Newsletter
August 18, 2025
School Is Starting and Here's What I'm Committing to for My Students, Especially My Male Students
Excerpts (links in the original, boldface added):
“When the semester begins, my classroom fills with anticipation and nerves -- mine included. Every term offers a chance to start fresh, build habits, and forge relationships that will carry us through. Those first weeks of any term are far more than icebreakers; they're a blueprint signaling to students who they are in this space and what we'll achieve together.
“I work hard to elevate every student. But as a professor and parent, I've noticed a pattern: male students often drift first when the relationship isn't there. Men are relational learners. When a young man feels known -- when he senses his professor notices and values him -- his engagement transforms. The work sharpens. Questions get braver. Risks feel worth taking.... [Followed by discussion of five specific steps to be taken.]
“These steps aren't gender-exclusive. Every student benefits from being known, encouraged, and challenged. Data shows social-emotional learning benefits manifest across demographics, improving academic outcomes and long-term success, with benefits lasting 18 years post-participation. But the stakes are especially high for male students facing unique educational challenges....
“Consider the broader context: male students are increasingly struggling in educational settings. They're less likely to graduate from college, with women now earning roughly 60% of bachelor's degrees. In 2021, men received only 42% of bachelor's degrees awarded -- the lowest male share on record. Male enrollment in higher education continues declining. These trends aren't about capability -- they're about connection. When young men don't feel seen or valued in educational spaces, they check out not just from assignments but from the entire academic enterprise....
“Education isn't just transmitting knowledge; it's developing whole humans capable of critical thinking, emotional intelligence, and meaningful contribution. When we commit to seeing and supporting whole students -- especially those most at risk of disconnection -- we don't just improve academic outcomes. We change life trajectories.
“That's the real measure of our work as educators. Not the tests passed or papers written, but the confidence built, connections forged, and capacity for growth instilled. This semester, I'm committing to that deeper work, one student, one name, one relationship at a time.”
Full op-ed by Stanford alum and Sarah Lawrence Prof. Samuel J. Abrams at Real Clear Education.
See also:
“It’s Not Just a Feeling, Data Shows Boys and Young Men Are Falling Behind” at NY Times (May 13, 2025): “The outcomes for Black boys are worse, and growing up in poverty disproportionately hurts boys.”
“The New Gender Gaps” at Harvard Magazine (May 15, 2025).
“Gender Achievement Gaps in U.S. School Districts” at Stanford Center for Education Policy Analysis (June 2018) comparing math versus language skills.
“Young Men in Crisis” at Stanford Review (September 30, 2024): “The classroom is only one place in which this disparity can be observed. Young men today are three times more likely to overdose, four times more likely to commit suicide, and a staggering 14 times more likely to be incarcerated than their female peers.”
The University Presidents Who Want to Fix Universities Before They Get Fixed
Excerpts (links in the original, boldface added):
“For well over a decade I have been of the view that universities need to fix themselves, or they will get fixed -- and that getting fixed is likely to be more destructive than restorative. Until recently, I held this view with regard to public universities in red and purple states, but I probably underestimated the extent to which universities had alienated large portions of the public and undermined their own reservoirs of political support -- and did not anticipate the focus with which some Trump Administration officials would target universities. To be sure, the Supreme Court's SFFA decision, which effectively declared the de facto admissions policies at most elite universities to be illegal, and the wave of campus anti-Semitism only made universities more vulnerable.
“The Atlantic has an interesting article on the growing divide among some university presidents about how to respond to the Trump Administration and current political pressures. On one side are folks like Princeton's Chris Eisgruber, who seem to think there is nothing wrong and that universities can and should ride out the storm. (Those we might call the ostriches of academia.) On the other are those like Daniel Diermeier of Vanderbilt and Andrew Martin of Washington University, who recognize that universities need to reform themselves. The latter camp accept the charge made by folks like Michael Clune that universities have brought much of their current trouble upon themselves....”
Full op-ed by William & Mary Prof. Jonathan H. Adler at Reason.
The Rapid Rise and the Disastrous Fall of the Medical University
Excerpts (links in the original, boldface added):
“Since January, American higher education’s research enterprise has faced unexpected reductions in funding from federal agencies brought about by executive orders and other actions from the White House. Times of crisis are also times for stocktaking. How did we get here?
“The story begins around 1940, as federal agencies, state governments, and private foundations began to negotiate their partnerships with universities, leading to the rise of ‘the federal-grant university,’ a term coined by Clark Kerr, a former president of the University of California, in his famous 1963 lecture, ‘The Uses of the University,’ given at Harvard....
“By the 21st century, a new model of the federal-grant university had emerged -- what we call the mediversity, or the medical university. To trace the contours of this new model, it is useful to consider the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB), which historically had not been an elite research hub but gained prominence in the last two decades. The research success of an institution like UAB illustrates how non-elite institutions could become serious players in the federal research-funding game. It also highlights an important transformation: In recent years, an increasing focus on medicine and health-related functions has become central to many institutional priorities, including the pursuit of federal dollars for research and patient care....
“The rise of biomedical sciences in federal research combined with the expansion of Medicare and Medicaid services at university hospitals made the academic medical center a distinctive entity within the American university -- and in the American economy. This new model, the mediversity, has spread to include about 20 universities in which the academic medical center is now the largest unit in budget, enrollment, and services in the host university, as well as the largest employer in its metropolitan area and perhaps in its state.... [Followed by discussion of the establishment and growth of biomedical companies with VC and government funding in coordination with academic medical centers, and then the sudden reversal with recent government cutbacks.]
“Did university presidents have contingency plans for this reversal of fortunes? Had overreliance on the mediversity model thrown off the gyroscope of the American university? Reviewing records and articles from 2022 through 2024, we find scant indication that university leaders, especially those at academic medical centers and the mediversity, discussed the possibility that political support might ever wane, compromising funding....
“.... For now, one cannot presume business as usual for any part of the American university system -- and perhaps especially for those that have grounded their institutional identity in the mediversity model.”
Full op-ed by Kentucky Prof. Emeritus John R. Thelin and Prof. Neal H. Hutchens at Chronicle of Higher Education.
How I Learned That College Students Aren’t Snowflakes
Excerpts (boldface added):
“For years I threatened to teach a course called ‘Books You’ll Never Read in College.’ It wasn’t only that I had grown tired of hearing students parrot the ideological orthodoxy on campus. My main concern, as a teacher of applied ethics, was that many of my students were reluctant to talk about important social, moral and political issues.
“When I asked my students to share anonymously what topics they would do their best to avoid in the classroom, the list included pretty much anything controversial: guns, religion, pronouns, the Middle East, abortion, LGBTQ rights, socialism, sexism in the workplace, transgender athletes in sports, parallels between transgenderism and transracialism, race, policing, support for or opposition to President Trump and 'anything that might anger others.'
“This spring, I made good on my threat. I came up with a better name for the course: ‘You Can’t Think That! Or Can You?’ I wrote a provocative course description to attract students. The syllabus would begin with Plato’s ‘Apology’ and John Stuart Mill’s ‘On Liberty’ and then would move to contemporary works such as Thomas Sowell’s ‘Social Justice Fallacies,’ Heather Mac Donald’s ‘The War on Cops,’ Abigail Shrier’s ‘Irreversible Damage,’ and Brad Wilcox’s ‘Get Married.’ To my surprise, the course filled within minutes and amassed a substantial wait list.
“Still, I was anxious about whether this experiment would work.... Instead, with great enthusiasm, students embraced their newfound freedom to say what they thought and to change their minds based on what others thought and said....
“One student was an advocate of polyandry, and another defended traditional marriage on religious grounds. One was a self-proclaimed Zionist, and another was writing an honors thesis critical of U.S. military support of Israel. With a lot of practice, they all learned how to be good intellectual friends despite their many differences. The classroom was our practice ground, where everyone was expected to try out the ideas of so-called wrongthinkers, listen carefully to one another, and find what might be true or useful even within a worldview or ideology that might be largely mistaken. Students couldn’t get enough of it. They carried their disagreements into the halls after class, and some set up lunch dates to understand better those whose views differed from their own....
“So, no, students aren’t snowflakes. Deep down, they are as hungry as ever for intellectual freedom. It’s also what they deserve. Many of their professors once received this kind of education, and they owe it to their students to provide the same opportunities for free discussion and debate. An important part of my job as an educator is to help students see that it’s possible to challenge or reject an idea while still respecting the person who holds it. As one student said in a final reflection on the course: ‘This changed the game for me. People are more than their ideas.’”
Full op-ed by U Richmond Prof. Terry L. Price at WSJ.
Top 12 Challenges Facing Higher Ed in 2025 and Some Exemplars for Solving Them
Excerpts (boldface added):
“Higher education is no longer coasting -- colleges and universities now face a defining moment. In the ‘go-go’ days just 15 years ago, higher education had 21 million students (graduate and undergraduate) and 18.1 million undergraduates. When there was a recession, higher ed institutions could count on an uptick in enrollment. Institutions were building multiple new buildings and programs to offer students, and new buildings and dormitories to teach and house the same students.
“Unfortunately, those go-go days did not last.... Then, when you kick in the cost of higher education and increased student debt, AI and technology reshaping how we teach and learn, and increased competition among colleges and universities, you have put [sic] is nearly the perfect storm....”
[Followed by discussion of these 12 challenges and examples of what some schools are doing in response:]
Declining Enrollment and Demographic Shifts
Rising Costs and Student Debt
Competition from Alternative Education Pathways
The Need for Innovation and Adaptability
Financial Sustainability Concerns
Political and Policy Changes
Public Perception and Value Proposition
Technology Challenges, Including Artificial Intelligence (AI)
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI)
Mental Health and Wellness
Globalization and Internationalization
Climate Change and Sustainability
Full article at Changing Higher Ed.
Other Articles of Interest
Higher Education Has Long Engaged in Racial Discrimination in Hiring (Full op-ed at City Journal. See also “Why I Support the Civil Rights Complaint Against Cornell University” by a Cornell alum at Substack. And for convenience, a PDF copy of the DOJ July 29, 2025 letter is posted at our Stanford Concerns webpage).
32 Colleges Accused of Using Early Decision to Drive Up Costs (Full article at Higher Ed Dive including a list of the schools named as defendants and NOT including Stanford. See also “Class Action Lawsuit Filed Against 32 Universities; All Students Admitted Since 2021 Named as Potential Members” at Campus Reform).
The Growing Problem of Scientific Research Fraud (Full article at Inside Higher Ed).
How the Social Sciences Killed Our Universities (Full op-ed by Boston U Prof. Emeritus Liah Greenfeld at National Association of Scholars).
Samples of Current Teaching, Research and Other Activities at Stanford
Click on each article for direct access; selections are from Stanford Report and other Stanford websites.
Stanford to Continue Legacy Admissions and Reinstate Standardized Test Requirements
How Sleep Affects Mental Health, and Vice Versa
Addressing the Potential Harms of Market-Driven Drug Development
Why Voices Light Us Up but Leave the Autistic Brain in the Dark (podcast, 31 minutes)
“If research universities are to pursue the truth wherever it lies, they cannot have a political ideology or pursue a particular vision of social change. They contribute to the betterment of society not by pursuing an ideological agenda but through the research and innovation of their faculty and students, by producing educated and knowledgeable leaders, and by serving as a model for civil discourse grounded in critical reasoning.” – From the Vanderbilt-WashU Statement of Principles