from the mob, not the mob from the speaker. Worst of all, Ms. Steinbach’s [Associate Dean for DEI] remarks made clear she is proud that Stanford students are being taught this is the way law should be.”
The Tyranny of the DEI Bureaucracy
The Editorial Board condemns university DEI offices as authoritarian, ideological enforcement bureaus. “The Stanford blowup shows how the culture of DEI, and especially its accumulation of power in the bureaucracy, has become a threat to free speech… Rather than promoting diversity, DEI officers enforce ideological conformity… they promote racial division rather than redress it, and institutions need to rethink their value.”
Woke word-policing is now beyond satire
George Will takes a tour of “woke” ludicrousness, showing that “In America…the worse wokeness becomes, the better. Wokeness is being shrunk by the solvent of the laughter it provokes.” Topics include: Stanford’s “Elimination of Harmful Language Initiative,” USC’s school of social work banning the word “field,” Stanford’s “Protected Identity Harm” system, DEI loyalty oaths, woke-editing Roald Dahl, and progressives’ serious use of the term “Latinx.”
Diversity statements are an imposition on academic freedom
Harvard alum Samuel Abrams (AM 07 PHD 10) writes that required diversity statements “are in conflict with the fundamental values that should govern university life: intellectual freedom and epistemic humility. They compel faculty to affirm contested views on matters of public debate or to embed specific ideological perspectives in their academic activities.”
Apathy Descends on Stanford and Stanford’s Search for Meaning
Stanford Review: On Apathy | On Meaning
Two must-read pieces on what’s happening on elite college campuses today. While it may seem that there’s activism and meaning-infused energy in some student publications, the reality on the ground at elite institutions tells a very different story. “We are going to oversee a sleepwalk into the decline of American democracy—led by apathetic elite college alums.”
Where’s the Line? On the Kalven Report, academic freedom, and the limits of institutional neutrality
Former Princeton Professor Joshua Katz writes that “Students, faculty, administrators, and the wider public are all paying attention these days to two hot-button topics in higher education: free speech and academic freedom. Meantime, a third topic, institutional neutrality, is slowly rising to national prominence.” While he supports the Kalven Report on institutional neutrality, he calls for a revised version “that bars any unit of the university from issuing statements about hotly contested matters outside the most exceptional of circumstances.”
My Liberal Campus [Princeton] Is Pushing Freethinkers to the Right
A piece on today’s campus climate, written by a senior at Princeton, could have been written by any student in the Ivy League and beyond where a puritanical and often hostile progressive ideology is forcing students rightward.
The Academic Mind 2022: What Faculty Think About Free Expression and Academic Freedom on Campus
FIRE surveyed nearly 1500 faculty regarding their attitudes on free expression and academic freedom. While “faculty are markedly more tolerant than the students they teach… A majority of faculty worry about losing their jobs or reputations because someone misrepresents their words. A third self-censor…[and] a significant portion…support punishing their colleagues in softer ways that can chill expression.”
How DEI Is Supplanting Truth as the Mission of American Universities
John Sailer describes how the principles of DEI are “meant to sound like a promise to provide welcome and opportunity to all on campus,” yet instead represent “controversial political and social views.” In order to advance in their careers, academics “must demonstrate fealty to vague and ever-expanding DEI demands and to the people who enforce them. Failing to comply, or expressing doubt or concern, means risking career ruin.”
MIT and Notre Dame Presidents Issue Freedom of Expression Commitment Statements
In February 2023, MIT president, Sally Kornbluth, and the president of Notre Dame, Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C., each issued a statement confirming their respective university’s commitment to freedom of expression.
As colleges become more Stasi-like, students live in fear of being reported
Rahn says out loud what many who have studied history fear. “I saw the horrors of the communist system up close,” he explains. “What I never anticipated was that..an enforced ideology would become the norm on many college campuses… Professors…who have never directly experienced socialism and communism are indoctrinating students with utopian fantasies…free debate has been abolished… concepts like innocent until proven guilty and due process are ignored. Students are encouraged to provide anonymous reports on others… Like the Stasi, colleges…keep detailed records on student behaviors.”
What Happened at Georgetown Law with Covid?
Another firsthand account of frightening thought mandates and punishment. “For questioning Covid restrictions, Georgetown Law suspended me from campus, forced me to undergo a psychiatric evaluation, required me to waive my right to medical confidentiality, and threatened to report me to state bar associations.”
‘Center for Freedom of Expression’ in the works at University of Chicago
“The University of Chicago reportedly plans to create a Center for Freedom of Expression that will include research and training on free speech” and is currently seeking to hire an Executive Director for the Center. According to the job posting “The University of Chicago is establishing a new Center for Free Expression that will build on our historic commitment and practice to provide a focal point for understanding and advancing free expression, in academia and the broader culture, in the United States and abroad.”
Feb ‘23 Higher Ed Collection
The following are higher ed-related articles of interest from February 2023 (to date).
A Black Professor Trapped in Anti-Racist Hell
A must-read, firsthand account of where DEI orthodoxy leads. Vincent Lloyd, a black professor who “like others on the left…had been dismissive of criticisms of the current discourse on race in the United States,” finds himself the victim of Chinese Cultural Revolution-style attacks and banishment.