Harvard Professor at Center of Elitist Attacks on Chris Rufo’s Harvard Credentials Backtracks
“HES courses are Harvard U courses (often the same as in FAS, as for my courses). HES bachelor’s and master’s degrees are Harvard U degrees. HES is a school in Harvard U analogous to other schools. HES students are Harvard U students.”
We wrote last week about the wave of snobbish attacks leading Critical Race Theory critic Christopher Rufo was hit with in the aftermath of the resignation of now-former Harvard President Claudine Gay.
Rufo is one of three conservative writers whose documentation of alleged plagiarism they say was committed by Gay has been credited for the outcry that led to her decision to step down.
At the center of the elitist attacks on Rufo and his Harvard education was Harvard Professor Jennifer Hochschild. Though she teaches at Harvard Extension School (HES), which is where Rufo obtained his master’s degree, she nevertheless proceeded to stick her foot in her mouth by insulting every HES student by agreeing with the opinion that between Harvard University and Havard Extension School, Harvard U. had the better, smarter students.
Here were some of the lowlights:
On Rufo: what do integrity police say about his claim to have “master’s degree from Harvard,” which is actually from the open-enrollment Extension School? Those students are great – I teach them- but they are not the same as what we normally think of as Harvard graduate students
— Jennifer hochschild (@Jenniferhochsc2) January 5, 2024
Rufo could have proudly and honorably said, "I pulled myself up by bootstraps;to prove it I have master's degree from Harvard extension school, along with other smart and gutsy students."Instead he used weasel words to try to attach himself to Ivy status and prestige.Insecurity??
— Jennifer hochschild (@Jenniferhochsc2) January 5, 2024
There was more, but you get the picture.
It had some folks questioning whether the professor who taught at the HES was saying degreees from the HES didn’t hold the same academic value and weight in comparison to Harvard U. degrees, which goes against what the HES website states:
We are a fully accredited Harvard school. Our degrees and certificates are adorned with the Harvard University insignia. They carry the weight of that lineage. Our graduates walk at University Commencement and become members of the Harvard Alumni Association.
Either Rufo went to Harvard, or Harvard is ripping thousands of people off every year. Which is it assholes?
— The Drunk Republican (@DrunkRepub) January 6, 2024
Here we are a week later and Professor Hochschild, who went quiet for several days on the Twitter machine after digging quite the hole, suddenly had a change of heart, or perhaps was urged by the Harvard legal department to take back what she said.
From the Harvard Crimson:
In an emailed response to [Harvard Extension Student Association] shared with The Crimson, Hochschild apologized for the way her posts were construed.
“I am sorry that my comments were understood to imply a ‘sentiment . . . that undermines the value and reputation of our institution,’ and that they caused HES students and staff distress,” Hochschild wrote. “That is far from my views; Harvard is rightly proud of the quality of and access to education manifested every day by HES.”
In a follow up email, she reiterated her admiration for HES students, writing that their degrees show “gumption, commitment, passion for learning, desire to use education in the service of their job or family or self.”
My point, which was clearly phrased badly in the original tweet, was that students should proudly state their HES degree,” she wrote. “I have apologized to HES staff and students for inadvertently involving them in a silly debate (of course an HES degree is a real Harvard degree—who said otherwise??) and in an inappropriate challenge to what they should be proud of.”
Hochschild also took to the Twitter machine to “clarify” things:
I was asked to clarify, and am glad to do so: HES courses are Harvard U courses (often the same as in FAS, as for my courses). HES bachelor’s and master’s degrees are Harvard U degrees. HES is a school in Harvard U analogous to other schools. HES students are Harvard U students
— Jennifer hochschild (@Jenniferhochsc2) January 12, 2024
In another tweet, written just after 4 a.m. Saturday, she addressed the students and staff whose education and work she had previously devalued all in an attempt to own the cons:
On this maelstrom, mainly to HES students/staff: I regret that you got dragged into a dispute with nothing to do with you, that caused distress.I endorse and admire HES’s promotion of an inclusive, engaged, ambitious student body. I'm sorry my writing seemed to suggest otherwise.
— Jennifer hochschild (@Jenniferhochsc2) January 13, 2024
Rufo, as one might imagine, was not inclined to believe that the prof’s convenient backtracking was in any way genuine:
This still isn’t an apology. Try this: “I apologize for denigrating HES in a petty, botched attempt to discredit Christopher Rufo. I was angry that Mr. Rufo scalped my friend Claudine Gay. I shouldn’t have reacted this way. I had the facts wrong and I’m sorry.”
— Christopher F. Rufo ⚔️ (@realchrisrufo) January 13, 2024
This is awesome. You dumped on your own school in an attempt to delegitimize my degree, then turned around and said it is, in fact, a wonderful, rigorous, and bona fide Harvard degree. You made a fool of yourself not once, but twice. That takes commitment. 🫡
— Christopher F. Rufo ⚔️ (@realchrisrufo) January 12, 2024
She's still digging. Imagine earning a BA from Oberlin, a PhD from Yale, and a professorship at Harvard, and never learning how to make a proper apology. The perfect symbol of an empty credential—all title, no class. https://t.co/AKaQOBYByw
— Christopher F. Rufo ⚔️ (@realchrisrufo) January 13, 2024
And no shame, either.
— Stacey Matthews has also written under the pseudonym “Sister Toldjah” and can be reached via Twitter. —
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Comments
You might think that you cannot have more contempt for these absolutely smug, self-satisfied Harvardeers
But you don’t.
Imagine a place that actually gave Lori Lightfoot a faculty appointment. And Brian Stelter. And Claudine The Plagiarist Gay remains on faculty.
And then this idiot lady-weasel trying to shame Rufo?
This is one sick, dysfunctional place.
Harvard clearly has become a very sick, dysfunctional place.
And Claudine Gay remains on faculty earning 900 large. Just wow!
Collecting $900K, not earning. As far as I can tell, Gay never earned anything.
When will the feds cut off any and all monetary support for this dump?
No Student Loans, No GI Bill, no research funds, nothing, nada.
Don’t forget the little goose-stepping gun-grabber David Hogg being given a virtue-signaling admittance.
Speaking of whom: a) what is his major, and b) what is his grade point average. I mean a real one, not after grade inflation.
He announced on his way into the school that he “planned” to major in Political Science. But It looks like he ended up switching to History.
He does have Charlene Gay’s signature on it, so at least it will be worth something as a collector’s item.
Life is Woketopia must be grand.
The vile and obnoxious Dhimmi-crats in corrupt American academia can’t help being smug, arrogant, elitist, narcissistic, self-reverential and condescending twits; it’s in their nature.
“He was wearing my Harvard tie. Can you believe it? My Harvard tie. Like oh, sure he went to Harvard!”
— Louis Winthorpe III, criticizing the sartorial airs of hustler Billy Ray Valentine, in “Trading Places.”
I’ll also add that after the revelation of well-documented and repeated incidents of virulent and systemic Jew-hate and Israel-bashing among students, professors and administrators at Harvard, over decades, as well as the school’s utterly nauseating and myopic embrace of contrived and fallacious Arab Muslim “Palestinian” propaganda mythologies of alleged grievance and victimhood (as meticulously described in the lawsuit that was recently filed), the time has now come when the fact of holding an undergraduate or graduate degree from Harvard is nothing to boast about, and, indeed, is something that the degree-holder shouldn’t seek to advertise.
Louis Winthorpe III. LOL, perfect analogy!
A great character from one of the greatest comedies of all time. 🙂
Right up there with “They’re a very musical people, aren’t they?”.
I use that line all the time, LOL.
Former harvard president claudine gay never should have made it beyond 4 year college degree with grade average of “C”.
She never should been awarded PhD, and she never should have been given job of professor, much less elevated to president of university.
How can anybody defend gay, and at same time criticize rufo? Harvard is woke joke.
What white person received tenure at Stanford with just 4 papers? What white person was president of Harvard with just 11 papers and no books?
In the world of woke and DEI, the ends are justified by any means.
Claudine Gay built her academic career out of affirmative action admissions, and plagiarism. Any recipient of HES diploma has better credentials than claudine gay. Harvard is woke joke.
So you’ve read her undergraduate papers and reviewed her exams and came to the conclusion she earned a 3.0 at best.
Also, do you have some weird issue with capitalizing proper nouns or is that some stupid signature shtick you do?
Truly pathetic that’s the best harvard could find that checked boxes for non-white and female. That speaks volumes about the quality of affirmative action.
It makes you wonder (out loud) about the rest of the faculty, certainly the most recent ones.
Elizabeth Warren, you’ve been mighty silent lately…
If there might be some hypothetical over/under wagering market out there somewhere – and not having any new objective evidence in front of me – what I have observed leads me to offer $10 on the Under side.
You can’t train a neural network without backtracking.
Qatar-bucks be almost like tranq
Sincere question:
Is anybody aware of anything unique or special that has come out of Harvard … using their knowledge of sociology and theology and economics and human behavior and environmental studies and engineering and architecture and finance ……. to bring about any improvements to Cambridge, Mass or Boston or New England?
Near as I can tell, drug addiction poverty unemployment murder and rape and molestation are just as bad in the Harvard -local region ……… as anywhere else in the U.S. No?
Am I wrong?
Emperors Wearing No Clothes much?
——
There ought to be an annual NCAA ACADEMIC TOURNAMENT just like the annual NCAA basketball tournament.
The schools would compete to demonstrate that they had come up with the best solution to one real-life problem.
The problem could be changed annually.
Or perhaps revisited periodically.
May the best team win.
Out in public — rather like America’s Got Talent.
You know who’d prolly be least likely to participate? Harvard’d be my guess.
Hey SIMON COWELL!! You looking for a new project??
Stanley Cavell (philosopher, film critic, lit crit)
IF social, political and economic problems were like hard science and engineering this proposal might make sense. These experimental sciences permit replication of experiments and offer fairly reliable predictions about how the world works.
But any issue whose solution depends on human behavior is not subject to such precision or predicability.
This proposal is an interesting thought experiment but very unrealistic.
One of the people who had agreed with her earlier statements TEACHES at HES. Forgot the name but she should have been fired, IMO
No, that was still her. Check out very first tweet.
She is total slime. On the other hand, were I in Russo’s shoes, I would always specify that my degree is from the Harvard Extension School. It is only prudent to recognize that anyone looking into my biography would see that my degree was indeed from the extension school, and might therefore foreseeably draw a negative inference from my omission- either through malice or ignorance.
Sorry, Rufo’s shoes. But, what’s in a name?
I believe he referred to his degree as coming from ‘Harvard’s Night School’.
That’s the difference between he and Hochschild. Her actions here seem to indicate she believes the name on her credentials are the most important thing while Rufo clearly believes what one accomplishes in life is more important.
I agree with Rufo. A CV is nice but it shouldn’t define your worth or ability. Otherwise we give far too much lifelong credit to those who managed matriculation into a handful of educational institutions….. oh wait that’s how our Nation arrived here…we somehow slipped into allowing rule by ‘experts’ with superficially impressive a CV and they have clearly failed …or maybe they actually succeeded at the mission they had all along?
But the degree isn’t from the Extension School. It’s from the university of which that school is a division.
Perhaps you are right. In that case it’s a question of what it is the custom for such a graduate’s CV identification. Is there a custom?
It’s a Harvard degree. There are no distinctions between degrees based on which school they were earned at. That’s the basis of the extension school’s marketing.
I nominate Chris Rufo for Education Secretary in the coming Trump administration.
Well, whatever he does next, even if he never accomplishes anything else, it seems to me that Mr. Rufo has already done more for this country than any combination of Hochschild and Hogg, Obama and Gay, Lightfoot and a dozen others at that increasingly non-serious place.
Back in the day, Christopher Rufo would be in line for a MacArthur grant.
Has anyone pointed out to Professor Hochschild that Harvard’s own policies make it almost impossible for a white male without connections like Mr Rufo to make it into Harvard’s on campus programs?
Respectfully, f**k that lady.
I hope that Mr. Rufo establishes a FLORIDA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY at New School Florida.
To supplant MIT and CalTech etc.
And I hope he gets the place started by recruiting top talent away from Harvard, MIT, Penn, Stanford, Michigan , Cornell,
One would imagine, after all, that most sane humans do not want to work among supporters of Hamas. I mean. if given the choice .
Apparently, Harvard faculty and Alumni don’t have an issue with it.
Here. Let me “CLARIFY” what you said you stupid fucking twat waffle.
“On Rufo: what do integrity police say about his claim to have “master’s degree from Harvard,” which is actually from the open-enrollment Extension School? Those students are great – I teach them- but they are not the same as what we normally think of as Harvard graduate students.”
So, you said it. You meant it. Now you are using weasel words to back yourself away from a law suit for Harvard for every”abnormal student attending HES.
Another professor that needs to be booted out of that shit hole school.
I appreciate Rufo’s activities, but he should stop using the word “scalped”. Scalping is a bloody, violent, gruesome procedure. Using that word makes him look bloody, violent, and gruesome. Civilized people should be able to get their point across without such words. Using “scalped” is foolish and counterproductive.
He’s using it to mock libs, who used it first to describe conservatives having knives out for Gay. Same way we use “deplorables.” Whether or not it is a winning pwn strategy is an open question.
With that hair? She looks scalped!
What all of this may lead to is an investigation of any job candidate’s credentials from before college or professional school. I wonder how the elite universities are going to react when employers in interviews ask applicants for their LSAT, GMAT or math SAT scores. I wonder whether schools will bar from campus interviewing any employer who asks, or will try to discipline students who provide their scores.
I have never had any respect for any of these hoity-toity ivy league frauds simply because they attended some school. Respect has to be earned. Me? I refused an appointment to West Point and it was offered three different times. Mistake? Yeah. Probably.
Whyd you turn down the offers? Whatd you do instead?
Please let me be clear: while I believe, as I stated, that “HES students are not the same as Harvard graduate students” I also am passionate in my belief that Harvard graduate students aren’t the same as HES students.
In this sense, they are indeed equal: equally distant from one another, in terms of talent, learning and intellect.
No difference.
I hope this clarifies the matter in a way that will allow us all to move forward – some of us further forward than others, but all equally moving not backward.”
FJB
Hochshild is Oberlin AND Yale?! A Two-Fer on the Sublime Arrogant Ignorance Scale!