Washington Adventist University has announced that it will be suspending several degree programs, including Education (Traditional), BioChem/Chemistry, Communication, History, Math, and Political Science. Additionally, the Bachelor of Social Work program, offered in conjunction with Andrews University, will be discontinued as of June 30, 2020.
In its announcement, WAU blames the retrenchment on the Wuhan pandemic—”As pandemic prevails, WAU makes difficult, necessary adjustments.” Certainly, it was a tragic blunder to shut down schools and colleges over COVID-19, as it is less dangerous to school-age kids (ages 6 to 23) than typical seasonal flu. But, as with brick-and-mortar retail, the virus shutdowns are exacerbating underlying weakness, and WAU, formerly Columbia Union College, has been struggling for many years. Indeed, much of higher education that doesn’t have government funding or an Ivy League-sized endowment is in trouble.
This is partially due to weak demographics in the developed world—the current U.S. birthrate is around 1.7, and even lower among demographic groups who are better able to afford college—but it is also because people just aren’t buying what contemporary “higher education” is selling. Unfortunately, academia has allowed itself to become “the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird,” including Darwinism, feminism and socialism in all its manifestations and stratagems, including “social justice,” intersectionality, queer theory, etc.
Here is an abstract of an academic article called “Palestine and the Will to Theorise Decolonial Queering,” written by a professor at the London School of Economics, the alma mater of George Soros, David Rockefeller, and Mick Jagger:
This article posits a theorisation of decolonisation in relation to queer as it emerges from the settler-colonial context of Palestine, what I call decolonial queering. The first part provides a new reading of Zionist settler-colonialism, which I define as hetero-conquest. Its novelty lies in refocusing the question of colonialism in native grounded knowledge of queering, while showing the limitations of those existing studies whose frames emanate mainly from American and/or global north contexts of racism and homo-nationalism. By tracing the contemporary continuity of hetero-conquest in Palestine, the second part unpacks the need for a radical theory of liberation that weaves decolonization into queer. . . . such a theory emanates from the amalgam of histories, geographies and bodies, whose restoration beyond the strictures of hetero-conquest opens the way for a radical multi-scalar politics of liberation.
Would you pay $25,000 a year to have your child taught by anyone capable of producing a word-salad of gibberish like that? The real question is how much would you pay to avoid having your child victimized by that level of lunacy. (By the way, the thesis seems counterfactual, because the Israeli “hetero-conquerors” are more tolerant of homosexuality than the Palestinians—”Tel Aviv is the ultimate LGBTQ travel destination!” exclaims one website.)
Seventh-day Adventist colleges and universities will be secure when they offer an education based upon a thoroughly biblical worldview.
First, we are doing a terrible disservice to young people when we put them in debt to get an education. Many students are graduating with $100,000 or more in student loan debt (which cannot be discharged in bankruptcy), meaning that they cannot afford to serve the church in low-paying missionary or Bible work, or really do anything except be corporate or government drones. That needs to stop. We must return to a “work-study” program, as modeled by Madison College and taught be Ellen White. Students who are willing to work should be able to graduate free of debt.
Second, we need in all science courses to emphasize God as the creator. There should not be one hint of Darwinism, or “the infidel supposition that the events of the first week required seven vast, indefinite periods for their accomplishment.” If Darwinism, or even long-ages creationism, is true, the Seventh-day Adventist Church is a sick joke. Hiring a Darwinist professor is like a hiring an arsonist to burn down your uninsured house. Adventist campuses should be world-renown centers of creationism and intelligent design research.
Third, Adventist campuses should be “reactionary” centers of counterrevolution where it concerns any aspect of the Sexual Revolution. God created us male and female, not in 57 genders, and it is just as important to uphold that principle as to uphold the Bible Sabbath. The different roles of men and women should be acknowledge and embraced. Feminism should be seen for what it is, an attack on the created sexual order, and something that requires its exponents to “sever all connection with the third angel’s message.”
Fourth, among the professors there must be no hint or taint of Marxism or socialism. The reasons why private property and free markets lead to prosperity, abundance, and human flourishing while socialism leads to want, despotism, and mass death are very well understood and should be taught to students. Our campuses have long been, are, and should continue to be, open to students of every race, but there must never be a hint of racial grievance-mongering. Andrews made a ghastly mistake in hiring a “vice president of diversity”; that mistake should be reversed and not repeated.
If the Adventist colleges and universities would embrace these principles and reject the opposing principles of secular academia, they would have no trouble filling their classrooms and dormitories to overflowing. If you are selling something of real value, you will not want for buyers.