How Linda McMahon Can Punish Columbia

Universities have lost the confidence of the American public. With President-elect Donald Trump having pledged to “impose real standards on colleges,” his education secretary nominee, Linda McMahon, has the opportunity to hold them accountable. There’s an obvious place to start: Make an example of a university that has brazenly misled its students by reporting inaccurate data to the U.S. News and World Report college ranking.

That school is none other than Columbia University — infamous for one of the worst outbreaks of campus antisemitism after the October 7 massacre, but the fount of other scandals as well. The New York–based Ivy League institution soared in the U.S. News rankings from 1988 to 2022, when it peaked in second place (tied with Harvard). Students — and their parents — are willing to pay for the privilege of attending such a high-ranked university: Columbia charges up to $93,000 per year. It’s no wonder schools like Columbia have taken drastic measures to leapfrog up the U.S. News list.

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Preston Cooper

Preston Cooper is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

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Universities have lost the confidence of the American public. With President-elect Donald Trump having pledged to “impose real standards on colleges,” his education secretary nominee, Linda McMahon, has the opportunity to hold them accountable. There’s an obvious place to start: Make an example of a university that has brazenly misled its students by reporting inaccurate data to the U.S. News and World Report college ranking.

That school is none other than Columbia University — infamous for one of the worst outbreaks of campus antisemitism after the October 7 massacre, but the fount of other scandals as well. The New York–based Ivy League institution soared in the U.S. News rankings from 1988 to 2022, when it peaked in second place (tied with Harvard). Students — and their parents — are willing to pay for the privilege of attending such a high-ranked university: Columbia charges up to $93,000 per year. It’s no wonder schools like Columbia have taken drastic measures to leapfrog up the U.S. News list.