Alex Shieh – Bloat at Brown University

Not everyone on campus sees the Trump administration’s threats to elite universities as all bad. The cost of college has skyrocketed in recent decades, and critics on both the right and the left have pointed to administrative bloat as one of the culprits. Even schools with relatively small student bodies, like my own institution, often employee layer after layer of assistant vice-provosts and deans and all manner of other administrators whose contributions to teaching and research are sometimes obscure, if they exist at all.

One of my students, Alex Shieh, has taken Elon Musk’s cue and set about calling attention to administrative bloat on our campus. He’s found himself in the spotlight after he sent out AI-aided emails to thousands of university administrators requesting information about how they spend their work days. He then used his website, Bloat@Brown, to publicly flagged administrators whose roles, he says, may violate federal discrimination law. Perhaps inevitably, that’s caused some consternation among faculty, staff, and students here. On this bonus episode of The Glenn Show, I talk with Alex about why he started Bloat@Brown, diversity of thought on campus, class-based affirmative action, and the role of diversity on campus.

This is a bonus episode of The Glenn Show. It’s available in its entirety to full subscribers, without whom The Glenn Show would not be possible. If you want to listen to the full version of this episode and our other bonus content—including monthly Q&As with John McWhorter—click below to sign up.