What Happened to College? How Politics Broke Higher Education and What We Can Do to Fix It by Neil Gross
Many thanks to Avid Reader Press and NetGalley for sending
me an advanced copy of Neil Gross’s important and insightful new book What Happened To College?: How Politics Broke Higher Education and What We Can Do to Fix It. While most of us are assailed by bad faith assaults on higher
education by bloviating modern Macbeths who are full of sound and fury but signify
nothing (Chris Rufo), Neil Gross, a sociologist who teaches and is the chair of
the department of Sociology at Coby College, has asked some interesting
questions of the current research and engaged in his own inquiry of undergraduates,
noting how their voices are often missing from the responses. As Gross untangles
the research and pulls on surveys and statistics to investigate the question of
“What Happened to College?”, we learn that there are many different factors across
different domains that have contributed to more politicized, if not polarized,
campuses in the US. However, it’s important to also pushback against the
simplified and uninformed responses that proliferate on social media,
conservative think tanks, and even from the government that try to implicate liberals
with indoctrination and enforcing “ideological capture” in college classrooms.
Thankfully, Gross’s deep dive into the research and his inclusion of student
voices provides an antidote to the shallow thinking and bad faith arguments
that continue to malign higher education. Nevertheless, Gross’s analysis
uncovers issues and concerns, but he offers some reasonable and evidence-based
ideas to improve teaching, communication, and socialization on campuses.
While Gross works in higher education and has observed
changes through Colby’s campus, he notes that this campus, located in Maine,
may not be representative of other campuses, and thus qualifies that much of
the research and results we encounter about polarization and divisiveness on campuses
should be viewed through the lens of the differences in schools. That is,
students will perceive freedom to share and interact much differently on small,
liberal arts campuses than they might on large, state school, research one, or
elite college campuses. Another aspect of the book that appealed to me was
Gross’s reminder that much of what we encounter in the news about incidents on
college campuses reflect isolated events at some of America’s most elite and
selective universities, yet the narrative that this is happening across all
colleges is somehow perpetuated. My spouse also works at one of these universities
that experienced significant disruption due to protests and encampments, and
although Gross doesn’t mention it, it’s important to note that these incidents
are disruptive to everyone on campus and, at times, involve members outside of
the campus community. Yet, due to a lack of critical examination into these
incidents, the blame is largely foisted onto administration, professors, and
specific departments, and this blind acceptance of these scapegoats has real
implications. People have lost their jobs, students have lost scholarships as
schools continue to lose funding for research and scholarship. Gross’s research
and analysis is an important reminder of the need for critical analysis of
these incidents and to be a careful consumer of information we encounter on
higher education.
In addition to being a professor, Gross also explains that
his research was partly driven by his son’s recent college application process.
While he notes that many students do not necessarily factor politics and institutional
neutrality into their decisions, he notes that the framing of attention to political
incidents on campus may affect how parents view college decisions. Thus, Gross’s
book is a great read for parents whose children are planning to apply and
attend college. He provides clear and well-researched information about the
different types of universities and how their campus politicization has shifted
over time. Furthermore, I thought that certain sections of this book would be a
great read for first year students in introductory courses to not only explore
the evolution of politics on campus, but to also gain a better understanding of
how to support claims and ideas with research and how to analyze and evaluate existing
research. Students would have an opportunity to examine survey and polling
data, but also to question the methods, samples, and questions that researchers
ask to raise further questions about the reliability and validity (as well as
potential biases) that result from research methods. While this may seem highly
technical and theoretical, Gross’s pedagogical skills make these methods
accessible for a general audience and further help to promote the kind of
critical thinking that is at the core of higher education.
What Happened to College? is organized around several
areas of the campus- admissions, friends, hooking up/romance, politics in the
classroom, cancel culture, and majors. Gross ends the book examining how
education in general and higher education specifically is a progressive idea
which ends up transmitting progressive ideas to students. He further explains
how selective universities tend to be more progressive or liberal, which in
turn attracts more progressive applicants. His research and analysis examines
the traditions of higher education and demonstrate that it’s not ideological
capture or indoctrination, but rather the progressive nature of education for
all that tends to further influence people’s thinking. I found the chapter on
majors to be particularly interesting, as Gross notes that some majors tend to
have more conservative or moderate views, while others tend to lean more
liberal, which kind creates this self-fulfilling prophecy. Students who tend to
lean more conservatively or moderately are more likely to study fields like
business, engineering, and sciences, where they encounter more students and
professors with similar ideas and values. Conversely, students with more
liberal learnings are more likely to select liberal arts, social sciences, and
education as majors, where they also encounter others with similar values and
beliefs. Other chapters that deal with teaching and cancel culture are also
important to consider since students have expressed concerns about sharing
their ideas in class. As Gross indicates, this is a documented concern for many
students, but I also think that college classrooms have always experienced the
challenges of getting students to share their ideas and experiences in a larger
and sometimes unfamiliar setting. Part of this is developmental, as students
are transitioning from a familiar high school setting to an unfamiliar
classroom with changing classmates throughout their 4 years. Some classes may
even be so large to limit any kind of dialogue. In my experience teaching in
higher education, it can take some time to build trust and establish an
environment where students feel comfortable sharing. I usually try to get
students to use their own experiences as a frame of reference to make
connections with the ideas and theories from readings. I also like to use small
groups to help establish closer connections and develop more comfort with
sharing with a small group before sharing with the entire class. Again, this
can take some time and effort to establish the level of trust and comfort. Students
in college are also, in the words of Mikhail Bakhtin, ideologically becoming, a
kind of continuous process that is shaped by the interactions with the
different people and values that surround them. As students move from their
varying home experiences to college, they probably encounter a greater variety
of values and backgrounds, some of which may counter what they believe. It’s important
to remember that their development of their own ideologies are a continuous and
ongoing process, and exposing students to a variety of different perspectives
is not only healthy, but also important to their development. Gross notes the role
that social media can play in students reticence. While social media can offer
students immediate responses and attention to their ideas and thoughts, it’s
not representative of the kind of dialogue and critical thinking that are an
integral part of a college classroom. Furthermore, the exposure to echo
chambers and divisive polarity that are often found on social media run counter
to the kind of thoughtful dialogue and evidence based reasoning that are often
found in college classrooms. Nevertheless, social media is something that
professors and students have to contend with on today’s campuses, but as Gross’s
research into the concerns about freedom of expression and careful
consideration of ideas from students indicates, it’s all the more reason why
college is so important for students today. Students need to learn to think and
listen considerately to ideas, as well as to be critical consumers of the kind
of information (and disinformation) they encounter online. College classrooms should
play important roles in shaping this kind of critical thinking to question and
counter the polarization present on social media. Gross’s conclusion recommends
some practical applications that can be implemented to improve dialogue and
interactions on campus to reduce polarization and create a better sense of
understanding and appreciation. I really appreciated seeing the importance of
teaching centers to help professors learn best practices for facilitating
meaningful dialogue and engaging students in sound instructional methods to support
deep learning. Furthermore, it was interesting to learn more about intentional
rooming arrangements in some schools and other programs like those at Duke
University that promote dialogue and discussion among students.
What Happened to College? is an important book to read,
not just for professors and others who work in higher education, but for
parents and students as well. Neil Gross’s thoughtful and critical analysis and
evaluation of the research about the politicization and polarization in higher
education helps to establish a more reasoned, impartial, and objective
perspective on many of the issues that students and faculty face in higher education.
This is especially important since the current narrative about ideological
capture and indoctrination relies on spotlight fallacies and
overgeneralizations that fail to document what is really happening on college
campuses and classrooms. These logical fallacies and the media attention they
have attracted have real world consequences on funding and opportunities in higher
education that will ultimately result in a less-educated population. If anything,
Gross’s research and analysis is an important reminder about the significance
of a college education in raising more questions and interrogating the data and
information we encounter. Highly recommended!
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