UC & Other Universities Support Harvard

From The Dartmouth: [Dartmouth] signed onto an amicus brief filed July 22 with the First Circuit Court of Appeals in support of Harvard University’s April lawsuit against the Trump Administration. Thirty-five other colleges and universities also signed the brief, including all Ivy League universities except Harvard. In the ongoing case, the Trump administration is appealing a September 2025 ruling in favor of Harvard after the administration froze $2.2 billion in federal grants because the university refused to comply with federal demands to make institutional changes such as reforming admissions and hiring practices, shutting down diversity, equity and inclusion practices and addressing antisemitism “or other bias” in campus programs. 

The brief argues that “even temporary cuts” to federal research funding could have “permanent effects” which “endangers” the “life-changing and history-altering innovations” that arise from “basic research” conducted at colleges and universities... Amici institutions listed advancements in “scientific progress” made possible by federal funding — such as the computer, DNA sequencing, the pacemaker and the “decades-long collaboration among academia, government and industry” which produced the internet — as “enormous long-term benefits” of university research...

Full story at https://www.thedartmouth.com/article/2026/08/flavin-dartmouth-signs-brief-in-support-of-harvard-in-research-funding-lawsuit-against-trump-administration. 

List in image above and brief at:

https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.ca1.53667/gov.uscourts.ca1.53667.00108480602.0.pdf.

Straws in the Wind - Part 268

From the Chronicle of Higher Education: ...New York University will begin a new initiative aimed at getting students to spend less time on their phones. It’s called NYU IRL (short for “in real life”), and it spans the university’s Manhattan, Abu Dhabi, and Shanghai campuses, where students will be enticed to enter “device-free zones" ...NYU IRL, which Linda G. Mills, NYU’s president, announced earlier this year, includes new resources for faculty to try “device optimization” in their classrooms, such as making it a featured topic in the university’s faculty learning exchange week, which is happening now. NYU will also host in-person events like a “supper club” in its dining halls.

To mark the beginning of the effort, NYU professor and author Jonathan Haidt is hosting a “fireside chat” early next month to talk through his bestselling book, The Anxious Generation. The 2024 book argues that the rise in smartphone usage in childhood over the last decade has contributed directly to the rise in mental illness in younger generations. Mills cites Haidt’s findings as a major inspiration for the new program...

Full story at https://www.chronicle.com/article/nyu-wants-students-to-put-down-their-phones-will-they.

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From the NY Times: The Defense Department has decided to cut academic ties with nearly two dozen top universities and think tanks as part of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s campaign against what he calls anti-American values and “wokeness.” ...In a video published to social media* ...Mr. Hegseth denounced the institutions in blistering language, calling them politically liberal institutions with “wicked ideologies” that were indoctrinating U.S. service members. He said that, beginning in the new school year in September, the Defense Department would ban service members from attending those universities.

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*https://x.com/secwar/status/2027474502876070386.

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In addition to Harvard, which was banned earlier this month, the Defense Department said the banned institutions would include the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Princeton, Yale, Brown, Georgetown, Johns Hopkins, Columbia, George Washington, Tufts, St. Louis and Carnegie Mellon, as well as the College of William & Mary, Middlebury College and Queen’s University in Ontario.

When Mr. Hegseth cut ties with Harvard, it was seen as part of a wider pressure campaign by the Trump administration to force the university to cut a deal with the government. But some of the universities that were banned on Friday have already agreed to a laundry list of demands from the Trump administration as part of an effort to remake the culture of higher education. The Defense Department said it would also cut ties with seven high-profile think tanks in Washington known for their defense and national security analysis: the Center for Strategic and International Studies, New America, the Brookings Institution, the Atlantic Council, the Center for a New American Security, the Council on Foreign Relations and the Henry L. Stimson Center...

Mr. Hegseth, who served as an infantry officer with the National Guard, graduated from Harvard’s Kennedy School in 2013 with a master’s degree in public policy... The Defense Department said it was considering replacing the programs with those at institutions including state universities and conservative Christian schools like Liberty University and Hillsdale College...

Full story at https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/28/us/politics/pentagon-universities-think-tanks.html.

Straws in the Wind - Part 91

From the Daily Princetonian: Food trucks, trips to New York City, and rock-stacking activities during winter break will be no more. Following the spring semester’s funding cuts, hiring freeze, and scrutiny from the federal government, the University will discontinue the Office of Campus Engagement (OCE) and its flagship program, Wintersession, effective Sept. 2, citing “challenging budgetary circumstances,” according to an email sent to Campus Life staff...

Wintersession will be shut down after six years... The office’s closure is one of the first significant cuts announced by the University, which asked most departments and units in May to prepare plans for 5–10 percent budget reductions. “This change and other cost-reduction efforts reflect financial challenges spurred by the federal government’s reassessment of its relationship with American higher education, as well as broader economic uncertainty,” the University said in a press release.

Launched in 2021, Wintersession was a free, two-week series of events open to all members of the Princeton community. Anyone could lead a session, which ranged from skill-based workshops to keynote events...

Full story at https://www.dailyprincetonian.com/article/2025/08/princeton-news-adpol-university-discontinues-wintersession-in-wake-of-recent-budget-cuts.

From the Middlebury Campus: [Middlebury] The college will end all residential graduate programs and certain online degrees at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies (MIIS) by June 2027. In a community-wide email and video announcement, college President Ian Baucom said that the Board of Trustees decided on Wednesday, August 27 to approve his recommendation that Middlebury phase its Monterey-based programs out within the next two years, citing severe under enrollment and financial deficits. This decision follows the college’s announcement of its $14.1 million dollar deficit in April, $8.7 million of which is accounted for by the struggling Institute. The series of cost-saving measures listed in that budget update, which included reductions to the retirement benefits of faculty and staff and increases in enrollment, sparked several forms of protest and calls to dissolve MIIS from Vermont faculty, staff and students. In May, faculty voted in overwhelming favor of a motion demanding the closure of MIIS within three years... 

Full story at https://www.middleburycampus.com/article/2025/08/middlebury-to-close-miis-by-june-2027.

Straws in the Wind - Part 65

From the NY Times: When the Department of Justice recently opened an investigation into George Mason University over accusations that the university’s diversity programs were discriminatory, many members of the faculty were outraged. Professors quickly published a resolution supporting their president and the university’s efforts around diversity. Now, Justice Department officials say they will investigate the faculty, too.

...The Trump administration said it would seek drafts of the faculty resolution, all written communications among the Faculty Senate members who drafted the resolution, and all communications between those faculty members and the office of the university’s president, Gregory Washington. ...The faculty resolution affirmed the university’s previous stance that “diversity is our strength.” It also defended Dr. Washington, the university’s first Black president, who has been a target of the Trump administration.

...The Justice Department’s interest in the faculty resolution suggested that the Trump administration was widening its targets as it escalates attacks on what it views as a left-leaning climate on college campuses...

Full story at https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/28/us/justice-department-george-mason-faculty-senate-investigation.html.

From the NY Times: Paul G. Mahoney, a former dean of the law school at the University of Virginia, was named the institution’s interim president on Monday, after his predecessor as president resigned under intense pressure from the Trump administration. The university’s governing board met on Monday to approve Mr. Mahoney’s appointment. He is taking over the helm of a university that was operating in a leadership vacuum as it attempted to negotiate a tricky legal predicament posed by several Department of Justice investigations.

The former president, James E. Ryan, left in July following a campaign waged against him by the Department of Justice and a conservative Virginia alumni group, the Jefferson Council, that led a multiyear crusade attacking the school’s diversity, equity and inclusion programs. The university’s longtime provost and second-highest executive, Ian Baucom, left earlier in the year to become president of Middlebury College. Members of the university’s board, who are appointees of Gov. Glenn Youngkin, a Republican, said at the meeting Monday that they hoped to select a new permanent president within four to six months...

Full story at https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/04/us/politics/university-virginia-appoints-interim-president.html.

The Way We Live Now (?)

From the Chronicle of Higher Education: Before she returned to teaching last spring after a leave of absence, Amy Clukey braced for the possibility that her students might cheat with ChatGPT. She’d heard complaints from her fellow professors and thought, sure, that’s not good. But plagiarism had never been much of a problem in her English classes.

“I was always, like, I’ll create unique assignments and they will be somewhat plagiarism-proof, and some students will get by me,” said Clukey, an associate professor at the University of Louisville. “But that’s fine because most of them will be doing their own work, and it’ll be great.”

It wasn’t great.

“I was just hit,” she said, “by a student army of cheating.” Students cheated on informal discussion-board prompts. They cheated on essays. A few weeks ago, she emailed a student to say that she knew the student had cheated on a minor assignment with AI and if she did it again, she would fail the course. Clukey also noted there were several missed assignments. The student replied to “sincerely apologize,” said she was “committed to getting back on track,” and that she regretted “any disruption [her] absence or incomplete work may have caused in the course.” But her next paper was essentially written by artificial intelligence. Curious, Clukey asked ChatGPT to write an email apologizing to a professor for plagiarism and missed work.

“And what did it do?” she said. “It spit out an email almost exactly like the one I had gotten.”

Talk to professors in writing-intensive courses, particularly those teaching introductory or general-education classes, and it sounds as if AI abuse has become pervasive. Clukey said she feels less like a teacher and more like a human plagiarism detector, spending hours each week analyzing her students’ writing to determine its authenticity.

But it’s not AI that has a lot of professors worried. It’s what lies behind that willingness to cheat. While the reasons vary by student and situation, certain explanations surface frequently. Students are working long hours while taking full course loads. They doubt their ability to perform well. They arrive at college with weak reading and study skills. They don’t value the assignments they’re given. They feel like the only way they can succeed is to be perfect. They believe they will not be punished — or not punished harshly — if caught. And many, it seems, don’t feel particularly guilty about it.

“When it’s that widespread, it’s a culture. It’s not just an individual student. It is so many. And when I talk to some undergrads, they’re like, ‘Everybody does it.’”

Some institutions, including Middlebury College, in Vermont, and Stanford University, are reconsidering elements of their honor codes because they’re simply not working. At Middlebury, the percentage of students who admitted on an annual survey to violating the honor code rose from 35 percent in 2019 to 65 percent in 2024. The most common self-reported violations were using unauthorized aids, such as SparkNotes or a friend, cheating on a test, and misusing AI.

In an online course, Clukey estimates that more than half of her students have plagiarized with AI. “When it’s that widespread, it’s a culture,” she said. “It’s not just an individual student, one out of an entire class or two out of the entire class. It is so many. And when I talk to some undergrads, they’re like, ‘Everybody does it.’”

When so many students admit to cheating, what does academic integrity mean anymore? Middlebury has been wrestling with this question as it undergoes an examination of its honor code, which states that students have a “moral obligation” to turn in classmates who cheat and largely does not allow professors to proctor exams. Those parts of the code could eventually be removed.

An interim report released in May by an honor-code-review committee found that, while campus culture generally affirms the value of academic integrity and that cheating is wrong, “the reality of daily practice suggests that the honor code has ceased to be a meaningful element of learning and living at Middlebury for most students.”

Along with pointing to the sharp rise in students who admit to violating the honor code, the authors note that few students report others for cheating; there is widespread confusion about how violations are adjudicated; and many professors want to proctor exams. Widespread use of generative AI adds another layer of complexity, but the report makes clear that problems with the honor system go far beyond what’s made possible with ChatGPT.

Many students, the report says, feel tremendous pressure to get A’s; anything less is seen as a failure. As a result, grades matter more than integrity. In the student survey, only 34 percent of students said they felt guilty violating the honor code. Other reasons students say they cheat include confusion over what their professors define as cheating; the ease of cheating through phones, AI, and unproctored exams; and the pressure to cheat when you see your classmates doing so...

Full story at https://www.chronicle.com/article/cheating-has-become-normal.

 

Cyber Insecurity - Part 3

Click to clarify

Remember the recent data breach that affected UCLA? If you search for MOVEit data breach, you quickly find - as the image to this post shows - that lots of other organizations were affected. The image is the tip of the iceberg; if you type MOVEit into Google, you'll get pages of references to other entities including CalPERS, Fidelity [any UC folks affected via that route?], New York City school records, Middlebury College, the US Dept. of Energy, Shell, TIAA, etc.

However, beyond naming names, the news accounts have little information. We still don't have a clear idea closer to home at UCLA as to how many people were affected, what the consequences were, whether they were provided with free data monitoring, or whether lawsuits have resulted from the breach.

Inquiring minds want to know. In any event, the lawyers are beginning to circle:

MIT Going Online & Sending Students Home

The MIT response was triggered by a finding that a recruiter had been on campus and was infected. From the Boston Globe:

MIT is moving all classes online and expecting undergraduate students to move out of their dormitories by Tuesday, as universities throughout New England step up their efforts to contain the spread of the coronavirus. The university said a recent visit to campus by a recruiter who had contracted the virus illustrated the risks — and the need for more aggressive precautionary measures.

MIT joins Harvard University, Amherst College, Smith College, and Middlebury College in instructing students to stay away from campus after spring break. All those colleges have given students a few days to a week to pack up their belongings and leave campus.

Source: https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/03/10/nation/mit-moving-online-classes-university-reports-visitor-with-coronavirus/

Interesting Read

If you're looking for an interesting read this holiday weekend, you might consider this one:
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/05/28/how-donald-trump-caused-the-middlebury-melee-215195

Opposites Attract (on Middlebury Issue)

From Inside Higher Ed:

Stylistically and politically, Robert P. George and Cornel West don’t have much in common. George, McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence and director of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University, is one of the country’s most prominent conservative intellectuals. West, a professor of the practice of public philosophy and African and African-American studies at Harvard University, is a self-described “radical Democrat” who, in addition to many books, once released a spoken-word album.

So when George and West agree on something and lend their names to it, people take notice -- as they did this week, when the pair published a statement in support of “truth seeking, democracy and freedom of thought and expression.” It’s a politely worded denunciation of what George and West call “campus illiberalism,” or the brand of thinking that led to this month’s incident at Middlebury College, where students prevented an invited speaker from talking and a professor was physically attacked by some who were protesting the invitation.

“It is all too common these days for people to try to immunize from criticism opinions that happen to be dominant in their particular communities,” reads the statement. “Sometimes this is done by questioning the motives and thus stigmatizing those who dissent from prevailing opinions; or by disrupting their presentations; or by demanding that they be excluded from campus or, if they have already been invited, disinvited.”

Sometimes, it says, “students and faculty members turn their backs on speakers whose opinions they don’t like or simply walk out and refuse to listen to those whose convictions offend their values. Of course, the right to peacefully protest, including on campuses, is sacrosanct. But before exercising that right, each of us should ask: Might it not be better to listen respectfully and try to learn from a speaker with whom I disagree? Might it better serve the cause of truth seeking to engage the speaker in frank civil discussion?”

All of us “should be willing -- even eager -- to engage with anyone who is prepared to do business in the currency of truth-seeking discourse by offering reasons, marshaling evidence and making arguments,” George and West wrote. “The more important the subject under discussion, the more willing we should be to listen and engage -- especially if the person with whom we are in conversation will challenge our deeply held -- even our most cherished and identity-forming -- beliefs.”

Such “an ethos,” they conclude, “protects us against dogmatism and groupthink, both of which are toxic to the health of academic communities and to the functioning of democracies.”...

Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2017/03/16/ideological-odd-couple-robert-george-and-cornel-west-issue-joint-statement-against

The actual West-George statement is at:

http://jmp.princeton.edu/statement

(Directions for those who want to sign are at link above.)

Not So Easy

The debate this past week at the Regents on the tolerance/intolerance resolution should be a reminder of another contentious issue that the Regents have yet to resolve. The powers-that-be at UCOP are supposed to be coming up with some mechanism to deal with campus complaints of sexual harassment and assault that will somehow provide due process to the accused. So far, the tension between innocent until proven guilty and guilty until proven innocent has not been easy for universities to resolve. External courts tend to focus on due process for the accused. Universities seem to be pushed by the federal govt. (executive branch) toward the latter. The problem is perhaps more intense for public universities (such as UC) than private. But even private institutions have had difficulty. From the Chronicle of Higher Ed:

A federal judge on Thursday ordered Middlebury College to reinstate a student who had been expelled over alleged sexual misconduct during a study-abroad trip last year, the Associated Press reports, citing court documents. The student, identified only as John Doe, was initially exonerated by the School for International Training, which ran the study-abroad program, in an unnamed foreign country, in which both John Doe and his alleged victim took part. Unhappy with the school’s findings, the victim, identified as Jane Doe, said she intended to file a complaint with the U.S. Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights, which is already investigating more than 100 colleges over their response to reports of sexual misconduct on their campuses. Middlebury then began its own investigation of the matter. After a five-month inquiry, it found John Doe to have sexually assaulted Jane Doe, and it expelled him. The college’s inquiry apparently also found fault with the School for International Training’s investigation. After exhausting his appeals at Middlebury, John Doe sued. He also sought a preliminary injunction blocking his expulsion while his lawsuit was heard. In his order on Thursday, Judge J. Garvan Murtha of the U.S. District Court in Brattleboro, Vt., wrote that the case’s unusual history, in which one academic institution cleared John Doe while another expelled him, created “a unique situation.” Still, he agreed that John Doe, a senior, should not have his education interrupted before his lawsuit could be heard. In a statement Middlebury said, “We are considering our legal options, but at this time we are obliged to comply with the court’s order.”

Source: http://chronicle.com/blogs/ticker/judge-orders-middlebury-college-to-reinstate-student-accused-of-sexual-assault/104709

The Middlebury case reminds one of the recent UC-San Diego and U of Michigan cases which this blog has previously noted: http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2015/09/more-straws-in-wind.html 

All we can say to the Regents is "if at first you don't succeed...":