Commentary: The Academy at the Crossroads, Part Two

December 14, 2023 1 min read

Heather Mac Donald
City Journal

Excerpt: The pro-Hamas uprising that broke out across American universities after October 7 roused once-somnolent alumni and donors. That awakening has now produced a new university charter, called a “Vision for a New Future of the University of Pennsylvania,” drafted by Penn professors. The charter’s authors, along with Penn’s rebel donors, hope to make agreement with the new constitution a requirement for Penn’s new president.

Penn 2.0 overcomes in one stroke a weakness bedeviling a central strategy of campus reform. Those seeking to create new universities face the challenge that no new institution can offer the prize that a legacy university confers: status and bragging rights. It is prestige that drives the ever-more frenzied torrent of college applications, rather than any promise of knowledge. The beauty of the Penn 2.0 plan is that it re-founds Penn on a new footing, while maintaining Penn’s prestige-granting power.

Click here for link to full article

Leave a comment


Also in National Free Speech News & Commentary

Commentary: The global free speech recession

October 30, 2025 1 min read

Matthew Harwood
FIRE 

Excerpt: Since Charlie Kirk’s murder, the Trump administration has launched a blitzkrieg against Americans’ free speech rights. The scale and speed are dizzying — and they jeopardize the United States’ credibility as the world’s leading defender of free expression as other democracies continue to falter.

Being critical of America, capitalism, and Christianity shouldn’t put you on the feds’ radar because all those viewpoints are protected speech. A federal investigation should only occur when there’s reasonable evidence that some person or group — regardless of their constitutionally protected beliefs and opinions — has crossed the line into criminality.

Read More
Are Too Many Professors Excellent Sheep?

October 30, 2025 1 min read

Amna Khalid and Jeffrey Aaron Snyder
Banished, Substack

Excerpt: Amna & Jeff talk to Jon Zimmerman about why some profs are afraid to speak their minds.

Read More
Harvard Salient’s Editor Says Conservative Student Magazine Will Not Obey Suspension by Alumni Board

October 29, 2025 1 min read

Samuel A. Church and Cam N. Srivastava, Crimson Staff Writers
Harvard Crimson

Excerpt: Harvard Salient editor-in-chief Richard Y. Rodgers ’28 announced on Tuesday that the conservative student magazine would remain active despite a Sunday statement from its board of directors suspending its operations pending a conduct investigation.

Rodgers wrote in an email to the Salient’s mailing list that the board’s decision to temporarily halt its operations was “an unauthorized usurpation of power by a small number of individuals acting outside the bounds of their authority.”

Read More