Princeton Has An Elitist Problem

I am a big fan of Princeton. When our son attended there, Vicki and I were designated as the Co-Presidents of the Princeton Parents Association for the Philadelphia region. That role gave us a glimpse into the inner workings of the university. One of the things that is noteworthy is that they are always seeking to make the university great as well as ethically good. Because they have a large endowment, they make it possible on January 27,2001 for all students who graduate to go into the world with no debt for students whose parents make under $100,000. This cost takes care of room, board, and tuition through grants and scholarships. This is to address classism.

Back when we were co-presidents of the Parents Association, the problem was that when black students were at the university, the black students formed a tight group of people that stayed together as a group. They were not integrating into the larger mostly white population of the university.

Along came a book by Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum, a psychologist, Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria, published in 1997. After considerable research she made the case that the black kids needed a safe place for these youth to process their racial identity through shared cultural experience and seek mutual support against societal prejudices. That book helped Princeton and me in my future endeavors.

Certain experiences helped me learn what the black kids were experiencing. They were very different places. They have in common, like the black students in the cafeteria, where “I was the odd man out”.

I worked with mostly black people in the steel mill, and one person took me under his wing in a tin shed where we ate lunch together to teach me the way the world really was. Because we were doing work that no one else would do, I became one of them because of the shared purpose of rigor. Mr. Williamson, who was my mentor, was a black man who had a son he was raising on this own. He would pace up and down in front of me bent over with his two arms and hands locked behind him as he held forth with what I needed to know. He was like a coach prowling the sidelines. He called me the professor because I was a college kid.

The other experience was when my family and I were vacationing in Paris. I didn’t speak French and the French people are notorious for having Americans try to speak their language. I felt cut out. If I heard an American family a short distance away, I would move closer to them to listen to a language that I understood. I felt connected. I knew how important it was to speak the native language of people which is a shared purpose issue.

When we were traveling in Russia, we had with us a Professor of Russian History who was a friend and fluent in the Russian language. It made the experience so much more enjoyable. When vacationing in Rome, one of my sons who was fluent in Italian and did the same thing enriching the experience by interpreting what we needed to know.

The same was true for the solution to Princeton’s challenge to realize how important that bonding is when you are outside the main environment.

But Princeton is currently dealing with another problem regarding elitism. This year a student, Daniel Yu, was the 2026 valedictorian, the first from the department of African American studies. Elitism takes many forms. Rigor was seen as less academic in his designated department than say such courses as pre-med or Theoretical Physics. Before he gave his remarks at graduation, thousands of strangers across media platforms ridiculed his selection as well as people associated with the university. The feedback criticized his major, African American Studies as well as his professors who taught in his major, as unserious and unscientific. It does not belong in the same sentence as academic excellence. His choice was villainized by the far right as shallow, and indoctrination. (Can you hear Trump’s voice in the background?)

Yu’s valedictory address gave him the last word, and it is profound. He said, in part, “Difficult and valuable are not synonymous. A Challenging task is not necessarily a worthwhile one. Consider introductory engineering courses are considered difficult. They demand technical skills. The technical skill is not the same as moral judgement. Disciplines like African American Studies requires sustained, critical judgement with power and inequality.

In the process, elite universities have lost sight of their ultimate obligation – to shape not just learners but citizens, people, and leaders. Student activists cannot escape our most pressing, political questions, and that intellectual inquiry and civic engagement are inseparable. Elite universities cannot afford to indulge in a narrow definition of academic excellence or intellectual challenge.

They must learn from the Black radical tradition that a truly rigorous education forces us not just to do but to question – and, always, to keep a more just world in our sights.”

To see what this looks like in real life view the video below of Michelle Obama’s address at the Opening of the Barack Obama Presidential Center in Chicago.

Address by Michelle Obama