Guest Post by Walter E. Williams
When you send your youngster off to college, you might not mind that they will have to walk on eggshells, respect taboos, snitch on fellow students for politically incorrect jokes and learn to use ad hominem arguments as a means to attack ideas they find “disagreeable.” If that’s your preference, you can choose from a wide variety of America’s top-ranked colleges. If you want to send your youngster to colleges that are seriously committed to civil and diverse debate, pick up a copy of the June 2019 edition of Reason magazine for some guidance.
Professors Debra Mashek and Jonathan Haidt authored “10 Colleges Where You Won’t Have to Walk on Eggshells.” Mashek and Haidt are, respectively, faculty members of Harvey Mudd College and New York University. Haidt is the co-founder of the Heterodox Academy and Mashek is its executive director. Heterodox Academy is nonpartisan and boasts a membership of more than 2,500 faculty and college administrators who advocate for open inquiry and civil disagreement on college campuses and in academic disciplines.
The Mashek and Haidt article discusses 10 colleges in alphabetical order. Among them is Chapman University, whose president, Daniele Struppa, is “an outspoken advocate of academic freedom and freedom of speech.” Struppa has little tolerance for the political correctness so prevalent at most of the nation’s colleges.
The University of Chicago has set the gold standard on free speech and open inquiry. In 2014, it created its “Statement on Principles of Free Expression” (aka the Chicago Principles). Those principles provide the framework for thinking about the importance of dissent as well as the role of the university for establishing the platform for debate. University of Chicago president Robert Zimmer says, “We have an obligation to see that the greatest variety of perspectives is brought to bear on issues before us as scholars and citizens.” The Chicago Principles, or substantially similar ones, have been adopted by 55 schools across the nation. In June 2018, the University of Chicago received Heterodox Academy’s Institutional Excellence Award in recognition of its stellar culture and support for open inquiry.
Other colleges listed in the Mashek and Haidt article, where students won’t have to walk on eggshells include Arizona State University, Claremont McKenna College, Kansas State University, Kenyon College, Linn-Benton Community College, St. John’s College, University of Richmond and Purdue University. It’s worth noting that Mitch Daniels is president of Purdue University and former two-term governor of the state of Indiana. Daniels and his interim provost Jay Akridge wrote this message to the Purdue community: “At Purdue, we protect and promote the right to free and open inquiry in all matters and guarantee all members of the University community the broadest possible latitude to speak, write, listen, challenge, and learn.”
In my opinion, it is truly a tragic state of affairs when free speech and free inquiry require protection at most institutions of higher learning. Indeed, it has been freedom in the marketplace of ideas that has made the United States, as well as other western nations, leaders in virtually every area of human endeavor. A monopoly of ideas is just as dangerous as a monopoly in other areas of our lives such as monopoly in political power and the production of goods and services.
At the end of Professors Mashek’s and Haidt’s article, they come up with a few suggestions for parents. Visit the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education website to find out about a particular college’s agenda to suppress free speech. By all means, check out the Heterodox Academy website. Search the college’s website for terms such as “open inquiry,” “freedom of expression” and “free speech.” Examine the college’s calendar of events to see whether speakers with diverse opinions are invited. Visit the campus. Talk with actual students about their experiences. In this article, Mashek and Haidt give specific questions to ask. I’d add to their list of things to do on a campus visit: Talk to the local police, bartenders and hospital people about the college. They might give you insights that an admissions officer would choose to keep hidden.
Walter E. Williams is a professor of economics at George Mason University.
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My wife and I are both graduates of the University of California at Irvine (it was getting pretty socialist when we graduated in 1984 and has only gotten worse). In a publication from them we received last year, the Chancellor made a point of commenting on how, in the 1960s when the University was opened (1965), the University of California was at the heart of the “free speech movement.” (Yes, we all know about the infiltration and bastardization of the anti-war movement, the free speech movement, etc.). He commented that it was truly tragic that 50 years earlier, the students were out in force, demanding an end to bans on free speech that were coming from the faculty and administration, while now, the call from the students is to BAN free speech by faculty, administration, and students alike.
I have no idea if his personal beliefs are embodied in the way things are handled at the University these days (there was certainly none of this current shit when we were there), but given that it is the UC system, it is highly doubtful. I wonder how much punishment he suffered just for his commentary in such a widely-read publication.
Nice to see that there are folks still upholding sound values and that there are other folks making information about them available to students and parents.
Two of the best for learning about Western Civilization, philosophy , religion and liberty….Grove City in Pa. and Hillsdale College in Michigan…..Also great George Mason in Va….learn to think and to research and to write well…..
My kid just graduated from Liberty University. None of that shit going on there. It was between that and Grove City. The boy can write. And he was presented with a plaque at graduation for the best research thesis across all disciplines in the whole school. And the school is huge. Proud Dad here.
My son just graduated from Liberty as well. Were you in the stadium? I didn’t see you there.
Indeed I was. I didn’t see you either.
Congratulations, LLuvCO2, to you and your son. Hard work pays off.
You should be. Bring him up with you next time you get a chance.
I will try. He will talk your ear off about the founding.
Congrats on your son’s achievements. Curious…
Does he read the writings on TBP, and if so, what he thinks of it, as a recent college graduate.
Maybe we’ll read something from him here, sometime in the future?
Thanks. I send him some essays now and again, but he is not a regular reader. Too young to be as cynical as us old folks…..
That’s a good trait.
Hopelessness is the rotten fruit that most cynics indulge in.
Impedes solutions.
We need more traditionalist educated young people capable of positive changes, by thinking outside of the box.
Well done, Daddy-O2 .
For the Christians in the mix, there is Patrick Henry College in VA. It was founded in 2000 to impart a Classical Liberal / Christian education to the students. It is small, the 2018 enrollment only had 309 students and the institution has only had 922 graduates since its founding in y2k. However, I can’t think of a better school if you want your child to get an outstanding education and reinforcement of the Christian faith.
No link to the list? Did not find it on reason.com
What do you mean lack of ideological diversity at colleges?
They have Marxists, Lenninists, Maoists, Trotskyites, Fabians, Gramscians (like “mayor pete’s Dad’), Bolivarian/Sandanistas, they have the full spectrum of the academically acceptable ideology available. If you go to seminary, you can even get Liberation Theology!
.
“Colleges Committed to Ideological Diversity”
In truly First World countries, colleges don’t give a shit about “ideological diversity”. They’re too busy focusing on producing fully-functional, educated and employable individuals that will be able to earn a decent living upon graduation in furtherance of developing their societies. Individuals such as engineers, doctors, scientists, and mathematicians.
American’t colleges on the other hand only produce debt-laden ‘experts’ overloaded on Identity Politics and ridiculous ‘fields of study’ such as “Trans-Queer Expressionism” …all marching merrily in unison like lemmings towards a cliff.
Sad what has happened to many places of education,nice to see some pushing the debate/freedom of speech.
Mr Williams besides being a good author is also a educator in the higher learning world,there is hope still.
Thank you so very much for posting this article. I strongly believe white males, in particular, are affected greatly by the suppression of free speech. The suppression begins for males in primary school and continues throughout their college career. I am angry that our young men are taught to accept the narrative that they are privileged and therefore; should somehow feel guilty and undeserving of success in life. I appreciate this information and will share it with my college-bound friend.
The first thing that rubs me wrong about the current ideas regarding post secondary education is that it should train people for a vocation. The purpose of higher education is to impart knowledge and reinforce critical thinking skills. The modern philosophy of education is to replace trade schools and apprenticeship with a so called college education. So one gets an Bachelor of Applied Science for Diesel Maintenance degree to become a Diesel Mechanic.
This is just one example of many. There is a community college close to my home that gives an Associates of Applied Science degree for Unix Administration. I mean for crying out loud. These vocations in the past would have been apprenticeships.
In the past, attorneys, doctors and now what have been called professional vocations were all apprenticeship vocations. Sure you went to school for the basics. However, early schools had three goals. Teaching how to read, write and do math. Additionally, they taught Latin, geography, history and basic science. The elementary education aka basic, was taught from grades 1 through 8. The older children taught the younger children. This imparts the skills of leadership and responsibility for the older children while freeing the teacher to cater to the more talented individuals in the school. Once elementary education was complete, there were four avenues available for the graduate:
1. Preparatory School. This basically equates to the modern acronym of high
school. Prep schools duty was to prepare the student for higher learning at the
university level
2. Vocational schools. These schools impart a skill/trade.
3. Apprenticeship with a reputable firm, Law, Medical, Accounting, etc.
4. The child returns home to learn the family trade, farming, smithing, etc.
The current intervention of the government into education has all but destroyed this tried and true mechanism of education in favor of marxist propaganda. In the united States it started by adopting the Prussian System of Indoctrination. Must have good and stupid people so they don’t question the orders of their superiors in time of war. This in time lead to not questioning superiors in all facets of work, life, religion etc.
Until the parents of the children refuse to allow their progeny to be corrupted by the marxist nothing will change. The degradation of civilization will march on and the marxist will slaughter what is left of intelligence in the human animal.