Surprise! Harvard Refuses to Obey the Supreme Court Ruling Outlawing Race Discrimination in Admissions. All They've Done Is End Discrimination Against Asians -- and Doubling Up on Anti-White Discrimination

I don't know how many surprises I can take in a week!

Matthew Schmitz:

Matthew Schmitz @matthewschmitz

Harvard did not stop discriminating by race, @herandrews writes. It simply stopped doing so against Asians. Affirmative action continues, but now it is entirely at the expense of one race instead of two.

Meanwhile, colleges are de-emphasizing standard English and championing black vernacular as a more authentic form of (academic!) speech.

That directive is a byproduct of the NCTE's 2020 Conference on College Composition and Communication (CCCC), whose delegates demanded that

Teachers stop using academic language and standard English as the accepted communicative norm, which reflects White Mainstream English!

and that

Teachers develop and teach Black Linguistic Consciousness that works to decolonize the mind (and/or) language, unlearn white supremacy, and unravel anti-Black linguistic racism!

In short, delegates to that conference "DEMAND[ed] Black Linguistic Justice."

If you thought that academe's social-justice warriors would retreat in 2025, you will be disheartened to hear what just happened at the Metropolitan State University of Denver (MSU).

In compliance with the CCCC's 2020 resolution, in December MSU's Writing Center redefined Standard American English as "a social construct that privileges white communities and maintains social and racial hierarchies." The writing center's new policy urges students to "us[e] their English (whatever that may be) in communicating their thoughts and ideas."

The Independence Institute was quick to mock MSU's decision, calling it "Good News for White Supremacists" because it "helps assure that people of color stay at the bottom." When the MSU writing center's new posting made national news, university officials "removed that content" and assured students that MSU "remains committed to rigorous academic standards and preparing all students for success in life and careers."

The NCTE's "new priests" view grammar instruction as "an instrument of imperialist oppression."

Meanwhile, an Ivy League president admits the undeniable: College education is suffering a historic lack of public confidence, and that lack of public trust is well-earned.

Very few do what President Beilock did. But I recommend that others try.

If you have not yet caught up with this story, here is what Beilock did: She published an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, frankly acknowledging the drastic decline in public confidence in American higher education. She allowed that the loss of confidence is warranted.

As a reader of the Chronicle of Higher Education and other megaphones of the liberal establishment, I know that college presidents know Beilock is right, but they also know that it is an unspeakable truth. The best they can do is declare that the loss of confidence is temporary and that when people come to their senses, they will realize that their colleges and universities fully deserve the respect that students, parents, and taxpayers used to have for the nation's thinkeries.

But the American public is more skeptical than ever before in our nation's history that college is "worth it" and that judgment will only grow more intense in the years ahead--unless Beilock's sage advice is heeded.

Her short essay names five problems and their possible solutions. The problems are: unaffordability, poor return on investment, political posturing, erasure of poor performance, and corrupt admissions. I've phrased some of those more bitingly than Beilock does. For example, what I label "corrupt admissions," she phrases as the need "to reinstate an SAT/ACT requirement." That requirement was, however, banished mostly because it stood in the way of favoritism in admissions.

posted by Disinformation Expert Ace at 04:30 PM

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