McMahon's call to action, and what it means for W&L
The Secretary of the Department of Education, Linda McMahon, just asked every college—W&L included, for the first time— o publish reform pledges by year's end. The talking points for those against academic freedom now come with a federal deadline attached.
When I wrote about what W&L should want in its next president, I didn't anticipate Washington handing the Board a script.
On August 3, Education Secretary Linda McMahon issued a "National Call to Action to University Presidents and Governing Boards." This statement asked every postsecondary institution in the country— not just the nine schools singled out for last year's failed "compact"—to publish a public statement committing to a list of reforms by the end of the year. The list outlines seven questions. these include admissions criteria, campus protest policy, "intellectual pluralism" in hiring, cost containment, academic rigor "in the age of AI," foreign research influence, and something called "prioritizing American interests."
W&L wasn't on the list of nine last fall. It's on this one. Every school in the country is.
Read the questions and you'll recognize the vocabulary. "Merit, achievement." "Intellectual pluralism." Institutional neutrality, which McMahon praised by name as a step some schools have "already begun." These aren't new demands. They're the same demands the Generals Redoubt has been making of W&L's Board for years, dressed up now with a Department of Education letterhead and a deadline.
Nobody is required to answer. Jonathan Pidluzny, the Department's deputy chief of staff for policy, was careful to say there are no "direct penalties" attached. Then, in the same breath, he warned that a university's silence "will speak volumes." That's the whole letter in miniature: no mandate, just leverage. The letter doesn't need to compel W&L to do anything. It only needs to exist, so that the next time the Redoubt tells the Board what "merit" and "pluralism" require, they can point to Washington and say the government already agrees with them.
The presidential search is still open. Ken Ruscio is still interim. And now there's a date on the calendar—December 31. By then we'll know whether W&L said anything at all, and if so, whose language it borrowed to say it.
We'll be watching.
Non incautus futuri
