Skip to Content

Stock photo from Pexels

Poll: Confidence in US higher education in steep decline

Confidence in higher education in the United States has seen a steep decline since 2015. And the waning confidence is not limited to the general public either - academics are losing faith as well.

Published: April 13, 2019, 7:53 am

    Read more

    According to polling institution Gallup, universities are the worst-performing institutions they measure. A lack of affordability have eroded the faith of Americans in their institutions of higher learning.

    Concerns about the future of their workplace were also noted within academia, with college and university trustees and board members expressing doubts about the future.

    Many administrators are intimately familiar with how higher learning institutions operate and impact society. The AGB 2018 Trustee Index, a recent study conducted by the Association of Governing Boards and Gallup, found that three in four trustees (74 percent) were concerned or very concerned about the future of higher education in the US. They focused largely on one issue however, that of affordability.

    College and university trustees blame the drop in public confidence on negative media reports about student debt (72 percent) and news reports on the cost of tuition (64 percent). Thus, more than half of trustees (58 percent) say their top concern is the cost of universities.

    The main problem facing these institutions is however the glaring lack of political choice on campus. A state lawmaker in Iowa has suggested that universities consider political affiliation in connection with hiring practices in order to balance out the distribution of political representation on the faculty.

    Conservatives on campus are completely outnumbered, given that about 60 percent of faculty identify as politically leftwing. This imbalance has hurt research, open discourse and freedom of expression.

    In 2017, Mitchell Langbert, an associate professor of business at Brooklyn College, published a study of the political affiliations of faculty members at 51 of the 66 liberal-arts colleges ranked highest by US News. The findings were startling, revealing a ratio of Democrats to Republicans is 70 to 1.

    In music, it is 33 to 1. In biology, it is 21 to 1. In philosophy, history and psychology, it is 17 to 1, and in political science, it is 8 to 1. The gap is slightly narrower in science and engineering. In physics, economics and mathematics, the ratio is around 6 to 1. In chemistry, it is 5 to 1.

    The only ray of light was engineering, were the ration was just 1,6 to 1.

    Bloomberg reported that the faculties of Wellesley, Williams and Swarthmore are currently so overwhelmingly left-leaning scoring ratios of above 120 to 1. At the US Naval Academy at Annapolis, it is much better, with 2,3 to 1 and 1,3 to 1 at military academy West Point.

    But despite the variability, none of the 51 colleges had more Republicans than Democrats. And according to the survey, over a third of universities had no Republicans at all.

    Consider donating to support our work

    Help us to produce more articles like this. FreeWestMedia is depending on donations from our readers to keep going. With your help, we expose the mainstream fake news agenda.

    Keep ​your language polite​. Readers from many different countries visit and contribute to Free West Media and we must therefore obey the rules in​,​ for example​, ​Germany. Illegal content will be deleted.

    If you have been approved to post comments without preview from FWM, you are responsible for violation​s​ of​ any​ law. This means that FWM may be forced to cooperate with authorities in a possible crime investigation.

    If your comments are subject to preview ​by FWM, please be patient. We continually review comments but depending on the time of day it can take up to several hours before your comment is reviewed.

    We reserve the right to del​ete​ comments that are offensive, contain slander or foul language, or are irrelevant to the discussion.

    Americas

    Ohio disaster: When hedge funds manage rail traffic

    East PalestineAfter the derailment of a freight train loaded with highly toxic chemicals in the US state of Ohio, a devastating environmental catastrophe may now be imminent. The wagons burned for days, and a "controlled" explosion by the authorities released dangerous gases into the environment.

    US President Biden orders ‘spy’ balloon to be shot down

    WashingtonThe US President gave the order to shoot down China's "spy balloon". The balloon had caused US Secretary of State Blinken to cancel a trip to Beijing. In the meantime, a second balloon was sighted.

    US is heading for a financial ‘catastrophe’ US Treasury Secretary warns

    WashingtonOn January 19, 2023, the United States hit its debt ceiling of $31.4 trillion. The country faces a recession if it defaults on its debt, the US Treasury Secretary warned in an interview. Her warning underscored the danger of printing money.

    Gun violence: More risk in Chicago and Philadelphia than Iraq, Afghanistan

    Providence, Rhode IslandA striking statistic: young Americans are several times more likely to be injured by a gun in cities like Chicago and Philadelphia than they are while serving as a soldier in a foreign country.

    Elon Musk, the first person in history to destroy $200 billion in a year

    Never before in human history has a person lost as much money in one year as Elon Musk did in 2022. The Tesla and Twitter boss lost $200 billion last year. However, with his remaining $137 billion, he is still the second richest person in the world.

    Extreme cold and winter storms sweep across US

    More than a million households without electricity, thousands of canceled flights, temperatures in the double-digit minus range and already 41 fatalities: The US is being overwhelmed by an enormous cold wave.

    Soros sponsors violent leftists and anti-police lobby as US crime surges

    WashingtonThe mega-speculator and "philanthropist" George Soros remains true to himself – he has been sponsoring anti-police left-wing groups with billions of dollars.

    FTX Founder Sam Bankman-Fried arrested after crypto billions go missing

    NassauHe is no longer sitting in his fancy penthouse, but in a cell in the Bahamas: Sam Bankman-Fried (30), founder of the crypto company FTX, is said to be responsible for the theft of 37 billion euros. An interesting fact is that media in the EU have so far kept this crime thriller almost completely secret.

    How Twitter helped Biden win the US presidency

    WashingtonThe short message service Twitter massively influenced the US presidential election campaign two years ago in favor of the then candidate Joe Biden. The then incumbent Donald Trump ultimately lost the election. Internal e-mails that the new owner, Elon Musk, has now published on the short message service show how censorship worked on Twitter. The 51-year-old called it the “Twitter files”.

    Alberta PM suspends cooperation with WEF

    EdmontonThe newly elected Premier Danielle Smith of the province of Alberta in Canada has recently made several powerful statements against the globalist foundation World Economic Forum and its leader Klaus Schwab. She has also decided to cancel a strange consulting agreement that WEF had with the state.

    Go to archive