If you look back 40 years or so, higher education was a lot different than it is today. Among the differences is that whereas college presidents used to be serious academics who focused on improving (or at least maintaining) intellectual integrity, now they are often empire buildings who are mainly interested in raising tons of money to spend on whatever enhances the institution’s prestige. They rake in money, lavish some on themselves and the rest on high-profile projects such as overseas campuses.

A good example is New York University. In her recent Chronicle Review piece, “NYU Eats World,” one of the university’s alumna, Claudia Dreifus, offers up a strong indictment of NYU under John Sexton’s presidency. She writes, “Like so many American universities today, NYU has no discernable center, no real purpose, except growth and a better spot on the US News rankings. The university attempts anything and everything — new programs, new buildings, new schools, new types of perks for its stars. No one seems to ask, ‘Can the students afford this?’ Or, better yet, ‘Is this wise?’”

I recommend reading the whole piece.

Claudia Dreifus is the co-author, with Andrew Hacker of an excellent 2010 book entitled Higher Education? I reviewed the book for the Pope Center, and when we hosted an event in 2011 on the way the “liberal” and “conservative” criticism of higher education often dovetail, she was among the speakers.

In my view, the Sextons of the higher education world were able to get away with turning their institutions into fiefdoms for their glorification and the lining of their pockets because they were liberals in good standing and thus mostly immune from attack by other liberals.