Although civic education is as important today as ever, the median number of high school civics courses has declined by two-thirds over the past 30 years, one scholar reports.
Introducing a Great Books curriculum in a state university today is a lot like staging a production of “Fiddler on the Roof” in Saudi Arabia, but Dr. Mark Winchell has succeeded in bringing the classics to Clemson University, albeit one course at a time.
“We have succeeded in sending a great many people to college and university,” Russell Kirk noted more than 25 years ago. “We have not succeeded in educating most of them.”
Although at least one professor thinks that they are not too bright, conservative students at Duke University, who are plentiful, and faculty members, who are not, have found some ingenious ways to get their point across.
Left to their own devices, the powers that be at UNC-Chapel Hill opt for the liberal answer to every question—from whom to choose for a commencement speaker to what to require for course reading.
“The promise of Brown will never be fulfilled,” a civil rights leader argues, “if the educational establishment, its enablers, [and] its cheerleaders resist reforms proven to elevate black educational achievement.”
With its dearth of intellectual diversity and its intolerance of dissent, CCSU often seems disturbingly similar to the CCCP, according to one heterodox professor.
Jean Cobbs’ political affiliation has made her a marked woman at Virginia State University, the historically black school where she has served on the faculty since 1971.
Monroe Community College has hosted drag strippers, but the New York school draws the line at sending care packages to U.S. troops: “We can’t get involved in anything that controversial.”
