Carol Platt Liebau: Harvard’s Eroding Institutional Prestige
Harvard is America’s oldest university with a cherished reputation as the quintessence of academic excellence.
Over the last five decades, the university has veered sharply leftward. Yet amid increasing radicalism and intolerance, its status has remained intact.
But what’s happening now proves the truth of Benjamin Franklin’s adage: “It takes many good deeds to build a good reputation, and only one bad one to lose it.”
The virulent antisemitism evident on its campus and the tone-deaf incompetence of its leadership have taken a toll. Early applications to Harvard have fallen a whopping seventeen percent—nearly one-fifth.
Of course, there is no shortage of excellent students to fill the seats at Harvard. But the drop is a welcome sign that market forces exist, and that Harvard’s institutional prestige will not continue indefinitely without real and meaningful reforms to the university’s operation.
Let’s hope we see some.
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