By Sarah Holliday

Only after years of prominent and disruptive campus activism, Harvard University President Alan Garber has confessed: universities, including his own, “went wrong” by permitting professors to inject their personal political views and ideological agendas into the classroom. He argued that this practice has led to free speech being chilled, open debate being discouraged, and the creation of intimidating environments where many students hesitate to challenge authority figures or speak openly about their own views.

Garber made these remarks during an interview with the Shalom Hartman Institute’s “Identity/Crisis” podcast in mid-December. His primary argument was simple: true academic excellence, far from subjective opinions, requires objectivity in the classroom. “[T]hink about it,” Garber said. “If a professor in a classroom says, ‘This is what I believe about this issue,’ how many students — some of you probably would be prepared to deal with this, but most people wouldn’t — how many students would actually be willing to go toe-to-toe with a professor who expressed a firm view about a controversial issue?”

He went on to tie this dynamic to broader challenges in fostering tolerance for disagreement, including the aftermath of the October 7, 2023, Hamas attacks on Israel. Garber noted that some faculty members promoted anti-Israel views in class only shortly after the tragedy, contributing to a climate where subtle forms of exclusion — such as “social shunning,” as he put it — became the most pervasive issue, particularly for Jewish and Israeli students on his campus and beyond.

The president, whose contract was recently extended for an “indefinite term,” emphasized a generational shift in attitudes toward free speech and teaching norms, explaining that when professors openly declare firm views on controversial issues, most students hesitate to counter them. The Harvard Crimson, the university’s student newspaper, responded to Garber’s remarks. It referred to them as rare and unusual, yet simultaneously the “most explicit public acknowledgement that faculty practices have contributed to a breakdown in open discourse on campus — and that he is committed to backtracking toward neutrality in the classroom.” Another Crimson article even went on to state that “Garber is the right choice for turbulent times.”

As the paper emphasized, these comments mark a significant shift, with Garber himself having expressed optimism: “I’m pleased to say that I think there’s real movement to restore balance in teaching and to bring back the idea that you really need to be objective in the classroom.”

Notably, this all comes amid heightened national scrutiny of elite universities. Ivy League schools like Harvard, for example, have faced criticism over their handling (or mishandling) of campus activism related to the Israel-Hamas war. This would include allegations of anti-Semitism and free speech concerns. To address these concerns, the Trump administration has taken an aggressive stance, freezing billions in federal funding for institutions deemed to have failed to respond appropriately to these issues. In one instance last year, the administration froze over $2.2 billion in grants and contracts to Harvard alone after the university rejected demands related to protest policies, DEI programs, and anti-Semitism measures — all part of a broader campaign pressuring schools to curb activism and address what many see as discrimination.

Harvard, even when considering some of the changes Garber has instituted, has resisted some federal orders, arguing they infringe on its independence and constitutional rights. Even so, Garber’s leadership has introduced key reforms, including adopting an institutional voice policy, which aims to commit the university and its senior leaders to neutrality on public policy issues that are unrelated to its core academic functions. Other changes involve revised protest rules, new student orientation modules on how to discuss controversial topics productively, and comprehensive task force reports addressing bias against Jewish, Israeli, Muslim, Arab, Palestinian, and other groups.

And further illustrating the ongoing responses to past ideological expressions, Harvard recently removed Gregory Davis from his position as Allston Burr Resident Dean of Dunster House. The decision followed the resurfacing by student-run outlet Yard Report of Davis’s social media posts from 2019 to 2024, which included anti-white sentiments such as a 2019 post stating, “It’s almost like Whiteness is a self-destructive ideology that annihilates everyone around it. By design.” His posts also included attacks on police, including a 2020 post urging people to tell cop friends to resign because they’re “racist and evil,” as well as a 2024 Pride Month message to “love each other and hate the police.” Davis even offered a defense of rioting in a 2020 post, claiming, “rioting and looting are parts of democracy just like voting and marching.”

Now, the question is: does this move align with Garber’s push for greater objectivity and reduced ideological injection in campus life? Furthermore, will his comments or related actions serve as a model that other universities will follow? As Harvard navigates turbulent times under Garber’s leadership, only time will tell whether his recent reflections signal a potential turning point. Whether this leads to lasting cultural change remains to be seen, but Garber’s words offer a clear diagnosis many have long emphasized: universities thrive when they prioritize objectivity and debate over ideology and politics.

Sarah Holliday is a reporter at The Washington Stand.