Harvard University is one of the most difficult schools to gain admission to, with the school turning away some 97 percent of applicants every year.
But once they get in, many of its students skip class and fail to do the reading, according to the Classroom Social Compact Committee, a group of seven faculty members that produced a report on Harvard’s classroom culture that has been fueling debate since it was released in January.
When they do show up for class, they are focused on their devices, and are reluctant to speak out. Sometimes it is because they are afraid of sharing ideas that others will disagree with. But often, they have not read enough of the homework to make a meaningful contribution, the report continued.
Rampant grade inflation allows them to coast through anyway, it concluded.
That means many students graduate without having benefited from talking very much with their teachers and peers, and they stay stuck in ideological bubbles, unwilling or unable to engage with challenging ideas.
Conservative critics have long argued that Harvard and other elite institutions have allowed liberal bias to dominate their campuses, effectively censoring free expression. Those concerns have fueled a Republican effort to remake college campuses in recent months. But even before Mr. Trump took office, the Harvard group’s report seemed to acknowledge that the critique had merit.
“At Harvard, as nationwide, the question of whether people can express their political opinions without fear of social or institutional sanction has attracted particular attention,” the report said.
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The post Harvard Students Skip Class and Still Get High Grades, Faculty Say appeared first on New York Times.
