Gay’s resignation — just six months and two days into the presidency — comes amid growing allegations of plagiarism and lasting doubts over her ability to respond to antisemitism on campus after her disastrous congressional testimony Dec. 5.
Gay weathered scandal after scandal over her brief tenure, facing national backlash for her administration’s response to Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack and allegations of plagiarism in her scholarly work.
While I am definitely onboard with your skepticism of elite institutions such as Harvard, I urge caution in automatically attaching a negative connotation as a sort of reactionary default. More than one thing can be true at once and while it’s entirely possible that our elitist system creates a lot of bullshit, it can also be true that our elite educational institutions create a lot of good.
Of course they do.
That’s why, if I hear someone attended an Ivy League school, I’ll praise them when they demonstrate to me they are actually doing good in the world with their expensive degree. Until then, I see no reason not to call a spade a spade. Ivy League a nepotism laundering machine.
Besides, why should education even be elite? It’s the same shit as the private schools that get so much praise. Why the hell should “the best” be gated to the few (who just so happen to be the wealthy or connected)?