In today’s Martin Center article, Indiana University sociology professor Fabio Rojas weighs in on how conservative students and faculty fare in our higher-education system. In his view, there are, to be sure, some obstacles strewn in their way by aggressive leftists, but on the whole, conservatives succeed. As a credentialing system, American higher education works well for them.
Rojas writes:
The need to reliably certify people for highly desirable and important jobs works to the advantage of everyone in the university, including conservatives, libertarians, and other academic minorities. A university that takes on the role of gatekeeper must evaluate their students primarily on demonstrated skill and hard work. In this way, the university makes it possible for many people to obtain a credential in a fair and just manner.
This credentialing system, to cite just one example, enables us to find high-quality, Constitution-minded jurists for the courts.
That’s the good news.
The bad news is that insofar as our colleges and universities are communities, conservatives are generally left out in the cold. Rojas continues:
On another level, higher education is a community. It’s about shared thoughts, feelings, and friendships. It’s about spending years in the same department as others. It’s also about tacit assumptions about missions and priorities. In this respect, there is indeed a misalignment between campus conservatives and the rest of the academy. In the academy, there is a gross imbalance between the affirmation of progressive values and everything else.
When academic conservatives come under unfair attack, do their leftist colleagues come to their defense? Almost never. That’s the test of community.