EXCLUSIVE: Top American universities including Harvard and Yale accused of peddling 'woke hysteria' by charging thousands of dollars for politically-charged diversity, equity and inclusion courses that are 'run by activists'
Harvard charges $12,400 for an online DEI course and Penn's is nearly $10,000. Courses cover ideas like microaggressions, unconscious bias and privilege. Even the US Air Force recently launched a hiring spree for DEI managers on salaries up to $180,000 per year whose responsibilities include 'ensuring a culture of inclusion' and achieving the military's 'inclusion mission'.
By Lewis Pennock
Daily Mail
March 26, 2023
Jenna A. Robinson, president at the James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal, told DailyMail.com that most DEI training and education is 'really run by activists rather than truth-seeking academics'
![Mike Gonzalez, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation think tank, told DailyMail.com: 'There's no place for [DEI] in American society, period. Least of all in a university, which is supposed to be devoted to truth discovery'](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2023/03/26/12/69084253-11895941-Mike_Gonzalez_a_senior_fellow_at_the_Heritage_Foundation_think_t-a-15_1679831032269.jpg)
Mike Gonzalez, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation think tank, told DailyMail.com: 'There's no place for [DEI] in American society, period. Least of all in a university, which is supposed to be devoted to truth discovery'
Top American universities including Harvard and Yale are peddling 'woke hysteria' by charging thousands of dollars for diversity, equity and inclusion courses that push controversial ideas which critics argue have 'no place in America'.
Some of the country's most revered institutions, including four out of the eight Ivy League universities, sell expensive 'DEI Certificate' programs which cover topics from microaggressions and unconscious bias to white privilege.
Harvard charges $12,400 for an online course that offers 'critical knowledge and skills to address bias and marginalization'. At Yale, the $3,600 'Fostering Inclusion and Diversity' program includes lessons on 'combating unconsciousDozens more institutions around the country also offer the courses, which are mostly taken online. Some can be completed in just a few days and many are targeted at business executives and individuals looking to break into the burgeoning DEI industry, which is worth an estimated $8 billion per year.
There is growing concern that colleges and universities are being permeated with left-wing ideologies at the expense of open debate and free speech. The issue reached boiling point earlier this month when a federal judge was abused by students at Stanford Law school as its Associate Dean for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion watched on but failed to intervene.
Stanford's Graduate School of Business offers a $1,500 course titled 'Leverage Diversity and Inclusion for Organizational Excellence'.
Mike Gonzalez, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation think tank, told DailyMail.com: 'There's no place for this in American society, period. Least of all in a university, which is supposed to be devoted to truth discovery.'
Gonzalez said the courses push an 'ideological, political strategy' and produce 'political commissars', adding: 'The sad thing actually is people could make good money out of this certificate because we have created this industry of nonsense.'
Jenna A. Robinson, president at the James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal, told DailyMail.com that most DEI training and education is 'really run by activists rather than truth-seeking academics'.
'I do not expect that these courses are academically rigorous at all,' said Robinson, who reviewed some promotional material. 'I think they are probably a cake walk and so they are selling the piece of paper.'
She said many university faculties across America are left-leaning to a 'really considerable extent', adding: 'I think that the zeitgeist on campus and the faculty opinions on campus are all leaning in that direction anyway and so makes them more likely to offer and embrace these kinds of courses.'
'I do think that they are cashing in on the current trend,' Robinson said.
Harvard's 'Equity, Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging Leadership Graduate Certificate', offered through its Extension School, comprises four courses billed at $3,100 each.
'You will gain critical knowledge and skills to address bias and marginalization and to foster an inclusive corporate culture,' the course summary states. It provides the 'skills and tools you need to facilitate dialogue, address unconscious bias, and build an inclusive organizational culture'.
The certificate takes between one year and 18 months to complete and participants can earn credits through courses which include 'Psychology of Diversity', 'Populism and the Erosion of Democracy' and 'Sex, Gender, and Sexuality'.
The course website's featured faculty includes Tracie Denise Jones, who is also an assistant dean for DEI at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Jones, who teaches diversity and inclusion management, says 'Diversity, Equity and Inclusion are not just words, they are intentional actions that we take everyday in our personal and professional lives'.
The University of Pennsylvania, another Ivy League institution, charges $9,368 for its 'Certificate in Social Difference, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion'. Participants also pay a $576 online services fee to enroll.
A course summary states: 'Today more than ever, there is an urgent need to identify and address the social histories and contexts of structural inequities such as systemic racism, sexism, classism, queerphobia, xenophobia, and other forms of institutional discrimination.'
The course includes teaching about intersectionality, how to properly use 'the vocabulary of social difference, diversity, equity, and inclusion'. Students come away prepared to 'contextualize difference and structural bias within mainstream professional contexts'.
Penn's course also teaches how to 'grapple with systemic practices that uphold historical relationships to various forms of power in society'.
Penn's faculty is fronted by Adjunct Assistant Professor Ufuoma C. Abiola, whose university profile describes her as a 'proven DEI thought leader'.
Yale offers a three-week online program titled 'Fostering Inclusion and Diversity' for $3,600. It promises it 'delivers the skills leaders need to build more inclusive and diverse teams'.
The course, which involves five hours of work per week, teaches the 'known and unknown barriers to building inclusive and diverse teams, such as making the business case and combating unconscious bias'.
Senior lecturer Dr Heidi Brooks fronts the Yale course.
Cornell University's online certificate costs $3,699 and includes courses on 'counteracting unconscious bias' and 'fostering an inclusive climate'. The course price was discounted to $2,589 on Friday as it recruits students for its April intake.
The material states: 'Despite decades of legal and social reform aimed at reducing discrimination in the workplace, inequality continues to be a significant problem in all societies and most workplaces.'
Cornell's course is led by Professor Lisa Nishii, who has also written three other DEI-related courses for the university, along with others about HR. She is an 'expert on inclusion in organizations', her biography states.
These courses can qualify individuals for plum jobs in both the private and public sector as DEI managers. Many organizations have established new DEI departments in recent years that dictate policies around hiring and diversity training.
The US Air Force recently launched a hiring spree for DEI managers on salaries up to $180,000 per year whose responsibilities include 'ensuring a culture of inclusion' and achieving the military's 'inclusion mission'.
Gonzalez said many of the nebulous terms used in DEI have been 'corrupted' and added: 'Inclusion now means exclusive, it excludes people with certain beliefs. It's the same thing with diversity and equity.
'Equity is the worst - equity means that the government and the private sector must treat people unequally according to their race.'
Robinson said DEI generally is 'a lot of jargon... it's almost like a group therapy session and not a lot of substance of education.'
She added: 'DEI doesn't work the way that we want it. It doesn't make companies better run, it doesn't make them more hospitable, it certainly doesn't make them better performing or more profitable and so I think that what they are really selling is virtue signaling.
'A lot of companies right now want to do that, they want to signal that they are inclusive and diverse and all of those things and I am sure that there is demand for these kinds of programs but I think there's probably not really any valuable substance to them.'
A DEI certificate offered by Georgetown University costs $8,490 - with six courses billed at $1,415 each.
Each of the courses involves three day-long classes. The courses include 'Theoretical Foundations of Diversity and Inclusion' and 'Cultural and Social Group Identities: Expanding Self-Awareness'.
Portland State University charges $2,196 for its DEI certificate program. The course includes four modules: DEI Fundamentals; Privilege, Bias, and Unconscious Bias; Microaggression; and Allyship.
Within the modules, classes teach ideas like 'the impacts of privilege among dominant groups' and how to 'identify one's own bias and unconscious bias against non-dominant groups'.
Further study includes learning to 'identify various types of microaggression' and 'the impacts of microaggression on non-dominant populations'.
Other examples include the University of North Carolina, whose course costs $714, the University of Washington, where a certificate requires the completion of three courses of two and a half hours that cost $325 each.
Rutgers University offers a DEI certificate for $1,200 that's made up of four two-and-a-half hour courses held over Zoom.
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