• “If this becomes the new normal… the intellectual thugs will take over many campuses….A minority of faculty are cowing a majority in the same way that a minority of students are cowing the majority.” Why Charles Murray is pessimistic following the Middlebury attack [AEI] Frank Bruni on the Middlebury events and “the dangerous safety of college” [New York Times]
• “Faculty and students need to be free to express ideas and viewpoints rather than be penalized for their politics.” [letter from group of Wellesley alumnae]
• Finally! Federal government in January opened door for universities to relax some of their IRB (institutional review board) scrutiny of human-subjects research in low-risk areas not involving medical intervention [Richard Shweder and Richard Nisbett, Chronicle of Higher Education, related Institutional Review Blog] Update: some annotations/corrections from Michelle Meyer;
• “Colorado student expelled for raping his girlfriend, even though both he and his girlfriend both deny the charge.” [Robby Soave/Reason on CSU-Pueblo case, via (and described by) Radley Balko] “End federal micromanagement of college discipline under Title IX” [Hans Bader/CEI, and related] “Maybe I’m drunk, but this doesn’t seem fair” [The Safest Space on “both were drunk, he got charged” poster]
• What, no taxpayer dollars to pursue favored legal causes? North Carolina proposal would bar public universities from representing lawsuit clients [Caron/TaxProf]
• I hadn’t followed the “New Civics” movement. It sounds pretty bad [George Leef, Martin Center]

Filed under: colleges and universities, law clinics, science and scientists, Title IX