The Associated Press published a story about my university
this past weekend highlighting its many acts of anticipatory obedience and
school administrators’ shock that it wasn’t enough to prevent the loss of
federal funding. Beyond that, I’m afraid the point of the story escapes me. What
is my campus telling us without saying it? Is this a whispered warning to similarly
small campuses that capitulation does not protect you from attack? Is it a mea
culpa for not demonstrating moral leadership to its students, staff, and community?
It is interesting that this story was not picked up by local news outlets; it was
only reported by national media AP and ABC News. So, who is the intended
audience and what is the message?
I disagree with the writer’s characterization of my campus as
apolitical. Education is a foundational institution of democracy and has been
under attack since the Reagan Administration. My campus is a prime target of nationally
funded local organizations that support the agenda to destroy all democratic
institutions clearly laid out in Project 2025. But this project isn’t new. The
narrative undermining education, including my campus, has been drip fed for
years by the Koch Foundation and Christian Nationalist organizations.
Charles Koch, owner of Koch Industries, is a key funder of
the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), a corporate bill mill, and
the State Policy Network (SPN), a network and service organization
for the "state-based free market think tank movement," and its stated
mission is "to provide strategic assistance to independent research
organizations devoted to discovering and developing market-oriented solutions
to state and local public policy issues.”
Koch Foundation contributions to CU began in 2009 with
$23,000 for “educational programs.” Contributions
expanded to include the CU Foundation and the Board of Regents. Contributions
to UCCS specifically began in 2013 with a mere $5,000 but hit the six-figure
range for the first time in 2016. Then Political Science Department Chair Dunn
invited Trump to hold political rallies on UCCS campus twice likely betting on
energizing the extremists within a 60-40 gerrymandered red congressional
district consisting of the second largest city in Colorado and five military
installations. Cat litter queen and QAnon follower Heidi Ganahl was elected to
the CU Board of Regents. This was my first year as a grad student in public
administration.
By 2017, Koch contributions to CU Boulder and UCCS grew into
millions of dollars. I noticed the loss of Local Government courses in my degree
program “due to lack of interest.” I guess my interest was irrelevant. The Koch
Foundation contributed $1.49 million to CU to establish a right-wing research center.
In 2019, the Center for the Study of Government and the Individual, led by
Dunn, set to work reinterpreting the version of the founding documents, civics
education, and economics that fit the world according to Koch and the rest of
the 1%. Their original mission statement thanks to the Wayback Machine: “The Center for the Study
of Government and the Individual (CSGI) exists to explore the constitutional,
economic, political, and social foundations of a free, flourishing, and
prosperous society, and to provide a vehicle for the candid discussion of the
proper relationship between government and individuals. Our vision is a
citizenry that is equipped for the challenges of self-government ahead of us.” Ominous then, confirmed
by the present danger. Thankfully, I managed to graduate in the nick of time in
2018. Finding zero opportunities with local nonprofits I went back for a PhD as
COVID got underway.
In January 2021, following the attempted coup in D.C. my
campus inbox started receiving the Koch Bros disinformation rag The Epoch Times
indicating their contributions bought access to data and contact lists. I
flagged 36 emails between January 18th to March 2nd as spam and reported them
to campus IT. I also blocked the emails so I don’t know how long the
disinformation was allowed to spread or if it’s ongoing.
I got in trouble in one of my courses for calling out the fact
that Reagan’s education department manufactured the education crisis. I was
admonished and given a poor grade. Oh well. I think it’s relevant
that Dunn taught stats in my program before leading the Koch funded Center. It
seems he left a stain. Anyway, I’ll say it again here, Reagan began defunding
education and justified it with disinformation (lies) about student learning
and teacher qualifications, most of it economic class-based and race-based.
Furthermore, Reagan’s campaign gained power alongside what was then called the
Christian Right, now Christian Nationalism. Obama shifted control over
education to the states in 2015 further opening the door for the extremists. What
happens in K-12 doesn’t stay in K-12, it impacts access to higher education.
The alliances that started with Reagan remain active today. Not
only are the Koch Bros all over the campus with their anti-democracy reprogramming,
but the Christian Nationalists have been very active on campus, too. The center
of it seems to be coming from or at least supported by the Woodland Park cult
at Charis Bible College. It hosts an annual Truth and Liberty Coalition conference
including a weird cross of televangelism and war planning presented by
organizations including Turning Point USA whose agenda is to organize protests
at the state and national capitol, attack libraries and schools with book bans,
and take over school boards. Seriously, you can’t walk from the UCCS library to
the parking garage without bumping into a sandwich board announcing a bible
study meeting sponsored by Turning Point, or
from the library to the student union and not have some fake-friendly
middle-aged balding white dude trying to hand you a bible. I know there had
been complaints in the past year over dogma-motivated bullying. It’s not a secret
on campus that the campus is a target. What is my campus telling us without
telling us? Am I facing another nick of time deadline saddled with huge student
loan debt and no prospects? Or is it worse? Is Christian Nationalism waiting in
the wings to “save” education?
I’ll end with this thought. I never expected to go to college, but I had been told it was the only way out of a life of poverty. Without financial aid I would not have had the opportunity to find my path. Universities are for students to figure out what inspires them, what kind of creativity appeals to them, what life are they meant to lead, and then follow it. How dare anyone limit access to finding your path to the few whose heritage owns the wealth to provide it. The future laid out by the 1% and Christian Nationalism recalls the worst of our past and they are just getting started. If capitulation is all I can expect from my university, I’m scared.
