Time was when America’s leading colleges and universities were eager to accept top-quality high school students, and would then teach them well. Today, however, top-quality students are apt to be rejected unless they have the correct racial background, and the teaching they receive is loaded with toxic ideology.

In today’s Martin Center article, John Mac Ghlionn looks at this alarming situation.

He writes:

Officially, elite schools offer a neat story. Competition has exploded. Applications are up. Acceptance rates are down. The bar is simply higher than ever before. But look closer and you’ll find gaping holes in this carefully crafted narrative. This isn’t merely the arithmetic of supply and demand. It’s a complete rewriting of the rules of merit—and a quiet betrayal of the very principle that made these institutions powerful in the first place.

Merit? Individual excellence? Nah — they’re all into social engineering. If you want to get accepted, find some way to present yourself as a victim.

What to do? Ghlionn answers, “There are urgent steps that must be taken. Federal funding must be tied directly to verifiable merit-based admissions. Foreign donations must be audited, exposed, and, if necessary, banned. New universities — genuinely independent, genuinely meritocratic — must be built. Every institution that prioritizes ideology over excellence must be put on notice: adapt or lose public funding.”

Read the whole thing.