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A better solution

Reader comment on item: Repairing America's Broken Universities

Submitted by Stuart Fagin (United States), Mar 21, 2019 at 17:11

I have not read the book being reviewed, The University We Need, but relying on Dr. Pipes' description I offer these comments:

1. The degradation of academia is indeed of immense importance. The continuing radicalization of the Democratic Party vindicates the dictum "politics runs downstream from culture".

2. Treadgold's solution, creating a new university from scratch, is no solution. Such a university is destined to be a minor player amongst American universities have little effect. Indeed, there already exists a very good university dedicated to transmitting and preserving Western culture, Hillsdale College. Hillsdale is valuable as a standard for humanities scholarship and as an educational institution for those students who take advantage of it. However, it has little value as an influencer of greater academia. The radicalization of the American university has continued apace over the past decades without taking notice of the existence of Hillsdale.

3. In fact, there is a straightforward solution to reverse university radicalization, applicable to our public state universities: state government should take control of the hiring, tenuring, and promotion of faculty. Such staffing decisions should be made by committees that report to the state's board of regents. These staffing committees would, in turn, make staffing recommendations guided by boards of discipline experts that they retain for this purpose. Properly constituted, these boards can be expected to make recommendations based on scholasticism rather than political orientation.

4. Our state universities are public institutions. We should not abide their control by cliques of radicalized faulty and administrators.

Submitting....

Note: Opinions expressed in comments are those of the authors alone and not necessarily those of Daniel Pipes. Original writing only, please. Comments are screened and in some cases edited before posting. Reasoned disagreement is welcome but not comments that are scurrilous, off-topic, commercial, disparaging religions, or otherwise inappropriate. For complete regulations, see the "Guidelines for Reader Comments".

Daniel Pipes replies:

2. Prof. Treadgold disputes your view of Hillsdale, having taught there. Best to read his book rather than my summary for the full argument.

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Reader comments (13) on this item

Title Commenter Date Thread
Another Take [34 words]Barry BlackApr 6, 2019 12:36249040
They can't blame so-called 'affirmative action' [76 words]Anon.Apr 7, 2019 10:56249040
Those tiny beds in the dorms would definitely put off prospective students [37 words]Anon.Mar 31, 2019 17:20248878
Prestige: denoting something that arouses respect or admiration [36 words]JeffMar 22, 2019 21:02248595
Re: [35 words]Anon.Apr 2, 2019 18:39248595
Thank you, I will read this book. [64 words]DongMar 21, 2019 22:03248567
A better solution [251 words]
w/response from Daniel Pipes
Stuart FaginMar 21, 2019 17:11248561
The conservatives lost the intellectual battle of ideas [70 words]Vadim AnshelevichMar 26, 2019 12:40248561
1It Can Be Done [112 words]
w/response from Daniel Pipes
Gordon JonesMar 21, 2019 14:35248556
A Solution [227 words]GEORGE ZILBERGELDMar 20, 2019 22:08248542
Been Going on a Long Time [27 words]David RyanMar 20, 2019 10:58248525
4First, let's terminate the federal student loan program [207 words]DaveMar 20, 2019 09:19248521
Good piece...but [16 words]Bruce BirnbergMar 20, 2019 09:09248520

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