There is a highly disturbing story out of Mount St. Mary’s University where the adviser to the school newspaper was fired after the newspaper ran a story of how university’s president, Simon Newman (left), had said that the school had to tighten its standards and get rid of less competitive students. He mocked colleagues who were resisting by reportedly saying “This is hard for you because you think of the students as cuddly bunnies, but you can’t. You just have to drown the bunnies.”
Category: Academia
By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor
Three weeks ago, we featured an article describing the plight of dozens of academics who faced arrest after signing a peace petition. These advocates were declared enemies of the Republic of Turkey. Now President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s government will put on trial a Turkish professor who placed onto an exam questions referencing PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan.
Ankara University professor Resat Baris Unlu faces charges for spreading “terrorist propaganda” after presenting his students a question comparing two documents written by the founder of the proscribed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) who is currently serving a life sentence.
By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor
A California school district faces a lawsuit which has been appealed to the Ninth Circuit were parents of a six-year-old boy having genetic markers for the condition of cystic fibrosis brought suit against the Palo Alto Unified School District claiming the district violated the Americans with Disabilities Act and First Amendment privacy rights of the child.
The case revolves around the issue of genetic discrimination. According to the lawsuit, parents enrolled six-year-old Coleman Chadman at Jordan Middle School. The parents disclosed the genetic marker for Coleman on an interview form requesting information as to the child’s medical conditions. As a result of that disclosure, and other events, Coleman was prohibited from attending school due to DNA markers for cystic fibrosis and not for any condition presently manifesting itself as a diagnosis of cystic fibrosis.
The case demonstrates a worrying problem leading to discrimination based on genetic factors where the expression of certain genes is not a guarantee of having such medical problems yet the discrimination is nevertheless applied.
Continue reading “Sixth Grade Student Allegedly Removed From School Due To DNA Profile”
The University of Connecticut is under fire this week after a report that it would create a living space segregated by race. The school is concerned about the lower graduation rate for black students. So it has arranged for black-only housing to try to maintain a more supportive environment. Others call is segregation and a return to pre-Brown v. Board of Education values. The university has insisted that it is not a separate dorm and that the reports have been overblown, as discussed on Snopes.
Continue reading “Critics: UConn to Create Black-Only Housing (Updated)”
We have been following the controversy surrounding the outrageous conduct of University of Missouri Mass communications professor Melissa Click attacking the media covering a “Black Lives Matter” protest.” She has now been charged with third-degree assault — an offense that is criminal but likely to result in only a fine.
Continue reading “University of Missouri Communications Professor To Be Charged With Assault”
We have been reporting on the protests occurring on college campuses and the troubling demands sometimes made by the “Black Lives Matter” movement in terms of academic components and programs, including college newspapers. Oberlin College President Marvin Krislov finally had enough after receiving a list of rambling demands from black students — demands declared to be nonnegotiable for the Administration. Krislov correctly refused to concede core control over the academic mission and yield to such demands which included things like the firing of certain employees and enrolling recently released prisoners.
Continue reading “Oberlin President Rejects List of Rambling Demands From Black Students”
Former LSU Education Professor Teresa Buchanan has filed an interesting federal civil rights lawsuit against the President of Louisiana State University and other school officials, claiming that the school’s sexual harassment rules (modeled on the rules crafted by the Department of Education) violated free speech and due process. I have been a critic of actions taken by the Administration against universities in forcing schools to strip students and faculty of due process rights. We previously discussed the controversy HERE.
We will occasionally have polls that leave me deeply depressed and the recent poll, conducted by the American Council of Trustees and Alumni, is such a case. When college graduates were asked, ten percent said that they believe Judith Sheindlin, aka “Judge Judy,” serves on the Supreme Court. That’s right, Judge Judy.
Continue reading “Poll: Ten Percent of College Graduates Believe Judge Judy Is On The Supreme Court”
We have another study indicating the rapidly worsening situation due to global climate change. A study published in the journal Nature Climate Change, shows that the amount of man-made heat energy absorbed by the seas has doubled since 1997. That absorption is much higher than anticipated and portends greater threats to ocean life as well as the continuing worsening of intense storms.
Continue reading “Study: Rate of Heat Absorption Of Oceans Has Doubled Since 1997”
One of the thrills for many people in North Dakota has been to visit the Elkhorn Ranch of former President Teddy Roosevelt in the Badlands along the Little Missouri River. While long listed as one of the “11 most endangered historic places” in the nation by the National Trust for Historic Preservation, the Elkhorn Ranch was the beloved location where Roosevelt hunted, bred cattle and began his writings on conservation. Although the government U.S. Forest Service purchased 4,400 acres, including the ranch, in 2007 as part of the Theodore Roosevelt National Park, it did not acquire the mineral rights. Now, over the intense objections of Roger Lothspeich, owner of Elkhorn Minerals, intended to mine gravel and destroy much of the area around the historic site. In response to a national outcry from historians and hunters, Lothspeich said “There is a lot of gravel to mine. I will keep on mining year after year, for years to come, and will not stop until I get all the gravel. That’s the type of individual I am. I just don’t give up.”
There is an interesting survey published this month on mental health and substance use issues for law students. The Bar Examiner report (available here) found that a quarter of all law students had been diagnosed at some point for depression, anxiety, eating disorders, psychosis, personality disorder or substance use disorder. I am not surprised by the figure and speak every year to my classes about dealing the mental health and dependency issues as part of my first year classes. I try to tell them that there is no barrier to practice for students who have these issues. Indeed, the real danger is found among students who ignore these issues in the highly pressured legal profession.
There was a curious moment recently in an interview with Hillary Clinton that might interest our political science and philosophy majors. Chris Matthews asked Clinton on MSNBC what a socialist is and the difference between a socialist and a Democrat. Clinton appeared unable or unwilling to answer that question. Given the fact that the Clinton campaign has referred regularly to Bernie Sanders being a socialist and distinguishing Clinton as a “progressive Democrat,” it would seem a fair question. It is not like asking for the difference between a “raven and a writing desk”, but it received the same unclear response.
Laurentian University Professor Dr. Michael Persinger has been removed from his class for confirming that students understand that profane language is used and discussed as part of his class. That would seem a basic exercise of academic freedom since Persinger was seeking to use the language as part of his introductory psychology course. Yet, the university declared him in violation of workplace policies.
There is a fascinating study out of the scientific journal Environment & Behavior that found that diners order significantly more food and drink when served by an overweight waiter or waitress. It appears that a Rubenesque servers with more waistline are better for the bottom line of restaurants.
We recently discussed the concern over the criminalization of speech in Israel. Now there is an added concern after Israel’s Education Ministry disqualified Dorit Rabinyan’s award winning “Gader Haya” (literally “Hedgegrow,” but known in English as “Borderline”)from being used in high schools. The reason? The novel describes a love story between an Israeli woman and a Palestinian man. The Education Ministry decided that the novel threatened “the identity and the heritage of students in every sector,” and the belief that “intimate relations between Jews and non-Jews threatens the separate identity.”