I thank our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, every day for Bob Jones University.
Hyper-conservative institutions of higher education like ol' BJ University ensure that today's youth aren't poisoned by the liberal minds of their instructors. Because clearly, the goal of the modern university is to provide a backhanded, Pinko-commie indoctrination of its students.
Through a steady stream of liberal professors and administrators, the communist mindset will creep its way back into the apple pies and the stars and stripes of America.
And, of course, the USSR will rise again.
Obviously the idea that colleges are a festering cesspool for liberal indoctrination is completely ridiculous. And the only credit Bob Jones should get is for providing a punch line for any academia related joke.
That doesn't mean that universities aren't filled with liberal professors; they are. But attending college doesn't pull you to one side of the fence, just like living in Nebraska doesn't automatically make you cream for corn.
The issue is slightly more multi-faceted than the screaming majority of conservative critics would have you believe.
A study released in last year's PS: Political Science and Politics journal researched what effect the ideology of an instructor had on their student's beliefs. The study looked at 7,000 students in 38 institutions.
There was no evidence to suggest that a professor's personal views directly impacted or changed the views of their students. The study in PS is one of three that has reached this conclusion.
So, as flattering as it is for some parents to worry about the persuasiveness of their kids' potential educators, it might be best to hold off on that tuition payment to Grove City College.
But let's make one thing very clear: Universities do have a disproportionate number of liberal instructors. A 2007-2008 study in the Chronicle of Higher Education found that 43 percent of full-time faculty classified themselves as "liberal," and 8 percent called themselves "far left." When looking at only public universities, the number of liberal professors jumps to 59 percent.
College professors did contribute to the Obama campaign this election season in staggering numbers. Data from the Center for Responsive Politics shows that professors and administrators in universities put $12.2 million into the hands of the Illinois senator.
Only $1.5 million of this same group went to the McCain camp.
Just because an instructor is liberal doesn't mean they're indoctrinating the youth. That myth is just a baseless conservative charge that tries to rationalize why so many college-aged kids happen to prefer the left to the right, and why, when it comes to politics and youth, it's best to apply a "left-hand rule."
Jeremy D. Mayer, the co-author of the book "Closed Minds? Politics and Ideology in American Universities" weighed in on the issue, saying that parents and family are the most important influences on a student's life, followed by the news media and peers.
"Professors are among the least influential," Mayer said. "It is really hard to change the mind of anyone over 15."
Loud and incessant conservatives still try to make the issue into something it's not. David Horowitz of the Horowitz Freedom Center has been on a liberal professor witch hunt for years. His mission statement is to end a "curricula of radicalism that tenured leftists are imposing on our students under the pretext of providing them with an education."
His center has a complaint list that targets "radical" instructors. A few glances over the complaints illustrate a different story. Many don't provide a class where the complaint arose from and many more are anonymous. They all give a personal anecdote from a disgruntled student that reads more like a vendetta letter than an actual complaint.
But why do college students align more to the left? An age-old argument goes something like this: College-aged kids don't work, pay taxes or have families – and thus, we don't have the life experiences to understand the "real" world.
This argument basically reads like: "We know you're in college, and we think that's adorable. But you need to shut up while the grown-ups handle things."
At the risk of sounding arrogant (but I'll say it anyway because that argument is as conceited as it gets), let me make a new argument:
"Why don't you shut up and let the better educated people handle things?"
A Pew Research Center study found that liberals were the highest educated group of all the groups it surveyed. 49 percent were college grads and 26 percent had post-graduate education. The study found a positive correlation between education and liberal ideology.
There's this adage that goes: "If you're not a liberal at 20 you have no heart; if you're not a conservative at 40 you have no brain." But this research suggests that liberals at 40 are statistically the ones with more brains.
The nature of our education and not the views of our instructors, is what makes us liberal. Our education forces us to examine all sides of an issue and determine which side has the best supporting evidence. It has absolutely nothing to do with who teaches us.
It's disgusting that conservatives don't give college students enough credit to think for themselves. As if every student is an automaton that will do whatever someone programs them for without a second thought. That's not the case; we just have a strong educational background that emphasizes critical approaches to issues.
And a lot of us are liberal. Deal with it.
Kyle Citta is a junior pre-med, english, and history major. reach him at kylecitta@dailynebraskan.com.
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39 comments
(Especially not if the student tends to have a liberal political view already, since they feel ideologically 'safe' in a university setting, where the biases they will encounter are more likely to mesh with their own than not.)Professors' political views can make a big impression. Get your head out of your butt.