American civilization with its wealth has built an educational system beyond anything imagined in the past. We have staffed our universities with more than 1.4 million full- and part-time teachers. Of those instructors, 60 percent of college instructors identify as “left” or “far-left.” Many of them have an intellectually close-minded mentality based on racial and sexual identity. One result is that we are producing ill-informed, civically ignorant students.
A year-long study conducted by researchers at the Center for American Institutions at Arizona State University, where I am a professor, found that many teachers in introductory American history survey classes in colleges filter the curriculum around racial, ethnic, sexual, and so-called gender identity, usually to the detriment of a well-balanced and comprehensive understanding of our nation’s past. The use of identity-focused terms, primarily the defining terms for diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI), e.g., “white supremacy,” “toxic masculinity,” and “homophobia,” infuse course instruction. In a review of 75 introductory history course syllabi found in large and small public and private colleges, DEI is the focus.
American higher education is producing students who not only despise America itself and our nation’s values, they’re also ignoramuses. A survey conducted by the American Council of Trustees and Alumni in 2019 showed that 63 percent of students did not know term lengths for U.S. senators or congressmen, only 15 percent could identify James Madison as the “Father of the Constitution,” and nearly 20 percent thought Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was the author of the New Deal. Things
