Yale Daily News

This is certainly no surprise. Yale spent 300 years building an unsurpassed academic reputation. Now, in the short span of a couple of generations, it has squandered all that hard work. It is now considered the home of the Ivy League's loony left, with things like "Sex Week" where porno films are screened and sex toys are handed out. Very, very sad.

Excellent. I haven't donated to Yale in years and will not do so for precisely the reasons noted in comment #1. This University grows more embarrassing every year - from institutional support for illegal immigrants to "Sex Week" to admitting a Taliban scumbag to bi-weekly protests against conjured oppression. Yale has devolved into little more than a high-priced liberal echo chamber that currently produces students who know far more about post-colonial queer theory than the Western canon (never mind basic American history). Truly a sorry state of affairs - and one I choose not to fund.

At #1:

How does any of that relate to the article? Yale was 8th... If you're 8th in the country, then you haven't been squandering anything. I mean, it sounds like you've decided to condemn Yale regardless of what any facts are. If Yale had finished first, you would come to the same conclusion precisely because your conclusions aren't based in facts. The first two comments are completely irrelevant to the article.

Maybe you're right, Yale has squandered its hard work if alums like you can't find a coherent argument with two hands and a flashlight. There are plenty of reasons to criticize Yale, but what reflects badly on Yale is when its alums don't show that they are smart enough to make a valid criticism.

Sadly, I must agree with 1 & 2 above. Since the administration appears to have completely gone off the rails, it is really up to the students to show maturity and do something about it. Stand up for what is right. Stand up for common sense. Don't allow yourself to be intimidated or shouted down. Trust me, one day you will be mature adults with children, grandchildren and a successful career. You will dread the thought of your grandchildren or colleagues discovering your participation in the raunchy aspects of "Sex Week." Life in the real world is very different. You can continue to watch Yale's downward spiral, or you can make a stand. Trust me, you do not want to graduate and learn that your alma mater is the butt of every academic joke. You do not want Yale to be cited as an example every time the conversation turns to what is wrong college today.

As an undergraduate, I'm definitely not surprised. Yale mishandles their money. Taliban admissions, making plans for expansion without student consultation, sex week (which is really just a week to glorify pornography instead of actual discourse on sex), and sexist rappers on campus while there are underfunded clubs. My money's going to go somewhere else besides Yale!

To #1 and #2 - Perhaps you are simply cheap.

http://ilovetheydn.blogspot.com/

I generally agree with the sentiments of #1, #2 and #5, but we should not forget that Yale still does a lot of good (the Grand Strategy program, Directed Studies come to mind). Many student organizations are also more than respectable, including the YDN, singing groups, athletic teams, fraternities and some of the YPU parties. Perhaps alumni should try to pool their resources and offer to donate only to the non-politicized components of Yale to ensure that our money is not mishandled.

Blame the admissions office. They're the ones that are letting all the causeheads in.
Dare I say that this place is so PC is that it prevents honest intellectual debate and discussion

man, these comments are depressing. yale sure does seem to get the majority of the flak from today's media though, out of all the ivies, and i have to admit i can kind of see why that's happening...

also, sex week is/was a total joke. i'm a freshman here, and all i can say is i hope i never once have to hear of that BS again over the next 3 and a half years.

Dear prudish alums:

There is nothing stopping you from earmarking a donation for, say, the Directed Studies program (which prizes the Western canon and intellectual circle-jerking above all else). It's not like your endowment has to go straight to Ron Jeremy.

Really? This had to turn into a prudish referendum on Sex Week?

There are plenty of valid reasons not to donate to Yale -- the most glaring, of course, being that they just sit on so much of the money, watching it build on itself, that the federal government is considering legislation that would force them to spend more. Angry "how dare you kids question the establishment or enjoy sex" rhetoric is just embarrassing.

Re: #3

How is alumni dissatisfaction with the current state of the University "completely irrelevant" to an article about a dramatic reduction in alumni donations? Your failure to grasp this basic point makes your flailing ad hominem attacks all the more enjoyable. Cheers.

#7, I am a member of more than one of your "respectable" organizations. Thanks. Given your comments, though, and those of #1,2, and #5, I'd prefer you stop complementing us before you embarrass us any further, and create harmful divides among student groups on campus.

Conservative politics are fine, but the nauseating nostalgia being expressed here for white, male orthodoxy is "conservatism" at its worst. As a current student with younger siblings, let me assure you that Yale is in no danger of becoming obsolete.

I'll just give money to my department, which is seriously underappreciated in my opinion, specifically instead of Yale in general...

Thank God Yale does not depend on the questionable generosity of some alumni to run itself these days. Yale's economic freedom means freedom to explore the frontiers of knowledge in ways that are not beholden to backward interests. Alumni who refuse to give money to Yale have all the right reasons to do so; it's their money after all. Sadly, alumni like these want an image of Yale that they only can recognize—a Yale in and of the past. Indeed, they fail to realize that Yale belongs to the future as much as to the past. When they complain that Yale is no longer recognizable to them, they in fact are saying that Yale is no longer the same. One should hold this view with skepticism. The last all-white undergraduate class at Yale became history only in 1954. In 1969, Yale threw it gates open to women, that is, mostly white women. Yale has seen demographic changes thereafter. Today, one can find an Asian American cultural center as well as a center for the study of globalization on campus. As Cole Porter's song goes, times have changed. If alumni refuse to donate because they cannot comprehend the new times, which for them will always pale in comparison to their good old times, Yale will be better off. That means Yale, now bolder and freer, can move forward to explore the ends of knowledge. Alumni like those above can live in the past.

All alumni in general really disgruntled with Yale as do we just have a few really disgruntled ones writing in on this? Seriously, what's the big deal about sex week? As for the supposed 'liberal' politics on campus, yes, liberals exist, as does everything else. I don't see what the problem is.

Re: #12

The reason it's "completely irrelevant" to a "drastic decline" is because the claim that there is a "drastic decline" is completely unfounded, or did you read the article? Even this 10% swing seems like it's still within the normal year-to-year variance.

Besides, everyone interviewed in the article, including the group that did the survey, said you can't draw many conclusions from this data. Anyone who would read this article and conclude that there has been a "drastic decline" is simply not a good reader.

Did any of you even read the article?! Both President Levin and the survey's director Ann Kaplan made it abundantly clear that COMMITMENTS to donations haven't changed a bit in the past few years despite the troubled economy. Their arguments as to why commitments are the best indicator of alumni donation activity are perfectly cogent, and I haven't seen one expert rebut them. The only donations measure that is down is the actual timing of the cash flow which will fluctuate with the timing of fundraising initiatives. Yale's fundraising health is as remarkable as ever because Yale is (and is still widely recognized as) a preeminent world-class university.

It's kind of sweet how #1, #2, #4 and so on so elegantly twist the facts to fit their predetermined (and rather ridiculous) conclusions. Yale is an extremely well-respected institution experiencing record applications - gaining admission is also now harder than it was for #1 or #2...

To prove my point, many posters lament the "admission" of a Taliban representative in their Yale criticisms. If these posters weren't trying to manipulate the facts for their own agenda, they would have also pointed out that Rahmatullah Hashemi was only allowed to STUDY at Yale in a non-degree program - he was denied admission to earn his degree. Educating the world in the virtues of reason and skepticism is a laudable mission. Notably, Mr. Hashemi came to praise Yale and its educational philosophy, noting that "everything here is based on reason." Mr. Hashemi went on to tell the NY Times Magazine, "I regret when people think of the Taliban and then think of me — that feeling people have after they know I was affiliated with them is painful to me." Mr. Hashemi was also active in student organizations where Muslim and Jewish groups communicated and connected peacefully. Does anyone seriously think that Yale made a mistake or betrayed some ethical principle in allowing him to come here (the bar is not set very high for the non-degree program) after being cleared by our federal security services?

The next time they post on an article, I suggest that the posters I have criticized read it first - not just its headline.

Well said #19.

What is really ironic is that despite how far to the radical left Yale has gone (with Sex Week, Taliban admissions, politicized programs like Gender Studies and Gay Studies, the Women's Center, 95% of faculty voting Democrat, protests against conservative speakers, sex education, Skull & Bones member burning an American flag, no ROTC on campus, MLK day off, military unwelcome at the law school, law school suing John Yoo, etc.), it is almost always the conservative alumni who donate to Yale. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that 80% of donations come from Republicans. I think that it is time for alumni to demand more control over what Yale does with their money. Have the conservatives donating to Directed Studies and the liberals donating to ERM and you would see which program ends up with the most.

I was somewhat relieved to learn that SWAY was externally funded but extremely disappointed that the university did nothing to distance itself from it. It tarnished the Yale "brand" and the university could have asked that Yale be removed from the title. I guarantee they would have if it had been Guns Week at Yale.

Is it true that Levin declined a $1 million gift for a stadium jumbotron?

Its said he found instant replay distasteful because it taunts successes and failures - self-esteem PC crxp.

Wasn't sex week on the proverbial jumbtron?