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CounterCurrent:
Resistance v. Reform
Higher education leadership can’t agree on current state of higher ed and what is to be done about it, causing a growing schism
CounterCurrent is the National Association of Scholars’ weekly newsletter, bringing you the most significant issues in academia and our responses to them.
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Category: Future of Higher Ed, Academic Reform, Higher Ed;
Reading Time: ~5 minutes
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** Featured Article: “The Elite-University Presidents Who Despise One Another” ([link removed])
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Amidst public outcry for higher education to reform, along with pressure from the Trump administration and the Department of Education (ED), it seems that a divide is growing amongst college and university leadership—some are joining the call to reform from within; others are having mental breakdowns, suffering from so-called “Trump Derangement Syndrome,” and deflecting all responsibility for the current state of higher education.
As we at the National Association of Scholars have stated many times, education reform efforts by individuals, groups, and even the government are necessary, but the most beneficial form of change always comes from within an institution.
Rose Horowitch at the Atlantic reports ([link removed]) how a panel discussion at the Washington, D.C. meeting of the Association of American Universities (AAU) devolved into an awkward argument after Princeton President Christopher Eisgruber publicly called out two of the other leaders for agreeing with the Trump administration’s narrative of American higher education. Chancellor Andrew Martin of Washington University and Chancellor Daniel Diermeier of Vanderbilt specifically were the recipients of Eisgruber’s pointed remarks. This AAU meeting sought to address the growing decline of public trust in higher education. It was clear that the leadership on the panel had very different views on this topic and who, or what, is to blame.
Horowitch explains that while Eisgruber argued ([link removed]) that higher education is facing politically motivated attacks and that there is no evidence of academia being “illiberal” and “out of touch” with America, Martin and Diermeier countered, saying that the Ivies are “dragging down the reputation of America’s heavyweight research institutions,” and that “the best path forward for higher education is to publicly commit to a kind of voluntary, modified de-wokeification.”
Clearly, reform is needed. The growing schism in higher education will only be made worse if institutions continue to substitute ideology for education while violating academic freedom and the Constitutional rights of students and faculty. Eisgruber’s claim that all is well and good in academia is weakened as new evidence emerges almost daily of higher education’s shortcomings.
Take George Mason University (GMU) for example ([link removed]) . An ED investigation ([link removed]) by the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) just found GMU ([link removed]) to be in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act in its hiring practices. After the 2020 George Floyd protests, GMU President Gregory Washington called for “expunging the so-called ‘racist vestiges’” from campus, and implemented faculty-diversity goals to solve this problem. ED Acting Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Craig Trainor said in a statement
([link removed]) last week that GMU “violated Title VI by illegally using race and other immutable characteristics in university practices and policies, including hiring and promotion.” Just yesterday ([link removed]) , President Washington responded to the ED’s request for GMU to review its hiring practices and for Washington himself to issue an apology for promoting discriminatory practices with a resounding “no.”
GMU is not the lone recipient of heightened public and government scrutiny. Since March of this year, the ED has opened upwards of 45 investigations ([link removed]) into Title VI violations. Along with these investigations are the cuts to science funding ([link removed]) and crackdowns on anti-Semitism and discrimination by the federal government—especially at the Ivies. And let us not forget America’s growing distrust ([link removed]) in academia.
Public pressure to reform is opening the eyes of some higher education leaders. A few are beginning to see the flaws of our current system. The “reformists” Martin and Diermeier had begun their work to bring awareness to higher education’s problems early last year, before Trump even won his second term as president. Then in late March, the Atlantic recounts ([link removed]) how Martin and Diermeier assembled a group of several dozen college presidents, board chairs, and think-tank leaders to form Universities for America’s Future, a “coalition of institutions that are focused on reform.” Eisgruber and his camp—the “resistance”—continue to urge colleges and universities to stand up and speak out ([link removed]) ag
ainst “government attacks,” especially since they believe higher education is in better shape than ever before.
The schism between the reformists and the resistance—or better yet the denialists—continues to grow, but at least there is hope to be found: higher education is slowly facing the facts. Higher education’s problems are not tied to a president or a presidential term, nor will they be solved long term by executive branch intervention—ever shifting political winds mean presidential reform without legislation can be easily reversed. Hopefully more leadership realizes academia’s deep-seated problems are self-inflicted before there is no future. Let’s see if they do something about it.
Until next week.
Kali Jerrard
Communications Associate
National Association of Scholars
Read the Article ([link removed])
For more on the future of higher ed, academic reform, and higher ed:
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August 21, 2025
** Federal Anti-DEI Guidelines Must Be Enforced Locally—State Attorneys General Should Step Up ([link removed])
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Louis Galarowicz
Ending DEI-based discrimination will come through numerous small acts of courage, assertions by employees of wrongdoing by employers, as well as legal battles and adoption by enforcement agencies.
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August 13, 2025
** Princeton President Melts Down, Rejects Responsibility for Campus Anti-Semitism ([link removed])
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Samuel J. Abrams
When Princeton President Christopher Eisgruber turned on his fellow university leaders at an April panel discussion, all but accusing Vanderbilt and Washington University chancellors of “carrying water for the Trump administration,” he revealed the dangerous delusion gripping elite academia.
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January 11, 2020
** Report: The Lost History of Western Civilization ([link removed])
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Stanley Kurtz
The Lost History of Western Civilization is a wide-ranging consideration of the academy’s role in producing America’s contemporary political and cultural divisions. The report traces the ways in which the 1988 controversy over the teaching of Western Civilization at Stanford set the pattern for today’s “Cold Civil War.”
** 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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