Poll: American Confidence In Higher Education Has Collapsed

A recent poll released by Gallup has revealed what many conservatives have intuitively known for several years now: we no longer trust our Universities and Colleges. Since 2015, trust in our institutions of higher learning has plummeted from 57% to 37%. Let. That. Sink. In.

Since the 1990s when the mantra of ‘everybody needs to go to college’ was thoroughly indoctrinated into parents and children alike, over the course of thirty years our trust has so degraded that just a bit more than a third of Americans trust academia according to Gallup in a poll taken from June 1-22.

As reported by The Chronicle of Higher Education, the inverse of the figure is even more startling, “62 percent of Americans surveyed by Gallup said they have “very little” or just “some” confidence in colleges and universities.In 2015, that figure was 42 percent.”

Gallup goes on to break down the data and as one might expect the distrust of Universities and colleges is profound among Republicans and Independents, while Democrats largely continue to trust them. Republican trust fell from 56% with"a great deal" or "quite a lot" of confidence to 19% since 2015, a drop of 37%. Among independents, the total of 48% fell 16 points to 32% while Democrats kept a majority of 59% only dropping 9 points from 68%.

As observed by The Hill, Gallup noted that it did not ask questions to determine the cause of the precipitous drop in American confidence but said,

“the rising costs of postsecondary education likely play a significant role.”

Zach Hrynowski, a research consultant at Gallup told the Chronicle “It raised our eyebrows,” he said. “It’s something that we don’t tend to see.”

He added, “In some ways, that should be a little bit more of a flag if you’re a president of a university or dean of admissions,” he said. “It’s even those Americans who have gone to college saying, ‘I’m less confident in these institutions than I used to be.’”

Gallup added in the report, “There is a growing divide between Republicans’ and Democrats’ confidence in higher education. Previous Gallup polling found that Democrats expressed concern about the costs, while Republicans registered concern about politics in higher education.”

The pollster also observed however that confidence in 16 other American institutions ranging from Congress to small businesses has also declined, with confidence in Big Businesses, Large tech companies, public schools, and police at all-time lows.