The alarming politicization of a governing board (opinion)
Public universities more and more are targets of political interference. At our establishment, George Mason College, we’re observing a extremely politicized transformation of the governing board that we worry could quickly be coming to a public college close to you.
Right here in Virginia, the place members of public college governing boards are referred to as guests, the state’s Republican lawyer common, Jason Miyares, primarily overturned years of precedent final fall when he issued an opinion stating that “the first responsibility of the board of holiday makers of every Virginia establishment of upper schooling is to the Commonwealth.” Describing a board of holiday makers merely “because the car by which the Normal Meeting has chosen to train the Commonwealth’s management over its faculties and universities,” Miyares added that “boards of holiday makers don’t exist for their very own sake or that of any explicit establishment.”
Governor Glenn Youngkin, a fellow Republican, seized on the AG’s opinion eventually yr’s orientation for brand new guests. In his remarks, the governor stated, “There’s this fable, and I wish to dispel it. This fable that board members are cheerleaders for the college and cheerleaders for the president … That’s not the way in which it really works. You’ve a accountability to the Commonwealth of Virginia … I as governor appoints you [sic] to play that position as a accountable extension of the chief department.”
Youngkin, who took workplace in January 2022, just lately introduced his third set of customer appointments to those boards, with the vast majority of members now having been appointed by him. At George Mason, Youngkin’s appointments are notably worrisome and proceed his sample of appointing political operatives and ideologues.
Considered one of us has been round lengthy sufficient to recollect the final time this occurred at George Mason. It was within the mid- to late Nineties when Governors George Allen and James Gilmore appointed, amongst others, Ed Meese, former lawyer common below President Reagan; Ed Feulner, co-founder of the Heritage Basis; Jim Miller, director of the Workplace of Administration and Funds below President Reagan; Invoice Kristol, founding father of The Weekly Customary; and Richard Fink, founding father of the Mercatus Heart (a analysis establishment at Mason identified for its free market-focused analysis) after which an govt with Koch Industries.
Whereas maybe not as distinguished as these people, Youngkin’s appointments to Mason’s board over the previous three years embrace 4 political appointees from the Trump administration: Kenneth Marcus, former assistant secretary of schooling for civil rights; Marc Brief, former chief of employees to Vice President Pence and former White Home director of legislative affairs; Robert Pence, former U.S. ambassador to Finland; and Jeffrey Rosen, former U.S. deputy lawyer common (and, for the ultimate month of Trump’s administration, performing lawyer common). A fifth appointee, Michael Meese (son of Ed Meese), served on Trump’s transition staff.
Two different Youngkin appointees served within the George W. Bush administration: Reginald Brown served within the White Home counsel’s workplace, and Nina Rees served as deputy below secretary for innovation and enchancment in Bush’s Division of Training. She additionally served because the senior schooling analyst and chief spokesperson for schooling on the Heritage Basis.
Two Youngkin appointees to George Mason’s Board of Guests at present work on the Heritage Basis. Lindsey Burke is the director of the Heart for Training Coverage at Heritage. Charles Stimson is a senior adviser to the president and the deputy director of the Edwin Meese III Heart for Authorized and Judicial Research.
One other Youngkin appointee, Armand Alacbay, is the chief of employees and senior vp of technique for the American Council of Trustees and Alumni. In accordance with Affect Watch, ACTA “is a conservative-leaning group that encourages faculty and college trustees, alumni, and donors to take a extra energetic position in setting institutional coverage.”
In distinction, of the 4 remaining guests appointed by former governor Ralph Northam, none have held a presidential appointment within the federal authorities or labored for a progressive advocacy group.
Within the mid- to late Nineties, one among us labored carefully with most of the Board of Guests members appointed by Governors Allen and Gilmore, particularly Ed Meese and Jim Miller, in establishing a Faculty of Public Coverage. Nobody can query their conservative bona fides. Given the nationwide repute of those distinguished conservatives on the board, many school members have been fearful that Meese et al. would impose their views on the brand new faculty. Nothing might have been farther from the reality.
Maybe it was Miller’s coaching as an educational. Or possibly it was simply the instances. Whatever the motive, in working with him each day for practically two months, typically at his suite at Residents for a Sound Economic system, which prominently featured a signed film poster of President Reagan in full cowboy regalia with six-shooter drawn, he by no means as soon as tried to impose his political beliefs in writing a mission assertion for the brand new faculty. He left that to the college. He didn’t counsel who ought to lead the brand new faculty, both. Certainly, on the time, board members adhered to long-standing rules set forth by the American Affiliation of College Professors and demonstrated their respect for the differentiated roles and obligations of the board vis-à-vis the college and administration.
Nevertheless, this was solely typically the case. In Could of 2000, Mason’s College Senate voted to censure the Board of Guests, “accusing it of interfering with the college’s area over the curriculum.” Particularly, the censure resulted from “two new course necessities inserted by board members that weren’t a part of the college plan,” together with, as The Chronicle of Increased Training reported on the time, a “specifically designed, semester-long course on U.S. historical past, and a second one on Western civilization. The school plan had merely required college students to take one among a wide range of programs from an permitted record as regards to ‘U.S. and Western establishments, traditions, and economies.’”
Quick-forward to the current day when, this previous spring, Mason’s present set of holiday makers blocked a faculty-driven effort to incorporate diversity-themed Simply Societies coursework within the curriculum. We watched Youngkin and his board of operatives deploy related methods to dam a racial literacy course at Virginia Commonwealth College. There’s little doubt that the guests at Mason have been taking directives from Youngkin, per the lawyer common’s opinion.
We’re involved about greater than the intrusion into the curriculum and the blatant violation of shared governance. A number of of the guests appointed by Youngkin have skeletons of their closets that ought to increase questions on their judgment and ethics.
The New York Occasions reported that Kenneth Marcus stepped down because the assistant secretary of schooling for civil rights amid complaints “of abusing his authority by forcing via circumstances that furthered his private and political agenda.” NBC Information reported that Charles Stimson resigned his place because the deputy assistant secretary of protection for detainee affairs “over controversial remarks through which he criticized legal professionals who signify terrorism suspects.” A report by the U.S. Division of State’s Workplace of Inspector Normal discovered that Robert Pence, then ambassador to Finland, was a part of a call to revoke an award to a Finnish journalist resulting from her social media posts important of Trump and made deceptive statements to Congress concerning the causes for the revocation.
It additionally appears ironic, at greatest, that Youngkin would appoint a number one critic of public colleges and public larger schooling, Lindsey Burke, to a public college governing board. Burke wrote Undertaking 2025’s schooling plan, which proposes eliminating the U.S. Division of Training. She wrote, “Slightly than persevering with to buttress the next schooling institution captured by woke ‘diversicrats’ and a de facto monopoly enforced by the federal accreditation cartel, federal postsecondary schooling coverage ought to put together college students for jobs within the dynamic financial system, nurture institutional variety, and expose colleges to higher market forces.”
For individuals who don’t know, Undertaking 2025 is the presidential transition plan organized by the Heritage Basis, which, in response to the undertaking director, is “systematically getting ready to march into workplace and convey a brand new military of aligned, skilled, and primarily weaponized conservatives able to do battle in opposition to the deep state.”
To our data, there have by no means been so many political appointees and conservative ideologues serving on a governing board within the commonwealth. We additionally know that conservative teams have focused Mason with their donations. Mason is without doubt one of the largest recipients of Charles Koch Basis funds within the academy and attracts different conservative donors who help its legislation faculty, economics division and affiliated organizations such because the Mercatus Heart and the Institute for Humane Research. Previously, many donor agreements allowed donors a voice in school appointments and allowed for different varieties of undue donor affect.
Mason is simply the most recent goal of political interference in public universities. The interference is available in many types—together with campaigns centered round mental variety and free speech—and has many targets, together with variety, fairness and inclusion packages; tenure; curricula; shared governance; accreditation; and even school hiring. Because the AAUP said final January, “Political interference in U.S. larger schooling has reached an alarming degree.” This interference “subvert[s] the likelihood that, as a web site of free inquiry, the college can serve the frequent good.”
Youngkin could also be comparatively hands-off in his political interference, leveraging his management via proxies. But, with assistance from the commonwealth’s lawyer common, he has discovered a technique to justify directing the guests he appoints to behave as his brokers. Ought to Youngkin be allowed to train his energy as we consider he would possibly via his majority board appointments, we worry the institutional injury to George Mason by the hands of those that search to destroy it as a public good.
