Trump’s Higher Ed Compact is “an attempt to save higher ed from itself”
My Op-Ed at The Daily Wire: “Under the current system, America’s universities are losing the public’s confidence and will lose public funding and relevance.”
Donald Trump’s proposed Compact For Excellence In Higher Education has been the subject of multiple media appearances by me, including:
- “Academia is a sinking ship, and the Trump administration is actually trying to intervene and rescue it” (Jesse Kelly)
- Higher Education Needs An Intervention (Federalist Podcast)
I have followed up with an Op-ed on the topic. It ran today at The Daily Wire, Trump Extends An Olive Branch To Academia. The Ivory Tower Slaps It Away:
Higher education is in a downward spiral of decreasing public confidence from which it is incapable of escaping without outside intervention.
For ideological and political reasons, however, most of higher ed is rejecting out-of-hand the Trump administration’s offers to help move higher ed back towards the center. That may prove to be a historic mistake.
A recent Pew survey shows 70% of Americans, including majorities across all major demographic groups and both political parties, believe academia is going in the wrong direction. In 2010, 75% of Americans thought college was “very important,” according to Gallup, and today only 35% do. This is an all time low.
There are many reasons for the loss of confidence, but part of it certainly is that higher education, particularly at the “elite” level, is a liberal bubble isolated from the mainstream. At Harvard, for example, under 10% of the faculty self-identify as conservative or very conservative compared with approximately 38% of the general public. Over 60% identify as liberal/very liberal compared to only 25% of the general public.
Harvard and other elite institutions do not “look like” America politically. For decades campuses cultivated a Critical Race and DEI culture that prizes group identity over individual merit, orthodoxy over debate, and exclusion over persuasion.
I see it at Cornell. DEI is a worldview that treats people as members of group identity categories and functions with something close to religious fanaticism. Changing the name from DEI to Inclusion and Belonging, as Cornell did, is just a superficial ploy.
While mocking the general public, higher ed depends on that public, in the form of the federal government, which provides hundreds of billions in federal grants and support annually. Many top-tier research universities rely on federal grants and support for substantial double-digit percentages of their budgets.
With the change in federal government control from Joe Biden to Donald Trump, a clash over funding and the trajectory of higher education was inevitable. President Trump’s critics say he is trying to smash higher education. That is wrong. What he is doing, with a bluntness that makes people uncomfortable, is using federal funding, the only lever left to rescue the failing system.
The administration’s new Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education offers financial incentives and expedited funding for institutions that reform and certify compliance in encouraging diversity of viewpoint, stopping discrimination, and raising merit rather than group identity as the focal point for advancement.
It’s a carrot and stick approach. The reward for moving towards the center is preferential funding treatment. For those that refuse, they can continue in the current system, where scrutiny of civil rights compliance risks loss of funding.
While the Trump administration has encouraged schools to seriously consider and provide feedback on the Compact, most who have responded have rejected any negotiation.
Instead, academia has embarked on a campaign to demonize the Trump proposal, framing it as “extortion.” While the higher education public relations campaign has had some impact in turning the public against Trump’s Compact, that doesn’t change the reality of public loss of confidence in higher education.
Objections to the Compact center on maintaining academic independence. That’s great in concept, but the reality is that nearly-complete independence has turned higher ed into an unsustainable political bubble.
Up to now, higher ed had almost unlimited funding and independence. All they had to do was not go crazy left. But they couldn’t restrain themselves, and that’s how they got Trump’s Compact.
An adult in the room is needed, and the Trump administration is attempting to play that role.
Most of the Compact’s proposed reforms are necessary. Protect free expression. Enforce existing conduct rules. Make administrators responsible for compliance. Limit practices that have turned American universities into leftist enclaves detached from the nation. The goal is not to impose a conservative orthodoxy but to restore diversity of thought and bring higher ed back towards the center.
Though the original deadline for the first nine schools has passed, the administration continues in discussion with them and others and has signaled openness as well. The universities should engage enthusiastically.
The Compact is not perfect, and there are some provisions that could be negotiated at least on a school-by-school basis. But to reject it out of hand is a sign that higher ed has not yet come to grips with reality.
Under the current system, America’s universities are losing the public’s confidence and will lose public funding and relevance. The Compact is not an attempt to destroy higher education, it’s an attempt to save higher ed from itself.
Donations tax deductible
to the full extent allowed by law.
Comments
Excellent post!
“But to reject it out of hand is a sign that higher ed has not yet come to grips with reality.”
If America is allowed to continue, there will be a paradigm shift in our education system. No more gathering of young fools in expensive, inefficient campuses with an almost total lack of adult supervision. (Leftist faculty don’t count as adults.)
And “Reality” is one of the names of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
whats wrong with graduating with degrees in islamic studies in conquering western lands
or
how africans built americas country without anyones help
the more valued how the media stole elections from jfk to fjb and beyond…that degree alone gets you the main anchor seat on cnn
The key change is to get govt out of higher education. Do that and Academia will be forced to focus on core academic competencies v fluffy bunny studies b/c they won’t have the funding to waste. Begin with student loans and Pell grants and restrict the funding assistance to STEM fields and ‘vocational’ programs and only at undergraduate level. Employers or the University themselves can figure out how or whether post grad work should/will be funded for those students without sufficient private means. Graduating students have the option to join the military after completing a BA/BS, earn the GI Bill and use that to fund post grad education.
This is a lost cause. Those running higher education and the pool of possible replacements are totally devoid of the proper character. At most they can be browbeaten into making watered down concessions, which they will constantly seek to undermine through subterfuge.
The future belongs to the Chinese. Chinese men have not been feminized, they are clear eyed and have not become decadent.
I fear that you are correct. However, I hope that you are wrong.
I think that the big, well funded schools are just going to play the “ wait them out” strategy and reinstate all the Leftist idiocy when the next Democratic regime is installed.
My hope is that the smaller and lesser funded universities will come over to a more rational way of conducting education. If a sufficient number of schools “ convert “ they would provide a powerful option for families to choose.
I doubt the big guys will play along – they will continue their process of renaming the programs.
PEOPLE, Parents and students, need to realize that so many of these degrees are useless and do NOT lead to most jobs, including management positions when you are 22.
So many of these youth (including Karens) have not put in the physical work in most jobs (including McD’s and others). They have NOT had the experience of failure and recovery. Too many have an inflated sense of self thanks to parents who spoiled their kids, yes spoiled. The simply do not understand the work pyramid. Government jobs are NOT the answer. Real world jobs are.
Years ago Vox Day wrote a couple books about his experiences with the sad puppy, angry puppy, etc revolt at the Hugos because of the SJWs taking over the process and at his own workplace. Well before anyone was talking about woke anything, Described in detail the process that was going on. It wasn’t an accidental thing, it was intentional. ‘SJWs Always Lie: Taking down the Thought Police.’, (2015) Worth a read.