Don't let up in reshaping LA higher education

Republican Gov. Jeff Landry and legislative majorities must not let the Louisiana State University System, or any of the state’s higher education boards, off the hook because, for now, they appear to be kowtowing.

Last week at the LSU Board of Supervisors’ meeting the panel, fresh off putting on board some Landry appointments that included Chairman Jimmie Woods, Sr. who Landry named to lead it under a new law granting him that authority, passed a resolution to review all programs in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard decision that banned preferential treatment by race in higher education admissions. Even though the decision addressed only admissions, the Board used it as a justification, as well as the Legislature’s Act 641 of 2024 that requires reporting on the existence of programs based upon racial or other preferences, that to comply with the act and the decision it would shut down any such programs or bureaucracies. The same resolution implemented the Kalven Principle in the system (the LSU Faculty Senate recently advocated for that), or that institutions remain officially neutral in commenting upon political issues, something that system Pres. William Tate IV had pursued as a matter of policy previously after some years of silence on the subject.

With that, the Board also ratified something long advocated in the space: a ban on diversity, equity, and inclusion statement requirements for hiring faculty members, which serve no useful purpose in educating and requires (at least lip service to) a mindset antithetical to true scholarly inquiry. This echoed a bill that received a committee hearing in the last legislative regular session that was held in abeyance for Louisiana’s four higher education systems to address issues it raised, including this one.

This long overdue move didn’t need the Court decision – which happened over a year ago so the Board could have acted on this much sooner – to prompt action. It was only when Landry took office that it has become a priority. Landry throughout his political career has argued against the inappropriateness of preferences being given in suspect categories – race, sex, ethnicity, national origin, and in viewpoints – to those who meet certain characteristics without compelling justification and acting as a substitute for genuine education.

It didn’t happen because the Board – until this year, entirely comprised of appointees of Democrat former Gov. John Bel Edwards – had a core component whose views, like Edwards’, were on the wrong end of the Court’s decision. But now that the guy who appoints to the Supervisors, Landry, as well as legislators who confirm those appointments and funding a healthy majority of whom agree with Landry on this issue are running things, this is a predictable reaction from appointees who by and large would like to keep their seats on the Board when Landry, who will have appointed a majority by the end of his term and with a second term would end up appointing all, makes his future selections.

Dishearteningly, three of the four black members of the Board – Collis Temple Jr. , James Williams and Valencia Sarpy Jones – after answering to the roll call for the Academic Committee meeting several items in advance of the resolution on the agenda, then left the meeting and didn’t appear to return, not voting on the resolution which passed unanimously with Woods’ vote, who also is black. Regrettably, Temple in the past has endorsed viewpoint discrimination preferential treatment of which is banned by the resolution and, perhaps as a consequence of that past support, donated to Landry’s campaign.

This capitulation by the Board shouldn’t dampen the resolve of Landry and legislative majorities to continue ensuring that genuine scholarly inquiry and information dissemination in instruction impartial to views shaped by fad and fashion occurs in Louisiana higher education, and not waste resources on the opposite. The resolution, despite its acceptance by the LSU System and whether it gains footholds among the state’s other three systems, should be codified into law for a measure of permanence. Vigilance also must be maintained to ensure institutions don’t play shell games, trying to hide or obscure programs and bureaucracies that practice contrary to the resolution, if need be calling upon legislative audit resources to guarantee this. Finally, any supervisory board members who don’t demonstrate unqualified support for these measures should not be reappointed, no matter their history of political donations.

Hopefully, we can take academia at its word it will recommit itself to unimpeded scholasticism and instruction that cultivates critical thinking. Yet it’s never fruitless in granting that trust simultaneously to seek verification.