ACTA Testifies Before the Ohio Sneate Committee on Higher Education in Support of Senate Bill 1

January 29, 2025—Today, American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) President Michael Poliakoff testified before the Ohio Senate Committee on Higher Education
in support of Senate Bill 1, the “Advance Ohio Higher Education Act.” Sponsored by Senator Jerry Cirino, the bill was filed on Friday, January 17, 2025. It is the successor of S.B. 83, which was under consideration in the 2024 session of the Ohio General Assembly.

S.B. 1 is an omnibus bill which, when implemented, will deliver dramatic and overdue improvements to the higher education landscape in the state of Ohio. The University System of Ohio is comprised of 14 public universities and 23 community colleges with 444,000 students. S.B. 1 has a companion bill in the Ohio House of Representatives, House Bill 6, sponsored by Representative Tom Young, chair of the House Workforce and Higher Education Committee.

President Poliakoff testified in favor of S.B. 1’s mandatory three-semester-hour course in American history and civics, coupled with a testing requirement. “In ACTA’s history, we have sponsored nine surveys to determine the historical and civic literacy of college students or recent college graduates. The results are apocalyptically alarming to anyone who cares about the future of our nation.” Dr. Poliakoff stated that this provision will put Ohio “in the vanguard of states whose legislatures have recognized their solemn responsibility to mandate this remedy for civic and historical illiteracy.”

He continued, “ACTA’s annual analysis of core curriculum requirements at over 1,100 liberal arts colleges and universities shows that only 19% of these institutions require a single foundational course in United States history or government. The causal line seems self-evident. Faculty and administrators may resent it when legislators specify core requirements, but the prevailing concept of ‘shared governance,’ which delegates academic affairs to the faculty, has clearly failed the public. In many instances, the failure seems deliberate.”

Dr. Poliakoff’s testimony also touched on other provisions included in S.B. 1. The bill mandates that all Ohio institutions of higher education adopt a policy of institutional neutrality, prohibiting university administrators from taking public positions on behalf of the institution on political and social issues. It requires the institutions’ presidents and boards of trustees to issue strong public statements committing their universities to the principles of free and open inquiry, civil discourse, and fostering an environment of intellectual diversity for all students and faculty. The bill would establish high-quality trustee training as well as periodic faculty performance evaluations and post-tenure reviews. And in another timely measure, the bill would roll back diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) departments, expenditures, and consultants,notably removing mandatory DEI statements from the faculty hiring and promotions process.

“S.B. 1 will serve the interests of the students, the dedicated faculty, and the taxpayers of Ohio,” stated Dr. Poliakoff. “It will also serve as a model that other states will look to for guidance. Because of the vision of this legislature, Ohio now has five independent institutes for the study and teaching of American constitutional thought, more such institutes by far than any other state in the nation. When the wise provisions of S.B. 1 become law, Ohio’s leadership in higher education will be indisputable.”  

Dr. Poliakoff’s full testimony can be found here.

MEDIA CONTACT: Gabrielle Anglin
EMAIL: ganglin@goacta.org