Page 106 - EW November 2023

International News

In the state of New Hampshire, a partisan producer of
classroom instructional videos, Prager University has been
accused by a gubernatorial candidate of illegally using the
“university” term in its name to hide its ideological agenda.
In Florida, meanwhile, state officials threatened legal ac-
tion against an effort to privately revive the New College of
Florida, a public institution whose leaders were pushed out
by a governing board of partisan appointees.
New College had long been known as a politically pro-
gressive campus until Ron DeSantis, the state’s Republi-
can governor and a 2024 candidate for US president, engi-
neered the ousting of its leadership. Now, some former New
College faculty are organising to teach free and subsidised
courses under the name Alt New College.
Attorneys representing New College wrote to Alt New
College demanding that it stop using the “confusingly simi- New College of Florida: confusingly similar name charge
lar” name. The attorneys cited New College’s top national
rankings in the liberal arts — built up over decades ahead lege and PragerU cases show the danger of the poorly regu-
of the DeSantis takeover — in warning Alt New College: lated environments in which they are allowed to operate.
“Our client views its intellectual property rights as one of PragerU probably faces no real legal risk over its choice
its most vital assets which must be vigorously protected.” of name because the words “college” and “university” are
Alt New College subsequently agreed to rename itself Alt pretty widely used by various businesses, says Jack Schnei-
Liberal Arts. der, a professor of education at the University of Massachu-
Prager University, meanwhile, is being pursued by Cinde setts Amherst. Alt New College faced a greater challenge on
Warmington, one of five members of New Hampshire’s ex- grounds of trademark infringement, he says.
ecutive council, an entity that shares some of the policy-
making powers of the state’s governor. Ms Warmington, Adversarial Collaboration Project success
a Democrat standing for governor in 2024, has asked the
state’s attorney general to disqualify PragerU from operat- taging an angry winner-take-all debate was, for many
ing in New Hampshire, on the basis of a state law that limits years, seen as the only way to settle a protracted aca-
the use of the terms “college” and “university” to entities Sdemic dispute. But a project that has asked social sci-
incorporated for that purpose. entists to work together when they disagree suggests that
Her more fundamental concern, however, centres on collaboration is a far better approach for resolving scholarly
PragerU’s expansion into the realm of public education. differences, because it produces more reliable results than
Prager produces videos in the style of classroom instruc- work undertaken with like-minded colleagues.
tion that convey right-wing perspectives on public policy The success of the Adversarial Collaboration Project at
issues, and several states — including Florida, Texas, Okla- the University of Pennsylvania, which has brought together
homa and Montana — have authorised them for use in their dozens of academics with conflicting ideological or theoreti-
schools. “It only further blurs the line between credible edu- cal views over the past few years, could even see its unusual
cation and partisan ideology,” says Warmington. approach become the norm for academia when bad blood
According to Christina Pretorius, the policy director at arises between scholars, argues the project’s director Cory
Reaching Higher NH, an advocacy group for public educa- Clark.
tion and college preparation, part of the problem is a New “When two scholars have a brawl and cannot reconcile
Hampshire programme known as Learn Everywhere, and their differences properly, the academic community should
similar provisions in other states, which allows outside expect them to work together,” Dr. Clark told Times Higher
vendors to supply public school content that counts for Education.
academic credit. The approach had been particularly effective in politi-
Learn Everywhere has more than a dozen suppliers, gen- cal science, where scholarly rows had broken out over ac-
erally running non-ideological activities such as a robotics cusations of liberal bias among researchers or claims that
competition that counts towards science education and a scholars had cherry-picked questions, research methods or
karate studio approved as a physical education course. But interviewees that would deliver results they wanted to see,
that arrangement has always posed risks to academic integ- explains Dr. Clark.
rity and college preparation, and PragerU has emerged as In one study exploring whether political conservatives
an especially problematic case, says Pretorius. are more closed-minded than liberals, the coupling of a
Even more broadly, says another expert, the Alt New Col- conservative researcher with more liberal academics led to

106 EDUCATIONWORLD NOVEMBER 2023