Heritage Foundation releases guide to colleges that teach instead of indoctrinate
Click for interactive map.
In an effort to find at least two universities in every state that are focused not on leftist and queer indoctrination but instead on free expression and open inquiry, the conservative Heritage Foundation has now put together an interactive map and guide that parents and high school students can use to choose a quality college to attend.
The image to the right is a screen capture of that map, located here. You can click on each dot to get more detailed information about why Heritage recommends or not recommends it. For example, for Thomas Aquinas College in California the guide says the following in explaining why it lists it as a “great option.”
The mission of Thomas Aquinas College (TAC) is to renew “what is best in the Western intellectual heritage and to [conduct] liberal education under the guiding light of the Catholic faith.” TAC has an impressive “A+” rating from the American Council of Trustees and Alumni. It does not have a bias response team, nor does it require diversity statements for hiring. It has an impressive 80 percent four-year graduation rate. Thomas Aquinas College also accepts the Classical Learning Test for admission.
Meanwhile, the guide says the following in giving Cornell University, Duke, Brown, Harvard, and Tufts a “not recommended” status:
These universities exhibit a pervasive hostility toward diverse viewpoints and lack robust core curricular requirements, undermining a well-rounded education. These institutions are often heavily influenced by ideologically driven administration agendas and DEI bureaucracies, frequently resulting in limitations on freedom of expression. Moreover, these universities typically demonstrate weak returns on investment, evidenced by lower graduation rates and diminished post-graduation income, making them less favorable choices for students seeking both intellectual rigor and long-term success.
These recommendations were derived by reviewing numerous other guides, such as the free speech listing put out by Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) as well information from the American Council of Trustees and Alumni. The guide also attempted to get as much local feedback as possible, and to increase that knowledge base users of this guide can add their own comments under every college heading.
This first guide covers only 280 universities. The foundation intends to make regular updates to expand the guide to hopefully one day cover the almost 3,000 colleges in the United States.
The sad thing about this first guide is that Heritage was unable to meet its goal of finding at least two “great options” in every state. Many states, such as Maryland, Colorado, and Texas, have only one such college. This result could either be a reflection of the truly bankrupt status of American academia, or merely because the guide so far covers only about 10% of the colleges in the U.S.
Unfortunately, I suspect the former, as this first guide seems to provide a very good sampling of the nation’s most important universities. What the guide however will hopefully do is direct students to the good colleges and away from the bad ones, which in the long run will help reform academia. The bad colleges will either have to fix themselves, or die.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit.
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Click for interactive map.
In an effort to find at least two universities in every state that are focused not on leftist and queer indoctrination but instead on free expression and open inquiry, the conservative Heritage Foundation has now put together an interactive map and guide that parents and high school students can use to choose a quality college to attend.
The image to the right is a screen capture of that map, located here. You can click on each dot to get more detailed information about why Heritage recommends or not recommends it. For example, for Thomas Aquinas College in California the guide says the following in explaining why it lists it as a “great option.”
The mission of Thomas Aquinas College (TAC) is to renew “what is best in the Western intellectual heritage and to [conduct] liberal education under the guiding light of the Catholic faith.” TAC has an impressive “A+” rating from the American Council of Trustees and Alumni. It does not have a bias response team, nor does it require diversity statements for hiring. It has an impressive 80 percent four-year graduation rate. Thomas Aquinas College also accepts the Classical Learning Test for admission.
Meanwhile, the guide says the following in giving Cornell University, Duke, Brown, Harvard, and Tufts a “not recommended” status:
These universities exhibit a pervasive hostility toward diverse viewpoints and lack robust core curricular requirements, undermining a well-rounded education. These institutions are often heavily influenced by ideologically driven administration agendas and DEI bureaucracies, frequently resulting in limitations on freedom of expression. Moreover, these universities typically demonstrate weak returns on investment, evidenced by lower graduation rates and diminished post-graduation income, making them less favorable choices for students seeking both intellectual rigor and long-term success.
These recommendations were derived by reviewing numerous other guides, such as the free speech listing put out by Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE) as well information from the American Council of Trustees and Alumni. The guide also attempted to get as much local feedback as possible, and to increase that knowledge base users of this guide can add their own comments under every college heading.
This first guide covers only 280 universities. The foundation intends to make regular updates to expand the guide to hopefully one day cover the almost 3,000 colleges in the United States.
The sad thing about this first guide is that Heritage was unable to meet its goal of finding at least two “great options” in every state. Many states, such as Maryland, Colorado, and Texas, have only one such college. This result could either be a reflection of the truly bankrupt status of American academia, or merely because the guide so far covers only about 10% of the colleges in the U.S.
Unfortunately, I suspect the former, as this first guide seems to provide a very good sampling of the nation’s most important universities. What the guide however will hopefully do is direct students to the good colleges and away from the bad ones, which in the long run will help reform academia. The bad colleges will either have to fix themselves, or die.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
I know a fair number of TAC graduates, and I can say, just judging by results, that I cannot praise this school highly enough.
It’s not for everyone, and it’s not cheap. But there is a role for it, and I am very, very glad it exists.
Absolutely beautiful campus, too. They weren’t afraid to stick to tradition in their architecture, too.
Related, its all related: its all a “Conspiracy”!
AFTER THE DEBATE: FACT CHECK
https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/after-the-debate-fact-check
MUMBO JUMBO? OR DENIAL OF DUE PROCESS?
https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/mumbojumbo-or-denial-of-due-process
I’d like to think my alma mater would be listed as a “Great Option” but, alas, they have chosen to go the route of DEI and indoctrination, as opposed to the more intellectual bent which was present back in my day (’82-’86). Rational inquiry is as dead as Caesar.
P.S. Now that I’ve looked at Heritage’s list, I am pleased (and not surprised) that I am the graduate of two of their “Great Schools” (both graduate degrees.)
That said….one of them (Catholic University of America in Washington DC) might give me hesitation if I had a child looking to go there for an *undergraduate* degree, because, solid as the school is, it is expensive as all heck, and limitations of scholarship opportunities means that you have to think hard about whether a degree is actually worth the money, especially if it must be debt-financed. College is just so, so, so much more expensive now than it was for us Gen X and Boomer peeps. You have to think hard about that.
I am curious to know why many schools seem not to have gotten any rating at all, and what criteria underlined those choices.
Richard M asked, “I am curious to know why many schools seem not to have gotten any rating at all, and what criteria underlined those choices.”
According to the Heritage site, this was there first pass at putting the guidelines together. More schools will be added as time passes, until they hope to include all U.S. colleges.
There are two on the list in Texas: UT Austin and University of Dallas. Frankly there are other fine, non lefty schools in Texas that are academically rigorous. The fact that Heritage listed UT makes me question the entire endeavor.
Robert Pratt: I must have missed one Texas dot in reviewing the page.
Heritage was very clear about the newness of this list, and was eager to have others with more “on the ground” experience add commentary and more information. Go to the UT listing and add you thoughts. It will influence them in the right direction.
You should also let them know about those “non-lefty” schools.
@Robert Pratt, University of Texas at Austin is a “not recommended” institution. The University of Austin (Great Option) was founded in 2021. I understand from somewhere else that it was founded specifically to counter the totalitarian drift in much of university education/indoctrination.
University of Colorado Boulder. Worth Considering? I guess it depends what subject one studies, but I refuse to even drive through Boulder, it’s an awful place.
I’m not surprised to see that the college that Mrs. Bucket and I went to, the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, shows up as red. Back in the day, there were still some fair-minded, if not actually conservative professors there, but the reports that I get from my daughter, who’s a senior there now, curl my hair. Unfortunately, she eats that stuff up. So much for the conservative upbringing she received. They proselytized that right out of her.
SB – You can always disown her. I’ve met with one such case. I worked for an Army captain, whose Marine colonel father disowned him when he accepted a commission as an Army officer. They hadn’t seen or talked on the phone for something like a decade. He was obviously written out of the will., I would think.
Wow—that’s cold.