UC's Janet Napolitano and Harvard's Drew Faust are silly, little people: Doing nothing to ease the suffering of college-loan debtors

In the scene at the water well in Lawrence of Arabia, Sherif Ali (played by Omar Sharif) gallops across the shimmering desert on a camel and shoots an Arab from a rival tribe for the petty offense of drinking from Sherif Ali's well.

T.E. Lawrence, a British officer played by Peter O'Toole, is outraged and rails against Sherif Ali's senseless violence against a fellow Arab. "So long as the Arabs fight tribe against tribe," Lawrence tells Sherif Ali, "so long will they be a little people, a silly people--greedy, barbarous, and cruel, as you are."

Today it seems that Americans are dividing into warring tribes--left against right, red against blue, progressives against conservatives. And this tribal warfare is causing us to descend to being little and silly people.

Nowhere is this more apparent than at our elite universities, where academic leaders engage in political posturing over petty issues while saying nothing about the suffering experienced by millions of student-loan debtors.

Here is an example. Janet Napolitano, President of the University of California, recently pledged $302,000 to expand food pantries at 10 UC campuses to help in the fight against "food insecurity" among college students.

I fully support food pantries for anyone who needs food. But Napolitano's gift, stretched over two years, is a pittance.  In fact, it amounts to only 5 percent of Napolitano's personal compensation over a two-year period.

Has Napolitano said anything about the suffering experienced by student-loan debtors in California? Has she tried to lower tuition costs at UC? Has she spoken out in favor of bankruptcy relief for student debtors who have been dragged down by massive debt they can never repay? Has she publicly criticized the for-profit colleges that have exploited so many low SES and minority students in the Sunshine State?

I don't think so. In fact, Napolitano once referred to student complaints about UC tuition hikes as "this crap."

How about Drew Faust, who pulled down nearly $1.5 million in total compensation while president of Harvard and who pocketed another $200,000 in cash and stock for serving on the Board of Directors of Staples? She sanctioned single-sex social clubs at Harvard--clubs that Harvard does not even recognize. But who gives a damn about privileged college boys and their private clubs?

Has Faust said or done anything to help solve the student-loan crisis?  No, she has not.

In fact, I don't think any president of an elite American university has uttered a peep about the for-profit colleges, insane tuition prices, or the total disregard for college students who have borrowed themselves out of the middle-class in order to obtain wildly overvalued college degrees.

I don't think any of these pompous academics have directed their institutions' lobbyists to put pressure on Congress to reform the bankruptcy laws so that insolvent college borrowers can shed their student loans in bankruptcy court and get a fresh start in life.

I could be wrong about Napolitano and Faust. Maybe they've done a hell of a lot to ease the suffering of student-loan debtors. If I judged them unfairly, I will apologize; and I will send them both a $20 gift card for a meal at the Waffle House. Who knows? They might meet one of their former graduates working as a Waffle House fry cook.

References

Nanette Asimov. Many college students going hungry, need donated food groceries and food stamps. San Francisco Chronicle, November 23, 217.

Isabelle Geczy. Napolitano--"This Crap" Pays Your $570,000 base salary. The Bottom Line, April 1, 2015.

John S. Rosenberg. Harvard Discloses Leaders' Compensation, Harvard Magazine, May 12, 1027.

John S. Rosenberg. Harvard Imposes Single-Gender Social Club Sanctions. Harvard Magazine, December 5, 2017.

 

 

 

 

 

Blah, blah, blah: Drew Faust, president of Harvard, lectures America on the value of arts education

Drew Faust, president of Harvard University, took time out from her busy schedule to co-author an op ed essay for USA Today on the value of arts education. Anxiety abounds, Faust and co-author Wynton Marsalis noted, about the ability of our current educational system to respond to a rapidly changing world. "Yet," they conclude, "the education we are fashioning for our children and their children seems ill-suited for the lives they will lead."

Faust and Marsalis went on to summarize the kind of education Americans need to live in the world we now inhabit and to shape the world to come:

We need education that nurtures judgment as well as mastery, ethics and values as well as analysis. We need learning that will enable students to interpret complexity, to adapt, to make sense of lives they never anticipated. We need a way of teaching that encourages them to develop understanding of those different from ourselves, enabling constructive collaborations across national and cultural origins and identities.

Faust and Marsalis then argue that many of the skills and attributes that students need to prepare themselves for life are taught through the arts--drama, music, dance, etc.

Well, who can argue with that? 

Drew Faust is president of  Harvard, the nation's most prestigious university and perhaps the most prestigious university in the world. We can reasonably assume that Harvard is providing students with an education that instills the values Faust and Marsalis articulated. Indeed, we might reasonably assume that all of the nation's elite universities--Harvard, Yale, Georgetown, Stanford, Brown, etc.--are instilling these values.

Drew Faust, President of Harvard Univefrsity

Unfortunately, I don't think these values are being taught in today's most prestigious universities.  Let's look at the people who work in the Obama administration, almost all of whom have undergraduate or graduate degrees from elite American universities.  For example, Jacob Lew, Secretary of the Treasury, has degrees from Harvard and Georgetown. Valerie Jarrett, one of President Obama's top advisers, received a degree from Stanford; and Obama himself has degrees from Columbia and Harvard Law School.

Do we see the Obamacrats exercising sound judgment as well as mastery? Do we see them demonstrating ethical values as well as analysis?  Do we see them expressing an appreciation for diverse cultures and religious traditions?

No, we do not.  Jacob Lew, our Secretary of the Treasury, received a $685,000 exit bonus from New York University when he left NYU to go to work for Citigroup. He also got a special deal from NYU on a home mortgage. Illegal? No. But certainly this compensation is inappropriate for a person working at a tax-exempt university.

And how about Valerie Jarrett, who basically said Americans are too dumb to understand President Obama's grand designs.  Has she demonstrated an understanding of people different from herself? No, she has shown contempt for the very people she is supposed to be serving.

And President Obama, who has accumulated honors and accolades all his life--has he demonstrated moral rectitude? Has he shown himself able to build "constructive collaborations across national and cultural origins and identities"? No, he has repeatedly insulted the Catholic Church, casually and perhaps even unknowingly. He has lied to the American public. His administration has managed to outrage many of the major nations of the world: France, Germany, Spain, Brazil, Mexico, Israel, Saudi Arabia and India among them.

It is time for Americans to realize that our nation's elite universities are not producing the leaders we need. The people who run our government--almost all graduates of our nation's elite colleges, are arrogant, provincial, condescending, and contemptuous of traditional American values, including the values associated with Christianity.  Perhaps more art education would produce better citizens as Faust and Marsalis suggest, but somehow I think President Obama and his cronies would still be as crude as they are now, even if they had taken a few art classes at their high-toned colleges.

References

Drew Faust and Wynton Marsalis. The Art of Learning. USA Today, January 2, 2014, p. 7A.

Danny Hakim. Obama's Treasury Nominee Got Unusual Exit Bonus on leaving N.Y.U. New York Times, February 25, 2013.  Accessible at: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/26/nyregion/lew-treasury-nominee-got-exit-bonus-from-nyu.html?_r=0

George F. Will. How a Presidency Unravels. Washington Post, November 22, 2013.  Accessible at: http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/george-will-obamas-presidency-unravels-through-chaos-and-crisis/2013/11/22/57132e74-52de-11e3-a7f0-b790929232e1_story.html