The threats to American higher education could have united university presidents. Instead, many of them are “frustrated, embittered, and paralyzed by disagreement,” writes Atlantic staff writer Rose Horowitch.
In her article, “The Elite-University Presidents Who Despise One Another,” Horowitch investigates the feud between two camps: the academic resistance and the reformists. The former, which includes Princeton President Christopher Eisgruber, believes that Trump’s attacks on elite colleges are attempts to weaken academic freedom. Eisgruber has criticized other university presidents for going too far to meet Trump’s demands.
The reformist camp, which includes Vanderbilt Chancellor Daniel Diermeier and Washington University at St. Louis Chancellor Andrew Martin, accepts some of Trump’s complaints and believes the best path forward is to “publicly commit to a kind of voluntary, modified de-wokeification,” writes Horowitch. “They want the American public to know that they are different from the Ivies. And they think that higher education needs new representation if it’s going to regain the country’s trust.”
Read Horowitch’s article exploring the question of who leads higher education into the future. Get unlimited access with an Atlantic subscription, starting at less than $2 a week.
