October 27, 2023

The size and vitriol of the anti-Israel/pro-Hamas rallies on campus has been a game changer. Yes, everyone knew that college students tend to be ill-informed politically, but the seething hatred of Jews and the misinformation — labeling Israel an apartheid society — was beyond belief. Obviously, something is terribly wrong with American higher education.

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What can be done? Though many prominent donors threaten to close their checkbooks, and top school administrators offer lukewarm apologies, the answer is, sadly: not much. The only solution is to create educational alternatives, a long-term strategy where today’s elite schools fade into obscurity and join the ranks of Transylvania University, a once prestigious university that still exists but is now more closely associated with Dracula than higher education,

The good news is that this mission can be accomplished and all the ingredients — mainly brains, organizational skill, and money — exist in abundance. This strategy will not produce overnight change, but it is the only alternative.

The necessary reform is impossible. The hatred of Western Civilization that encourages woke kids to champion homophobic, misogynist militant Islam has entered American higher education’s DNA. And this is in addition to all the nonsense about gender fluidity and Critical Race Theory. No school can screen applicants for gullibility nor impose a litmus test for prospective faculty. Nor would champions of Western Civilization demand schools to return to an era when universities were church-run sanctuaries for doctrinal orthodoxy. Yes, these donations from angry billionaires are large, but funding is also fungible so Middle East billionaires or radical foundations can easily replace the likes of Leslie Wexner or Ron Lauder.

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Hope starts by recognizing that many contemporary elite schools began as educational nonentities. The world-famous California Institute of Technology was founded  in 1891 as Throop College, an obscure vocational school, and did not began its march to excellence until later. Throop College shed its name in 1910 and became Cal-Tech in 1920 thanks to the efforts of leading scientists on the faculty, notably Robert A. Millikan and George E. Hale. Only in 1934 it officially joined the ranks of other major American universities.

The University of Chicago exemplifies a similar rags-to-riches tale. It was founded in 1856 by a few Baptist educators with funding from Senator Stephen A, Douglas, a champion of slavery.  The tiny religious school was transformed, however, by John D. Rockefeller’s money and land donated by department store magnate Marshall Field. The new incarnation offered its first class on October 1, 1892, with an enrollment of 594 students. Its growth owed much to its first president, William Rainy Harper, a clergyman and accomplished scholar.

In 1901 John D. Rockefeller also founded what is today Rockefeller University, a world-renowned graduate-student-only research institution in New York City. As of 2022, some 26 Nobel laureates have been affiliated with Rockefeller University plus countless other science luminaries.

Such stories are hardly unusual and many of today’ s most prestigious schools, including Stanford, Vanderbilt, and Duke owe their existence to megadonors. Clearly, universities, like corporations, can be started ground up. Hedge fund operator Ken Griffin has given Harvard $500 million, more than ample to create a first-rate school from scratch.

Nor are the mechanics of university creation especially arduous, since funding already exists together with capable administrators. Tech companies such as Apple and Google came out of virtually nowhere to dominate their industry. This is the “California Garage model” of building academic excellence.

Several real estate websites advertise inexpensive properties that once housed colleges. Many downtown locations are also on the market thanks to ample empty office space. In either case, these newly-founded colleges and universities would follow the venerable European university of providing classroom instruction and almost nothing else.