The Persistence of the Old Regime

by Kieran Healy on August 6, 2014

This afternoon I ended up reading [this Vox story](http://www.vox.com/2014/8/6/5973653/the-federal-government-tried-to-rank-colleges-in-1911) about an effort to rank US Universities and Colleges carried out in 1911 by a man named Kendric Charles Babcock. On Twitter, [Robert Kelchen remarks](https://twitter.com/rkelchen/status/496746198112686082) that the report was “squashed by Taft” (an unpleasant fate), and he [links to the report itself](https://ia700504.us.archive.org/0/items/classificationof01unit/classificationof01unit.pdf), which is terrific. Babcock divided schools into four Classes, beginning with Class I:

And descending all the way to Class IV:

Babcock’s discussion of his methods is admirably brief (the snippet above hints at the one sampling problem that possibly troubled him), so I recommend you [read the report yourself](https://ia700504.us.archive.org/0/items/classificationof01unit/classificationof01unit.pdf).

University reputations are extremely sticky, the conventional wisdom goes. I was interested to see whether Babcock’s report bore that out. I grabbed the US News and World Report [National University Rankings](http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities) and [National Liberal Arts College Rankings](http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-liberal-arts-colleges/) and made a quick pass through them, coding their 1911 Babcock Class. The question is whether Mr Babcock, should he return to us from the grave, would be satisfied with how his rankings had held up—more than a century of massive educational expansion and alleged disruption notwithstanding.

It turns out that he would be quite pleased with himself.

[click to continue…]

Another Anti-Zionist Professor Punished for His Views (Updated)

by Corey Robin on August 6, 2014

Until two weeks ago, Steven Salaita was heading to a job at the University of Illinois as a professor of American Indian Studies. He had already resigned from his position at Virginia Tech; everything seemed sewn up. Now the chancellor of the University of Illinois has overturned Salaita’s appointment and rescinded the offer. Because of Israel.

The sources familiar with the university’s decision say that concern grew over the tone of his comments on Twitter about Israel’s policies in Gaza….

For instance, there is this tweet: “At this point, if Netanyahu appeared on TV with a necklace made from the teeth of Palestinian children, would anybody be surprised? #Gaza.” Or this one: “By eagerly conflating Jewishness and Israel, Zionists are partly responsible when people say antisemitic shit in response to Israeli terror.” Or this one: “Zionists, take responsibility: if your dream of an ethnocratic Israel is worth the murder of children, just fucking own it already.”

In recent weeks, bloggers and others have started to draw attention to Salaita’s comments on Twitter. But as recently as July 22 (before the job offer was revoked), a university spokeswoman defended Salaita’s comments on Twitter and elsewhere. A spokeswoman told The News-Gazette for an article about Salaita that “faculty have a wide range of scholarly and political views, and we recognize the freedom-of-speech rights of all of our employees.”

I’ve written about a number of these types of cases over the past few years, but few have touched me the way this one has. For three reasons. [click to continue…]