Harvard Stands Tall

 

by Pa Rock

University Grad

I am a fan of higher education and have a fistful of university degrees to prove it.  Whenever I am in the vicinity of a major seat of higher learning, I try to find time to take a stroll around the campus to get some sense of what the students and their professors are experiencing by being there.  While I was living in Asia a little more than a decade ago, a friend and I had the opportunity to explore National Taiwan University for the better part of a day with an alum from that school, and on another trip we wandered the entire campus and roamed through of the buildings of the University of Guam.   Some friends and I also spent a beautiful spring morning at Oxford University in England where my curiosity led me into a couple of buildings that were off-limits to tourists.   

Here in the United States my campus experiences have been with state universities and one community college where I taught evening classes in social sciences and English for several years.  

So I have a fairly good feel for what college and university life is like.

One area of secondary education where I have had no experience whatsoever is with the the big "Ivy League' schools, the places where the financially-gifted send their spawn, and where many of America's future leaders are generated.  I do have a good friend who grew up in a working class family in the rural midwest, secured a scholarship to Harvard where he obtained his bachelor's degree, and went on to become a small town physician back in rural midwest - but he is a fortunate exception to the general rules of class and privilege in the United States.

But the purpose of today's posting is not to gnaw on the Ivy League schools for being elitist, it is rather to recognize Harvard for standing up to a bully.

Harvard University is a private institution, not under the direct control of either the state or federal government, though it is subject to the laws of both, and does receive various financial backings and incentives which are rooted in funding from the government.  Harvard, the oldest university in the United States, has amassed over the centuries the largest financial "endowment" (cash and property) of any university in the world, and its current holdings now total over $53 billion, a situation which gives it a bit more room to navigate the demands of a demanding government.

Over the past several weeks the Trump administration, which operates largely on revenge, has begun flexing its power with several entities that before had been fairly independent of government controls.  Though spurious lawsuits and denial of access to government activities, Trump has put his thumb on news organizations and placed limitations of press freedom to gather and disseminate news.  The administration has also threatened several major law firms with barring them from government work unless they cut special deals with the government to provide work "pro bono" on causes and cases that are of special interest to the administration.  And, the Trump administration has also targeted certain Ivy League schools where student protests erupted last spring.

The Trumpers do not like people protesting authority, whether they make their commotion on Harvard Yard or in the streets of Portland.  (But if it's goobers in red hats tearing the Capitol apart, well . . . that's a different story.)

The Trump administration is now attaching requirements to research funding and other government assistance that dictate policies they expect the universities to implement and enforce, policies which would, among other things, limit the student and faculty rights to free speech and expression.  These dictates from the federal government are cloaked in the guise of fighting anti-semitism and are in response to student and faculty protests of Israel's treatment of the Palestinians in Gaza, protests which occurred on multiple US campuses last spring - some at "Ivy League" schools.

Generally the Trump administration wants major American universities to eliminate DEI programs, ban face coverings during protests, use "merit-based" hirings and admissions, and control activist faculty and administration structures.

Trump hit Columbia University in New York City with a freeze on $400 million in government funding last week, and that school quickly seemed to fall in line with his demands, including enforcing protest rules, banning masks, holding student groups accountable, and reviewing the university's Middle East studies curriculum.   Still, the President of the University pushed back saying that the school would reject any "heavy-handed" orchestration of what the school could teach, research, or who it hires.

Then the Trump administration took what was basically their win at Columbia, and marched on to Harvard,  But Harvard proved to be a tougher nut to crack.   Trump and company announced a freeze on more than $2 billion in grants and contracts after Harvard refused to comply with the government overreach into how the private university manages itself.  Now the Trump administration is looking at Harvard's "tax-exempt" status, a further threat.

Harvard stood tall and pushed back at a bully.  

Christopher Eisgruber, the president of Princeton University, another Ivy League school that, like Harvard and Columbia, produces America's future leaders - and America's future - has announced that his school will "stand by Harvard."  Eisgruber said that Trump's actions were "the greatest threat to American universities since the Red Scare of the 1950's."

If our public schools and our great universities are destroyed, what remains can more easily fall under the iron heel of authoritarian despot, and that is obviously the point.

America's schools, colleges, and universities have always been at the forefront of advancing civilization.  Their peril is our nation's peril, and threats to our institutions of learning directly endanger our nation's freedom and future.

Thank you, Harvard University for standing tall for all of us.  Salute!