The University of Austin, a new university dedicated to rejecting “illiberalism” found at most of America’s higher education institutions, boasts a founding board of advisers including ex-New York Times columnist and editor Bari Weiss.
“So much is broken in America. But higher education might be the most fractured institution of all,” former St. John's College President Pano Kanelos wrote in an announcement.
“We are done waiting for the legacy universities to right themselves. And so we are building anew,” he added, noting he will launch the new university alongside journalists, university presidents, professors, philanthropists, researchers and public intellectuals who share the same concerns about higher education, Fox News reports.
“We are a dedicated crew that grows by the day. Our backgrounds and experiences are diverse; our political views differ. What unites us is a common dismay at the state of modern academia and a recognition that we can no longer wait for the cavalry. And so we must be the cavalry,” Kanelos continued. “It will surely seem retro - perhaps even countercultural - in an era of massive open online courses and distance learning to build an actual school in an actual building with as few screens as possible. But sometimes there is wisdom in things that have endured.”
Indeed, University of Austin will have a “rigorous curriculum” designed by “society’s great doers.” The university plans to introduce students to open inquiry with an “intrepid pursuit of truth.”
“An education rooted in the pursuit of truth is the antidote to the kind of ignorance and incivility that is everywhere around us,” Kanelos wrote. “It is time to restore the meaning to those old school mottos. Light. Truth. The wind of freedom. You will find all three at our new university in Austin.”
Bari Weiss, a former New York Times columnist who resigned from his position at the paper claiming he was bullied by coworkers in an “illiberal environment” sits on the advisory board alongside Hoover Institution’s Niall Ferguson, author Heather Heying, Harvard professor Arthur Brooks, journalist Sohrab Ahmari, author Andrew Sullivan and more.
The university’s website describes a timeline for the university, saying it plans to launch a graduate program in entrepreneurship and leadership in 2022, graduate programs in politics, applied history, education and public service in 2023 and an undergraduate college in 2024.
"There is a gaping chasm between the promise and the reality of higher education. Yale’s motto is Lux et Veritas, light and truth. Harvard proclaims: Veritas. Young men and women of Stanford are told Die Luft der Freiheit weht: The wind of freedom blows," Kanelos wrote. "These are soaring words. But in these top schools, and in so many others, can we actually claim that the pursuit of truth—once the central purpose of a university—remains the highest virtue? Do we honestly believe that the crucial means to that end—freedom of inquiry and civil discourse—prevail when illiberalism has become a pervasive feature of campus life?"
