Local Colleges Oppose Panel on Middle East

WASHINGTON — A group of New York universities are lobbying Congress against a plan to create an advisory panel to oversee federally funded Middle East studies programs.

The bill is being pushed by conservatives and pro-Israel forces concerned that Middle East studies programs funded in the name of improving America‘s national security have become shelters for professors and students hostile to American interests.

Rep. Howard Berman, a California Democrat, has spoken of “the anti-American bias that pervades…Middle East studies programs.” Examples include a Columbia University professor, Joseph Massad, who has claimed that “Zionist Jewish colonialism” was a “commitment to European white supremacy in Jewish guise.”

The lobbying effort has the potential to put Senator Clinton in a conundrum. She’s a member of the Senate’s Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, which has jurisdiction.

Lobbyists for New York colleges say they are looking to Mrs. Clinton for help in fending off the oversight panel, which they complain violates academic freedom.

Mrs. Clinton has also tried to stay on the good side of the pro-Israel community, which is a powerful constituency in New York.

The head of federal relations for New York University, Alicia Hurley, said New York universities are “very concerned” by a provision that would create an advisory board to oversee federally funded area-studies programs.

Representatives of a group of New York universities, including Cornell, Columbia,and NYU, met Friday with aides to 12 New York congressmen to discuss a range of issues, including the proposed advisory board, Ms. Hurley said. The meeting included representatives of Mrs. Clinton, Ms. Hurley said, adding she met with Mrs. Clinton. “The conversation with Senator Clinton went very well,” she said. “She understands our concerns.” She would not say whether Mrs. Clinton planned to work on the universities’ behalf. Mrs. Clinton and her aides did not answer repeated phone and e-mail requests for comment from The New York Sun.

New York University, Columbia University, Cornell University and the New School University will receive a total of more than $2 million in grants from 2003 to 2005 under Title VI of the Higher Education Act, according to the Department of Education. Overall funding for the Title VI program,which funds studies of the Middle East and other areas important to national security, has risen to more than $30 million in 2003, up 30% since 2001.

The main goal of the grants is to recruit government employees, according to the Department of Education web site. “There is a tendency to see the grants as entitlements,” said Daniel Pipes, a founder of Campus Watch, which monitors Middle East Studies on campus. “The purpose of the program is to strengthen the government capabilities in key areas…which seems like an outrageous proposition to the universities.”

A Hoover Institution fellow and National Review Online contributor, Stanley Kurtz, said university faculty who are funded by the Title VI grants funded in the House bill promote an antigovernment agenda.

He cited a Web site at New York University with essays on September 11, 2001 that sharply criticize American policy. “Naturally, it is right and proper that projects funded byTitle VI are governed according to standards of free speech and academic freedom,” he said. “Free speech, however, is not an entitlement to a government subsidy. And unless steps are taken to balance university faculties with members who both support and oppose American foreign policy, the very purpose of free speech and academic freedom will have been defeated,” he said.

A House bill creating the advisory panel was sponsored by the chairman of the Subcommittee on Select Education of the Education and the Workforce Committee, Rep. Peter Hoekstra. The section that the universities oppose says,"Nothing in this title shall be construed to authorize the board to mandate, direct, or control an institution of higher education’s specific instructional content, curriculum or program of instruction.”
“The Board is authorized to study, monitor, apprise, and evaluate a sample of activities supported under this title in order to provide recommendations to the Secretary or Congress for the improvement of programs under the title and to ensure programs meet the purposes of the title,” the bill says, referring to the secretary of education.

Even though the language says the board will not have authority to change curriculum, many universities and academics say it is not enough of a safeguard for free speech. “Put bluntly, the fear in the academic community is that even if the Board can’t review syllabi,funding can be used as a weapon to enforce the promulgation of a particularistic view of American interests,” said a lecturer in the department of political science at Yale University, Richard Marcus, in an email.

The language stating that the board could not “direct” universities was added to the bill following lobbying from higher-education interest groups, who have said they are still not satisfied with the safeguards.

“We believe the current legislation leaves open the possibility that the Advisory Board could intrude into the academic conduct and content of higher education and could impinge on institutional decisions about curriculum and activities,” said the president of the American Council on Education, David Ward, in a letter to Congress. “Indeed, the powers vested in the proposed advisory board make it more of an investigative, rather than an advisory, body.”

The director of government relations for Columbia University, Ellen Smith, said Columbia approves of an “independent” advisory board – something that is not included in the language of the bill, which creates a board that includes government representatives. “We felt that an advisory board with goals set by an independent body such as the National Academy of Sciences would make most sense,” she said.

Ms. Hurley said that the government exercises the appropriate amount of oversight through the grantmaking process. She said the best way for the government to recruit students was through loan-forgiveness plans.

Proponents of increased oversight say many scholarship programs, including Fulbright Fellowships and National Security Education Programs, have boards and that the government has a specific interest in ensuring that students move into government positions.

Mr. Kurtz suggested redirecting Title VI funds to the Defense Language Institute until the program can be reformed. “Under the umbrella of the Defense Language Institute, students with a desire to serve their country would have no fear of retaliation or ostracism from professors who view cooperation with the American government as immoral,” he said.

The Senate is not planning to pass a stand-alone bill like the House and will address the board issue as part of a larger higher-education bill early next year, said congressional aides close to the bill who asked not to be identified.

Ms. Hurley said New York University planned to work with Mrs. Clinton closely on the issue in 2004.