The Academic Condition in the United States

One person can at most add only a drop to the oceans of reporting and analysis of student protest. I would put first the necessity to recognize not so much the extreme degree to which a radical critique of society and government has developed in American students but in the diversity and range with which it is represented. It is neither valid nor useful to think only of the radicals and the rest. A recent survey of student attitudes (January 1969) makes this clear. This is the spectrum which emerged: revolutionaries, 3 percent; radical dissidents, 10 percent; reformers, 39 percent; moderates, 37 percent; conservatives, 11 percent. Thus only a quarter are at the extremes while three-quarters dominate the broad middle ground; it is these who will surely determine what is to become permanent from this cultural revolution.

One of the wonders of this period has been why some universities are caught in almost continuous turmoil or violent climaxes and others remain relatively stable. Many factors contribute and some are quite local. But the quick judgments, made in heat and anger, which blamed inept administration or spineless faculty do not appear to survive more considered examination.

Several surveys indicate that young adults who are alienated from society and adopt radically new values usually have college educated parents in the upper income brackets, who have been permissive in their child rearing. Such families tend to send their offspring to the more expensive private universities. Astin’s research, based on 35,000 questionnaires from 200 institutions, indicates that whether or not a university is a centre of protest activities is not a function of university policies or size, but rather of the type of student. He concludes that a student body that includes a disproportionate number of students disposed to political activity is likely to have unrest regardless of administrative policies or the relationship between faculty and students.