Tag: universities

Homeland Security corrects data error — international student enrollment rose, not declined

International student enrollment increased last year, according to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security — contrary to data the agency previously posted, which showed a decline.

A new analysis by Chris Glass, a professor at Boston College, found that student and exchange visitor information system data issued by DHS underreported the number of international students by more than 200,000 — an error that the agency corrected this month. Glass flagged the change on July 7.

The numbers from SEVIS, a division of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, show overseas enrollments totaled 1,294,231 in September, compared to the earlier-reported, erroneous figure of 1,091,182. SEVIS data tracks college students as well students in public and private high schools, language training, flight schools and vocational schools, among other programs.

The corrected data shows year-over-year growth of 6.5%, according to Glass. This is largely in line with Open Doors data, released by the U.S. Department of State and the Institute of International Education, which also found that the U.S. hosted a record number of students from abroad in the 2023-24 academic year. 

The revised numbers show “robust growth,” Glass told CNBC. “It’s critical data at a moment when people are paying close attention to the number of international students in the U.S.”

SEVIS did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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College Students Can Take a Class to Learn How to Steal – Yes, Really

New York City college students at a four-year university in Manhattan can now take a course titled “How to Steal,” which promises to look at “radical ethics” around theft. Yes, you read that correctly.

Students at Eugene Lang College of Liberal Arts can take the four-credit class that will cost students upwards of $10,040 to look at things like the “aesthetics of theft in a world where accumulation is sacred,” the New York Post reported.

The report noted the insanity of the course description.

It read:

This field-based seminar explores the politics, ethics, and aesthetics of theft in a world where accumulation is sacred, dispossession is routine, and the line between private property and public good is drawn in blood. 

Students will critically examine what it means to steal-from whom, for whom, and why— through site visits and fieldwork in places where capital is hoarded and value is contested: corporate storefronts, grocery chains, museums, libraries, banks, and cultural institutions.

The one part that really stood out was the part about how the course will ask the question, “Is it possible to steal back what was already stolen?”

It went on:

What does theft look like under capitalism, colonialism, and in everyday life? When is theft survival, protest, or care-and when is it violence, appropriation, or harm?

The course catalog concluded by pointing out that the class is “not a course in petty crime—it is a study in moral ambiguity, radical ethics, and imaginative justice.”

The irony of teaching this class in a blue state like New York, where criminals can shoplift less than a $1,000 worth of goods and face nothing more than a misdemeanor, is not lost. California was also a place where this craziness ruled the day, allowing people to just steal and face little consequences, before residents said enough was enough, passing Proposition 36, as RedState reported.

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Indiana U. professor supports transparency unless it applies to people like him

A new Indiana law requiring public university professors to post their syllabi online “threatens academic freedom,” according to an Indiana University Bloomington professor who is involved in government transparency efforts.

The law, included in a budget passed in May, “almost certainly will have a chilling effect on professors,” according to Professor Gerry Lanosga.

Beginning this school year, professors must post their syllabi online for not just students to see, but the entire public, which includes the taxpayers who actually fund the operations of the university. 

Yet for Professor Lanosga (pictured), this amounts to “surveillance,” according to comments he gave the student newspaper. He also joked “Maybe the impact on posting them to the public is that students may read it more.”

The media studies professor said he has nothing to hide, even though he opposes the law.

“It isn’t inherently bad — faculty don’t have anything to hide in their syllabi and people will comply with the law,” Lanosga said. “But what is the rationale? What are the motives? It hasn’t been made clear,” he told the Indiana Daily Student.

The rationale is that public university professors are supposed to serve, well, the public. They are paid by taxpayers to teach classes and conduct research. The secondary principle is that the work of public employees should be generally available to the public. 

Lanosga should know this since he specifically lists “freedom of information” as an interest on his faculty bio, he won the “Investigative Reporters and Editors’ Freedom of Information Medal,” and serves on the board of the Indiana Coalition for Open Government. 

Instructors have some flexibility to reveal certain information just to enrolled students, according to the student newspaper. A good law leaves some room for exceptions.

But in general, the work of public professors should be free and open to the taxpayers. There are other benefits as well – perhaps prospective high school students want to know what they will learn in a political science, chemistry, or economics class if they attend IU.

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University of Melbourne Broke Victoria’s Privacy Law by Using Wi-Fi to Monitor Protesters on Campus

The University of Melbourne’s covert surveillance tactics during a campus protest have been declared unlawful, following a ruling by Victoria’s deputy information commissioner that the institution broke the state’s privacy laws.

The decision condemns the university’s quiet use of digital tracking tools against students and staff involved in a pro-Palestine demonstration, raising serious concerns about the growing use of surveillance technologies in academic settings.

We obtained a copy of the decision for you here.

Prompted by media attention earlier this year, the investigation focused on how the university responded to a May protest held inside the Arts West building.

Rather than relying on open dialogue or standard disciplinary processes, university officials resorted to monitoring individuals through the campus Wi-Fi network, matching connection data with student ID photos and security camera recordings.

A total of 22 students were identified through this process, all without prior warning or a clear legal basis. Staff were surveilled as well, with the contents of ten employees’ email accounts examined to uncover involvement in the demonstration. Three of them later received formal warnings.

Although the commissioner’s office accepted that CCTV footage was used within legal boundaries, it found the use of Wi-Fi tracking in disciplinary investigations to be unjustified.

The monitoring of staff emails was also flagged for breaching expected privacy norms.

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Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker Signs New Law Mandating Abortion Pills on Campus at All Public Universities in the State

J.B. Pritzker, the Democrat Governor of Illinois, has just signed a new law mandating that the abortion pill, sometimes referred to as the day after pill, will be available on the campuses of all public colleges and universities in the state.

Pritzker’s reasons for doing this are so transparent. Pritzker is planning to run for president in 2028 and he has to have something to say that he has done for the far left when he is on a primary debate stage in 2027.

It probably won’t even matter. The fact that Pritzker is a billionaire is going to disqualify him in a Democrat primary.

The College Fix has the story on the new law:

Illinois governor signs new law mandating abortion pills on campus

Public colleges and universities in Illinois will be required to offer abortion pills on campus under a new law that Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed on Friday.

In a video on X, Pritzker said he was “very proud” to sign the legislation at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, surrounded by students and abortion activists.

“I made a promise to the women of Illinois — as governor, I will ensure your medical decisions will be your own,” Pritzker said in the video. “Now, we continue fulfilling that promise.”

However, a state pro-life organization said the legislation will hurt students.

“This bill places the health and safety of young women at risk and turns institutions of higher learning into abortion facilities,” Illinois Right to Life responded in a statement to WCIA News.

The law, House Bill 3709, requires public institutions of higher education to provide access to contraception and medication abortions to students for free, if the campus has a student health center.

If the center includes a pharmacy, it must provide contraception and abortion pills to students, according to the bill.

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How colleges hide quotas, California’s deadly economic model and other commentary

Campus watch: How colleges hide quotas

“The demographic makeup of the class of 2028” — the first admitted after the Supreme Court’s racial-preferences ban — “suggests that at least some colleges were playing games rather than obeying the Court’s edict,” reports Naomi Schaefer Riley at Commentary.

At schools like Princeton, Harvard and Yale, the racial make-up changed only slightly or not at all, likely because they used proxies for race, such as information about the challenges applicants faced based on their schools and neighborhoods — info admissions offices get via Landscape, a tool provided by the College Board, the nonprofit that runs the SATs and AP exams.

“The College Board is colluding in the creation of a complex new system for schools to identify the race of a student without explicitly asking for it.” Universities need to be held “to account.” 

“Lots of well-intentioned political leaders . . . think it’s a great idea” to move city elections to “coincide with the year we pick presidential candidates,” but “I don’t,” warns New York magazine’s Errol Louis.

“National political dynamics would inevitably cause vital city issues unique to New York to get swallowed, distorted, or ignored.” “Imagine trying to help voters focus on strictly local matters . . . while national candidates are spending hundreds of millions of dollars” on “ads for and against sweeping” national proposals. This is exactly why city elections got moved to odd-numbered years in the first place.

“New York is better off deciding local issues without a lot of political noise coming from — or intended for — other places.”

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George Washington University Faces Pressure To Become ‘Sanctuary Campus’

According to Campus Reform, “More than 45 student groups at George Washington University (GWU) signed a petition calling on the school administration to declare the school a ‘sanctuary campus’ for illegal immigrants.”

Like much of academia, GWU is a hotbed of open borders liberalism.

In this specific case, the petition was launched by The GW Socialist Action Initiative.

The group, according to Washington Free Beacon, issued demands for the university, “among the demands were banning federal immigration enforcement officials from entering campus and refusing to cooperate with government surveillance or deportation efforts.”

The Socialist radicals also issued a threat that “any deal that GW could reach with the Trump Administration will harm student life and wellbeing.”

These demands were not without precedent at this university. Previously, GWU’s chapter of Students For Justice In Palestine made a similar demand on May 3rd, “calling on the administration to bar Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents and reject compliance with federal deportation orders.”

Students For Justice In Palestine also called President Trump’s policies a “terror campaign” and said the university was taking “blood money” by agreeing to comply with federal immigration law.

In yet another example of irrational intersectionality Students for Justice In Palestine circulated a petition saying the University’s silence in the face of federal intimidation is “violence against its noncitizen community members.”

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White DEI staffer settles discrimination suit against UW-Eau Claire for $265,000

University of Wisconsin leaders recently resolved a lawsuit brought on by a white diversity, equity and inclusion staffer who alleged she was discriminated against because of her race.

Rochelle Hoffman, former assistant director of the Multicultural Student Services at the UW-Eau Claire, and the UW Board of Regents ended the three-year-old dispute by settling the complaint, Wisconsin Public Radio reported.

“Under the terms of agreement, both Hoffman and regents stipulate that the $265,000 payment ‘is not to be construed as an admission of liability’ or wrongdoing and is intended only to ‘avoid litigation and buy their peace,’” WPR reported earlier this month.

Hoffman said in a statement: “Despite facing unlawful discrimination in that DEI role as a white woman, I remain steadfast in my belief that high-quality, accessible education — grounded in data and responsive to a changing workforce — is essential for all learners.”

Hoffman is now listed as an employee at Western Technical College, and spokespersons for UW-Eau Claire and the UW Board of Regents declined to comment to WPR.

Hoffman had claimed the public university became a “hostile environment” and there are “blatant actions of racial discrimination against white folks” like herself, The College Fix previously reported in January 2024 shortly after she filed her lawsuit.

“On a regular basis there are great educators that are told they shouldn’t occupy multicultural space, to check their white privilege, passed over for jobs for an outside candidate of color, and reminded they are ‘inherently racist’ because they are white,” Hoffman had alleged.

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U. Wisconsin med school admits black students at 6 times rate of Asians

The University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health accepts black applicants at a rate six times higher than it does Asian applicants, despite lower average Medical College Admissions Test scores, a medical advocacy group recently reported.

However, the public university denied that it accepts applicants based on their race when contacted by The College Fix.

The report “Skirting SCOTUS Part III: How Medical Schools Continue to Practice Racially Conscious Admissions” by Do No Harm analyzed 2024 admissions data from 23 medical schools, including the University of Wisconsin’s.

At the Wisconsin medical school, it found that “a black applicant has nearly 10 times the odds of admission compared to an Asian or white applicant with the same MCAT score and GPA.”

Admitted black applicants averaged MCAT scores in the 62nd percentile, while white and Asian admits averaged scores in the 86th percentile, according to the report.

A page on the medical school’s website states that “diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) are top priorities,” and that it aims to build programs that “reflect” the communities it serves. Its admissions page also highlights that 28 percent of the students who are admitted are “underrepresented in medicine.”

However, UW spokesperson John Lucas told The Fix that the medical school does not discriminate on the basis of an applicant’s race.

“The admission process reviews every aspect of an application with the strength of academic preparation key to determining an applicant’s likelihood of success. No student is admitted on the basis of their race/ethnicity/identity,” Lucas said in a recent email.

“Students are admitted on the basis of their likelihood to succeed throughout the rigorous course of study” in the medical school’s programs, Lucas said.

He also told The Fix that the medical school “educates and trains competent and skilled physicians who are well-equipped to practice medicine and care for their patients.”

Meanwhile, Ian Kingsbury, director of research and co-author of the report, told The College Fix that the admissions analysis was based on data from public records requests to allopathic medical schools in the U.S. Do No Harm works to keep identity politics out of medical education and practice.

The group requested data on student acceptance rates, race, MCAT scores, and GPAs to “observe whether candidates receive preferential treatment based on their race,” Kingsbury said.

“Students with stronger academic credentials (i.e. GPA and MCAT scores) tend to perform better through the medical school pathway (i.e. medical school and residency). Deprioritizing objective measures of merit in service of racial goals is extremely foolish,” he told The Fix in a recent statement via email.

Do No Harm’s report, published in July, is the third part in a series of investigations into racial discrimination at U.S. medical schools.

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JB Pritzker Under Fire Over His Latest Move Helping Illegal Aliens

Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed into law a measure that opens state-funded student financial aid to all residents, regardless of immigration status, making illegal immigrants in Illinois eligible for educational financial benefits.

The legislation, framed as creating “equitable eligibility for financial aid and benefits,” establishes that any student residing in the state who is not otherwise eligible for federal financial aid can now qualify for assistance.

The law specifically cites students disqualified from federal aid, such as transgender students who fail to register for selective service or noncitizen students who lack lawful permanent residence.

The bill was met with immediate criticism from conservatives, including Rep. Mary Miller, R-Ill., who described the move as prioritizing illegal immigrants over Illinois families.

“Allowing taxpayer-funded financial aid for illegal aliens is a slap in the face to hardworking Illinois families and students,” Miller told Fox News Digital.

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