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March 28, 2025
To PFS Subscribers, Members and Friends,
On March 10 the Department of Education’s office of Civil Rights sent letters to 60 universities, including Princeton. Theseletters warned of potential “enforcement actions” if institutions do not protect Jewish students.
On March 20, in reaction to the Trump administration’s threat to cut $400 million in Federal funding from Columbia University, 18 law professors with a range of views from liberal to conservative, signed a public letter in The New York Review arguing: “the government may not threaten funding cuts as a tool to pressure recipients into suppressing First Amendment-protected speech.” The next day, Columbia conceded to government demands. Other thanBrown University’s President Christina Paxson, who detailed what Brown would do under similar threats, Princeton’s President Eisgruber was a lone voice amongst the leadership of these universities – in The Cost of Government Attacks on Columbia, published by the Atlantic on March 19.
This week in The Chronicle of Higher Education, three of the 18 public letter signatories, all first amendment scholars, discuss what Columbia and other universities threatened with funding cuts should do. It is worth reading “It is Remarkable How Quickly the Chill Has Descended.” with Michael C. Dorf, of Cornell University; Genevieve Lakier, of the University of Chicago; and Nadine Strossen, of New York Law School.
PFS has created what we have called “Attributes of Campus Reform.” Its purpose is to list reforms needed to help lead universities out of the current chaos, and to restore the core mission of U.S. higher education. The first three attributes are the “Chicago Trifecta” – The Chicago Principles’ commitment to free speech and academic freedom, the Kalven Report’s commitment to Institutional Neutrality, and the Shils Report’s commitment to merit and scholarly excellence as the criteria in faculty hiring and promotion. Other attributes focus on admissions policies, free speech and right to protest rules, bureaucratic overreach, anonymous reporting systems, and more. The final two address the role of university presidents and boards of trustees:
– A university President who leads to instill the three core principles throughout the university. Uniquely positioned, a President should make clear early and often that punishment based on controversial but protected speech will not occur on campus.
– A board of trustees composed of informed and engaged leaders who prioritize academic excellence, academic freedom, accountability and affordability. Trustees are not just boosters and donors, but leaders who identify needed reforms and demand results.
Read all 15 “Attributes of Campus Reform” as well as the accompanying list of leading organizations and individuals who are national experts of such reforms.
PFS is supporting two upcoming on-campus events:
On April 7 at 6pm in McCosh 28, radio host and author Scott Horton will speak on the conflict between Ukraine and Russia, and touch on other points from his new book;Provoked:How Washington Started the New Cold War with Russia and the Catastrophe in Ukraine, hosted by the student group, Princeton Open Campus Coalition (POCC).
On April 24, Bret Stephens, New York Times columnist and Editor in Chief of SAPIR, will give a talk entitled “Writing About Israel as a Columnist – and as a Jew.” The event is hosted by the new student group B’Artzeinu.
Don’t miss this month’s Inner Circle virtual meeting on April 3 at 5pm EST where we will hear from Bernard Haykel, Professor of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton.Professor Haykel will discuss the state of faculty proposals on speech, statements, and institutional positioning, as well as the University's responses to the new administration's policies and President Eisgruber's recent statements on political subjects.
If you are not a part of the Inner Circle be sure click on the button below to join us for monthly discussions with the people who are shaping the future of free speech on campus.
I’m a Liberal at a ‘Conservative’ University. How Did I End Up Here?
My students at UATX know they can disagree passionately with their classmates—a more meaningful definition of ‘safe space’ than what I encountered teaching in the Ivy League.
By Boris Fishman, Princeton ‘01, the Free Press, March 22, 2025. (See quote of the month below.)
‘It Is Remarkable How Quickly the Chill Has Descended’
Legal Scholars on what Columbia University should have done, and what other colleges could do next.
By Evan Goldstein and Len Gutkin, The Chronicle of Higher Education, March 25, 2025.
Universities Sprint from ‘We Will Not Cower’ to Appeasing Trump
By Maggie Severns, Wall Street Journal, March 23, 2025
A Look at Princeton’s DEI Structure Amid Trump Trashing DEI
By Stuart Taylor Jr., Real Clear Politics, March 23, 2025
Princeton must protect the sanctity of scientific research
By Davis Hobley, The Daily Princetonian, March 23, 2025
The Cost of the Government’s Attack on Columbia - The Atlantic
Christopher L. Eisgruber, March 19, 2025
From The Dispatch Debates, March 19, 2025
Funding With Strings Attached Risks Strangling Academic Freedom
Universities must have the ability to teach what they want without fear of government punishment.By Keith E. Whittington
VS.
Columbia University Has the Free Speech Problem, Not the Trump Administration
The administration’s actions are about protecting free speech, a duty Columbia has abdicated.By Charles Fein Lehman
Heterodox Academy Releases Report Tracking Institutional Statement Neutrality Policy Wave Across the Academy March 11, 2025
Trump is Launching America’s Version of the Cultural Revolution
The President’s war on colleges undermines a crucial competitive edge
Fareed Zakaria, The Washington Post, March 14, 2025
And on CNN Fareed’s Take: Trump administration’s ‘war on colleges’
Boris Fishman ‘01, former lecturer at Princeton and
currently Professor of Literature and Creative Writing at University of Austin (UATX).
Prize-winning novelist Boris Fishman graduated from Princeton in 2001 in Slavic Languages and Literature, and returned to teach creative writing at Princeton from 2015 to 2020. Here he tells a story of why he left Princeton, and he contrasts his experience teaching at Princeton with his current experience teaching at University of Austin (UATX).
“I spent five years teaching creative writing at an Ivy League university where, despite good evaluations, there was no further opportunity for me because the university wanted to advance those with a different identity. I was an adviser to a talented student there who was deemed ineligible for a writing prize because, as a white person, it was not his “place” to write about the indigenous communities he was portraying (with great interest and sensitivity).
I know we liberals aren’t supposed to say these things out loud. But my family spent too many years being silent in the Soviet Union for me to pretend it didn’t happen.
As much as I personally liked my colleagues, I left this university in part because I was unwilling to keep giving of myself to a place with those values. I now teach at a university that was willing to consider my qualifications apart from those factors. As uneasy as I was about the match, I wanted to try to give of myself to a place withthese values.
…
I admire that no students pulled out their phones during that 90-minute visiting lecture on Hesiod. That my students won’t call me Boris even when I’ve invited them to; that when class ends, many will say, “Thank you for class, professor.” They seem grateful for the opportunity to learn from someone who knows more than they do, at least in this one thing.
…
It may seem tempting to ridicule this kind of respect as overly deferential, but most of the students I had at this university [Princeton] were far more timid and correct; so often, they said only what I wanted to hear, or nothing at all. My UATX students disagree with me and each other, politely but firmly, about the right place to introduce a secondary character in a story, whether a character’s transformation should have taken longer on the page, and ideological issues, too. They carefully diverge from each other, knowing they won’t be attacked by their classmates—a more meaningful definition ofsafe space. These young people are as vulnerable and impressionable as 18-year-olds have every right to be, but they areengaged, and they areresilient. I don’t take this for granted—it depends on our discourse staying civil and cordial. That is the only thing I aspire to police. I haven’t had to do much of it yet.”
From: I’m a Liberal at a ‘Conservative’ University. How Did I End Up Here?
By Boris Fishman ‘01, the Free Press, March 22, 2025.
To Princetonians for Free Speech Subscribers, Members and Friends,
In February the Trump administration’s focus on radical change in higher education continued unabated. The Department of Education Office of Civil Rights released a letter on non-discrimination policies. DEI programs are targeted, with sweeping mandates that have caused several universities to take preemptive action to avoid federal funding cuts.
To Princetonians for Free Speech Subscribers, Members and Friends,
Whoa. January certainly was a month of explosive change for higher education! Three executive orders that could impact funding of universities prompted President Eisgruber’s January 28 letter, which rightly admits “there is much we do not know.” See the Daily Princetonians coverage of Eisgruber’s letter: Eisgruber says U. is “exploring measures” in wake of Trump orders, stops short of specific guidance.
Most importantly, take a close look at our special feature, written by PFS cofounder Ed Yingling, 2025: A Breakthrough Year for Free Speech on Campus. It is a grand synthesis of the many ways 2025 could be a year of dramatic change at US Universities, change that could critically impact free speech, academic freedom and viewpoint diversity at Princeton and elsewhere. Yingling’s article helps to make sense of the radical changes that lie in store.
To Princetonians for Free Speech Subscribers, Members and Friends,
Happy New Year! At PFS we are delighted to welcome our inaugural Executive Director; you can see below our introduction to Angela Smith. Our Special Feature includes two original articles by our PFS student writing fellows Marisa Hirschfield ‘27 and Khoa Sands ‘26. And nationally, we feature an event of particular importance to anyone interested in the state of academic freedom and free speech on America’s college campuses, held by the University of Chicago Forum for Free Inquiry and Expression. It is presented virtually as well as in person on January 31, 2025, and features Princeton professor and New York Times columnist Zeynep Tufekci. See below for details.
And PFS momentum is building! As 2024 came to a close, over 1,200 hundred new subscribers signed up with PFS. Please help to build awareness by asking your alumni and other friends to join us HERE. And for those who may have missed it, here is our 2024 Annual Report.
