Time to Deactivate Academia?

The Higher Education Establishment insists that its mission is just that. Academic insiders know better.

“Activism in this broad sense rules the day in contemporary higher education,” Zena Hitz, a tutor at St. John’s College in Annapolis, writes in the summer 2017 issue of Modern Age. “The core purpose of the University of Texas, according to its mission statement, is ‘to transform lives for the benefit of society.’”

“Education is for the sake of ‘social transformation,’ says Harvard College—or ‘the improvement of the world today,’ according to Yale University.” Yet and still, conservatives ready to high five each other and yell “I told you so” should remember that fundamental law of physics that goes something like, “For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.”

“Activism reaches far beyond progressivism,” Hitz writes. “Conservatives, too, use academic institutions to wield social and political influence, and activism is often nonpartisan.”

“Partisan politics on campus generates strong emotions, but no one is outraged by the assumption that political and social goods are paramount.” Her point about not using colleges and universities for any sort of political partisanship is well taken.

Nevertheless, conservatives may scratch their heads and wonder what “academic institutions” they can enter, let alone “use.”