New Book Argues Student Choices Drive Higher Education Polarization
A new book by Colby College sociology professor Neil Gross, titled 'What Happened to College? How Politics Broke Higher Education and What We Can Do to Fix It,' published by Simon & Schuster, posits that students are largely responsible for the increasing political polarization on U.S. college campuses. Gross's research, which includes nationally representative surveys of four-year undergraduates and interviews with 100 students and recent alumni from 18 institutions, suggests that students actively create 'political bubbles' through their choices of roommates, friends, clubs, majors, and even the universities they attend. While conservatives often accuse universities of liberal indoctrination, Gross argues that colleges are not doing enough to counteract students' ideological self-isolation. He highlights that a significant number of students consider a university's political reputation when applying, leading to a growth of institutions becoming either more progressive or more conservative in their studen... 
