If an executive at a private corporation stonewalled federal investigators, violated civil rights laws, or faced serious academic integrity allegations, he would be fired on the spot. In higher education, he gets a million-dollar payout and a warm seat on the faculty.
Tyler Austin Harper’s cover story in The Atlantic about Bates College exposed a small liberal arts school consumed by administrative overreach, allergic to accountability, and willing to bend rules for fashionable causes. But the incident at Bates is not isolated. It reflects a deeper, systemic pathology across American higher education: Campus leaders violate policy, ignore basic standards of conduct, and expose their institutions to massive legal liability — and instead of being disciplined, they are rewarded.
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