Scholars Line Up To Join Anti-‘Woke’ Online Education Platform
Scholars Line Up To Join Anti-‘Woke’ Online Education Platform
BY TYLER DURDEN THURSDAY, MAY 13, 2021 - 10:45 PM Submitted by Peter Svab of The Epoch Times,
Hundreds of scholars, including some distinguished figures, have
applied for positions at an online education startup that promises explicitly
non-“woke” instruction in a number of academic disciplines.
Named
“American Scholars,” the project was started
several months ago by Matthew Pohl, former University of Pennsylvania
admissions officer. As soon as word got out, résumés started to stream in from
academics offering their participation, its leaders said.
Pohl described the project as the fruit of his gradual
disillusionment with his career in the academic world, where he drove
admissions at several prestigious universities. He noticed that with regard to
education, most students weren’t getting their money’s worth, attributing that
to the “administrative bloat” of establishment colleges, as well as the spread
of quasi-Marxist ideologies that have come to be collectively known as
“wokeness.”
He intends the project as an antidote to both. The interactive
format of part-lecture, part-documentary video with quizzes, and feedback
sessions will aspire to demonstrate that quality learning can be furnished at a
fraction of the cost of a modern-day college. Meanwhile, the content itself
will be rooted in traditional American values, in sharp contrast to the
ideologies currently dominating most universities that promote hostility toward
such values.
“There is a massive and unrecognized demand for actual
professors, business leaders, real thinkers whom regular people can associate
with and learn from to better understand how they can live better lives through
the Constitution and through conservative values,” Pohl told The Epoch Times,
later adding that the guiding principles of the project could be more
accurately described as “classical liberalism.”
“We actually expect a significant number of people who do not
identify as conservative to join us—simply because they agree with our values,”
he said in an email.
For the role of chief academic officer, who is responsible for
the scholarly grade of the content, Pohl tapped Michael Rectenwald, a retired
liberal studies professor at New York University.
Having given up his communist beliefs, Rectenwald left his job
after he irked colleagues by criticizing the woke ideology. He went on to
become an authority on
corporate socialism, a convergence of government and business
interest in establishing a novel form of totalitarian, socialist rule. He’s
authored several books on the topic, including “Google
Archipelago: The Digital Gulag and the Simulation of Freedom,” which warns
against the rising power and ambitions of gigantic digital companies.
American Scholars will offer modules taught by bona fide
academics on history, the Constitution, the natural sciences, math, writing,
business, economics and personal finance, ideological studies, literature,
technology science, law, and religious studies, Rectenwald said.
He’s already received applications from several hundred
scholars, including some prominent names, from which he’ll be soon picking the
first 10 instructors.
“We even have chairs of departments interested in working for
us,” he said.
Rectenwald shared with The Epoch Times a sample of the
applicants’ names under the condition that they won’t be released for now, as
none of them has yet been selected for any of the positions. In addition,
Rectenwald has his own list of “top-notch talent” he’ll ask to come onboard.
“It’s going to be something where they’re able to deliver
content in the way they want to, without the pressures that are being exerted
on them in the university system to accommodate various ideologies like critical race theory and socialism and
postmodernism and so forth,” he said, adding that such ideologies also will be
taught, but from a critical standpoint.
The first offerings, planned to start in the fall, will focus on
history, the Constitution, economics, and personal finance, he said.
The material will be suited for homeschoolers, college prep, as
well as adult learning.
The project doesn’t seek to be accredited as an actual
university, but rather to equip its alumni with the knowledge to “push back
against some of the pernicious ideologies that are being purveyed in the
system,” Rectenwald said.
“We’ve got to be frank. We’re in the midst of a major culture
war.”
The content range, as well as the format of the platform, was
selected based on a series of focus group polls of a total of about 1,000
families, Pohl said. Personal finance, for example, stood out as both an acute
interest of the poll respondents as well as a blind spot of the current
university system, where students often sign up for massive debt with little to
no calculation of return on investment that would allow them to make such
decisions adeptly, according to Pohl.
Development of the online platform is run by an expert who for
now requires anonymity, due to his involvement with Big Tech, Pohl said.
So far, the project is self-funded with some offers coming in
from investors, he said. He plans a subscription model starting at $19 a month
and scaling up to about $39 a month for premium access.
American Scholars fits into a growing selection of education platforms that approach their material from a more traditional standpoint. The conservative Hillsdale College offers free courses on a variety of politically relevant subjects, while PragerU recently began offering an online education portal for K–12 students.
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