University of Virginia interim President Paul Mahoney announced Friday that the University has provided comments on the proposed Compact for Academic Excellence in Higher Education. The compact, which the U.S. Department of Education invited UVA to join earlier this month, offered multiple public and private institutions preferred access to research grants and other benefits if those schools agreed to pursue particular approaches to admissions practices, tuition, foreign enrollment and other issues.
In a letter to U.S. Secretary of Education Linda McMahon, Mahoney identified many areas of agreement between the stated goals of the compact and UVA’s approach to education, research and patient care, but made clear that the University seeks “no special treatment in exchange for our pursuit of those foundational goals. The integrity of science and other academic work requires merit-based assessment of research and scholarship.”
While the University does not agree that research funding should be tied to a contractual arrangement as proposed, Mahoney acknowledged the need for continued partnership with the federal government. “Higher education faces significant challenges and has not always lived up to its highest ideals,” he said. “We believe that the best path toward real and durable progress lies in an open and collaborative conversation. We look forward to working together to develop alternative, lasting approaches to improving higher education.”
In a separate letter to the UVA community announcing the decision, Mahoney thanked the many people who shared their perspectives about the compact through the University’s online public comment form, and affirmed the institution’s commitment to “continue to work to strengthen free expression and free inquiry, protect academic freedom, ensure affordability, promote intellectual pluralism, and maintain institutional neutrality in an increasingly polarized world.”
UVA was one of nine colleges and universities initially invited to join the compact.