Download a transcript of the podcast HERE.
Note: Please check any quotations against the audio recording. The views expressed by guests on this podcast are their own and may not necessarily reflect those of ACTA.

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Oases of Excellence are outstanding programs at colleges and universities across the country that are dedicated to educating students for informed citizenship in a free society by maintaining the highest academic standards, introducing students to the best of the foundational arts and sciences, teaching American heritage, and ensuring free inquiry into a range of intellectual viewpoints. ACTA’s Oases of Excellence network includes over 90 programs at a wide range of institutions. The network is a forum for sharing ideas and best practices for running an independent liberal arts program and serves as a valuable resource for donors who are committed to supporting academic excellence.  

The mission of the American Foundations minor is to deepen cadets’ understanding of the Constitution in alignment with West Point’s overall mission of forming leaders of character ready to serve the Army and the nation. The minor’s courses, guest speaker program, and academic enrichment experiences create an interdisciplinary community of cadets and faculty dedicated to understanding America’s Founding principles. Hugh Liebert, co-director of the minor, remarked, “We are honored to receive ACTA’s recognition as an Oasis of Excellence.”  

ASU’s Center for American Institutions is an interdisciplinary academic program dedicated to “preserving and renewing our fundamental American institutions to maintain well-ordered liberty.” The center undertakes research projects to examine the “state and health of American institutions”; offers courses centered on maintaining a constitutional republic; and holds regular lectures for the campus community and the greater Phoenix area. Professor Donald Critchlow, director of the center, stated, “ACTA’s recognition of CAI’s mission by honoring the center as an Oasis of Excellence is humbling, especially to be among the other Oases who are equally committed to restoring the promise of higher education. Dr. Michael Poliakoff and his fine team at ACTA should be commended for their pursuit of academic excellence, freedom, and accountability.”  

Oases of Excellence and the faculty who lead them are restoring the legacy of higher education, one student at a time. ACTA President Michael Poliakoff remarked, “A strong liberal arts education has become all too rare at a time when students need it the most. These centers’ efforts to prepare students for an informed and engaged life of the mind are vital for the strength of our civil society and the health of our nation.”  
   
A complete list of ACTA’s Oases of Excellence can be found here. 

MEDIA CONTACT: Gabrielle Anglin
EMAIL: ganglin@goacta.org

The post ACTA Celebrates Two New Oases of Excellence At the United States Military Academy At West Point and Arizona State University appeared first on American Council of Trustees and Alumni.

Which makes you wonder: Who put this crew in charge? It does not seem to occur to the protest community that such decisions are supposed to be the result of stakeholders pushing for change and officialdom wanting to accommodate them.

Not extortion.

College protests have spread beyond Columbia and Harvard to campuses across the country. And if a poll of 719 Columbia students, faculty and workers conducted by New York Magazine and the Columbia Daily Spectator is to be believed, 68 percent of those at Morningside Heights hope pro-Palestinian demands are met.

Hamas should be happy with American academia.

Me? I stand with Israel. I also agree that all students and faculty have a free-speech right to express opposing views. But they do not have a right to trespass on campus quads, and they do not have a right to keep students who want to learn from college classrooms.

As Steven McGuire of the American Council of Trustees and Alumni, or ACTA, told me, “Most if not all of these encampments can and should be shut down on the basis of content-neutral policies.” He’s right.

So where do we go from here?

Fight hate speech with smart speech. Social media platforms have enabled critics to see just how twisted many of the woke pro-Hamas protesters are.

At George Washington University, a small group of students had a bullhorn dialogue about how great it would be to execute — actually behead — administrators. “To the guillotine,” they chanted, apparently undisturbed that they were aligning themselves with the French Revolution’s Reign of Terror.

Columbia student Khymani James shared his negative views on Zionism on social media: “I don’t fight to injure or for there to be a winner or a loser, I fight to kill,” James wrote. James, who has apologized, has been barred from Columbia’s campus.

Good luck finding a good job if any of you actually graduate.

Last year, hedge fund CEO Bill Ackman called on fellow big shots not to hire students who blamed Israel, not Hamas, for the Oct. 7 massacre that left more than 1,200 dead. It’s time the protest class realized that bad ideas and a general lack of judgment can have consequences.

Activists who broke laws — by damaging property or trespassing — should face serious consequences. They prevented students who wanted to to learn in a classroom from a chance to do so. They also cost their institutions a lot of money. Their privileged status as students should not exempt them.

Anyone who’s involved in organizing or leading campus occupations, McGuire offered, “should receive some pretty significant discipline.” That could be a suspension, and in extreme cases “even expulsion.”

(I’d add clean-up duty. Make tent dwellers clean up after themselves.)

But McGuire cautioned, “I’d be surprised if we see consistent, strong follow-through,” because for too many years, administrators caved to chaos.

Now it’s time to grow up.

This appeared in the Las Vegas Review-Journal on May 7, 2024.

The post School’s out, and academia is due for a protest reckoning appeared first on American Council of Trustees and Alumni.

The Fraternity and Sorority Action Fund will host the panel, entitled “Innocent Until Proven Greek: How Academic Bureaucracies Threaten Student Civil Liberties” at 9 a.m., Thursday, April 25, 2024, at the National Press Club, 529 14th Street NW, Washington, D.C.

Registration, found at this link, is required for both the media and the public and is non-transferable. A complimentary hot breakfast is included for all registrants.

The event will be live-streamed on ACTA’s YouTube Channel.

About the Panelists

Dr. Dawn Watkins Wiese is the Chief Operating Officer of FRMT, Ltd., which provides insurance for men’s fraternal organizations. She is the founder of Plaid, an organizational and leadership consultancy. Prior to consulting, Dr. Wiese was the Vice President of Student Affairs, Dean of Students and Dean of Freshmen at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Va. She also served as Associate Dean of Students and Director of Student Events and Events Planning at Guilford College in Greensboro, NC.

Dr. Steve McGuire is the Paul & Karen Levy Fellow in Campus Freedom at the American Council of Trustees and Alumni ACTA). Prior to joining ACTA, Dr. McGuire was director of the Matthew J. Ryan Center for the Study of Free Institutions and the Public Good and associate teaching professor in the Augustine and Culture Seminar Program at Villanova University. He holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Lethbridge, a master’s degree from the University of Saskatchewan and a PhD from The Catholic University of America, where he was a Bradley Fellow and an ISI Richard M. Weaver Fellow. He was a 2021 Claremont Institute Lincoln Fellow.

Micah Kamrass is an attorney specializing in higher education at Manley Burke, where he represents both the men’s and women’s groups suiting the University of Maryland for civil rights violations. He attended The Ohio State University for undergraduate, graduate and law school. Here, he served as the student body president representing more than 40,000 of his fellow students, as well as president of Alpha Epsilon Pi and on the group’s International Supreme Board of Governors. He earned a PhD in Higher Education Leadership and Policy from Vanderbilt University. He is also an adjunct professor teaching higher education law at the University of Louisville.

Farah Aliabadi is a sophomore at the University of Maryland studying psychology. She is the president of Zeta Tau Alpha Sorority.

Garrett Bruce is a sophomore at the University of Maryland studying finance and management. He is the president of Kappa Alpha Order and the former Chief Justice of the UMD Interfraternity Council Judiciary Board.

Follow this link to register for the event. It will be live-streamed on ACTA’s YouTube Channel if you are interested but cannot attend.

MEDIA CONTACT: Gabrielle Anglin
EMAIL: ganglin@goacta.org

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At universities today, it’s a nearly $125,000 question — that’s how much students on campus for four years can expect to rack up in school bills, on average, according to federal data.

And here in New England, it’s a $22 billion question — that’s how much our roughly 250 colleges and universities contributed to the regional economy in 2022 alone, according to the New England Board of Higher Education.

For generations, college students have invested money — plus years of time and effort — in hopes of emerging from schools as well-rounded critical thinkers with job skills that would get them hired in a flash. And for many decades, a college degree seemed as safe a bet as you could find for a bright future. But now campuses (and college presidents) are in the crosshairs of ideological fights, overall student debt stands at a near-record $1.72 trillion, and new graduates fear AI will snatch away jobs before the ink is even dry on their diplomas.

To find what New Englanders think right now, the Globe Magazine partnered with Emerson College Polling, a nonpartisan, nationally-ranked polling center based in Boston, to survey 6,000 adults across all six states in this region. In February, we cast a wide net for respondents, including adults of any age and education status; those currently in school and people long graduated; those working or unemployed, homemaking, or retired.

For many, their reply to the question was a resounding Yes. In New England, our survey revealed, folks who show notable support for the idea that a college degree is worth the expense includes students who are working full time (71 percent agree), current students who aren’t working (64 percent), Hispanic/Latino people (58 percent), Asian people (56 percent), Democrats (56 percent), people with advanced degrees (55 percent), and 18- to 24-year-olds (51 percent). Even respondents who didn’t finish high school are pro-college (53 percent).

However, when you look at answers for all 6,000 New England adults combined, opinions are split nearly down the middle. While 46 percent agree that a four-year college degree is worth the expense, 44 percent disagree and 10 percent neither agree nor disagree. Groups with particularly high levels of disagreement include vocational and technical school grads (63 percent disagree), people with an associate’s degree (51 percent), and Republicans (51 percent).

There are doubts about college in our region, to be sure, but higher education here doesn’t have the thoroughly chilly reception it has earned nationally. A March 2023 Wall Street Journal-NORC survey of 1,019 US adults found that 56 percent said a college degree isn’t worth the cost. More than 60 percent of 18- to 34-year-olds in that survey had also lost faith in the value of a degree — a notable difference from ours, which shows young New Englanders still supporting it.

At the state level, our survey found Connecticut residents have the highest support for college, at 49 percent, followed by Rhode Island, at 48 percent. Opinions are mixed in Massachusetts and Vermont. And in New Hampshire and Maine, the largest share of respondents who weighed in say college isn’t worth it.

As for how most New Englanders define “worth it,” respondents overwhelmingly drew a direct line between college and career. Forty percent of respondents said the main reason to attend college was to get a good job (followed by “to make more money,” at 24 percent). This was the top reported answer for every state, age, education level, race/ethnicity, and political leaning.

Equally striking, our survey revealed that 56 percent of New England adults believe that a college degree is essential for landing a good job. While this shows an overwhelming belief in the promise of college, that support suggests a sharp drop from 13 years ago, when a Gallup-Lumina survey found that 69 percent of respondents nationwide said a degree is essential.

Other Gallup surveys found the portion of US adults ages 18 to 29 saying a college degree is “very important” plunged from 74 percent in 2013 to 41 percent in 2019.

“A college education is worth it, no question,” says Lawrence Schall, president of the New England Commission of Higher Education, an accrediting agency for colleges and universities in the region and beyond. He points to the long-term earning power of a degree, known as the college wage premium, compared with not having one. “With the return on investment, over a lifetime of work, how do those rates progress? That premium [with a degree] almost doubles.”

But studies show that historic economic advantage has been eroding for recent graduates as loans and other debts have skyrocketed. And amid these higher-than-ever stakes of making the wrong choice, the cost-benefit analysis undertaken by prospective students and their families has gotten far more complicated.

Things are different now than when Lisa Cornelio, a 58-year-old survey respondent from Connecticut, and her siblings went to college. “I grew up in an old New England mill town, so most folks were blue collar,” she says. “For whatever reason, my mom was able to encourage my dad to send all of us to great institutions, and he had the resources to do that.” Cornelio was also able to work jobs while attending Princeton, and didn’t need to take out loans.

Now, however, Cornelio works as a social worker and college consultant, and sees the different kinds of struggles her students go through. “It’s not even the top-tier institutions that are expensive, but community colleges, too,” she says. She asks her students a core question, one she didn’t necessarily need to ask herself in school: “You have to do a real inventory: What are you doing this for?”

Julie Reuben, a historian at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, has seen the risks when students start school but don’t finish. “Going into higher education is very expensive,” she says, “and what is particularly expensive is not finishing.” Almost a third of the 2.4 million students who started college in 2017 have since left without earning a degree, according to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center. “These students take on loans but do not get the economic benefit of a four-year degree.”

The risks didn’t used to be this high. Adjusted for inflation, students at four-year colleges face tuition costs that have more than tripled in the past six decades. “Generationally, it was [once]much easier to get a college degree, affordable enough to work your way through,” Reuben says. “Students could go without gaining a lot of debt. That’s the reality they knew.” But today, she continues, “To graduate without significant debt, you have to come from a well-resourced family or go to a school with financial aid.”

In the Globe Magazine-Emerson College Polling survey, 52 percent of New England adults said their college degrees were not worth the loans they needed to get them, and now regret taking on that debt. A similar portion of respondents — 53 percent — support using government funds to reduce or forgive student loans, though the Republican and age 60-plus segments show strong opposition.

People such as Michael Poliakoff believe it’s not just the cost of college that is draining support: What is taught is inadequate to prepare students for many jobs. Moreover, colleges have become an “echo chamber” of ideas, he says. “It used to be a diploma from a four-year college would get you a good job,” says Poliakoff, president of the Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit American Council of Trustees and Alumni. “So many employers are not confident in newly hired four-year college graduates.”

The concept of free speech on campuses is hotly contested. When our survey asked respondents to choose which was the bigger problem for colleges, 52 percent reported it’s people being allowed to say harmful or misleading things, while the rest believe it’s people being prevented from saying what they want.

“Take these findings as a wake-up call,” says Poliakoff, whose organization advocates for the free exchange of ideas on campus. “College should be a place where you think the unthinkable and challenge the unchallengeable. . . . It should be an opportunity for everyone to come out with greater strength for career and citizenry.”

Lisa Cornelio, the social worker and college counselor from Connecticut, tries to remind her students that “there are a lot of options for greatness.” For some, that’s going from high school to college. “A good education can expand your mind,” she says, “bring you the confidence to go after things that, without that degree, you may hold yourself back from.”

But for others, success is ignoring the drumbeat (and peer pressure) that a four-year degree is the only path. “If you have a dream and a vision, then you can get going on it,” she says. “I think vocational schools and training can do wonders, and people end up living great lives because they’re out doing what they love every day, and it didn’t involve going to a four-year institution.”

According to the Globe Magazine-Emerson College Polling survey, New England adults seem to agree with Cornelio about options. When asked what a high schooler should do after graduation — assuming no obstacles stood in the way — 39 percent say attend a four-year college. But the next highest answer — at 23 percent — was to enter a non-college training program. (For 18- to 24-year-olds surveyed, the second choice is to enter the workforce.)

Lawrence Schall’s accreditation agency, the New England Commission of Higher Education, recently announced it would consider accreditation proposals from colleges looking to offer bachelor’s degrees in fewer than the traditional 120 credits, which could mean going for three years rather than four. The idea is to get people out of the classroom and into the job market sooner and less burdened by debt (Merrimack College and New England College have both expressed interest).

“The power of American education is in the diversity of institutions,” Schall says. “All with different admissions, price points, outcomes — the information is out there for people to find their place.” The Harvards and MITs represent only a sliver of New England institutions, he points out, adding there is a huge number of smaller colleges here where an “extraordinary education” is available at an affordable price.

“People think of college as one thing,” Schall says, “but it is nowhere near one thing.”

This article appeared on The Boston Globe on April 11, 2024.

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With the guidance of our Council of Scholars, ACTA has identified seven subject areas that together make up a foundational core curriculum in the liberal arts. What Will They Learn?® evaluates curricular and general educational requirements at over 1,100 U.S. colleges and universities, rating each institution’s curriculum on an “A+”–“F” scale based on whether they require students to study these essential subject areas.  

The seven subject areas are Composition, Literature, (intermediate-level) Foreign Language, U.S. Government or History, Economics, Mathematics, and Natural Science. What Will They Learn?®’s new “A+” grade identifies liberal arts institutions that require students to take courses in all seven subject areas. Out of 1,134 universities reviewed by What Will They Learn?®, only seven universities earn an “A+”. 

These seven institutions are Christopher Newport University, Patrick Henry College, Thomas Aquinas College in California, Thomas Aquinas College in Massachusetts, Thomas More College of Liberal Arts, the University of Dallas, and the University of Saint Katherine. Each of these universities stands out for its rigorous curriculum and commitment to liberal arts education. 

Our “A+” schools are models of educational quality and pedagogical integrity. These institutions deserve the consideration of academically serious students and should serve as inspiration to educators seeking to make students’ college years some of the most rewarding and transformative years of their lives.

MEDIA CONTACT: Gabrielle Anglin
EMAIL: ganglin@goacta.org

The post WWTL Announces Its First A+ Grade Schools appeared first on American Council of Trustees and Alumni.

“The Honors College at Houston Christian University shares in the university’s central confession, ‘Jesus Christ is Lord,’ by providing an integrated general education for undergraduate students willing to approach their studies with modesty and reverence. […] In small classes designed for transformative conversations, students and faculty seek truth together,” says program director Gary Hartenburg, Ph.D. “The Honors College curriculum stretches from the ancient world to the twentieth century, and students revel in its poetry, drama, history, art, philosophy, science, psychology, economics, mathematics, and theology. […] Our Honors Scholars come from all over the world and reflect the makeup of Houston as a global leader of diversity and growth. We are grateful to ACTA for recognizing the Honors College at HCU as a Hidden Gem.”

Gabriella Hsu, ACTA’s Senior Program Manager for Curricular Improvement says, “ACTA’s Hidden Gems program highlights major, minor, and certificate programs that offer students an unparalleled education in the liberal arts. Hidden Gems programs are so named for the high caliber of their faculty, thoughtfully structured curricula, and commitment both to the challenges and rewards of liberal education. Students enrolled in Hidden Gems programs are drawn into community and discussion rooted in the rich interdisciplinary study of the liberal arts and sciences. In its mission to support academic excellence, ACTA believes that the Hidden Gems program is an invaluable resource for students seeking a robust, collegial, and enriching education.”

ACTA’s Hidden Gems initiative serves as a complement to our What Will They Learn?^® (WWTL) project. WWTL rates the core curriculum requirements at over 1,100 schools to determine which institutions provide a rigorous, liberal arts-oriented general education. Programs designated as Hidden Gems offer a robust liberal arts education regardless of their home institution’s core curriculum. WWTL and Hidden Gems help prospective students locate universities and programs that will prepare them for successful careers, informed citizenship, and human flourishing.

See a comprehensive list of all Hidden Gems here.

MEDIA CONTACT: Gabrielle Anglin
EMAIL: ganglin@goacta.org

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“The PPE Program focuses on understanding how social, political, and economic institutions, as well as considerations of justice, rights, and liberty, have, do, and should interact and shape one another. At its heart is the recognition that philosophy, political science, and economics are each individually important to understanding the world in which we live—but that bringing the three disciplines together illuminates issues that otherwise are obscured by the shadows cast by relying solely on one or the other,” says Geoffrey Sayre-McCord, founding director of the PPE program. “We are proud, to say the least, to counted among ACTA’s Hidden Gems.”

Gabriella Hsu, ACTA’s Senior Program Manager for Curricular Improvement says, “ACTA’s Hidden Gems program highlights major, minor, and certificate programs that offer students an unparalleled education in the liberal arts. Hidden Gems programs are so named for the high caliber of their faculty, thoughtfully structured curricula, and commitment both to the challenges and rewards of liberal education. Students enrolled in Hidden Gems programs are drawn into community and discussion rooted in the rich interdisciplinary study of the liberal arts and sciences. In its mission to support academic excellence, ACTA believes that the Hidden Gems program is an invaluable resource for students seeking a robust, collegial, and enriching education.”

ACTA’s Hidden Gems initiative serves as a complement to our What Will They Learn?® (WWTL) project. WWTL rates the core curriculum requirements at over 1,100 schools to determine which institutions provide a rigorous, liberal arts-oriented general education. Programs designated as Hidden Gems offer a robust liberal arts education regardless of their home institution’s core curriculum. WWTL and Hidden Gems help prospective students locate universities and programs that will prepare them for successful careers, informed citizenship, and human flourishing.

See a comprehensive list of all Hidden Gems here.

MEDIA CONTACT: Gabrielle Anglin
EMAIL: ganglin@goacta.org

The post ACTA Designates the Philosophy, Politics, & Economics minor program as a Hidden Gem for its Robust Liberal Arts Curriculum appeared first on American Council of Trustees and Alumni.

Key findings from the survey include:

• Thirty-nine percent of respondents said shouting down a speaker is always or sometimes acceptable.
• Nine percent of respondents said using violence to prevent someone from speaking is always or sometimes acceptable. This number rose to 27% among students who identify as Democrats, compared to only 6% among Republicans.
• Forty-eight percent of respondents said they self-censor at least occasionally. Forty percent of Republicans said they self-censor fairly or very often, compared to only 6% of Democrats.

“These survey results show that Furman University, like so many American colleges and universities, is failing to maintain a culture of free expression and openness to viewpoint diversity,” stated Steven McGuire, ACTA’s Paul & Karen Levy Fellow in Campus Freedom. “Given the evident willingness of many Furman students to shut down views they do not like, it is not surprising that so many of their peers feel they cannot share their views on campus. The different experiences of Democratic and Republican students at Furman are especially notable. Republicans are much more likely to self-censor, which means that the whole student body is not regularly hearing the full range of views widely held by segments of the American people on various subjects.”

Furman’s leadership can take action to restore the free exchange of ideas on campus by adopting the measures outlined in ACTA’s Gold Standard for Freedom of Expression. “It is the solemn duty of governing boards to remove the barriers to free expression at their institutions, wherever those barriers are found,” remarked ACTA President Michael Poliakoff. “They must not accept evasive answers when core freedoms and values are at issue. Americans are properly impatient when they see the money they pay for college so misused that graduates emerge emotionally and intellectually unprepared for the discourse that is fundamental to civic life.”

The survey report can be found here.

MEDIA CONTACT: Gabrielle Anglin
EMAIL: ganglin@goacta.org

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The Chicago Principles: Report of the Committee on Freedom of Expression

The Chicago Principles articulate the importance of free expression as an essential feature of the university. They commit the university to allowing the widest possible range of ideas to be spoken and heard, even those that are considered wrong or offensive by many. They stress that the members and guests of the university must not be prevented from expressing their views.

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