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EDUCATION

Social Media Campaign Targets ‘Ivory Tower Hypocrites’ By Sara Dogan

https://www.frontpagemag.com/social-media-campaign-targets-ivory-tower-hypocrites/

Over the past several decades, few places in America have become more hostile to free speech than our universities. These institutions of higher education have become cloistered echo chambers of leftist thought where voicing a dissenting opinion is cause for abrupt dismissal or being hauled before a disciplinary board and sentenced to reeducation.

Yet in the wake of rising anti-Semitism, university administrators seem to have had a sudden change of heart. Free speech, once considered suspect, is now declared to be of paramount importance to the healthy functioning of a university, even—or perhaps especially—when the group being targeted by it is Jews.

The Freedom Center’s Spring 2025 Campus Campaign targeted these elite universities and their leaders as “Ivory Tower Hypocrites” in a published report and a wide-reaching social media campaign.

“At far too many campuses, the same administrators that have defended the free speech rights of Jew-haters, Hamas supporters, or radical gender activists have blatantly failed to secure the same rights for those with opposing views,” explains the report.

Universities named in the report include UCLA, Columbia, UPenn, Georgetown, Wake Forest and the University of Nevada-Las Vegas, among others. These schools allowed woke leftist activists to run roughshod over campus rules and violate codes of conduct with impunity, while failing to extend even basic free speech protections to students and faculty with opposing views.

Former University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill defended a blatantly anti-Semitic Palestinian literature festival on campus, claiming to “fiercely support the free exchange of ideas as central to our educational mission” but persecuted conservative law professor Amy Wax for declaring that sex is binary and airing the inconvenient truth that black law students “rarely” finish in the top half of their class.

John D. Sailer Cornell’s Racialist Hiring Scheme The university’s FIRST program mandated “diverse” lists of finalists.

https://www.city-journal.org/article/cornell-university-hiring-race-first-program

At Cornell University, faculty search committees adopted a series of checkpoints to ensure that job candidates were sufficiently “diverse.” Internal documents I’ve reviewed raise questions about whether the university unlawfully used racial preferences in hiring—and offer a revealing look at the tactics of Cornell’s social-justice advocates.

In 2021, Cornell received $16 million from the National Institutes of Health to help start its Faculty Institutional Recruitment for Sustainable Transformation (FIRST) program, aimed at increasing the faculty’s “compositional diversity” by hiring ten new professors. According to the program’s grant proposal and progress reports, its leadership team screened applicants at four stages—the initial pool, longlist, shortlist, and finalist slate—to ensure “as diverse a pool as possible.” These checkpoints aligned with the program’s stated objective: “Cornell University aims to increase the number of minoritized faculty in the biological, biomedical, and health sciences through establishing an NIH FIRST Program at Cornell University.” The university pledged to hire the ten new professors specifically from “groups underrepresented in their fields.”

Title VII of the Civil Rights Act prohibits discrimination in hiring. Had Cornell restricted these faculty positions to certain racial groups, it would have plainly violated the law. The Cornell FIRST program was more subtle, prioritizing diversity throughout the search process rather than at the final hiring stage.

Still, the program’s carefully structured, four-stage process—explicitly designed to shape the racial composition of the candidate pool—raises legal concerns. “Each search will be governed by a clear process and 4 checkpoints,” the FIRST proposal notes, “to ensure that the search has as diverse a pool as possible.” The process is described step by step.

The barbarians inside the gates Yascha Mounk on woke, Trump and the death of the university. VIDEO

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBSxdJttGkM

America’s Ivy League universities have long been hotbeds of censorship and intolerance. Unpopular views are deplatformed, unorthodox professors are cancelled and research prioritises PC fads over facts. Donald Trump has vowed to force universities to clean up their act – but is he helping on hurting? Here, Yascha Mounk – editor of Persuasion and author of The Identity Trap – argues that Trump’s campus diktats are only stoking a woke backlash. Free speech and reason are just as imperilled as ever, he says. The university could now be in its death throes. Watch, share and be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel.

The Persistent Presence of Absence The public school exodus continues unabated. By Larry Sand

https://amgreatness.com/2025/06/25/the-persistent-presence-of-absence/

The fact that many children are ditching America’s public schools is undeniable. Most recently, Nat Malkus, Deputy Director of Education Policy at the American Enterprise Institute, reported that while chronic absenteeism spiked during the COVID pandemic, it remains a serious problem. In 2024, rates were 57% higher than they were before the pandemic. (Students who miss at least 10% of the school year, or roughly 18 days, are considered chronically absent.)

Malkus goes on to explain that in 2018 and 2019, about 15% of K–12 public school students in the U.S. were chronically absent—a number so high that numerous observers and the U.S. Department of Education are labeling it a “crisis.”

In total, nearly one in twelve public schools in the United States has experienced a “substantial” enrollment decline over the last five years.

The problem is especially egregious in our big cities. In Los Angeles, more than 32% of students were chronically absent in the 2023-2024 school year.

In Chicago, dwindling enrollment has left about 150 schools half-empty, while 47 operate at less than one-third capacity.

Additionally, schools identified by their states as chronically low-performing were more than twice as likely to experience sizable enrollment declines as other public schools.

In February 2025, FutureEd disclosed that data from 22 states and the District of Columbia for the 2023-24 school year show significant differences across grade levels, with absenteeism particularly severe in high school.

“In most states, 12th graders have the highest rates of chronic absenteeism, often far exceeding state averages. In Mississippi, for example, the overall absenteeism rate was 24%, but among seniors, it soared to 41%. Several other states have senior absenteeism rates above 40%, with rates in the District of Columbia and Oregon exceeding 50%.”

Fahad Ali, a Nasty Piece of Work Timothy Cootes

https://quadrant.org.au/news-opinions/anti-semitism/fahad-ali-a-nasty-piece-of-work/

Since October 7, the misbehaviour of Australia’s academics has provided excellent and amusing copy for Quadrant, but hasn’t yet effected much improvement in the hiring standards of our universities. This is the topic, you might say, of my thesis-in-progress, which posits that you can get away with the most obscene displays of moral imbecility in this country so long as you brandish your academic title.

A new case study, I’m bound to report, may very well test the credibility of my thesis. Dr Fahad Ali, a casual lecturer at the University of Sydney, set out his preferred foreign policy vision and objectives just as Israeli airstrikes began targeting the greater Tehran area. “F*** sanctions,” Ali advised his social media followers. “I want Zionists executed like we executed Nazis.”

His post, due to an obvious violation of community standards, was removed by X, and a similar decision now falls to his employer. The University of Sydney, according to The Australian, is “appalled” by Ali’s remarks and has promised to conduct a speedy investigation.

The coverage of this incident so far suggests Ali (right), a sensitive plant, is just a well-meaning and passionate advocate for Palestine who let himself become emotionally overwhelmed. On the contrary, this latest hissy-fit, in both content and volume, looks rather similar to many of Ali’s previous outbursts, so the evidence against him is really starting to pile up. In the spirit of cooperation with Quadrant, the University of Sydney, in its review of Ali’s ongoing employment status, might pursue any of the following lines of inquiry. 

University Abuse of Taxpayers Must End Why private colleges should become part of the marketplace. by Larry Sand

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm-plus/university-abuse-of-taxpayers-must-end/

When perusing the news these days, you can’t escape the onslaught of stories about Harvard. The once venerable institution, with its current involvement with Jew-hatred—which the school fosters or disregards—has become emblematic of the degradation of our nation’s higher education system.

Alan Garber, Harvard’s president, has repeatedly acknowledged an epidemic of antisemitism at the university. “It is present on our campus. I have experienced antisemitism directly, even while serving as president, and I know how damaging it can be to a student who has come to learn and make friends at a college or university.”

Harvard, however, is hardly a one-off.

The nation’s colleges are hotbeds of Jew-hatred. StopAnti-Semitism, an advocacy group, issued a report card in late 2024 that details how 25 colleges across the country treat Jewish students.

In the introduction, the group states, “Since last year’s staggering 1,500% increase in antisemitic submissions, StopAntisemitism has been forced to triple the size of our team just to manage the deluge of reports. This year alone, we’ve seen a jaw-dropping 3,000% rise in antisemitic tips and submissions, as universities across the country fail to protect their Jewish students in the wake of violent antisemitic uprisings.”

The findings are quite disturbing:

55% of Jewish students have personally been victims of antisemitism at their schools.
43% did not feel safe enough to report the incidents.
Of those who did report, 87% believe their school failed to investigate properly.
43% hide their Jewish identity from their classmates out of fear.
72% feel unwelcome in certain spaces on campus simply for being Jewish.
67% say Jews are entirely excluded from their school’s DEI initiatives.
69% are blamed for the actions of Israel—actions they have no control over.
67% feel their university did not take sufficient action to protect Jewish students in the wake of the 10/7 massacre.
43% would not recommend their school to fellow Jewish students.

The Sesame Street Seduction by Linda Goudsmit

https://goudsmit.pundicity.com/28625/the-sesame-street-seduction

No stranger has ever seduced a child with spinach. Predators understand that seducing a child requires offering something the child wants or providing something that engages the child. So it is with educational seduction.

Preschool educational television program Sesame Street, originally created to help young children from low-income families prepare for school and stimulate their desire to learn, first aired in November 1969. The show was spectacularly successful with children from all socio-economic backgrounds across America, who watched their beloved Muppet characters, and learned letters, numbers, geometric forms, classification, ordering, problem-solving, and social interactions. Sesame Street revolutionized children’s programming and proved that children could learn through visual media. Edutainment, a new genre in television programming was born.

After decades of success teaching foundational skills in reading and mathematics, and helping children learn through music, iconic characters, and repetition, Sesame Street at 55 years old is no longer recognizable––Sesame Street has gone woke. The astonishing educational success of Sesame Street made it a prime-time target for those who understood how easily the programming could be repurposed and used for anti-American, anti-family woke indoctrination. Education is a dual-use industry, and the fall of Sesame Street represents the capture of the American education industry at the pre-school level. Sesame Street is now a favored edutainment weapon of the globalist War on America that targets our nation’s youngest children.

Globalist Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) articulated the power of educational indoctrination. “Chapter 15, Obama’s Grand Plan: Fundamental Transformation” from my 2022 release The Collapsing American Family: From Bonding to Bondage, further explains how educational indoctrination is the long-range tactical strategy for globalism’s strategic goal to rule the world:

The value of educational propaganda in the globalist campaign is described in chilling detail by English aristocrat Lord Bertrand Russell in his 1953 classic, The Impact of Science on Society.81 Educational indoctrination is the primary instrument for eliminating objective reality, dismissing the American family, subverting American culture, and destroying America from within. Russell unapologetically explained the process that drives a society to madness:

It may be hoped that in time anybody will be able to persuade anybody of anything if he can catch the patient young and is provided by the State with money and equipment.

Education should aim at destroying free will so that pupils thus schooled, will be incapable throughout the rest of their lives of thinking or acting otherwise than as their schoolmasters would have wished. . . . Influences of the home are obstructive; not much can be done unless indoctrination begins before the age of ten; in order to condition students, verses set to music and repeatedly intoned are very effective. . . . It is for a future scientist to make these maxims precise and to discover exactly how much it costs per head to make children believe that snow is black. When the technique has been perfected, every government that has been in charge of education for more than one generation will be able to control its subjects securely without the need of armies or policemen. (pp. 27–28, Routledge Classics, 2016 edition)

Columbia University Failed to Meet Accreditation Standards, Department of Education Finds Haley Strack

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/columbia-university-failed-to-meet-accreditation-standards-department-of-education-finds/

Columbia University failed to meet accreditation standards due to its inability to uphold civil rights law and punish harassment against Jewish students, the Department of Education announced Wednesday.

Office of Civil Rights (OCR) officials have notified the Middle States Commission on Higher Education, the body that sets Columbia’s accreditation standards, that the university is “in violation of federal antidiscrimination laws and therefore fails to meet standards.” Administrators’ unwillingness to address months of anti-Israel activism on Columbia’s campus created an unsafe environment for Jewish students, the department added, putting the university in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

The news comes weeks after the Trump administration found that Columbia “failed to meaningfully protect Jewish students against severe and pervasive harassment on Columbia’s campus and consequently denied these students’ equal access to educational opportunities to which they are entitled under the law.”

“After Hamas’ October 7, 2023, terror attack on Israel, Columbia University’s leadership acted with deliberate indifference towards the harassment of Jewish students on its campus. This is not only immoral, but also unlawful,” Education Secretary Linda McMahon said. “Accreditors have an enormous public responsibility as gatekeepers of federal student aid. They determine which institutions are eligible for federal student loans and Pell Grants. Just as the Department of Education has an obligation to uphold federal antidiscrimination law, university accreditors have an obligation to ensure member institutions abide by their standards.”

Columbia must either comply with federal law or risk losing accreditation status.

OCR began its investigation into Columbia in February. The Trump administration has given Columbia lists of demands and recommendations on how to combat the campus’s rampant antisemitism problem, some of which Columbia has resisted. The administration has cut off hundreds of millions of dollars in federal funding to Columbia as a result.

Anti-Israel protests began on Columbia’s campus directly after Hamas’s October 7 attack. The campus labeled the situation a “crisis,” even switching to remote classes for a time, after students began solidarity encampments that turned disruptive and violent. Jewish students were told by religious leaders to leave school over security concerns.

Though eventually broken up by law enforcement, student encampments kept popping back up. Students illegally occupied campus buildings and were charged on multiple counts including burglary, trespass, and criminal mischief.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio is reviewing the visa status of some anti-Israel protesters involved in the demonstrations.

Equity Quackery Quality-free education and racial bean counting are still with us. By Larry Sand

https://amgreatness.com/2025/06/04/equity-quackery/

While numerous changes are needed to improve our faltering education system, eliminating the concept of “equity” should perhaps be at the top of the list.

Grading for Equity, written by Joe Feldman, a former teacher, administrator, and “educational grading consultant,” made its arrival on the scene in 2018 and, sadly, is still used by many schools.

In the Grading for Equity regimen, teachers don’t consider homework, extra credit, or “soft-skill” behaviors, such as punctuality, attendance, timely submission of assignments, and class participation. Students are given additional time to complete tests and can retake them repeatedly to demonstrate mastery or raise their grade. Also, teacher quality is not essential. All that matters is that certain ethnicities are equally represented in various areas, making the group the focus instead of the individual.

The examples are myriad. In Buffalo, the state spent $500,000 on the Teacher Diversity Pipeline Pilot. The goal of this program is to help teacher aides become certified teachers. Eligibility, however, is based on whether the employee increases the diversity of the teaching staff, rather than on their ability to teach or their classroom experience.

In California, Palo Alto schools are eliminating honors classes. Beginning in September, first-year students will no longer have the option of taking a rigorous honors biology class. Proponents insist that removing different “lanes” for students or “de-laning,” based on achievement, will promote equity and encourage all kids to pursue science throughout their high school career.

In Illinois, state data show that only 41% of students in third through eighth grade could read at grade level in 2024, and just 31% in 11th grade. In math, 28% of third through eighth graders were proficient, and only 26% of 11th graders were.

What does State Superintendent of Education Tony Sanders plan to do about the poor scores?

He wants to lower proficiency benchmarks on state assessments, claiming his plan will “right-size our benchmarks for proficiency on state assessments to provide us with more accurate data about student performance.”

Harvard has brought this reckoning on itself Free speech and the pursuit of truth were abandoned long before Trump. Sean Collins

https://www.spiked-online.com/2025/06/04/harvard-has-brought-this-reckoning-on-itself/

In its war on Harvard, the Trump administration has dropped some serious bombs on America’s most prestigious university. It is investigating Harvard for violating the 1964 Civil Rights Act by tolerating racial discrimination and anti-Semitism. It has frozen more than $3 billion in federal funding and cancelled the government’s remaining contracts with Harvard. Trump himself has threatened to revoke the university’s tax-exempt status. A Republican budget bill, meanwhile, would impose higher taxes on Harvard and other universities’ endowments. Most recently, the administration has sought to stop Harvard from enrolling foreign students for allegedly failing to comply with requests for information about ‘pro-terrorism conduct’ on campus (a court has temporarily halted that attempt).

These aggressive moves follow Harvard’s decision to sue the administration for threatening its funding, unless it complied with demands outlined in a letter sent in April. These demands include allowing the government to review hiring and admissions decisions, audit faculty, students and staff for viewpoint diversity, ban students ‘hostile to American values’, and provide regular updates to the administration, among other stipulations.

While Harvard has an immense $53 billion endowment, the Trump funding cuts, if enacted, could still be financially devastating. Barring foreign students would be particularly damaging, as they make up 27 per cent of Harvard’s total enrolment and an even greater proportion of its revenue. One Harvard professor has called it ‘an extinction-level event’.

Harvard and its president, Alan Garber, have refused to negotiate with the administration and instead appear to be relishing the fight. Opponents of Trump – the broader Harvard community, Democrats and sympathetic media – hail Garber as a hero, the face of a renewed ‘Resistance’. Bernie Sanders has congratulated Harvard ‘for refusing to relinquish its constitutional rights to Trump’s authoritarianism’. Garber received a standing ovation at Harvard’s recent commencement ceremony.

Harvard claims it is focussed on resisting government overreach into academic affairs, specifically the administration’s ‘demands to control Harvard’s governance, curriculum, and the “ideology” of its faculty and students’. But underlying its resistance is the belief that criticisms of Harvard are largely unfounded, and that the university does not require significant reforms. Trump, in Harvard’s view, is motivated by animus toward higher education, and the issue of anti-Semitism is merely a pretext for destroying institutions he sees as hostile. Harvard professor Steven Pinker, who has previously criticised his university on free-speech issues, recently wrote that Trump and other critics suffer from ‘Harvard Derangement Syndrome’. Trump’s ‘obvious motivation is to cripple civil-society institutions that serve as loci of influence outside the executive branch’, he says.