“Grave Concerns” on Antisemitism, DEI on the Run, March to Madness, Cartels, Scholar Activists, and More
House Committee Continues to Press the Antisemitism Problem
We are certainly out of adjectives to describe the brazen horror of Hamas’s attack on Israel last October and of Israel’s outsize and lethal response in the weeks and now months following. But few would have predicted that our college campuses would be the nation’s lightning rod for America’s response to the tragedy in the Middle East or that the U.S. House of Representative’s Education and Workforce Committee would be the stage for airing the dramas and demons of the differences, including hearings that dethroned two Ivy league college presidents.
Opening another chapter in the Republican-led committee’s self-appointed watchdog role in the ongoing debate was chairwoman Representative Virginia Foxx (R., N.C.), who wrote a 12-page letter on March 8 to MIT president Sally Kornbluth, the lone survivor of the grilling last fall, and MIT Corporation chairman Mark Gorenberg with her “grave concerns regarding the inadequacy of MIT’s response to antisemitism on its campus.”
There is certainly no lack of reports of hate-filled antisemitism on campuses across the country (see Further Reading, below), and Columbia University’s president, Minouche Shafik, was also summoned to Washington to testify about “campus antisemitism” even as two civil-liberties groups filed a lawsuit against the Ivy League school for suspending two anti-Zionist student organizations last November. Under the circumstances, it perhaps wasn’t surprising that a Columbia task force tasked with addressing the problem “would rather not say what anti-semitism was” and that the Hechinger Report, a self-described “national nonprofit newsroom that reports on one topic: education, offered a roadmap for “combat[ing] antisemitism without compromising academic freedom.”
Stay tuned.
Sources
House Education Committee Opens Antisemitism Probe into MIT (National Review)
Columbia University's president agrees to congressional hearing over campus antisemitism (USA Today)
Columbia president ‘forced’ to congressional antisemitism hearing (Times Higher Education)
What Is Antisemitism? A Columbia Task Force Would Rather Not Say (New York Times)
How to combat antisemitism without compromising academic freedom (Hechinger Report)
Further Reading
The Campus Antisemite’s Secret Weapon (RealClear Education)
Jewish Northwestern Students Shocked by Glorification of Antisemitic Terrorism (National Review)
Students protest UC Berkeley antisemitism after incident with speaker (San Francisco Chronicle)
‘Grave Concerns’: House Education Committee Demands Documents Related to Elite University’s Handling of Antisemitism (Daily Signal)
Responding to subpoena, Harvard describes efforts to fight antisemitism (Washington Post)
U.S. Opens Civil Rights Investigation Into UC Berkeley, 4 Others (Inside Higher Ed)
Jewish Students Describe Facing Antisemitism on Campus to Members of Congress (New York Times)
Campaigners step up legal drive over US campus antisemitism claims (Financial Times)
As Campus Antisemitism Reared Its Ugly Head, Conservatives Woke Up. What Comes Next? (National Review)
Northwestern Faculty, Students Slam University for Creating Committee to Combat Antisemitism (National Review)
Texas Tech Suspends Professor Over Alleged ‘Hateful, Antisemitic’ Posts (Chronicle of Higher Education)
Should Universities Protect Campus Anti-Semites? (Public Discourse)
Columbia Antisemitism Task Force Finds Harassment of Jews Treated Differently Than Other Groups, Urges School to Correct Course (National Review)
Jewish, Muslim Students Fear Their Views Put Them in Danger (Inside Higher Ed)
DeSantis invites Jewish students fearing antisemitism to Florida universities (Tampa Bay Times)
College Dorm Decorations Become a Front in the Campus Free Speech Wars (New York Times)
Harvard’s Leaders Hit With Subpoenas as Congressional Probe Into Antisemitism in the Ivy League Heats Up (NY Sun)
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Down and Out in DEI Land
It’s hard to find any good news for diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives these days. The big headliner this week was from Alabama: Alabama governor signs law banning college DEI funding. Higher Ed Dive’s subhead was: “The legislation, which will take effect Oct. 1, reflects a broader trend of state bills moving to limit or prohibit diversity programming in public education.” A few weeks earlier, The New York Times announced, “University of Florida eliminates All D.E.I.-Related Positions.” Even the good news sounds bad: “University of Virginia Spends $20 Million On 235 DEI Employees, With Some Making $587,340 Per Year.” And to rub salt in the wound, the OpenTheBooks story’s subhead reads, “It takes tuition payments from nearly 1,000 undergraduates just to pay their base salaries!”
Democrats did make their case for DEI in a “contentious” hearing on March 7, after Utah Republican and African-American Burgess Owens called DEI initiatives “a cancer that resides in the hearts of American academic institutions” in his opening statement at the House Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce Development’s hearing. (See “Divisive, Excessive, Ineffective: The Real Impact of DEI on College Campuses.”) As Inside Higher Ed reported, “His Democratic colleagues offered a forceful renunciation of that characterization.” But as political pendulums go this one is swinging right.
Sources
Alabama governor signs law banning college DEI funding (Higher Ed Dive)
University of Florida Eliminates All D.E.I.-Related Positions (New York Times)
University of Virginia Spends $20 Million On 235 DEI Employees, With Some Making $587,340 Per Year (OpenTheBooks)
Democrats Make Their Case for DEI (Inside Higher Ed)
Further Reading
Which college, university leaders are speaking out against anti-DEI efforts? (University Business)
Diversity Advocates Condemn Elimination of DEI Staff and Programs at University of Florida (Diverse)
After Texas’ DEI Bans, Administrators Got ‘Creative.’ Then They Got in Trouble. (Chronicle of Higher Education)
Here Are 3 Ways That Republicans See Campus DEI Efforts as Harmful
(Chronicle of Higher Education)
Texas’s War on DEI (City Journal)
University of Florida Guts DEI Offices and Fires All Staff Over New Statute (Daily Beast)
Accuracy in Media Investigations Reveal Red State Rot in Higher Education (Daily Signal)
DEI at public colleges, medical schools comes under congressional attack (Higher Ed Dive)
U of Florida Eliminates DEI Positions, Appointments and Spending (Inside Higher Ed)
Can You Create a Diverse College Class Without Affirmative Action? (New York Times)
The NIH Sacrifices Scientific Rigor for DEI (Wall Street Journal)
DEI killed the CHIPS Act (The Hill)
DEI Doesn’t Have To Die for Freedom of Speech (Discourse Magazine)
Giving DEI the Pink Slip (City Journal)
Zealous DEI Programs Land a University in Court (Martin Center)
Richard Corcoran, Florida New College president and DeSantis ally, debates DEI (University Business)
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Shortstack: Taking on the Cartel, Fighting for Civilization, Breaking Monopolies, Forbidding Scholar Activism, and More
Taking On the College Cartel (Law & Liberty)
Higher education faces a more fragile and contested future (University World News)
62% of Americans Lack a College Degree. Can They Solve the Labor Shortage? (Wall Street Journal)
Higher education faces a more fragile and contested future (University World News)
Against Scholar-Activism (Martin Center)
The fight for civilization in higher education (The Spectator)
Medical Schools Should ‘Combat Racism.’ But Not Like This. (Free Press)
Princeton’s President makes bogus arguments that diversity and academic excellence are compatible (Why Evolution Is True)
A so-called activist Supreme Court shrugs at extreme campus speech rules (Washington Post)
Have the Liberal Arts Gone Conservative? (New Yorker)
Is the SAT making a comeback? More colleges are returning to test score requirements, but effectiveness remains questioned (Pittsburgh Post Gazette)
Hot Off The Presses
Biden Administration Set to Notify Thousands Eligible for Student Loan Forgiveness via Email Top of Form
President Biden’s latest move is a game-changer for millions of Americans buried under student loan debt. By beefing up the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program, he’s not just offering a lifeline to public servants like teachers, firefighters and nurses—he’s throwing them a financial rescue rope. Some 78,000 eligible individuals will receive an email from President Biden next week, says the White House, signaling their path to debt forgiveness. Additionally, thousands more enrolled in PSLF will soon be notified via email if they are on track to have their debt forgiven within the next two years. Under the revamped plan, eligibility requirements are getting a facelift, making it easier for more people to qualify. But that’s not all—Biden’s proposal includes upping the forgiveness amount from $10,000 to $25,000 per year, promising significant relief for those shackled by student debt. Moving away from its past reputation for red tape and low approval rates, PSLF is getting a needed makeover. “Because of the fixes my Administration has made,” says the president, “we have now cancelled student debt for over 870,000 public service workers—compared to only about 7,000 public service borrowers ever receiving forgiveness prior to my Administration.”
Source
Biden cancels nearly $6 billion in student debt for public service workers (NPR)
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March to Madness: The NCAA “Stares Down Its Doomsday Scenario”
There’s no bracket on this one, but for a while these past few years the National Collegiate Athletic Association, which dates to the Teddy Roosevelt era and now regulates student athletics among some 1,100 schools, has faced some existential competitors, including the end of amateurism. Dartmouth basketball players just voted to unionize, and a court has prohibited the organization from enforcing its name, image, and likeness (NIL) rules for college athletes. “Amid a barrage of legal attacks,” says The Wall Street Journal, “even NCAA leaders have dropped a century-old stand against pay-for-play—now they’re just fighting over whether the athletes are employees.”
Will next year’s March Madness feature half-time ads by players?
Sources
National Collegiate Athletic Association (Wikipedia)
Dartmouth Basketball Players Vote to Unionize in New Challenge to NCAA’s Amateurism Model (Wall Street Journal)
Judge Bars NCAA From Enforcing Rules on Name, Likeness (Inside Higher Ed)
College Sports Stares Down Its Doomsday Scenario (Wall Street Journal)
Further Reading