Earlier today, I published Joshua T. Katz’s essay, “Food for Thought Goes Hungry at Princeton.” His piece zeroes in on the university’s decision to cut meal privileges for non-advising fellows in the residential colleges, framing it as a small but telling loss in the broader culture of academic life. Princeton’s endowment is so vast that […]
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At the start of the academic year, Princeton University announced that, effective immediately, faculty and staff members who are “non-advising fellows” in one of the seven so-called residential colleges would no longer enjoy meal privileges in their college. The reason is, of course, the “new financial environment.” Princeton’s endowment is so large that Malcolm Gladwell […]
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Two recent news items from academia caught the eye. One is that Harvard might establish a new institute for the study of civics and the Constitution. Presumably, this would be a self-governing body within the university with enough independence to pursue a distinct mission—in this case, a relatively traditional approach to its discipline. If Harvard […]
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Few sectors of American life are as toxic and dysfunctional as higher education, and yet sometimes delicious rectification happens, and it is a time to savor. American universities are starting to crack under pressure—from growing public skepticism about higher education, outside activism, and the Trump administration’s push to stamp out both anti-Semitism and unconstitutional “diversity, […]
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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 […]
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Imagine you are a sophomore in college. The semester has been academically overwhelming, and your girlfriend recently dumped you. One night it reaches crisis level and you go to campus mental health worried you might harm yourself. You volunteer to enter the hospital and are released a few days later feeling more hopeful. Then your […]
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