A New Survey Demands the Attention of Christian Universities

Lumina/Gallup results show students might vote with their feet

My morning news update always begins with a review of Inside Higher Ed and The Chronicle of Higher Education. Mostly, I’m quickly skimming the stories and news updates. Occasionally, a story strikes me as important enough to read more closely. Yesterday provided me with a good example: a survey of prospective college students conducted by the Lumina Foundation and Gallup.

Inside Higher Ed opened their story like this:

For a growing number of students, choosing what college to attend is becoming something of a political referendum. Survey data released today from Gallup and the Lumina Foundation show that state policies—especially on hot-button issues like reproductive rights and gun control—can have a big impact on where prospective students enroll.

While banning DEI, limiting abortion access, and promoting open carry may make for good politics among conservative politicians holding off primary threats, students may be paying a lot of attention. To the extent that they can exercise choice about where to go to college, they report a willingness to steer clear of states that have taken such steps.

The second paragraph of the Chronicle story said this:

The saliency of these social issues crossed partisan lines. A majority of Democrats and Republicans said gun policies were at least somewhat important in their college choices. Likewise, for students for whom reproductive health care was a factor in their decision-making, Democrats, Republicans, and independents alike would prefer to attend college in a state with greater access to such services.

The Lumina/Gallup report is based upon a web survey of just under 7,000 people. They are either currently enrolled in college, have some college and might go back, or are not yet enrolled but plan to. As my education newsletters pointed out, there are strong sentiments around DEI, guns, and abortion. But the findings that got my attention — and that Christian Universities need to look at — had to do with laws limiting “divisive concepts”.¹

Lumina/Gallup Report p.12

Three in four of the students responded said that they would prefer attending a college that doesn’t restrict divisive topics like race or gender. Female attitudes on the topic are stronger than males, democrats more than republicans, nonwhites more than whites.

What is particularly telling is what the floor is for the various groups. Six in ten republicans don’t want restrictive policies. Seven in ten males and just over that for whites agree. These are not the views of “radical leftist students” you hear critiqued on Fox or on Charlie Kirk’s social media feeds. This is a strong majority of college-bound students.

While I’d grant that Christian university students might not match the findings of the Lumina/Gallup survey, there’s no doubt enough of an overlap to make this a matter of concern. As much as a despise the “student as consumer” metaphor, it is apt when they are choosing one college over another or one state over another.² In an era of ongoing enrollment challenges, can Christian universities simply ignore data like this?

This tension between students who want intellectual freedom and administrators or trustees who want “safe environments” is one of the major themes of my Fearless Christian University book.³ If the latter hold the reins too tightly in order to “protect the brand”, there is a serious risk of students deciding to simply avoid the institution by either attending a state school or, as I’m hoping to inspire, one that is fearless.

Yesterday, Chris Gehrz wrote about the Joey Cochran Anxious Bench essay I wrote about on Wednesday. Chris picks up the same theme I raise above.

Rather than “disown and disinherit” problems of evangelicalism’s own making and “retreat into the safe ghettos of conservative, confessional affiliations,” Cochran would have “leading intellectual evangelical spokespersons” apply to evangelicalism the principles that the late Tim Keller suggested for the local church:

He then explains a recent Christian Scholar’s Review blog by California Baptist Social Work professor Krystal Hayes. She argues that Christian universities need to expand beyond the current crop of Christian students (I have a chapter on this). She suggests that an orientation toward justice and diversity should be central. She notes that an embrace of Christian identity need not devolve into partisan separation but can be the essence of what we claim Christian community is about.

In the book, I argue that developing an openness to such diversity — in terms of background and ideology — could conceivably provide the Christian university with an opportunity to model for all of higher education how a true academic community can operate. Chris puts it like this:

Christian universities can play an important role in all such respects — helping Christians to better communicate the gospel, better love our neighbors, and yet still “critical and challenge” our society. But to return to Cochran’s Niehburian opening, such institutions are also in a prime position to critique the church itself, and to challenge Christians to “take ownership and responsibility for their culture and society.”

Christian universities need to pay attention to the attitudes and priorities of their potential students. Not just the ones who easily fit the mold already carefully created by the institution. They have to think about the students who look at the Christian university and then opt for another school because they don’t sense intellectual hospitality. Failure to seriously consider this will only exacerbate the existing demographic cliff enrollment challenges.

1. Think Florida’s recent legislation, even though the state entered into an important settlement that seriously limits some of the potential harms of “Don’t Say Gay”.

2. The metaphor works at the decision point about where to go to school. After that it fades into “what the student wants”.

3. Got word from Eerdmans yesterday that the manuscript is “accepted for publication”!