Forgive the long start, but it does outline the struggle against a state controlling education and learning
On one side is Harvard, the nation’s oldest and wealthiest university, with a brand so powerful that its name is synonymous with prestige.
On the other side is the Trump administration, determined to go further than any other White House to reshape American higher education.
Both sides are digging in for a clash that could test the limits of the government’s power and the independence that has made U.S. universities a destination for scholars around the world.
On Monday, Harvard became the first university to openly defy the Trump administration as it demands sweeping changes to limit activism on campus. The university frames the government’s demands as a threat not only to the Ivy League school but to the autonomy that the Supreme Court has long granted American universities.
The federal government says it’s freezing more than $2.2 billion in grants and $60 million in contracts to Harvard (and other universities including other elite ones, but most have caved in - until now.
Already, Harvard’s refusal appears to be emboldening other institutions.
After initially agreeing to several demands from the Trump administration, Columbia University’s acting president took a more defiant tone in a campus message Monday, saying some of the demands “are not subject to negotiation.”
Harvards refusal has now been met with further Trump action
Trump threatened Tuesday to escalate the dispute, suggesting on social media that Harvard should lose its tax-exempt status “if it keeps pushing political, ideological, and terrorist inspired/supporting ‘Sickness’
Sickness?
Thesis their attitude to education from schools to universities, to education in the military, and libraries so far in institutes like the Naval Institute - how long before all libraries.
Burning books next?
Back to Harvard:
“The impasse raises questions about how far the administration is willing to go. However it plays out, a legal battle is likely. A faculty group has already brought a court challenge against the demands, and many in academia expect Harvard to bring its own lawsuit.
In its refusal letter, Harvard said the government’s demands violate the school’s First Amendment rights and other civil rights laws.”
More in the article, ie what is supposed to be “sickness”
But this little quote “took the biscuit” in a way for me.
Obviously some republicans at Harvard are in a complex situation, but
A statement from Harvard’s Republican Club implored the university to reach a resolution with the government and “return to the American principles that formed the great men of this nation
Great men of the nation? Are we in the 1950's?
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