Christina Lee, Head Photography Editor

A new president’s committee will attempt to discern the causes behind declining trust in higher education — and what universities can do to rebuild confidence. The committee of ten Yale professors will begin “a process of reckoning and reflection,” University President Maurie McInnis wrote in a Friday afternoon announcement.

To guide its work, the committee will ask for the perspectives of members of the Yale community, as well as a variety of “external experts” and “critics of higher education,” McInnis wrote to the News. Rather than requesting a report or specific outcome, she wrote, the committee will decide itself how to present its findings to McInnis.

A form on the committee’s website solicits comments from Yale affiliates and the general public. McInnis wrote that the group will also create some way for Yale community members to discuss this topic. Her announcement states that attempts to foster dialogue on campus may take place “in the classroom.”

Throughout the announcement, McInnis described the issue as concerning “public trust” in universities as they “come under attack in the public square,” and charged the committee with addressing “public perception.” She did not mention attacks from the federal government such as threats to revoke federal funding or rhetoric framing schools as liberal echo chambers, instead formulating the problem as a lack of confidence among the American people.

McInnis wrote that as universities attempt to understand falling trust, they must “redouble commitments to academic freedom and free speech. At the same time, they cannot operate sealed off from the society in which they are embedded, and which they were established to serve.” She noted that universities must combat “self-censorship” on campus.

The committee is co-chaired by history professor Beverly Gage and sociology professor Julia Adams. There is a professor on the committee from the School of Medicine, School of Management, School of Public Health, School of the Environment and the Law School. Three other faculty members in Yale College round out the group, working in the English, astronomy and physics and slavic languages and literatures departments.

McInnis wrote to the News that she selected these professors based on “several factors, including their ability to convene internal and external experts representing a broad range of views and their commitment to strengthening Yale and higher education more broadly.” 

Gage wrote to the News that the committee has not had its first meeting, so she cannot yet comment on the specifics of its work.

Adams called the president’s charge for the committee “especially important and timely.”

“We will cast a wide and inclusive net to be sure that many points of view are heard to inform the Committee’s deliberations,” she wrote.

McInnis explained she sees faculty governance as core to Yale. For her, this manifests in faculty committees, which conduct work as “part of my broader strategy of shaping Yale’s future” based on feedback she receives in meetings.

McInnis first identified declining trust in higher education as a priority she would address during her presidency in a November interview with the News.

Yolanda Wang contributed reporting.