To finding the light in the darkness this holiday season
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CounterCurrent:
Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah from NAS
To finding the light in the darkness this holiday season
CounterCurrent is the National Association of Scholars’ weekly newsletter, bringing you the biggest issues in academia and our responses to them.
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Category: Future of Higher Ed, Current Events, Higher Ed;
Reading Time: ~4 minutes
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Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah, CounterCurrent readers! I hope I haven’t caught you checking your phone between the hurry to wrap gifts and escape the family curmudgeon.
This newsletter has a particular affection for optimism. Since we began writing CounterCurrent in 2019, every week since, we’ve covered the many drastic ways higher education has changed—for the better and worse. This year has been nothing different, yet there appears to be more light than darkness peaking through the curtains, even on these short winter days.
The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression reports ([link removed]) that 29 educational institutions have adopted institutional neutrality. Such policies were anathema just a few short years ago—remember kids, ‘silence is violence!’
Some institutions have gone even further. As Dartmouth president Sian Leah Beilock writes ([link removed]) in the Wall Street Journal this week,
Ending political statements by presidents isn’t enough. Dartmouth’s Principles of Institutional Restraint … spell out clear guidelines on restraint for academic departments and institutes that choose to speak as a unit.
These changes are essential in the absence of better policies. They will, I hope, breathe new life into the educational enterprise and return it to “discovery, improvement, and dissemination of knowledge,” as the 1967 Kalvin Report encourages. But, of course, simply adopting policies favoring institutional neutrality will not square this circle.
As Peter W. Wood, president of the National Association of Scholars (NAS), argued earlier this year ([link removed]) , colleges and universities “ought to stand for clearly stated values and defend them forthrightly against whatever pressures arise from students, faculty, trustees, politicians, foreign powers, or the general public.” College presidents can hide behind a policy of institutional neutrality when they should stand behind important principles, such as free speech.
This brings me to another light emerging on campus—Campus Freedom Centers. These institutions offer an affirmative understanding of education and American life. Specifically, these serve as a place for students to “explore American civic values with the full freedom of expression, intellectual diversity, and open inquiry that such studies require.”
These new centers have sprouted from legislative proposals in Ohio ([link removed]) , North Carolina ([link removed]) , Florida ([link removed]) , Texas ([link removed]) , and Arizona ([link removed]) . More states are considering creating similar programs and expanding requirements for general education credits in government, history, and civics.
Of course, I can’t conclude without mentioning the elephant in the room—a new administration intent on reforming education. We’ve covered many of these policies previously ([link removed]) , so I’ll only mention two reforms: accreditation and Title IX.
Accreditors have taken their monopoly for granted. NAS has long argued ([link removed]) that accreditors have overstepped their original intent by imposing ideological standards on colleges and universities and specific programs. (For a good briefer on accreditation and why reform is necessary, read this excellent article ([link removed]) on Minding the Campus.) President-elect Trump and his nominee for education secretary ([link removed]) , Linda McMahon, have encouraged broad accreditation reform. Some states have already begun to reverse the damage done by accreditors ([link removed]) .
Title IX has long been a problem within higher education. The Biden administration has made it worse by gutting due process and imposing gender ideology ([link removed]) . The incoming Trump administration has promised to return to a Title IX rule as propagated by Education Secretary Betsy DeVos. That rule was celebrated by NAS and ensured due process for students accused of sexual misconduct.
Let us look forward to the new year and all the opportunities it can bring. In the meantime, a reminder to be nice to your crazy uncle. After all, as my colleague Jared Gould argues ([link removed]) , you might learn something.
Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah from all of us at the National Association of Scholars!
Until next week.
Chance Layton
Director of Communications
National Association of Scholars
Read the Article ([link removed])
For more on the future of higher ed, current events, and higher ed:
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December 20, 2024
** California’s Insanity—Legislators Push Admission Priority for Descendants of Slavery ([link removed])
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Wenyuan Wu
Race peddlers are at the scheme of reparations again. This time, they are playing the game in higher education, hoping to get progressive government agencies to legislate racial preferences in college admissions.
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December 17, 2024
** America’s Demographic Cliff Will Reshape Higher Education—for the Better ([link removed])
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Peter Wood
The demographic cliff is not news to anyone who has been paying attention to college enrollment or workforce needs.
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January 19, 2023
** Report: Comprehensive Restructuring ([link removed])
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John D. Sailer
This study of the University of Texas at Austin surveys the most influential policies enacted on campus in the name of diversity, equity, and inclusion.
** About the NAS
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The National Association of Scholars, founded in 1987, emboldens reasoned scholarship and propels civil debate. We’re the leading organization of scholars and citizens committed to higher education as the catalyst of American freedom.
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