In 2010, which in some respects seems like a lifetime ago, 75 percent of Americans considered a college education to be “very important,” according to Gallup.
Today, according to a Pew survey, 70 percent of Americans, including majorities across all major demographic groups and members of both political parties, think academia is going in the wrong direction.
A generation ago, such a striking reversal was perhaps unthinkable. Now, looking back over the last ten years or so, it was all but inevitable.
Radical university administrations hire radical professors who promptly proceed to indoctrinate students with radical propaganda, most of which is anti-free speech, pro-censorship of conservatism, loaded with an overall loathing of the foundational tenets of America — and that's just for starters.
From two attempted assassinations of President Donald Trump in 2024 to the shocking public murder of Turning Point USA CEO Charlie Kirk in Utah this September to anti-ICE, antisemitic, and pro-Hamas campus demonstrations, the radicalization of America’s college students has never been more disturbingly visible.
In an effort to move higher education (back) to the center, the Trump administration on October 1 unveiled the Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education. The initiative, which was initially offered to nine universities, promises preferential federal funding for those agreeing to its terms by November 21. On October 14, the administration broadened the invitation to include all U.S. colleges and universities.
So how's that all worked out, so far?
As William Jacobson, a clinical professor of law at Cornell Law School, put it on Thursday, "the ivory tower slaps it away."
The compact begins thusly (emphasis, mine):
American higher education is the envy of the world and represents a key strategic benefit for our Nation. In turn, the U.S. university system benefits in a variety of ways from its extraordinary relationship with the U.S. government.
These include (i) access to student loans, grant programs, and federal contracts; (ii) funding for research directly or indirectly; (iii) approval of student and other visas in connection with university matriculation and instruction; and (iv) preferential treatment under the tax code.
To advance the national interest arising out of this unique relationship, this Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education represents the priorities of the U.S. government in its engagements with universities that benefit from the relationship.
Those priorities include:
Equality in Admissions
Discriminatory admissions processes reflect a fundamental misunderstanding not only of Civil Rights law and the U.S. Constitution, but of the damaging impacts such practices have on individuals and our Nation as a whole. Treating certain groups as categorically incapable of performing — and therefore in need of preferential treatment — perpetuates a dangerous badge of inferiority, destroys confidence.
Therefore, no factor such as sex, ethnicity, race, nationality, political views, sexual orientation, gender identity, religious associations, or proxies for any of those factors shall be considered, explicitly or implicitly, in any decision related to undergraduate or graduate student admissions or financial support, with due exceptions for institutions that are solely or primarily comprised of students of a specific sex or religious denomination.
In a "normal" world, what part(s) of the above should be controversial? Zero, of course, but today's university environment is far from the environment many of us experienced in our respective college years.
Marketplace of Ideas and Civil Discourse
Truth-seeking is a core function of institutions of higher education. Fulfilling this mission requires maintaining a vibrant marketplace of ideas where different views can be explored, debated, and challenged.Therefore, signatories to this compact commit themselves to fostering a vibrant marketplace of ideas on campus.
Yeah, this is never going to happen.
As is the case with the entirety of the Left, universities, in my not-so-humble opinion, will remain hotbeds of radicalized discontent for the foreseeable future — even after Donald Trump exits the political stage.
Institutional Neutrality
Signatories shall maintain institutional neutrality at all levels of their administration. This requires policies that all university employees, in their capacity as university representatives, will abstain from actions or speech relating to societal and political events except in cases in which external events have a direct impact upon the university. Policies requiring institutional neutrality must apply with equal force to all of the university’s academic units, including all colleges, faculties, schools, departments, programs, centers, and institutes.
Again, a nonstarter.
Many universities are far too invested in radical leftism to make significant changes, even if they wanted to — and they don't, even as some pretend they will do so in an effort to appease the administration.
Jacobson referenced Harvard University as an example:
[H}igher 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.
[...]
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.
While none of the above is exactly breaking news, it encapsulates an insidious cancer in higher education that continues to metastasize in universities across America as students come and go.
MORE COLLEGE FUN: University of Pennsylvania Computer System Attacked and the Message, While Hilarious, Couldn't Be Clearer
Harvard Refuses to Say If It Will Sanction Dean Who Defended Death Threats Against Trump
Finally, as Jacobson wrote:
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.
"The reality," mused Jacobson, is that "nearly-complete independence has turned higher education into an unsustainable political bubble."
Is there any doubt?
A Few Thoughts in Closing
Following the 9/11 terrorist attack in 2001, I remember writing in subsequent articles through the years about how it would take another 9/11, God forbid, to bring America back together, again.
However, given today's troubling reality, including Tuesday's election of "democratic socialist" (read: straight-up Marxist) Zohran Mamdani as New City's next mayor, I fear that such an attack would only rip the country further apart.
What say you?
