Last week, Harvard's Claudine Gay, Penn's Liz Magill and MIT's Sally Kornbluth went before Congress to talk about free speech and antisemitism, imploded, and unwittingly declared war. It's not a good thing for the presidents of prestigious universities to be unwitting. Unless, of course, they had their wits entirely about them, as I believe they did.
Great column until the last bit. Please—please! American “higher ed” is not represented by the Ivy League (thank goodness). Those institutions represent a tiny minority of those of us working in the field, a tiny minority of laughable money and privilege. Anyone interested in knowing “higher ed” in the United States will have to be less lazy and reductive and do a bit of research into the rest of us.
Comparing the contorted values of these three "real" university presidents with the unwavering, neanderthal credo of the fictional Dean Wormer exposes the tragedy and peril we face when leaders lack moral imperatives.
Great column until the last bit. Please—please! American “higher ed” is not represented by the Ivy League (thank goodness). Those institutions represent a tiny minority of those of us working in the field, a tiny minority of laughable money and privilege. Anyone interested in knowing “higher ed” in the United States will have to be less lazy and reductive and do a bit of research into the rest of us.
Bravo.
Brilliant perspective, Eric!
Comparing the contorted values of these three "real" university presidents with the unwavering, neanderthal credo of the fictional Dean Wormer exposes the tragedy and peril we face when leaders lack moral imperatives.