Princetonians for Free Speech

Princeton University’s Board of Trustees is now advising the Council of the Princeton University Community’s Resources Committee to “quickly dispose of petitions” when the potential for consensus is low, and to “avoid becoming a tool for intensifying division,” according to a public statement released by the board on Wednesday. The Resources Committee is a group of faculty, students, and staff that considers proposals for dissociation. 

“If dissociation submissions clearly fail the consensus criterion, there is no need to thoroughly examine whether other criteria are met, to burden disputants with establishing a lack of consensus, or to otherwise extend consideration of the petition,” the statement read. Dissociation refers to severing financial relationships with an entity, including refraining from soliciting or accepting gifts or grants and purchasing products from the entity.

On Sept. 29, the Yale Political Union hosted Aaron Withe, the CEO of the Freedom Foundation, who debated for the resolution, “Ban Public-Sector Unions.” It’s not a popular argument at Yale. At least, that’s what you’d gather from the YPU Instagram poll posted in the hours before the debate: nearly 80 percent of respondents were opposed.

Would it surprise you to learn that, at the end of that evening, the YPU voted 35-25 in favor of the resolution? The same argument, roughly as popular as herpes, won a comfortable victory. How did an initially marginal view end up sweeping the room? What mattered was that right-wing party members turned out — and left-wing ones didn’t. What mattered, ultimately, was that conservatives showed up to debate — and progressives didn’t.

There is little question that universities are beset by pathologies that hamper many graduates with debt, resentment, and bad ideas. But another Gallup poll released just last week points to growing recognition that universities are the culmination of educational shortcomings, rather than their source.

Satisfaction with K-12 education has fallen to 32 percent, a 27-year low, Gallup found. That is down eleven points in two years. Dissatisfaction has hit a record high of 67 percent. When asked to rate schools across six areas, Americans ranked critical thinking dead last: only 20 percent gave schools a positive mark, while 47 percent rated them as doing a poor job, the only plurality “poor” rating of any category measured. Even parents, who historically grade their own children’s schools far more generously than the national system, now report satisfaction at a record low.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit on Tuesday vacated the district court decision that ordered the University of Pennsylvania to turn over the names and contact information of Jewish employees to the Trump administration. 

Though the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission had already withdrawn its subpoena, the American Association of University Professors, a party to the case, still considers the decision a “significant victory” that will protect other institutions from similar probes.

The Trump administration urged the First Circuit on Monday to let it revoke Harvard’s funding, arguing the district court lacked the authority to require the government to restore nearly $2.7 billion in research grants last fall.

Justice Department lawyer Michael K. Velchik ’12, arguing before a crowded courtroom, asked a skeptical three-judge First Circuit panel to toss out a September 2025 ruling by U.S. District Judge Allison D. Burroughs requiring the Trump administration to restore Harvard’s funding. Velchik framed the dispute between Harvard and the Trump administration as a contractual issue stemming from the termination letters issued widely to University researchers in May 2025 — a question that he said could only be decided by the Court of Federal Claims.

In the summer of 2023, Gov. Mike DeWine signed a bill into law that created “civics institutes” at five of Ohio’s public universities. Over the last two budgets, the state has poured $59 million into their operations.

So far, the evidence suggests that Ohio’s push for civics is more about squelching viewpoints the state opposes than it is about widening the marketplace of ideas. Consider the official statement of Wright State University’s Center for Civics, Culture, and Workforce Development, which offers a dense compilation of conservative shibboleths: “The Civics program educates students for virtuous citizenship by: Examining the American experiment in ordered liberty by reestablishing the transcendent as a legitimate starting point for intellectual inquiry, while embedding freedom in natural law and the formative institutions, traditions, and customs of Western civilization.”