Free Republic

Intellectual rot within universities has become increasingly obvious. It stems from the widespread adoption of critical, feminist, and queer theories in academic work. The result has been a constant stream of illogical, unscientific, and otherwise incoherent academic papers. Organizations such as the Martin Center, Do No Harm, the National Association of Scholars, The College Fix, and Reality’s Last Stand have been at the forefront of exposing all of this. I think there is more to expose, however, not just in terms of the total volume of this wrongheaded work but also in terms of its misdirected moral compass. Whereas critiques...

The UNC System’s new policy requiring public posting of faculty syllabi is grounded in a sound principle: Taxpayers deserve to know what is being taught at their public universities. Greater transparency strengthens public trust and reinforces institutional accountability. Under the new policy, faculty are required to include specific categories of information in their syllabi, and universities in turn must make those syllabi publicly available. This is not merely a suggestion of openness but a formal compliance obligation placed both on individual instructors and on the institutions that employ them. Yet, while the policy contains important improvements to current practice, it...

Iranian leaders call the US the “Great Satan” and burn effigies of President Donald Trump in the streets — but that doesn’t stop them sending their kids over here to learn. Children of regime leaders and bigwigs are at prestigious universities across the US, including University of Massachusetts, New York’s Union College and George Washington University, The Post can reveal. Sources said allowing people linked to the regime to assume such influential positions could present a threat to US values. “I would think that there would be a security risk as Iranian academics have been critical in forming public opinion...

The Lone Star State has done something rare, new, and needed: It has given its anti-DEI statutes teeth. As of January 9th, students, faculty, and university employees can now report violations of Senate Bill 17, a 2023 statute banning all Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) practices, to a complaint portal at the State Office of the Ombudsman’s website. A dropdown menu lists the six possible areas where Texas colleges and universities might sneak in DEI measures, ranging from the curriculum to hiring processes. Non-student citizens can use a separate portal to provide unofficial feedback and complaints. According to the complaint-process...

In February 2025, a newly installed Trump Department of Education (ED) issued a so-called Dear Colleague Letter. The letter put educational institutions on notice that ED intended to enforce the nation’s anti-discrimination laws, particularly those in Title VI of the Civil Rights Act and in the Constitution. It further specified that “discriminatory practices” would not be tolerated merely because they had been repackaged “under the banner of ‘diversity, equity, and inclusion’ (‘DEI’).” Left-wing media pundits went berserk. They said the policy announcement was a “threat to equal opportunity,” called it an “extreme and implausible interpretation of the law governing diversity,...

In January, a change to UNC System policy that might appear to be merely administrative reopened a longstanding debate about the political oversight of academic knowledge. The issue concerns public access to syllabi—the documents that professors typically prepare for every course they teach, laying out the course’s goals, assignments, and schedule. The new policy stipulates that “each constituent [UNC] institution shall develop an online platform to house syllabi for each course offered in a given semester or session.” Many faculty have objected to the development. The North Carolina Conference of the American Association of University Professors—the main professional organization for...

The lefty student government at a local California university rejected a proposal that would grant its student body free subscriptions to The New York Times, citing issues with how The Times covered major world-happenings. “The New York Times has historically been a little bit problematic and controversial in their reporting and in their journalism,” student official Alya Hassan, who voted against the proposal, told the Fresno Bee. Hassan referenced its coverage of Israel and Gaza as one example, adding the organization lacked journalistic integrity for avoiding words like genocide, ethnic cleansing and occupied territory in its reporting. The paper has...

More junior colleges are offering four-year bachelor’s degrees in addition to two-year associate’s degrees, and traditional universities hate the competition. But while students and policymakers should welcome new options, junior colleges (also known as community colleges) have obstacles to overcome as they attempt to create reliable alternatives to four-year institutions. Over the last two decades, lawmakers in at least 24 states have adopted provisions allowing community colleges to expand their degree offerings to include four-year bachelor’s programs. Customarily, community colleges offer high-school graduates who are not prepared for four-year degree programs the chance to earn two-year associate’s degrees and offer...

There is a fundamental difference between how China and the United States view higher education. Grasping that difference is essential to national security. Top Chinese graduate students are cultivated with the expectation that their expertise will advance state priorities. So when Beijing sends its top students to matriculate at American universities, it is not pursuing benign cultural exchange; it is deploying strategic assets. Seen through that lens, China is using the American university system as a conduit for absorbing American know-how, extracting technical expertise, and moving valuable research and intellectual property back to China. The practical effect is that People’s...

Buried in new data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) is a bearish sign for a college education, the first time we’ve seen this in 50 years. Trade workers without a college education are gaining new advantages in employment stability and even in earnings. On paper, a college degree still earns more but that edge is slipping too.W. Scott McGill/ShutterstockThe Cleveland Fed explains: “For decades, college graduates have typically faced lower unemployment rates, found jobs faster, and experienced more stable employment than high school graduates without college experience. Combined with higher expected wages, these advantages reinforced higher education as...

Walk into almost any undergraduate classroom in the UNC System today, and one thing becomes immediately apparent: Men are often a minority. This is not something announced in orientation materials or highlighted in strategic plans, but it is visible in lecture halls, student organizations, and group projects across campus. What once felt like a subtle shift has become harder to ignore, raising a basic but surprisingly under-asked question about public higher education in North Carolina: Where have all the male students gone? When I arrived at UNC-Chapel Hill freshman year, I wasn’t thinking much about gender ratios, nor did anyone...

I reveal here that I have finally read a likable DEI book, one that I found so because—beyond any doubt whatever—this book will infuriate the DEI faithful. Make no mistake, I don’t like this book in the same way I might enjoy a Douglas Murray takedown of leftist shibboleths or a Thomas Sowell skewering of the economic-egghead fringe. Rather, for DEI proponents, it’s a realistic adjustment of expectations in a post-Floyd era, in which the ashes of DEI doctrine are being scraped from the floor even as you read this. Authors Kenji Yoshino and David Glasgow have at least one...

Placed prominently within President Trump’s controversial “compact” for higher education was a call to center merit in admissions. The president’s offer to universities, which followed more than a decade of battles over what factors to consider in admissions, has sparked new debates about the meaning and value of merit. In particular, some college-admissions officials have pushed back on the idea that merit exists or have said that they have more meritorious individuals than spots. The second claim is partially true, but the first is not. Many selective colleges offer even more selective merit-based scholarships, which shows that they have at...

Texas A&M University is ending its women’s and gender studies program, changing the syllabuses of hundreds of courses and canceling six classes as part of a new policy that limits how professors can discuss some race and gender topics, school officials announced Friday. The changes to and cancellation of courses comes months after a viral video of a student confronting an instructor over her lessons threw Texas A&M, one of the largest universities in the country, into upheaval. University officials tried to reassure the campus that the impacts of the new policy would be minimal, affecting only a small portion...

Officials at Tufts University urged the community to report sightings of immigration officials Tuesday after they were alerted about federal activity near the campus.Yolanda Smith, chief of the university’s police department, told students and staff in an email that the campus’ Department of Public Safety was “actively monitoring the situation in coordination with our municipal partners in Medford and Somerville.”Anyone who encountered immigration officials “on or near campus” was urged to call campus police. They also referred community members to their Office of University Counsel website, which included information about their protocols regarding federal agents.“Tufts has a well‑defined process for...

The integration of artificial intelligence (AI) into everyday life occurred in what seemed like a blink of an eye. At every turn, some form of an AI “assistant” now offers to correct grammar, help compose emails, take notes of video calls, or distill large amounts of information into easily digestible summaries. Yet, even though AI is only an arm’s length away, many of its uses remain unexplored by academics and non-academics alike. In academia, some simply haven’t taken the time to learn how to use AI, while others are skeptical and even suspicious about its influence on research and learning....

Over the past year, a number of common tactics have emerged from the opposition to what is widely referred to as the Trump administration’s “defunding” of education. One of these is to decry the ostensibly catastrophic harm that will result from Trump’s moves, particularly in the areas of public health and scientific research. “American science and innovation should not be subject to the political winds of the day,” the Center for American Progress (CAP) intoned in a piece published over the summer. According to the authors, a would-be despotic, right-wing administration is “targeting” higher education for “political retribution.” “Higher education,...

Do American colleges still teach students how to think? Or have whole programs been built on fashionable but unexamined assumptions? Increasingly, one wonders whether parts of the curriculum are outright harmful. For years, it has felt as though American higher education were approaching rock bottom. One of the newest degrees on offer suggests we may finally have arrived. As a religious practice within Buddhism—particularly in its Theravada and Zen traditions—so-called mindfulness meditation aims to cultivate an awareness of the present moment, calm the mind, and help one avoid being carried away by thoughts. The term often overlaps with self-help trends...

Updated at 3:20 p.m. ET, Jan. 22, 2026: Dallas Baptist University posted an update explaining that "the Dallas Police Department and the FBI worked alongside our DBU Police Department to investigate the matter, and we can now issue an all-clear." According to university authorities, classes will resume as normal on Friday, Jan. 23. Original report:Dallas Baptist University canceled classes Thursday amid concerns about an unspecified threat to campus ahead of a planned speech by President Donald Trump's Housing and Urban Development Secretary Scott Turner. The Texas-based Southern Baptist Convention-affiliated university announced Thursday morning that it was canceling classes due to...

Watch full game highlights from the College Football Playoff National Championship as the Indiana Hoosiers defeated the Miami Hurricanes, 27-21. Fernando Mendoza threw for 186 YDS on 16-of-27 pass attempts with 1 rushing TD while RB Kaelon Black led the Hoosiers in rushing with 79 YDS on 17 carries.