A recent report conducted by a non-profit think tank found that attending college tends to make students more liberal. The think tank, the Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI), has in the past advocated for laws regulating the content of classroom education. 

The report, entitled “The Shaping of the American Mind: the Diverging Influences of the College Degree & Civil Learning of American Beliefs,” explored Americans' civics knowledge and belief in American values and compared their responses with their level of education.

ISI is generally regarded as a conservative organization; its mission statement is that “ISI seeks to enhance the rising generation's knowledge of our nation's founding principles — limited government, individual liberty, personal responsibility, the rule of law, market economy, and moral norms.” ISI’s first president was the conservative William F. Buckley.

The results were based on answers to the organization’s 33-question civics quiz, distributed to 2,500 people.

According to Richard Brake, ISI's Civic Literacy Program Chairman, students in college tend to have more liberal views on a narrow range of socially contentious political issues.

"If you go to college you are more likely to favor abortion on demand, you're against school prayer and you're much more in favor of same-sex marriage," said Brake in an interview on C-SPAN.

Meanwhile, respondents who did well on the quiz tended to believe more strongly in, "America's founding documents, the Ten Commandments, the free-enterprise system and the essential goodness of America," said USA Today writer Mary Beth Markein.

Brake said college students with more liberal views also lack basic knowledge of American civics, such as being able to name the three branches of government.

"There's a question of whether there might be some indoctrination going on on campus, in relation to civic ignorance," Brake said.

But other organizations, such as the Chronicle of Higher Education, question the accuracy of ISI's methods for collecting data.

While ISI's report stated that 39 percent of people with bachelor's degrees support same-sex marriage, a separate study conducted by UCLA's Higher Education Research Institute found that 64.9 percent of college freshmen supported same-sex marriage. Taken together, these studies could indicate that spending time in college actually makes students more conservative.

In a study of college students and faculty, the UCLA study also found that the shift to more liberal beliefs was peer-influenced and not a direct result of college faculty curriculum.

Angus Johnston, author of the Student Activism blog, called the study “ridiculous.”

“The survey’s definition of “civic knowledge” encompasses issues that bear little relationship to civics as that term is commonly understood,” wrote Johnston. “The survey’s subjects range from Sputnik to the moral philosophy of Saint Thomas Aquinas.”


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