The University of Pennsylvania must publicly stand up to President Donald Trump and others demanding radical changes to curriculum and academic decision making, including soundly rejecting the offered membership in the Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education.
Last week, the Trump administration invited nine universities to sign onto an agreement in exchange for preferential treatment when it came to federal grants. According to Penn’s branch of the American Association of University Professors, this deal would mean ceding Penn’s ability to determine its own future.
Admissions, hiring, firing, research, grades, and discipline would become subject to federal approval. Compact signatories would be required to freeze tuition for five years, limit the enrollment of international students, and adhere to strict definitions of gender. Schools would also commit to protecting “conservative ideas” on campus.
Even if Penn accepts, any benefits from the deal could be withdrawn if the Justice Department determines the institution violated the agreement.
This latest threat to Penn’s independence from the administration is in a way homegrown. According to reporting from the New York Times, much of this agenda was created not by Trump or any of his Washington cronies, but by financier Marc Rowan, an activist donor and Board of Advisors Chair at Wharton.
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Rowan became more involved in campus politics after the university hosted Palestine Writes, a literature festival featuring Palestinian authors, in September 2023. Critics objected to the inclusion of some guests, including controversial former Pink Floyd bassist Roger Waters, who is not Palestinian. Amid the debate, Penn’s Hillel building was vandalized. Penn’s then-president, Liz Magill, issued a statement clarifying the literature event was organized by student groups, not the university, and condemning antisemitism as counter to Penn’s values.
When Hamas brutally attacked Israel on Oct. 7 of that year, it reanimated opponents of the festival, who felt that the university, which has historically been a haven for Jewish scholars, had not done enough to protect Jewish students during the crisis.
Magill’s initial statement denouncing the attacks was called inadequate, and she stumbled while answering questions at a Congressional hearing. Rowan called on donors to withhold resources. On Dec. 9, 2023, Magill resigned. Three days later, Board of Trustees Chair Scott L. Bok joined her.
The pressure on Penn and higher education in general, however, had just begun.
Trump, himself an alum, had a long list of demands for the school once he took office for his second term in January. After the federal government froze research funds, Penn apologized to the teammates of transgender swimmer Lia Thomas, and stripped Thomas of all accolades. Faculty and students rightly criticized the move as a capitulation.
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In exchange, the Trump administration released $175 million in frozen research funds. While President J. Larry Jameson described the process as simply seeking to conform to federal Title IX requirements, the Trump administration saw it as a sign that money could be used to coerce Penn’s leaders.
Penn must resist any further submission, and Rowan and other activist donors must remember that free speech is a two-way street.
In 2007, Penn’s College Republicans hosted “Terrorism Awareness Week,” renamed from its original “Islamofascism Awareness Week.” The event was designed by a right-wing advocacy group spearheaded by David Horowitz and Stephen Miller, who is now the deputy White House chief of staff. The Southern Poverty Law Center described Horowitz, who died earlier this year, as a “leading purveyor of anti-Muslim propaganda.”
While the event was controversial, the government rightfully stayed out of the debate.
The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, which has made its reputation defending the right of conservative speakers to present at colleges, condemned the proposed compact, writing that, “A government that can reward colleges and universities for speech it favors today can punish them for speech it dislikes tomorrow. That’s not reform. That’s government-funded orthodoxy.”
No amount of money is worth what the Trump administration is asking for.