Chris here: I've criticized pervasive info failures in higher ed, from campus budget opacities to the inability of national associations in the humanities to gather data that can be used to strategize and build positions, organizations, and infrastructure. Here's a group doing something about that. The Coalition for Action in Higher Education and the Academic Council of Jewish Voice for Peace have launched a project called “Know Your Governing Board." The core of it is a survey that they are asking campus groups across the country to fill out. There's research involved! It will be worth it. Their statement is below.
UC President Mark Yudof Reviews Demands Nov 2011
§§§
On behalf of the Coalition for Action in Higher Education and the Academic Council of Jewish Voice for Peace, we share with you a template titled “Know Your Governing Board.”
We envision this questionnaire as an intervention in the ongoing crisis of US higher education. We hope the answers you and your colleagues generate will serve as a prelude to developing strategies to criticize, challenge, and ultimately remake the governance structure at our colleges and universities. As such, we view this template as a participant in allied struggles to fulfill the promise of higher education as a truly public good.
In recent years, especially but not exclusively in so-called “red states,” the governing boards at many public and private institutions have imposed regulations that undermine institutional autonomy, subvert faculty participation in governance, compromise academic freedom, and subordinate the conduct of higher education to the cause of ideological conformity.
If we are to understand and combat these attacks, we must render these bodies visible; make their work transparent; and disclose their links to other loci of power. Accordingly, we encourage faculty members to share their findings in public forums on their campuses and with colleagues at other institutions.
To do so, we first ask faculty to organize a “Know Your Governing Board” forum on their campuses, either in person and/or online, on April 17, 2026. This date marks the third annual Day of Action organized by the Coalition for Action in Higher Education (https://www.dayofactionforhighered.org/).
Second, by April 15, please email your responses to this questionnaire, whether complete or partial, as an attachment or a hyperlink to our email address: whorulestheacademy@proton.me. Unless you specify otherwise, we will post all submissions on the Who Rules the Academy caucus page of the Coalition’s website.
We view this template as a living document and, accordingly, urge you to modify its questions in any way you think appropriate for your home institution.
We hope you will embrace this task, and we are eager to assist you in any way we can.