The hottest University Governance Substack posts right now

And their main takeaways
Category
Top Education Topics

Why Grad Students at Columbia May Go on Strike

Common Sense with Bari Weiss • 459 implied HN points • 09 Mar 26
🚌 Education University Governance
  1. About 3,500 graduate student workers could authorize a strike that would halt teaching, grading, and research, potentially disrupting Columbia’s academic operations.
  2. The strike vote is happening amid campus turmoil over pro‑Palestinian protests and clashes between university leaders and federal scrutiny over alleged antisemitism.
  3. The union’s political focus is controversial among students, and an affirmative vote could quickly escalate tensions by triggering an immediate walkout.

Stanford Starts to Make Ammends: Lessons from the Pandemic

COVID Reason • 535 implied HN points • 14 Oct 24
🚌 Education University Governance
  1. Open dialogue is key to understanding different viewpoints and creating solutions. It's important to have respectful conversations, especially when opinions differ.
  2. Universities should promote healthy discussions and critical thinking. They play a big role in preparing future leaders to engage with tough topics.
  3. Recognizing past mistakes can lead to better decisions in the future. Learning from errors is essential for growth in both education and public policy.

What Qatar Bought from Carnegie Mellon for $1 Billion

Common Sense with Bari Weiss • 315 implied HN points • 02 Feb 26
🚌 Education University Governance
  1. Qatar has poured far more money into American universities than other countries, spending about $6.6 billion since the 1960s and outpacing China.
  2. Carnegie Mellon received roughly $1 billion from Qatar and runs a campus in Doha.
  3. A Jewish student's antisemitism lawsuit and unsealed court documents have raised questions about whether large Qatari gifts come with strings or influence university decisions and policies.

The NYT Recruiting Brochure for New College

Can We Still Govern? • 808 implied HN points • 28 Dec 25
🚌 Education University Governance
  1. Major coverage presents the takeover as a manageable makeover but leaves out many critical facts and voices, mostly quoting people aligned with the new regime.
  2. The political takeover has sharply curtailed academic freedom: programs were closed, books removed, faculty were fired or denied tenure, and classroom speech is chilled by state pressure and surveillance.
  3. The overhaul is politically driven and financially unsustainable — per‑student costs have exploded, academic standards dropped with heavy athletic recruiting, and the campus now depends on ongoing government subsidies.

From DEI to DSI: Handling the Neofascist Trumpist Turn to “Discourse Safety Initiatives”

Brad DeLong's Grasping Reality • 169 implied HN points • 30 Dec 25
🚌 Education University Governance
  1. Universities should stick to their core job: protect academic freedom and judge scholarship by merit, while fostering communities where people can speak, listen, think, learn, and support one another.
  2. New waves of weaponized cancel culture and ‘discourse safety’ initiatives risk repurposing campus rules to stifle inquiry, so institutions must resist transactional compacts that trade academic integrity for political favor.
  3. The practical response is to recommit to institutional neutrality: protect nonviolent, non-disruptive protest, prevent violence and major disruptions, avoid policing off-campus political speech, and use clear norms and measured enforcement to preserve open debate and scholarship.
Get a weekly roundup of the best Substack posts, by hacker news affinity:

Protests and Civil Disobedience in Totalitarian Regimes and in Democracies

Heterodox STEM • 227 implied HN points • 09 Dec 25
🚌 Education University Governance
  1. Protests under totalitarian regimes are often the only way to expose injustice and carry severe personal risk, while in democracies protest is protected but should be exercised without disrupting core civic and institutional processes.
  2. The 2024 campus protests were described as deliberately disruptive and at times intimidating or violent, with vandalism and little accountability for participants and insufficient enforcement by university administrations.
  3. Universities should protect learning and research by enforcing clear time, place, and manner rules, applying consistent, content-neutral sanctions for violations, and educating students in democratic civic engagement to avoid outside intervention.

Is Internal Reform of Academia Possible?

Unsafe Science • 183 implied HN points • 14 Dec 25
🚌 Education University Governance
  1. Academia is seriously skewed by left-wing ideological capture that affects theory, methods, hiring, teaching, funding, and publishing. That bias leads to censorship, politicized journals, and distorted scholarship.
  2. Many insiders block reform through denial, deflection, and a ‘now is not the time’ or ‘can’t do’ mentality, and some reformers weaken efforts by worrying about optics or jargon instead of acting. Common excuses include claiming reform is a right-wing plot, minimizing the problem, or endlessly debating terms.
  3. Internal reform is possible but difficult and requires sustained, practical action like working groups, viewpoint-diversity initiatives, and firm pushback against obstructionary rhetoric. Progress will be slow and needs a mix of patient inside efforts, outside pressure, and educating skeptics with evidence.

Academia’s most notorious thought criminals unite to discuss controversial topics

Heterodox STEM • 192 implied HN points • 04 Dec 25
🚌 Education University Governance
  1. A group of academics urged open, uncensored debate on taboo or controversial topics, arguing that free discussion is needed to challenge prevailing campus norms.
  2. They criticized a strong egalitarian and cultural-relativist mindset, saying it can block honest inquiry about human differences and raise real concerns about cultural compatibility and assimilation.
  3. Universities were described as facing a crisis of protests, weak leadership, and mission drift, prompting debate over whether outside pressure or government leverage is necessary despite potential harms to international students and STEM.

Fixing Universities

The Honest Broker Newsletter • 1413 implied HN points • 23 Dec 24
🚌 Education University Governance
  1. Universities need to focus more on their main jobs: teaching and research. It's important for them to prioritize these roles over sports and other activities.
  2. They should take institutional neutrality seriously, meaning universities shouldn't push political views. Instead, they should let students and faculty discuss and debate these issues freely.
  3. Expanding access to education for all kinds of students is crucial. Universities should aim to serve everyone in society and help improve American democracy.

The 1915 AAUP Warned the AAUP Not to Become the AAUP of 2025

Unsafe Science • 109 implied HN points • 21 Nov 25
🚌 Education University Governance
  1. A major faculty organization has shifted from defending academic freedom to taking partisan progressive positions. Examples include endorsing DEI-based faculty evaluations, permitting academic boycotts, and supporting divestment actions.
  2. A century-old warning said academic freedom should not be used as a shelter for uncritical partisanship, because that breeds outside intervention and damage to universities. Current policies show that warning coming true by inviting controversies that harm internal order and public standing.
  3. These partisan moves carry real risks: DEI criteria can be vague and unevidenced, boycotts are likely to be applied selectively, and divestment campaigns can be hypocritical and damaging to a university's reputation. Such outcomes may undermine, rather than protect, academic freedom.

Harvard's double standard for Gay

Heterodox STEM • 1579 implied HN points • 13 Dec 23
🇺🇸 U.S. Politics University Governance
  1. Harvard's president was accused of plagiarism but faced no consequences, leading to concerns about double standards.
  2. Students at Harvard face severe punishments for plagiarism, while the university seems to handle allegations against its president differently.
  3. The president's controversies have raised questions about the institution's values and reputation, affecting its students and donors.