by WorldTribune Staff, December 12, 2023
How much does the University of Wisconsin Board of Regents covet the university system’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) programs?
The board voted last week to reject state funding that Republicans in the state legislature tied to limiting the scope of the system’s DEI programs.
On the table: $800 million and across-the-board faculty raises within the UW system.
“It looked as if a deal had been struck until at the last minute the Board of Regents backed out,” Not The Bee reported on Monday.
State Assembly Republicans had tied the funding to the following list of concessions:
• A cap on all DEI hires, to remain in place for three years.
• Renaming and redefining the positions of one-third of DEI staff — about 45 system employees — to roles more closely related to student success.
• A three-year freeze on all new administrative hires across the system.
• Elimination of the UW TOP program, an initiative to promote diverse faculty hires, to be replaced, starting next year, with a program promoting faculty who support underrepresented and “at-risk” students.
• Excising the diversity statement currently included on applications to two UW campuses.
• Creating a new endowed faculty chair at UW Madison dedicated to conservative economic thought, classical economics, or classical liberalism.
• Implementing a new module on free expression for all entering undergraduate students.
• Adoption of a guaranteed admissions program for the top 10 percent of state high school graduates, who would automatically be accepted to all UW campuses except Madison, which would take the top 5 percent.
The Board of Regents was reportedly ready to accept the GOP’s offer, but then caved in to pressure from leftists in the faculty union, student groups, and Democrats in the Assembly.
The board ultimately voted 9-8 to leave the $800 million on the table along with the across-the-board raises for the UW system’s 39,000 employees.
Not The Bee noted: “It really shows you where these people’s priorities are, doesn’t it? They’d rather teach kids about George Floyd than teach them about George Washington. They’d rather admit students based on their skin color rather than their grades. They’d rather hire someone strictly based on skin color or ideology rather than their actual merits.”
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