(Daily Mail) Top American universities including Harvard and Yale are peddling ‘woke hysteria’ by charging thousands of dollars for diversity, equity and inclusion courses that push controversial ideas which critics argue have ‘no place in America’.
Some of the country’s most revered institutions, including four out of the eight Ivy League universities, sell expensive ‘DEI Certificate’ programs which cover topics from microaggressions and unconscious bias to white privilege.
Harvard charges $12,400 for an online course that offers ‘critical knowledge and skills to address bias and marginalization’. At Yale, the $3,600 ‘Fostering Inclusion and Diversity’ program includes lessons on ‘combating unconscious bias’.
Dozens more institutions around the country also offer the courses, which are mostly taken online. Some can be completed in just a few days and many are targeted at business executives and individuals looking to break into the burgeoning DEI industry, which is worth an estimated $8 billion per year.
There is growing concern that colleges and universities are being permeated with left-wing ideologies at the expense of open debate and free speech. The issue reached boiling point earlier this month when a federal judge was abused by students at Stanford Law school as its Associate Dean for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion watched on but failed to intervene.
Harvard University (pictured) charges $12,400 for an online course that offers ‘critical knowledge and skills to address bias and marginalization’
Tracie Denise Jones (left) teaches diversity and inclusion management for the Harvard course while Lisa Nishii (right) wrote Cornell’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Certificate program
Cornell University’s online certificate costs $3,699 and includes courses on ‘counteracting unconscious bias’ and ‘fostering an inclusive climate’
Mike Gonzalez, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation think tank, told DailyMail.com: ‘There’s no place for this in American society, period. Least of all in a university, which is supposed to be devoted to truth discovery.’
Gonzalez said the courses push an ‘ideological, political strategy’ and produce ‘political commissars’, adding: ‘The sad thing actually is people could make good money out of this certificate because we have created this industry of nonsense.’
Jenna A. Robinson, president at the James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal, told DailyMail.com that most DEI training and education is ‘really run by activists rather than truth-seeking academics’.
‘I do not expect that these courses are academically rigorous at all,’ said Robinson, who reviewed some promotional material. ‘I think they are probably a cake walk and so they are selling the piece of paper.’
She said many university faculties across America are left-leaning to a ‘really considerable extent’, adding: ‘I think that the zeitgeist on campus and the faculty opinions on campus are all leaning in that direction anyway and so makes them more likely to offer and embrace these kinds of courses.’
‘I do think that they are cashing in on the current trend,’ Robinson said.
Harvard’s ‘Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging Leadership Graduate Certificate’, offered through its Extension School, comprises four courses billed at $3,100 each.
‘You will gain critical knowledge and skills to address bias and marginalization and to foster an inclusive corporate culture,’ the course summary states. It provides the ‘skills and tools you need to facilitate dialogue, address unconscious bias, and build an inclusive organizational culture’.
The certificate takes between one year and 18 months to complete and participants can earn credits through courses which include ‘Psychology of Diversity’, ‘Populism and the Erosion of Democracy’ and ‘Sex, Gender, and Sexuality’.
The course website’s featured faculty includes Tracie Denise Jones, who is also an assistant dean for DEI at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Jones, who teaches diversity and inclusion management, says ‘Diversity, Equity and Inclusion are not just words, they are intentional actions that we take everyday in our personal and professional lives’.
At Yale (pictured), the $3,600 ‘Fostering Inclusion and Diversity’ program includes lessons on ‘combating unconscious bias’.
Penn’s course is fronted by Adjunct Assistant Professor Ufuoma C. Abiola (left), who is described as a ‘proven DEI thought leader’. Yale’s ‘Fostering Inclusion and Diversity’ course is led by Heidi Brooks, who has a doctorate in psychology
