Latest news with #SmithCollege
New York Post
6 days ago
- Science
- New York Post
Failing on every front, is higher education still sustainable today?
A professor specializing in honesty, Francesca Gino — fired for dishonesty. This latest headline from trouble-plagued Harvard puts higher education's problems in a nutshell. Not only do many Americans believe higher education is elitist, but increasingly they're concluding it's also not very good at its job, or even harmful. Advertisement And with reason. Gino, a Harvard Business School behavioral scientist who studied (of all things) honesty, was stripped of tenure and fired because of academic dishonesty, the first Harvard professor so treated since the 1940s. Investigators found problems with several of her more famous studies were the result of research misconduct. Advertisement Nor is she Harvard's only problem child: Claudine Gay had to step down as the school's president amid her own plagiarism scandal. And these problems are rife throughout the academy. A Smith College commencement speaker this year even had to surrender her honorary degree when it turned out her speech had been stolen. It's not just about copying. There's also a widely acknowledged 'replication crisis': Scientists publish papers reporting results, but it's increasingly impossible for others to reproduce those results, leading to what some have called an existential crisis for research. Advertisement We're told cuts to federal spending on higher education will imperil research, but such claims would be more troubling if the 'research' were of more reliably high quality. It's an open secret that the pressure to produce a constant flood of papers that are publishable and, better yet, interesting enough to spark headlines leads to corner-cutting, 'data torture' and overclaiming — or, sometimes, outright fraud. The result is an expensive self-licking ice cream cone of grant applications and publications, but the actual contribution to human knowledge is often lacking. Of course, research isn't the only justification for higher education; we had colleges and universities long before professors saw academic publication as the major goal of their jobs. Advertisement Higher education was long justified as a way to promote our society's values and instill knowledge. College grads were supposed to understand philosophy, government, literature and human nature in ways that people without such a higher education couldn't. They were supposed to gain a deeper appreciation of our society's roots and purposes, and an ability to think critically, and to re-examine their views in the face of new evidence. This is one reason for the requirement that military officers have college degrees — a requirement that probably should be rethought: Does anyone seriously believe this is what colleges and universities teach now? An overriding theme at elite colleges — and by no means limited to them — is that Western culture is uniquely evil, white people are uniquely awful, and pretty much any crime is justifiable so long as the hands committing it are suitably brown and 'oppressed.' Meanwhile, numerous universities face federal civil-rights investigations for allowing and in some cases promoting antisemitism and violence against Jewish students. We've seen riots, violence, Jewish students surrounded and attacked on campus or forced to hide out in attics as mobs rampage through buildings. The notion that our colleges and universities are encouraging students to follow their better instincts seems unsustainable. Advertisement And how are schools doing at inculcating actual, you know, knowledge? Not so well. In a recent study, Richard Arum and Josipa Aroksa found there's not a lot of learning going on: 45% of students 'did not demonstrate any significant improvement in learning' over the first two years of college; 36% failed to show any improvement over four years. The reason: Courses aren't very rigorous, and not much is required of students. Then we see things like UCLA Medical School's notorious dumbing down of admissions in the name of 'diversity.' Advertisement Though racial preferences are outlawed in California, UCLA has made its minimum requirements much less demanding in order to promote minority admissions. The result: Up to half of UCLA medical students fail basic tests of competence. The public has noticed, which is why higher education, whose position seemed unassailable not long ago, is facing successful assaults from both the Trump administration and the market. Advertisement As one wag put it on X: 'Harvard is quickly realizing that nobody outside of Harvard cares about Harvard.' Or, if they do care, they want to see it turned upside down and shaken hard. As evolutionary biologist Thomas Ray observed, 'Every successful system accumulates parasites.' American higher ed has been extraordinarily successful, and it has been parasitized by grifters, political hacks and outright terrorist sympathizers. Advertisement Now that it's lost public sympathy, it can expect a stiff dose of the salts. Good. Glenn Harlan Reynolds is a professor of law at the University of Tennessee and founder of the blog.
Yahoo
27-05-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
House Republicans vote to defund hundreds of Planned Parenthood clinics
Donald Trump and the Republicans' budget bill could take reproductive health care access away from more than 1.1 million Planned Parenthood patients. Carrie Baker, professor of Women and Gender Studies at Smith College, joins MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell to discuss the consequences Republican Medicaid cuts will have on low-income Americans: 'more people will end up with unwanted pregnancies … they won't have access to cancer screenings.'
Daily Mail
24-05-2025
- Politics
- Daily Mail
Fury as controversial trans former health chief is given huge honor by all-women's college
A liberal arts women's college has come under fire for awarding former President Biden's transgender health secretary with an honorary degree. Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, announced it would be giving Admiral Rachel Levine an honorary degree. On Sunday, Levine was formally given the award - causing a protest on campus over the fact she is transgender. The college said it handed the award down for her work as an 'accomplished physician, public health expert, and LGBTQ + advocate'. She was one of four honorees selected by the college to speak at their commencement ceremony. Feminist group the Women's Declaration International had protested the decision last weekend prior to the ceremony. In a post to its X account they said: 'Tomorrow, Smith College - a historically women's college - will award Richard "Rachel" Levine an honorary degree. 'Levine, who pretends to be a woman, will then speak at commencement. We're on the ground in Northampton, MA to show our support for women.' 🚨Video of Biden transgender HSS official Rachel Levin's commencement address at Massachusetts all-women's Smith College. Obtained by @DailyCaller — Ashley Brasfield (@BrasfieldAshley) May 21, 2025 Prominent anti-trans activist Riley Gaines had also posted about the decision to hand Levine the degree. She wrote: 'Smith college, a private *women's* college in Massachusetts, awarded Rachel (Richard) Levine an honorary degree today. 'He then delivered the commencement address. Ladies, congratulations — your graduation was led by the very thing feminism was allegedly fighting.' While Biden's health secretary Levine had been pushing to make it easier for children under the age of 18 to change genders. Levine began her transition in 2011, when she was 54. She'd already been married for 23 years and raised two children, both of whom are now young adults. Levine has sparked controversy on multiple occasions as she endorsed providing to offer gender-affirming care to minors. She praised an Alaska gender-affirming care clinic in August of 2023, asserting the treatment it offered was 'lifesaving medical care.' The company she praised promotes ideas that children should learn that doctors 'assign' gender to babies by making a 'guess' - while also promoting the use of 'gender-inclusive biology.' Teachers and educators need to speak to children 'without assuming that there are only two sexes and that everyone within a particular sex is the same', they said. Prominent anti-trans activist Riley Gaines had also posted about the decision to hand Levine the degree Instead of using the word 'mother' in these conversations, they also recommend using terms such as 'egg producer' or 'carrier.' After word of the degree was spread on social media, users attacked the decision to hand it to Levine. One person posted: 'What a tragedy to have a man pretending to be a women receive an honorary degree at a woman's college.' Another commented: 'That's not progressive that's a slap to the face of all women. Educated women.' The commencement ceremony appears to have been plagued with problems, with fellow honoree Evelyn Harris, a musician, agreeing to give her degree back already. Smith College President Sarah Willie-LeBreton said in a letter on Tuesday, only two days after the ceremony, that Harris had been found to plagiarize her speech. The letter, seen by People, she said: 'It has come to our attention that one of our honorary degree recipients, musician Evelyn M. Harris, borrowed much of her speech to graduates and their families from the commencement speeches of others without the attribution typical of and central to the ideals of academic integrity. 'Ms. Harris was forthcoming about her choices while also acknowledging that she sought to infuse the words of others with her own emotional valence.'
Yahoo
21-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Northeastern U. expands homeland security division with $33 million purchase
This story first appeared in the Boston Business Journal. Northeastern University has bought an office building in Burlington for $33 million, expanding the school's presence in that town. The purchase, which closed Monday, gives Northeastern a four-story, 109,000-square-foot building just over a mile from a cluster of buildings it has in Burlington. The existing campus includes Northeastern's George J. Kostas Research Institute for Homeland Security as well as innovation and technology labs. Northeastern spokeswoman Renata Nyul said the new building will add to the university's capabilities. Read more: Smith College graduation speaker plagiarized speech, gives back honorary degree 'Focused primarily on homeland security and defense research, Northeastern's expanding Burlington campus is a critical piece of the university's global research enterprise,' she said in a statement. 'The new building will expand the footprint and capabilities of our world-class faculty researchers.' The sale of the Burlington BioCenter, as the building is called, was arranged by the real estate firm Newmark. The seller was an entity affiliated with MetLife Investment Management. The building, with office and lab space, was most recently assessed by the town at just under $20 million. Northeastern is doing far more construction at its main campus in Boston. The university plans to replace Matthews Arena, which it says is the world's oldest multipurpose sports facility. The building, which opened in 1910, has reached the end of its useful life, according to the school, which wants to build a new facility on the same site. Northeastern has also won approval for a 23-story, 1,400-student residential tower on Columbus Avenue and for the conversion of part of Back Bay's Sheraton hotel into housing for more than 800 students. 'Now is the time': Harvard calls for donations amid wave of federal cuts Congressional committees accuse Harvard of working with Chinese Communist Party Smith College graduation speaker plagiarized speech, gives back honorary degree Trump admin cuts another $60 million in grants from Harvard University MIT, Harvard scientists make important breakthrough in Alzheimer's research Read the original article on MassLive.
Yahoo
20-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Smith grad speaker gives back honorary degree after president learns she plagiarized speech
Musician Evelyn Harris, one of Smith College's commencement speakers, has relinquished her honorary degree after plagiarizing her speech, according to a Tuesday email obtained by MassLive. Smith College President Sarah Willie-LeBreton wrote in an email to the Smith College community that Harris 'borrowed much of her speech to graduates and their families from the commencement speeches of others without the attribution typical of and central to the ideals of academic integrity.' 'In conversations about this after the event, Ms. Harris was forthcoming about her choices while also acknowledging that she sought to infuse the words of others with her own emotional valence. With appreciation for the requirement of academic integrity so central to the values of Smith, Ms. Harris has chosen to relinquish her honorary degree,' Willie-LeBreton said. Harris did not immediately respond to outreach from MassLive. A college spokesperson pointed to the institution's Academic Honor Code, defining its academic community by its commitment to scholarship, 'which depends on scrupulous and attentive acknowledgement of all sources of information.' 'I appreciate those who brought the dissonance of this moment to our attention and am very grateful for the graciousness of Evelyn Harris's decision,' Willie-LeBreton wrote. Willie-LeBreton acknowledged Harris' 'long and generative contributions' to music and culture, both nationally and internationally. Read more: An undocumented student's story: Why it's hard to be here no matter who is president Harris is a vocal teacher, former member of the world-renowned a cappella group Sweet Honey in the Rock, and a global performer for more than 50 years, according to the college. Harris was one of four recipients of honorary degrees at Smith on Sunday. The others included: Danielle Allen, a Harvard professor of political philosophy, public policy and ehtics and founder and chairperson of Partners In Democracy; Admiral Rachel L. Levine, the 17th assistant secretary for health for the U.S. Department fo Health and Human Services; and Preeti Simran Sethi, an Emmy-award winning writer, academic and mental health coach, according to the college's website. Trump admin cuts another $60 million in grants from Harvard University MIT, Harvard scientists make important breakthrough in Alzheimer's research This is how much Harvard University's top earners made, according to tax filings Billionaire speaker gives Mass. graduates unexpected gift at ceremony Trump administration continues 'unraveling' Harvard as it cancels wave of grants Read the original article on MassLive.
