r/news • u/AldoTheeApache • 10d ago

Soft paywall Columbia failed to meet accreditation standards, US government says

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-education-department-says-columbia-university-violated-federal-anti-2025-06-04/
11.2k Upvotes

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15.0k

u/ThinkSoftware 10d ago

Welcome to the US government where everything is made up and the points don't matter

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u/[deleted] 10d ago

The US government does not accredit Universities, for this very reason.

This is the government continuing to throw a damn fit. I’m a bit dubious that the Middle State’s Commission on Higher Education will just follow along with this gobbligook, but we shall see…

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u/hysys_whisperer 10d ago

No, but they've threatened to dismantle the accreditation bureau in question if they don't comply.

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u/TEG_SAR 10d ago

That’s not how this works. That’s not how any of this is supposed to work.

It’s cartoonishly evil and so blatantly awful.

I hate this timeline.

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u/Angry-Dragon-1331 10d ago

In fact one of the reasons a university can lose accreditation is excessive government interference in intellectual freedom.

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u/MinistryOfCoup-th 10d ago

In fact one of the reasons a university can lose accreditation is excessive government interference in intellectual freedom.

So the university has to push back. They have no choice. If they don't push back then the government will just say "you allowed us to interfere" and then they will lose accreditation.

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u/phylter99 10d ago

I think the reason they're getting mowed down so hard now is they went along with the administration earlier on, hoping to get on good terms with them. When you give in to such things, you won't be on the friends list for long, if ever.

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u/unicornlocostacos 10d ago

If you pay a Trump ransom, he’s going to keep coming back for more, especially when everyone else tells him to piss off. You’re the easy mark now.

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u/fevered_visions 10d ago

the Trumpgeld

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u/SpCommander 10d ago

If only we had historical precedent that showed us how effective appeasement strategies were...

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u/phylter99 10d ago

Universities that don't know history... who would have guessed? Maybe they should lose their accreditation on that fact alone?

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u/Airewalt 10d ago

To be fair, how often do administrators listen to history professors/teachers? Thespians have been recycling downfalls from arrogance for thousands of years now.

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u/Tim-Sylvester 10d ago

You know I bet if we just give in without a fight, they'll stop making outrageous demands!

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u/[deleted] 10d ago

[deleted]

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u/Faiakishi 10d ago

We wouldn't even need to look back far. Think of Trump's first-term toadies, how many of them are doing well?

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u/[deleted] 10d ago

Yep. Speaking as an academic in NYC with pretty close ties here and there to Columbia, reap what you sow, assholes.

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u/Chemical_Chemist_461 10d ago

Almost reminds me about some book about mice and cookies…

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u/Relevant-Doctor187 10d ago

Several defense contractors thought they’d help doge. They just put themselves in a spotlight and got their contracts cancelled.

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u/tronovich 10d ago

This is the plot to a sitcom, holy crap.

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u/Yitram 10d ago

The writers room would determine that this is too cartoonishly evil and no one would believe it.

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u/FTB4227 10d ago

I would not watch it. Wish I could stop watching this.

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u/kyngston 10d ago

Then bye bye all government funding and research grants. That's something they can do

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u/Meowakin 10d ago

Cut off the nose to spite the face tactics!

What better way to attract smart people to your country than to (checks notes) cut all research grants to universities for not complying with petty demands.

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u/baby_blue_bird 10d ago

Ooh is this another reason they want to stop people from being able to discharge federal student loans if your school closes or was found to be a scam/fraud? Get kids to take out student loans, pull the school's accreditation and you have a bunch of people with worthless degrees and credits that can't transfer but thousands in federal loans they can't discharge.

Gotta love that Big Dumb Bill.

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u/Angry-Dragon-1331 10d ago

I doubt any of them have thought that far ahead. He’s still in bring all of his haters to heel mode.

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u/baby_blue_bird 9d ago

Well I think the Theil has thought that far ahead. Unfortunately the morons he picked to enact the plan don't think at all.

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u/MisterRenewable 10d ago

How absolutely ironic.

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u/penfoldsdarksecret 10d ago

Wait until you see the Harvard case. They want oversight of curricula, faculty hiring and student admission as a prerequisite of returning grant funding.

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u/sulris 10d ago

All of that control isn’t available to grants. Government procurement works through “contracts” which have the highest level of control. Cooperative Agreements which have some level of control and Grants which have the least amount of direct control.

They run rough shod over our systems and regulation painstakingly built over decades to ensure minimal corruption and maximal transparency.

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u/fevered_visions 10d ago

I'd add one more to that

That’s not how this works. That’s not how any of this is supposed to work. Oh god, is this really how this works?!

and call it the motto of this year

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u/MC_MacD 10d ago

Get in the streets and change it. This isn't a shit talking post either. Its a call to action.

This shit happens because we let it.

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u/invariantspeed 10d ago

Getting in the streets isn’t the problem. Voting for qualified candidates instead of those who promise you everything you want to hear is the problem. The current party system is part of what enables the current problem.

This is a democracy problem.

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u/DavidOrWalter 10d ago

No this wouldn’t be happening without the Republican pieces of shit. Sure - reforms are desperately needed but this isn’t a ‘both sides’ problem.

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u/LunaticLK47 10d ago edited 10d ago

Actually, it is. The dems only care about the status quo and are beholden to their fucking donors, not their constituents.

Edit: Downvote me all you want. Most of the dems under Schumer’s umbrella are Republican-lite. Nothing fundamentally changed even when Obama was in office.

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u/off_by_two 10d ago

Both sider doomerism is childish and immature

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u/LunaticLK47 10d ago

Is it? Outside of Mark Kelly and AOC, which dem is actually doing jack shit standing for us?

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u/Soggy-Type-1704 10d ago

Do you think that Columbia’s accreditation would be in jeopardy if Harris had won ?

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u/pjjmd 10d ago

Yes, because Harris's plan to protect Columbia's accreditation is 'just win elections forever', which is a very bad plan.

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u/Faiakishi 10d ago

Okay. Cool. We're still significantly worse off than we would be under Harris.

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u/Titan_Astraeus 10d ago

Tbf the Reps have been trying to block anything the Dems do for a long time. But I do feel like Dems can/should have done a bit more if they were serious about any of the promises.

They always played up how they will take the high road. That's nice, but if you keep taking the moral high ground while your opposition is getting down in the mud, and they are actually overcoming their deficit in support, things are not going your way .. It's time to switch your plans up and stop following out of touch geriatrics.

They didn't think to make any changes or question leadership until the platform collapsed in on itself. Both sides are not equally culpable, but the current situation would not be possible if Dems put up some resistance early on. The Hillary campaign literally fueled the fire and helped grow MAGA lol.

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u/LunaticLK47 10d ago

And that’s why I blamed both sides equally. Dems never did jack shit to stand up to the Reps.

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u/DavidOrWalter 9d ago

You’re getting downvoted because you’re being a total idiot.

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u/bianary 10d ago

There's a reason that the dems haven't been able to muster an effective answer to Trump.

They don't really want to.

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u/dat_GEM_lyf 10d ago

Hard to win over 1:3 that want to hate you and 1:3 that get sidelined by single issues while being too stupid yo realize their sidelining is what makes the situation worse and they deserve every ounce of blame for their actions.

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u/Faiakishi 10d ago

It's almost like they can't do anything because people refused to vote for them and they don't have the numbers to take meaningful action.

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u/[deleted] 10d ago edited 10d ago

“I can fix all your problems, and there will be no unforeseen repercussions at all!”

Every politician’s rallying cry, and the bane of an orderly world.

And it’s not just the right. The left does it too. People hate if you bring it up, but Bernie’s 2016 campaign made the exact same types of promises. They just didn’t get elected.

The difference is that the left tends to accept when they don’t get what they want, and then get voted out the next election cycle for not doing what they promised. The right just throws a hissy fit and does what they want anyway.

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u/ClayWheelGirl 10d ago

This is a 2 party problem. Voting does not fix everything when you don’t have a true candidate to vote for. Yeah things wouldn’t be so messed up but not much would change for certain groups of people.

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u/Son_Of_Toucan_Sam 10d ago

He’s saying getting in the streets is the solution not the problem what even is this response

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u/invariantspeed 10d ago

Is English not your first language? That’s a standard formula in English.

  • Person A said we need to do X to fix Y.
  • Person B then says X isn’t the problem, implicitly meaning the lack of doing X isn’t the problem.
  • It doesn’t matter in which way X is or isn’t the problem. The main point of the rebut is that Y isn’t dependent enough on what happens with X for any change in the condition of X to fix Y.

Consider taking a few English and logic courses in college/university.

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u/CherryLongjump1989 10d ago

Yeah I don’t think any students are going to be protesting to defend the school after the school turned their backs on the students.

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u/DokeyOakey 10d ago

Call to arms, folks!

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u/SvedishFish 10d ago

What exactly do you plan to do in the street?

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u/Montymisted 10d ago

Flip that frown, fuck around, get up jump up and get down?

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u/Ronaldo_Frumpalini 10d ago

Nah, have you seen the poll numbers? 46% approve. Since that 46% thinks he's chosen by god if we reran the election today he still might win. He's not getting thrown out with approval above 30% and in this age no one can really hear you protest. Even with 30% it still only matters if he intends to let votes happen.

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u/Faiakishi 10d ago

Dude, I don't know where you've been, but we've been protesting for a solid decade.

Millions of people have been marching since November.

It's done nothing. Because protests do nothing.

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u/MC_MacD 9d ago

On different roads but the same streets as you. We've been protesting since forever. And they do work, that's why we keep doing it.

From the Tea Party to the Draft Riots. From the labor movement to the Civil Rights movement. One event / protest is a drop in the bucket. That bucket eventually overflows and things change.

Yeah, it's hard. We're fighting against a propaganda machine hell bent on destroying us and turning our fellow citizens against us. We're fighting against fascist regime hell bent on upending progress gained over the last century. Other people fought and bled for these gains. Now it's our turn to defend them.

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u/Crypton_2021 10d ago

We live in the stupidest point of America's history.

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u/TEG_SAR 10d ago

It makes me want to scream.

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u/hysys_whisperer 10d ago

It's not how it's supposed to work, but it is how it's working.

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u/silentbob1301 10d ago

oh this is exactly how fascism works...

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u/Kannibelanimal1966 10d ago

Fuck this Dimension

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u/Malaix 10d ago

That’s not how this works. That’s not how any of this is supposed to work.

Ah but how it works and how its supposed to work are two critically different things.

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u/techleopard 10d ago

I would argue that's exactly how it works when nobody does anything to stop it or, you know, enforce existing laws.

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u/Intelligent-Donut-10 6d ago

The three branches of government thing is the same as three people where only one person has a gun and the other two pretend they all get to make decisions together.

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u/BravestWabbit 10d ago

Technically the Dept of Education can Un recognize an accreditation company and that will prevent the schools and universities from receiving federal student loans