In Part II, I explore how universities could potentially mitigate or overcome the challenges, risks, and dangers identified in Part I: the problematic reduction of the value of a college education to the financial gain of graduates, the deemphasis on the traditional deeper values and moral purposes of education, the declining trust in colleges, and the injurious and punitive threats and attacks from Trump and the forces of MAGA (https://michaelnill.com/american-universities-in-danger-part-i-whats-happening-and-why).
Since the vulnerabilities of universities are multiple, strategies to deflect, mitigate, or overcome them will need to be varied. Success is by no means guaranteed. However, while the stakes and risks are high, in the best-case scenario this situation would actually serve to promote changes that in the long-term would strengthen our colleges and universities.
In Section A below, I discuss what universities can do reactively or defensively to withstand direct governmental demands from MAGA. In subsequent sections, I suggest longer-range approaches colleges can initiate in meeting their vulnerabilities, addressing problems, and regaining public trust.
Section A: Dealing with Attacks and Threats of MAGA
These threats demand immediate attention and represent the most serious vulnerability for two reasons: (1) if succumbed to, they jeopardize an institution’s integrity and independence from political control and (2) they are often accompanied by threats of economic strangulation if universities do not follow the desires of the Trump administration, at a time when they are already in financial difficulty from a declining college-age population and other factors.
As discussed in Part I, evidence strongly indicates that although these actions or threats have the veneer of a good-faith effort to improve universities or even to ensure they follow the law, their real intention is to disrupt and begin the process of achieving their ultimate goal of having universities conform to and promote MAGA beliefs.
Pursuing that ultimate goal will subject universities to never-ending new threats. And the tactics employed will continue to involve bullying, intimidation, and a willingness to test the limits of the law and the Constitution in the pursuit of that goal. The same tactics are being used against the media. There is no way to sugar coat this. Bullying is ultimately only stopped by isolating or removing the bully and his/her allies. In this case, Trump and the forces of MAGA would need to be swept from office by voters. Since that outcome is not a given, universities will need to be thinking of defending themselves for a potentially long struggle. But first, they must have strategies against the immediate threats.
In reality, their short-term options are quite limited. Universities can succumb to demands, negotiate, or file court challenges either individually or through joint legal action coordinated by various university associations. Taking a look at responses to some major MAGA initiatives shows that each of these approaches has been adopted, with varying results.
In the case of anti-DEI demands, for example, some universities immediately met the demands before concerted legal action against them was organized. The subsequent legal action turned out to be successful on grounds that the demands threatened the free speech of educators, failed to define clearly the terms DEI, and overrode civil rights protections.
Government charges of allowing discrimination, exclusively directed at antisemitism and accompanied by threat of a freeze on federal funding, were also met with varied responses. They included a successful lawsuit by Harvard and negotiations undertaken by various universities that sometimes had them agreeing to pay millions of dollars to unfreeze funds.
Another approach the administration is using to make demands is through control of criteria used in the process of accrediting universities. After the original plans for this were viewed as beyond overreach, a committee of accreditors agreed to meet with administration officials to avoid an even worse outcome. A draft has been agreed to, but not endorsed by committee members (https://www.chronicle.com/article/whats-in-the-trump-administrations-final-proposal-for-overhauling-college-accreditation?). A final plan should be ready by the end of the year. Once that is announced, there already seem to be plans in place to file a lawsuit against the changes as an intrusion on the independence of institutions of higher education.
At this point, it is clear that legal action, and especially joint legal action when appropriate, is the best defense against government interference. The more universities can put aside their rivalries and work together on planning and meeting these attacks the better chance, I think, they have of success.
The wrong move for higher education institutions is to work in isolation, negotiate individually, or succumb, whatever the reasons their administrations or boards may have to favor such responses: fear of the loss of federal funding, hope for some competitive advantage over other schools, or a belief that the demand in question seems valid. Such an approach sets a precedent that makes not just these institutions but all universities vulnerable to further government control of education.
However, avoiding this precedent does not mean that universities should not assess and address the potentially legitimate issues underlying the administration’s accusations, as I discuss in Section C. To the extent possible, this should be done at the initiative of the colleges themselves in order to maintain their independence from the government and politicians.
Private universities are typically in a better position to resist the demands than public ones, which are far more beholden legally to their state governments and politically appointed governing boards. Their prospects seem ominous. Faculties at some schools are feeling besieged and confused about exactly what they are or are not allowed to say in the classroom. As a recent article in The Chronicle of Higher Education sees it (https://www.chronicle.com/article/the-future-of-the-public-research-university):
Explicitly partisan goals are being imposed on [public] higher education, disrupting the salience of professional expectations. Since 2023, 32 laws in over a dozen red states have been enacted to limit or eliminate campus activities supporting diversity, equity, and inclusion. Some states are even asserting direct control over the curriculum, such as a suite of legislation under consideration in Iowa. As a result, public universities [across blue and red states] no longer operate under a single set of professional values and standards. Partisan blocs are forming, with distinct political missions and regulatory regimes.
If so, this is not just a matter of succumbing to MAGA on this or that point. It also means losing sight of the essentials of a university as a place for independent, free exploration of what is true for the purpose of enriching and benefiting its students and society at large. My advice here is that, if at all possible, public universities should form or shore up existing joint associations that span both red and blue states to stake out some universal claim for independence from politicians. For universities in states with strong MAGA identities among elected officials and governing boards, maintaining independence will be an uphill battle to say the very least.
In the next sections, I turn to what higher education can do on its own initiative to meet its vulnerabilities. The vulnerabilities mostly have to do with colleges or undergraduate divisions of universities. Those will be my focus.
Section B: Highlighting the Purposes of Colleges
For some time, universities have been weakened by emphasizing the value of higher education in terms of good financial outcomes for graduates and deemphasizing deeper, more traditional purposes. This focus and the desire of parents and students to secure such outcomes has pushed colleges to emphasize job readiness programs at the expense of any liberal arts requirements in the humanities or social sciences. However, with tuition having far outpaced inflation and the job market now uncertain, the economic gain argument has become increasingly problematic and, hence, also the value of a college education.
Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act adds an unfortunate new dimension to this issue. It demands that a college degree produce economic gain by mandating colleges to measure the economic gain for each of their programs. If the mean salary of graduates in four years for any particular major does not indicate they are doing better than high school graduates, the federal government will reduce or end financial aid for students in that major or program. Since that bill is now law, the mandate is a given, although the Dept. of Education can regulate the application of the law. Its specifics, then, are open to some change.
However, according to an extensive, recent study, even after paying high tuitions, graduates in every major are still financially ahead of high school graduates by $200,000 to $35,000 depending on one’s major after 15 years from starting college (https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2026/05/14/here-are-undergraduate-programs-that-are-paying-off-ones-that-arent/). But that is after 15 years, not 4.
Moving from economic to educational reasons to attend college
The above article belatedly mentions towards the end that college is about more than money; and in its twisted, contradictory way, MAGA recognizes that too. As we saw in Part I, it acknowledges and even promotes the larger purposes with its talk of patriotic education, the study of founding texts and civics, and even Classical education—but in the service of an exclusionary group molded by MAGA beliefs, much like the model Orban established in Hungary (https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2026/05/27/rise-conservative-civic-education-programs-universities/). Just recently, the Dept. of Education announced a partnership with more than 40 conservative organizations “to promote a civic education that teaches American history, values, and geography with an unbiased [sic] approach” (https://www.npr.org/2025/09/17/nx-s1-5544582/u-s-education-dept-unites-conservative-groups-to-create-patriotic-civics-content).
Perhaps unwittingly, MAGA thus opens the door for colleges to return to exposing students to the humanities and social sciences and to craft traditional mission statements that speak to the values of a non-exclusionary humanity that bind us together in a search for truth and the common good. That is why I was so disappointed in the recommendations of a recent Yale committee report on Trust in Higher Education that looked critically at ways to improve. While I saluted the statement in Recommendation 8 that “educational value cannot be reduced to a future paycheck,” I was distressed at Recommendation 2 that reduces the mission of the entire university simply to “create, disseminate, and preserve knowledge through research and teaching” (https://president.yale.edu/sites/default/files/2026-04/Report-of-the-Committee-on-Trust-in-Higher-Education.pdf). The previous version at least had committed Yale “to improving the world today and for future generations.”
The recommended statement seems so neutral that it sounds as though it was designed to win Trump’s approval—nothing in it about the value and purpose of knowledge or the environment in which it is explored, how it is related to society, how the moral dimension or values fit in, or what is expected of graduates. In Recommendation 8, after saying educational value can’t be reduced to paychecks, it grants the additional value of the graduates who make public contributions such as journalists and those in government service. But shouldn’t it be part of a university’s mission that all their graduates contribute to the good of society regardless of their profession? In contrast, the mission of Yale’s undergraduate division thankfully still speaks to the moral and broader purposes of education.
To strengthen undergraduate education in these troubling times, each college should craft and abide by mission statements and related documents that incorporate some of the points in the above paragraph to highlight the important and indispensable functions universities perform in helping to nurture the next generation of knowledgeable, critical-thinking, and ethical citizens. At the suggestion of Lee Bollinger, I would also include something about the university’s need to be independent of political pressure or control if it is to perform its essential and disinterested task of pursuing what is true (https://www.chronicle.com/article/universities-need-a-new-defense). This freedom ideally operates in line with a commitment to our constitutional democracy and to moral standards of decency such as respect for persons, avoidance of the abuse of others, compassion, and honesty.
Such public governing documents would, I think, help universities ward off attacks from the government. At the same time, they would provide publicly-accessible criteria by which universities can evaluate themselves or be evaluated, with the potential of increasing public trust. The documents should also convey a commitment and rationale for ethnic and racial diversity and an environment free of discrimination.
Committing to some requirements in the humanities and social sciences
Statements that reference the deeper purposes of education would be mere window-dressing, however, if they do not lead to undergraduate course or subject area requirements that have students grapple with texts that raise questions of what it is to be human and lead a good life; explore issues in American history, civics, and society; and engage in arguments with civility and respect for evidence. As David Brooks writes,
People absorb their moral values, their sense of purpose, and their way of life from within a tradition…. [And an important part of that] tradition of moral wisdom is the body of work we call humanism—the great novels, paintings, poems, dramas, histories, and philosophical tracts by thinkers and artists from all over the globe…(https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/2026/05/reactionary-traditionalism-worldview/686597/).
Students need some familiarity with that tradition. Unlike MAGA courses, the courses proposed here would not restrict texts and sources to those from Western Civilization, Christianity, and the white race.
I would suggest a group of at least four such courses for all undergraduates regardless of their major. Crucial, too, is that these courses be taught well. The reality is that among larger universities especially, teaching undergraduates well is not a priority (https://www.chronicle.com/article/how-our-growth-obsessed-universities-spiraled-out-of-control?). If taught engagingly, a potential added benefit for faculty and students is that they might attract additional students to major or minor in the humanities or other majors that at present are bleeding enrollment to those that seem to provide more immediate access to certain professions or more immediate higher salaries.
Ultimately, colleges need to focus on the message to students, parents, and the public at large that undergraduate education is more about process than product. Yes, it provides a diploma, but it exists to provide the skills and desire for continued lifetime learning and openness to a life of thoughtful, meaningful engagement with the world and those around us. With such messaging and perspectives, perhaps there would be fewer students looking at college as getting through a series of hoops the quickest and easiest way possible.
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TO BE ONTINUED: Subsequent sections will focus on analysis and corrective suggestions for operational problems such as tuition costs and grade inflation and politicized accusations regarding DEI, discrimination, and lack of viewpoint diversity.