UVa Memorial Illuminates a Neglected Part of Virginia’s Past

Posted on March 15, 2021 by | Leave a comment


by James A. Bacon

The memorial to the slaves who labored at the University of Virginia is a quiet, dignified and moving tribute to the Virginians whose contributions to the university went unappreciated and unrecognized for too long. Yesterday my wife and I visited the memorial, which was dedicated almost a year ago, for the first time. It is a wonderful example of the “additive” approach to remembering our past — adding new layers of understanding — as opposed to the purgative approach of blotting out the remembrance of those who made significant contributions to society but whose association with slavery, the Confederacy or segregation offend modern-day sensibilities. Continue reading →

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Posted in Memorials, Race, Equity and Diversity

RIP E. Morgan Massey

Posted on March 11, 2021 by | Leave a comment

E. Morgan Massey

Editor’s note: E. Morgan Massey graduated from the University of Virginia in 1949. A member of the Alpha Tau Omega fraternity, he was a generous donor to the School of Engineering and the Darden School.

by James A. Bacon

Virginia lost one of her greatest sons today when E. Morgan Massey passed away after a brief battle with cancer. As author of his authorized biography, I had the good fortune to get to know him these past three years. At 94 years, he was a kind man, and a gentle man, and the people who knew him loved him. Continue reading →

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Show Us the Plan!

Posted on March 9, 2021 by | 4 comments

Parents Petition to the University of Virginia Administration

Dear UVA Administrators and Board of Visitors

We write to you today as a large, rapidly expanding coalition of UVA stakeholders including parents, students, and alumni who are increasingly concerned about the current living/learning conditions at the University of Virginia.

We fully appreciate the complexities involved in navigating operations during this pandemic and acknowledge the difficulties the Administration has faced keeping students, staff, faculty and the community safe. We placed our trust in your decision making over the past year but have become increasingly alarmed at the negative impacts your decisions are having on the environment that now exists. We can no longer stay silent and expect better efforts be made to improve the conditions under which students attending the university are now living and learning.

Below are a few examples of the issues we would like to highlight: Continue reading →

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Posted in Student health, safety, welfare

Surprise — Zero Intellectual Diversity in Diversity Speaker Series!

Posted on March 9, 2021 by | 1 comment


The University of Virginia perpetuated the damaging stereotype of African- American society as an intellectual monoculture today with the release of speakers in its upcoming Racial Equity Speaker series. The three speakers represent a narrow range of black views on the issue of racism in America. Continue reading →

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Posted in Intellectual diversity, Race, Equity and Diversity

Will Historians One Day Contextualize the Contextualizers?

Posted on March 8, 2021 by | 1 comment

by Walter Smith

The Virginia Magazine newsletter recently featured this article on two newly formed commissions: one to articulate the university’s commitment to free expression and inquiry, the other to pursue recommendations of the Racial Equity Task Force regarding the renaming of buildings and memorials.

Regarding the first commission, the fact that an internationally respected institution founded by Thomas Jefferson, perhaps history’s greatest advocate for free speech, finds it necessary to study the issue is damning on its own terms. No further comment needed.

My primary complaint dwells on the naming and renaming commission. To start with, I cannot believe a name of an inanimate building, thing or place is truly “harmful” to any thinking person. You could name the buildings after Hitler, Mao, Stalin, Idi Amin, Pol Pot, Nebuchadnezzar, Genghis Khan, or any other offensive person you can think of, and I would not be “harmed.” I might think you were stupid, but I wouldn’t be harmed. Continue reading →

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Posted in Freedom of speech and expression, Race, Equity and Diversity

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The Soul of the University – Still Thinking

Posted on March 4, 2021 by | Leave a comment

by James C. Sherlock

The battle for the soul of the University of Virginia is on writes Jim Bacon, like me an alumnus. There is apparently only one fighter on the side of freedom of expression, reasoned debate and the maintenance of order as key foundations of academic freedom. That is the Board.

University President Ryan has shown himself to be conflicted about those foundations. He has found himself frozen in several sets of headlights trying to maintain any of the three, much less all of them.

The left has replaced reason in education with “social-emotional learning.” Let’s hear from the “Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL)” (Did you doubt there would be such an organization?): Continue reading →

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Sign Standards for UVa’s Lawn Upheld

Posted on March 3, 2021 by | 1 comment

No longer allowed

by James A. Bacon

No longer will it be permissible for residents of the University of Virginia’s rooms on the Law to post large signs on their doors proclaiming, “F— UVA,” as a Lawn resident did last semester. Under new policies issued by the University administration, Lawn residents will have to confine their profane proclamations to within the borders of two message boards, reports the Cavalier Daily.

In a collective statement to the student newspaper, several Law residents criticized the new rules as prejudicial against students of color. The restriction, said the statement, will result in “increased surveillance,” which in turn will “inherently harm and endanger the most marginalized and vulnerable students in this space.”

“This policy displays the extent to which the University is selective about who can exercise free speech and the content of that expression. Evidently, BIPOC students and allies cannot be critical of the University while simultaneously living on the Lawn.” Continue reading →

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Posted in Freedom of speech and expression

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“Hard” and “Soft” Threats to Academic Freedom

Posted on March 1, 2021 by | Leave a comment

by James A. Bacon

Dismissals and de-platforming of conservatives in academia have gotten a fair amount of media attention, but they are only the most outrageous and visible of the threats to intellectual diversity on college campuses. In a new study for the Center for the Study of Partisanship and Ideology, Eric Kaufman, a professor of politics at the University of London, finds that lesser forms of discrimination against conservatives and other intellectual minorities, such as gender-critical feminists, occur outside of public view.

Continue reading →

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Posted in Freedom of speech and expression

Freedom for All or Just for Some?

Posted on March 1, 2021 by | Leave a comment

My son is a third year at UVA. Sadly, he is not having the experience he would have liked. He introduced me to your Jefferson Cabinet website. I thought I would share an email I recently sent to President Ryan. Keep fighting the good fight. — Georganne K. Mallas, CLAS 1995

Dear President Ryan,

I write to share that while I was appreciative of the University offering students a remote winter term class option at no additional tuition charge, I must say, I was appalled by the content of my son’s winter term class: The Art of Resistance. Continue reading →

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UVa’s COVID Commissars

Posted on February 26, 2021 by | Leave a comment

Woohoo!

by James A. Bacon

COVID-19 infections may have been trending down in Virginia for almost two months now, but they spiked at the University of Virginia several days ago, and the Ryan administration imposed tough new rules to curtail the spread. Not surprisingly, many students have violated the restrictions. In so doing, they have sparked a backlash that appears to be directed not at rule breakers generally but at offenses associated with fraternity and sorority activity.

Under the new COVID regime, in-person attendance at classes are allowed, but social gatherings are not. Students are allowed to walk to and from classes, work, dining or medical care, but otherwise told to isolate themselves. Inevitably, questions arose in the interpretations of the rules, and the Dean of Students clarified that two students could walk together, but they must wear masks and stay six feet apart.

Needless to say, fraternity and sorority parties are not allowed. Continue reading →

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