Samuel J. Abrams is a professor of politics at Sarah Lawrence College and a nonresident senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.
Harvard College has a grade inflation problem. But beneath it lies a deeper scandal: the faculty who have allowed, and even encouraged, the decay. The Atlantic recently reported that the average GPA at Harvard now hovers around 3.8—a number so inflated it renders distinctions meaningless. Students today can largely count on being graded as excellent, […]
Read More
Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce’s engagement was always going to make headlines. When one of the world’s most famous women says “Yes!” to an NFL star, the cultural churn is inevitable. Social media exploded, entertainment outlets fed the frenzy, and for millions of young Americans, it felt like a major life moment. That’s all well […]
Read More
“On today’s college campuses, students are not maturing — they’re managing. Beneath a facade of progressive slogans and institutional virtue-signaling lies a quiet psychological crisis, driven by the demands of ideological conformity.” Researchers Forest Romm and Kevin Waldman just published a devastating portrait of undergraduate life at Northwestern University and the University of Michigan, “Performative […]
Read More
Editor’s Note: The following is an article originally published on RealClear Education on August 15, 2025. With edits to match Minding the Campus’s style guidelines, it is crossposted here with permission. When the semester begins, my classroom fills with anticipation and nerves—mine included. Every term offers a chance to start fresh, build habits, and forge relationships […]
Read More
When Princeton President Christopher Eisgruber turned on his fellow university leaders at an April panel discussion, all but accusing Vanderbilt and Washington University chancellors of “carrying water for the Trump administration,” he revealed the dangerous delusion gripping elite academia. His outburst at the Association of American Universities (AAU) meeting wasn’t just poor form; it was a […]
Read More
Editor’s Note: The following is an article originally published on RealClear Education on August 8, 2025. With edits to match Minding the Campus’s style guidelines, it is crossposted here with permission. “I’m going to be in debt for my whole f—ing life. How does that even make sense? I signed up for this s— when I was […]
Read More
The latest Harvard Crimson Faculty of Arts and Sciences survey should be read not as a snapshot of opinion, but as a damning portrait of moral failure. For the second year in a row, most respondents to the survey said they did not observe “systemic antisemitism” at Harvard. In the wake of a year of […]
Read More
A striking new Gallup poll reveals a sobering truth: just 58 percent of Americans describe themselves as “extremely” or “very” proud to be American—the lowest level since the question was first posed in 2001. The decline is sharpest among two groups long seen as pillars of our civic and cultural institutions: young Americans and Democrats. […]
Read More
As a professor with over twenty years of experience in higher education, I’ve watched with growing concern—not only at the rise of anti-Semitism on campus, but also at the shallow, reactive ways many institutions have responded. Nationwide, Jewish students are encountering levels of hostility and marginalization that would have been nearly unimaginable just a few […]
Read More
Editor’s Note: The following is an article originally published on Sutherland Institute on July 02, 2025. With edits to match Minding the Campus’s style guidelines, it is crossposted here with permission. In his recent piece in Education Next, my American Enterprise Institute (AEI) colleague Frederick Hess offers a crucial corrective to the prevailing winds in civic education. He calls […]
Read More
Editor’s Note: The following is an article originally published on RealClear Education on July 02, 2025. With edits to match Minding the Campus’s style guidelines, it is crossposted here with permission. Harvard Government Department professors Ryan Enos and Steven Levitsky recently warned in the Harvard Crimson that if Harvard negotiates with the Trump administration to restore frozen federal research funding, […]
Read More
The intense anti-Semitic environment that has been allowed to flourish at Sarah Lawrence College (SLC) and has even been promoted by its president, Cristle Collins Judd, has rightfully drawn the attention of members of Congress, federal agencies, and the press. SLC has become an increasingly hostile place for Zionist and Jewish students, with open calls […]
Read More
Harvard, the nation’s oldest and most prestigious university, has long set the standard in higher education. For Jewish families, gaining admission has historically been both a symbol of merit and a source of communal pride. But Harvard has also long resisted their inclusion—first through admissions quotas in the early 20th century, and now, once again, […]
Read More
Editor’s Note: The following article was originally published by RealClear Education on May 05, 2025. It has been edited to match MTC’s style guidelines and is crossposted here with permission. A graduate student I have worked with over the past year recently emailed me to share the exciting news that he will be teaching a course this fall. Being able to design […]
Read More
In response to the Trump Administration’s continued attacks on higher education, leaders of some of the most prominent colleges and universities are pushing back—albeit hypocritically. Nearly 500 college presidents and deans signed an open letter from the American Association of Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, titled “A Call […]
Read More
Editor’s Note: The following article was originally published by RealClear Education on April 10, 2025. With edits to match Minding the Campus’s style guidelines, it is crossposted here with permission. Last week, the Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) wrapped up their “Week of Rage,” a week-long series of programs intended to intimidate and threaten those unsupportive […]
Read More
In the winter of 2024, the U.S. Department of Education announced that an investigation is underway at Sarah Lawrence College (SLC) over its anti-Semitic environment. The U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights wrote in a December 23 letter that it will examine “whether the College failed to respond to alleged harassment of students […]
Read More
In an article for Slate, Joel Swanson, a newly hired professor of Jewish Studies at Sarah Lawrence College (SLC), selectively presents only part of the story regarding the college’s response to the wave of anti-Semitism that swept SLC following Hamas’s October 7 massacre in Israel. No surprise to me, Swanson uses the piece to argue […]
Read More
The Heterodox Academy found that in 2024, more than 100 colleges and universities across North America adopted institutional neutrality policies. Taking a cue from the 1967 University of Chicago Kalven Report, which argued that the university must remain neutral to be a home to a wide diversity of views, impartiality protects open inquiry and academic freedom […]
Read More
I recently published an article detailing the pervasive anti-Semitic environment at Sarah Lawrence College (SLC), where I have been a faculty member for the past fifteen years. In it, I presented troubling facts about the rise of anti-Semitism on the New York-based campus and shared my perspective on SLC’s handling of these issues. Rather than […]
Read More
I recently spoke with a senior at Sarah Lawrence College (SLC), where I have taught for 15 years. We had never met before. The student hopes to graduate this spring, but that remains uncertain. Now at home, taking classes remotely, unsure if graduation will be possible. The students stays away out of fear. As a […]
Read More
A blog post recently appeared in my inbox from Frances Lee, the new interfaith chaplain at Sarah Lawrence College, reflecting on the challenges of the fall 2024 semester. That term was marked by violent protests and disruptions led by Students for Justice in Palestine and their allies—events that gained national attention. As a Jewish professor […]
Read More
Sarah Lawrence College (SLC) fell last week after the student-led Divestment Coalition occupied the school’s main administrative building and established an encampment on campus. The protests, supported by external groups such as National Students for Justice in Palestine and the Palestinian Youth Movement’s New York City chapter, were essentially facilitated by the school, with the […]
Read More
In the dead of night on November 21, a group of students linked to Sarah Lawrence College’s (SLC) Divestment Coalition stormed Westlands, the school’s main administrative building, and announced their occupation through social media. This was no quiet protest. Hiding their identities behind masks, the group decorated the building with signs, barricaded doors, and blocked […]
Read More
Over the past week, I’ve had challenging conversations with many students. While they recognize that Donald Trump won re-election fairly and that the country’s mood differs from the campus atmosphere, they still feel frustrated and anxious. I try to reassure them that our future is bright and that we live in a great country, yet […]
Read More
College Presidents for Civic Preparedness, an organization intended to help their schools become “beacons of free inquiry and civil discourse,” recently announced that it has expanded to 100 members, all of whom have “pledged to champion critical inquiry, free expression, and civil discourse on their campuses.” With this announcement, the organization released an “inaugural progress […]
Read More
Last week, the shopping period for my classes at Sarah Lawrence College (SLC) was disrupted on Zoom by a “Divestment Coalition” of campus groups, including the Sarah Lawrence Socialist Coalition and the Sarah Lawrence Review. The coalition announced a “boycott” of all my courses for the 2024-25 academic year, labeled me a “staunch advocate of Israel’s right to […]
Read More
With colleges and universities reopening in a few short weeks, I want to remind fellow faculty that educating students is one of the most important tasks they are charged with performing. For faculty to provide a responsible college education today, we professors must help our students learn how to find and then embrace the truth […]
Read More
Men and women are increasingly diverging politically, a notably pronounced trend on college campuses. College-aged men—a shrinking demographic—have become more conservative, while college-aged women have moved into the liberal camp. Young women are more likely than their male counterparts to vote, care about political issues, and participate in social movements and protests. A cursory look […]
Read More
Editor’s Note: This article was updated on June 1, 2024, to correct an inaccuracy regarding Sarah Lawrence College’s 2024 graduation ceremony. Initially, it was stated that graduating students were seen in an Instagram post chanting “from the river to the sea” during the commencement address. Instead, students held anti-Israel signs, and the chanting, initially thought […]
Read More