Free Republic

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...

The Greater Springfield NAACP wants colleges — including the University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst College and Holyoke Community College — to address surging Turning Point USA chapters on their campuses. The conservative group ramped up here and around the country after founder and spokesman Charlie Kirk was shot and killed during an event at a Utah university in September.

WASHINGTON — Education Secretary Linda McMahon is sending a letter to 43 million Americans with student loans — about 9 million of whom are in default — to notify them that the Treasury Department is taking over debt collection, The Post has learned. The letter describes the transfer of responsibilities as a way to protect taxpayers by improving the efficiency of the collection process — after loan repayments were paused through much of the Biden administration, with borrowers protected from delinquency through September 2024. “For too long, Americans have shouldered the consequences of poor leadership and persistent mismanagement of our...

Newly released emails reveal how the Biden administration’s Department of Education (ED) in 2022 attempted to form a secret parent advisory council to give teachers unions and left-aligned activist and parent groups power over federal education policy. Under former President Joe Biden, the department created the National Parents and Families Engagement Council ostensibly as a “partnership between parents and families, educators, district leaders, and entire school communities to support student success.” But behind the scenes, the short-lived council was composed of hand-picked activist organizations that focused on radical racial, gender and immigrant-focused ideologies. As Defending Education notes, “not a single...

An Iowa school principal was arrested on first-degree harassment charges two days before his wife filed a restraining order against him, court records show. Justin Blietz, 40, was booked into a Linn County, Iowa, jail in connection with the alleged harassment on Saturday, March 14, according to online court records reviewed by PEOPLE. Blietz allegedly told a woman he would slit her throat and "watch her die," according to a criminal complaint obtained by The Gazette and KCRG. It wasn't immediately clear who the subject was of his alleged harassment. Blietz is the founding principal of a charter school in...

Engineering school taught us to write code. It never taught us to write. Now writing is the whole job. I went to engineering school at the University of Virginia. I appreciated the education. The engineering program is rigorous. I learned differential equations, thermodynamics, signal processing, data structures, and enough physics to respect what I didn’t understand. (And, I barely made it through.) I now wish I had majored in English if you’d told me that thirty years ago, I would have laughed at you, and then gone back to failing an electromagnetics exam. You know what I didn’t learn? How...

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...

Portland Press Herald It’s official. Mainers will vote on proposal to ban trans athletes in girls sports. The secretary of state’s office announced Tuesday that it had verified the signatures collected by proponents to get the measure on the November ballot . March 17, 2026 Rachel Ohm, Staff Writer Maine will vote in November on a proposal that would ban transgender students from sports teams, bathrooms and locker rooms that align with their gender identity. The Maine Department of the Secretary of State announced Tuesday that it has verified the signatures collected by proponents of the measure in support of...

A former high school principal with ties to Oregon has been sentenced to more than five years in prison after being convicted of possessing and distributing child sexual abuse material, a case that has left many people shaking their heads in anger and disbelief. Jeremy P. Williams, 50, of Longview, Washington, previously served as the principal of Rainier Junior/Senior High School in Rainier, Oregon. According to court records and reporting out of southwest Washington, Williams was sentenced on February 23 to five years and one month in prison. In addition to prison time, he has been ordered to register as...

A controversial bill to significantly reduce state regulation of home schooling narrowly cleared the House of Representatives Wednesday. House Education Policy and Administration Committee Chairman Kristin Noble, R-Bedford, said the bill resulted from weeks of work behind the scenes with home-schooling parents and advocates from across the state. “This does advance core principles of parental rights, educational freedom, and limited government intervention in family decisions,” Noble said. State Rep. Muriel Hall, D-Bow, a retired educator, said the legislation would undo 30 years of collaboration to ensure students in home education have the same opportunities to thrive as those in public...

Los Angeles teachers are expected to announce a strike date Wednesday that could halt classes for nearly 400,000 students. The timing is set to coincide with a massive rally in downtown LA involving three major unions. The walkout, if it happens, would be open-ended, lasting until a new contract is agreed upon. United Teachers Los Angeles represents more than 30,000 educators and staffers, whose contract expired last June.

A school in Canada designated its cafeteria as a “no food space” to support fasting Muslim students during Ramadan — sparking a firestorm online as critics questioned the decree’s fairness. The Fairview School in Calgary, Alberta shot into the spotlight after reports emerged of the controversial policy that created food-free zones during select hours to accommodate students during the holy month. The cafeteria was labeled a “no food space” during the first half of the lunch hour for fourth through sixth graders. It remains a “no food space” for the older students’ entire lunch hour, according to a leaked email...

Democrat darling and Texas Senate candidate James Talarico is taking heat after it was discovered that, as a public school teacher in San Antonio, he made his sixth-grade students write "Obama memoirs" celebrating his election. Corey DeAngelis, a school choice advocate and research fellow at the Heritage Foundation, called the assignment "disqualifying" for a Senate hopeful in Texas. In a Facebook post by Talarico dated Nov. 13, 2012, he announced, "Today, we finished writing our Obama memoirs," explaining that "students wrote a memoir of Election Night from the point of view of a member of the Obama family." One of...

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...

Five years ago, I blew the whistle on a school I loved. Did it make a difference? I taught high school English at an independent school in New Jersey for seven years. I loved the school’s focus on resilience and growth. I loved my colleagues, who challenged and nurtured our students, including my own children, who attended the school. And I felt lucky to be part of such a vibrant learning community. That all changed in 2014. A young dean, fresh from an education conference hosted by the National Association of Independent Schools, led the faculty in what we now...

A former Texas substitute teacher and her boyfriend are now facing a combined 38 child sex crime charges, with their bonds set at nearly $9 million. Madison Paige Jones, a former substitute teacher in the Midlothian Independent School District, and her boyfriend Zackery Dondlinger were first arrested in December after Midlothian police launched an investigation into allegations involving a 5-year-old child who lived in Jones’ home. Jones’ bond was initially set at $90,000 and Dondlinger’s initially reported at $250,000, but after the additional charges were filed earlier this month, their bonds increased dramatically. Jones faces 13 counts of aggravated sexual...

My solution is simple and market based – make colleges co-sign or share default risk on any federally backed loan The Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals just slammed the door on the Biden era’s SAVE student loan repayment plan. On Monday the court told a district judge to approve the Trump administration’s settlement with Missouri and kill the program for good. More than seven million borrowers who had been coasting in forbearance for a year and a half now face the music. They will have to switch to one of the old repayment options or start writing real checks. It...

'It was not just a butt smack or a butt grab,' she continued. 'It was a groping of a private area. It had been occurring for several months.' The victims' parents were less than satisfied with how the school district and Principal Georgina Aye handled the distressing case. 'I think from the very beginning, Fairfax County has attempted to diminish what happened to these girls,' a parent said, calling the county's approach to the situation 'abysmal.' An undocumented migrant has been charged with nine counts of assault and battery after it was claimed that he was groping fellow students in...

BREAKING: The Chicago Teachers Union voted to strike on May Day (the 1st). "No School, No Work, No Shopping" We need to put the teachers union cartel out of work for good.

The Old Dominion University shooter was serving a long jail sentence for providing material support to ISIS, but was released early, thanks to Joe Biden. How did he get a gun to carry out this attack? Not that criminals follow the law, but we know how Mohamed Jalloh obtained a firearm for this terrorist attack that left a decorated war hero, Lt. Col. Robert Shah, who was also the head of the school’s ROTC program, dead (via Associated Press):The man charged by DOJ for selling the gun used by the ODU terrorist was caught straw purchasing three guns in 2021...