After the incendiary testimony in front of Congress by the presidents of Harvard, UPenn, and MIT, a question arises: Why, exactly, are these institutions of supposed higher learning sticking with their embattled leaders? Why couldn’t those leaders have simply condemned chants like “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” or “There is only one solution, intifada revolution”?
To answer that question, we have to answer another: What is higher education for?
Obviously, universities serve a purpose. They wouldn’t have survived this long if they didn’t. But that purpose has shifted over time. Originally, universities were an extension of church education: Those who completed the trivium — grammar, rhetoric, and dialectics — and the quadrivium — math, geometry, music, and astronomy — moved on to universities. Over time, universities evolved into centers of…
