Tag: universities

U. Arizona offers ‘LGBTQ+ liberation’ internship to develop ‘scholar-activist identity’

The University of Arizona is offering a for-credit internship this fall to give students a deeper understanding of “Queer and Trans liberation” and encourage “the development of a scholar-activist identity” for “LGBTQ+2S” students.

One Arizona-based education policy expert raised concerns with The College Fix about the public university granting academic credit for “ideological activism.”

The internship is a student-funded, three-credit and year-long collaboration between the LGBTQ+2S Resource Center and the university’s Pride Alliance student group, according to the program’s description reviewed by The College Fix.

The program’s webpage was removed after a media inquiry about it last week from The College Fix. An archived version from the 2023-24 school year is still available.

“This internship encourages the development of a scholar-activist identity for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, questioning, asexual, and two-spirit (LGBTQA+2S) and allied students at The University of Arizona, particularly through the lens of sexual orientation, autonomy and advocacy, gender identity, and gender expression,” according to the program description for the 2025-26 year reviewed by The Fix.

Additionally, interns will discuss “LGBTQ+ Liberation” and attend a weekly class “focusing on identity development and social justice leadership skills,” according to an Instagram post by the Pride Alliance.

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Law schools face pressure to discriminate under ABA accreditation ‘monopoly’: report

The American Bar Association places pressure on top public law schools to implement “unconstitutional” race and sex-based preferences in admissions and hiring, according to a new report by the Pacific Legal Foundation.

The foundation’s report, published in July, says the ABA does this through its “monopoly” accreditation process.

However, a bar association official denied any unlawful discrimination when contacted by The College Fix.

Pacific Legal, a public interest law firm focused on defending individual liberties, based its findings on accreditation reports from 45 of the top 50 public law schools through open records requests from 2014 to 2023.

The report found that 20 of the responding schools were criticized for failing to meet the ABA’s “diversity standards,” thus risking their accreditation status. These criticisms include failing to hire a sufficient amount of faculty from minority groups, having  “limited DEI curriculum integration,” and “not having enough LGBTQ+ support groups.”

According to the report, these standards often require or encourage practices that conflict with the U.S. Constitution and state and federal civil rights laws.

“The ABA has told law schools that they have to implement the ABA’s own problematic diversity standards, even if state or federal law might prohibit them from doing so,” Zack Smith, senior legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told The Fix recently when asked about the report. Smith previously worked as an assistant U.S. attorney in Florida.

The findings center on the bar association’s accreditation Standards 205 and 206, which obligate law schools to demonstrate a commitment to diversity and inclusion regarding students, faculty, and staff in terms of race and sex by the virtue of “non-discrimination,” according to the foundation’s report.

Schools that fail to meet these standards risk punishment and a loss of accreditation, according to the report.

The report documents examples of schools being pushed to adopt racial preferences despite state-level prohibitions. In one case, Charleston School of Law was denied accreditation until it agreed to appoint a diversity director to remediate concerns regarding sufficient racial diversity in the school.

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America First Legal Files Complaint Over Civil Rights Violations At John Hopkins School Of Medicine

According to Campus Reform, “America First Legal has filed a civil rights complaint with the Department of Justice against the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine over ‘discriminatory’ and ‘unconstitutional’ practices.”

This civil rights complaint was filed over Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI) by Stephen Miller’s America First Legal (AFL).

AFL announced this development in a press conference on July 17th.

According to Megan Redshaw, counsel at AFL, “This is about restoring equal treatment under the law.”

Redshaw alleged, “Johns Hopkins has received billions in taxpayer dollars, but it is actively segregating opportunities based on race and sex. That is not just wrong—it’s unconstitutional.”

The complaint itself accused Hopkins of embracing DEI principles, including discrimination along both racial and gender lines.

AFL points to Diversity Leadership Council and House Staff Diversity and Inclusion Council as well as Diversity Roadmap as programs by which the school engaged in discriminatory practices.

According to AFL, “Johns Hopkins has constructed a façade of legality around a deeply illegal system. They have replaced explicit race-based admissions with upstream sorting, downstream subsidies, and bureaucratic double-speak designed to preserve racial preferences.”

The complaint also alleges that the discriminatory practices in medicine are not only illegal but also pose challenges to healthcare.

America First Legal has also been active in standing against the onslaught of DEI, having filed civil rights complaints against both Colorado State and Cornell University.

American First Legal is on the front line of real modern-day civil rights on behalf of all Americans.

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Drones, cameras, AI: University of Illinois real time crime center raises privacy concerns

Thousands of cameras. A fleet of drones. Gun shot detection devices. Stationary and vehicle-mounted automatic license plate readers.

A major metropolitan city? No, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign’s Real-Time Information Center furnishes the institution’s Division of Public Safety with a number of technologically sophisticated tools that have some privacy experts alarmed.

The drones, gunshot detection devices, automatic license plate readers, and campus-wide system of roughly 3,000 security cameras are among the tools currently utilized at the campus, which enrolls about 59,000 students.

Social media monitoring programs and “AI-driven video analytics software” are also among the technologies being evaluated for possible future implementation, according to a document sent by Urbana Police Chief Larry Boone.

He sent it to city officials as they deliberate a proposed city ordinance to establish stricter approval, oversight, and transparency requirements for Urbana’s own acquisition and use of the kinds of surveillance tools being used by the university’s Real-Time Information Center.

According to the document, the Real-Time Information Center provides a wide array of services designed to enhance public safety, streamline operations, and support law enforcement agencies.

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Safe spaces for all? Only if you’re on the left

The concept of “safe spaces” in academia began to emerge in the 1970s, gaining popularity during the Obama administration. At that time, the left repurposed the idea to shield students, often with the support of far-left faculty, from viewpoints they found uncomfortable or offensive, especially conservative ones. Conservatives like Ben Shapiro were treated as existential threats, prompting safe spaces to be “activated” whenever opposing ideas dared to enter the lecture halls.

The irony is telling; many of the very students who champion safe spaces have driven conservative or even “moderate” professors out of their jobs, verbally harassed right-leaning classmates, and, more recently, escalated attacks on Jewish students at campuses across the nation, including UCLA, Harvard and Columbia.

“Columbia University cracked down on dozens of students who participated in the anti-Israel encampment and a recent takeover of a campus library, where protesters injured at least two public safety officers and vandalized the building… over 70 students of the New York City-based institution are facing consequences, with about 80% of them receiving suspensions, expulsions or degree revocations. Most of those suspended received two-year suspensions,” reported Samantha Kamman of the Christian Post.

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U. Pittsburgh teaches high school students, teachers to be ‘social justice’ activists

The University of Pittsburgh has partnered with local public high schools through the Justice Scholars Institute to “prepare young people to be advocates for change and social justice.”

The institute’s emphasis on creating “social justice” activists raises questions about whether the program is truly about education or if it’s about advancing a political agenda.

“The term ‘social justice’ is designed to make radical political views sound non-political and virtuous,” Paul Runko, director of strategic initiatives for K-12 programs for Defending Education, told The College Fix in a recent interview.

“You’re not opposed to justice, are you? Because that would make you a supporter of injustice. The phrase itself has no concrete meaning, which is part of why it is so useful,” Runko said. Defending Education is “a national grassroots organization working to restore schools at all levels from activists imposing harmful agendas.”

Through the university’s Justice Scholars Institute, high school students in Pittsburgh public schools can take college-level courses and earn credits.

The educational program is aimed at equipping students “to become change agents within their school, community, and broader world,” according to its website.

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Dept of Education Investigates 5 Universities Over Scholarships to Non-Citizens

The Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights has opened investigations into five universities to determine whether they are granting exclusionary scholarships for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) or undocumented students in violation of civil rights law.

The department announced the national origin discrimination investigations on Wednesday into the University of Louisville, the University of Nebraska Omaha, the University of Miami, the University of Michigan, and Western Michigan University.

DOE said the investigations are based on complaints submitted to OCR by the Legal Insurrection Foundation’s Equal Protection Project, and will ultimately assess whether the schools are in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964’s prohibition against national origin discrimination.

“On January 21, 2025, President Trump promised that ‘every single day of the Trump Administration, [he] will, very simply, put America first.’ Neither the Trump Administration’s America first policies nor the Civil Right Act of 1964’s prohibition on national origin discrimination permit universities to deny our fellow citizens the opportunity to compete for scholarships because they were born in the United States,” Acting Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Craig Trainor said in a statement.

“As we mark President Trump’s historic six months back in the White House, we are expanding our enforcement efforts to protect American students and lawful residents from invidious national origin discrimination of the kind alleged here,” he added. 

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U. Kansas staff required to remove gender pronouns from emails

The University of Kansas staff is now required to remove gender pronouns from their email signatures to comply with a new Kansas Board of Regents directive, the school announced Tuesday.

All staff must remove “gender-identifying pronouns and personal pronoun series from their KU email signature blocks, webpages, Zoom/Teams screen IDs and any other form of university communications,” the announcement from KU Chancellor Douglas Girod states.

KU staff have until July 31 to comply.

Further, Girod told the university community that “KU Information Technology will remove the gender pronoun field from the ‘people’ pages on websites.”

The announcement cites the Kansas Board of Regents’ recently issued directive to state universities, which comes in the wake of a state legislative budget provision targeting “diversity, equity, and inclusion” initiatives across state agencies.

The regents mandated that state universities dismantle DEI programs, “including pronoun labels,” the University Daily Kansan reported.

Girod’s announcement also lists four other provisions that the university has already addressed in response to the new directive.

The school has eliminated all positions, “mandates, policies, programs, preferences and activities” that relate to DEI. It has also canceled related state grants or contracts and abolished DEI training requirements.

Some of these changes are already apparent.

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Columbia University says it has suspended and expelled students who participated in protests

 Columbia University announced disciplinary action Tuesday against students who participated in a pro-Palestinian demonstration inside the Ivy League school’s main library before final exams in May and an encampment during alumni weekend last year.

A student activist group said nearly 80 students were told they have been suspended for one to three years or expelled. The sanctions issued by a university judicial board also include probation and degree revocations, Columbia said in a statement.

The action comes as the Manhattan university is negotiating with President Donald Trump’s administration to restore $400 million in federal funding it has withheld from the Ivy League school over its handling of student protests against the war in Gaza. The administration pulled the funding, canceling grants and contracts, in March because of what it described as the university’s failure to squelch antisemitism on campus during the Israel-Hamas war that began in October 2023.

Columbia has since agreed to a series of demands laid out by the Republican administration, including overhauling the university’s student disciplinary process and adopting a new definition of antisemitism.

“Our institution must focus on delivering on its academic mission for our community,” the university said Tuesday. “And to create a thriving academic community, there must be respect for each other and the institution’s fundamental work, policies, and rules. Disruptions to academic activities are in violation of University policies and Rules, and such violations will necessarily generate consequences.”

It did not disclose the names of the students who were disciplined.

Columbia in May said it would lay off nearly 180 staffers and scale back research in response to the loss of funding. Those receiving nonrenewal or termination notices represent about 20% of the employees funded in some manner by the terminated federal grants, the university said.

A student activist group said the newly announced disciplinary action exceeds sentencing precedent for prior protests. Suspended students would be required to submit apologies in order to be allowed back on campus or face expulsion, the group said, something some students will refuse to do.

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Professor Claims Pro-Life Americans are a Bunch of White Racists

A professor at the University of Kentucky claims that the American pro-life movement is closely linked to white nationalism and political extremism in a book set to be published next month.

Campus Reform reported that Carol Mason’s From the Clinics to the Capitol: How Opposing Abortion Became Insurrectionary, set to be published in August by the University of California Press, argues that opposition to abortion has played a significant role in shaping what she describes as anti-democratic movements in the US and abroad.

According to the publisher’s description, the book contends that “white nationalism and authoritarian populism have taken hold in America under the guise of opposing abortion,” and that “antiabortion stories, images, and policies have primed Americans to embrace attitudes and politics once deemed extreme.”

Mason is a professor in the university’s Gender and Women’s Studies department. Her academic interests include “critical studies of whiteness,” “race and reproduction,” and “Right-Wing Movements,” Campus Reform reported.

In the book, she analyzes decades of pro-life materials, linking them to a range of ideological developments including Cold War conspiracies, religious fundamentalism, Tea Party populism, and the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.

It also claims that American pro-life activism has supported the “global rise of the Right” through tactics, personnel, and funding.

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