'Déjà blue': Professors NOT happy after Trump once again defies polls
One professor said he was "feeling genuinely unsafe" by the thought of so many people voting for Trump.
Professors and academics across the United States were not thrilled after President Trump and the Republicans exceeded expectations in the 2020 election.
Professors took to social media on the evening of the Nov. 3 election, expressing their disdain at a strong performance from President Donald Trump and other Republicans across the country. While there is no clear winner of the presidential race, Trump yet again defied most of the polls in key swing states, as he did in 2016, resulting in several states remaining too close to call the morning after polls closed.
Ibram X. Kendi, the head of Boston University’s Center for Antiracist Research, was not happy with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s defeat of Democratic challenger Amy McGrath in Kentucky.
Captioning a prediction from AP Politics projecting that McConnell would win in Kentucky, Kendi simply tweeted “no.”
— Ibram X. Kendi (@DrIbram) November 4, 2020
Professor Adam Grant of the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School had a “sinking feeling of depression” knowing that half of the United States voted for Trump.
Geoffrey Garrett, dean of the University of Southern California’s Marshall School of Business, retweeted Grant.
Déjà blue, n. The sinking feeling of depression at realizing that half the country is willing to forgo competence and character in the most important job on earth
— Adam Grant (@AdamMGrant) November 4, 2020
[RELATED: USC admin defends handling of prof who used Chinese word that sounds like racial slur]
Jesse Stommel, a senior lecturer in linguistics at the University of Mary Washington, explained on Twitter that he “basically cancelled” all of his classes for the rest of the week.
Many institution’s cancelled classes today. That isn’t enough. I basically cancelled the whole week. I added stuff to the syllabus. But it’s all optional. And the readings connect issues of the course to the election.
No exams. Nothing graded. No proctoring. Now is not the time.— Jesse Stommel (@Jessifer) November 4, 2020
On election night, he also found himself “feeling genuinely unsafe” given the number of people willing to vote for the President.
Again, I find myself feeling genuinely unsafe, given the sheer number of people willing to vote for Trump.
— Jesse Stommel (@Jessifer) November 4, 2020
Professor Sara Goldrick-Rab of Temple University encouraged her colleagues to cancel their exams after the election: “You will not be assessing knowledge. You’ll be assessing exhaustion, a commitment to democracy, and a million other things.”
Dear colleagues at Temple:
If you have an exam scheduled for your students tomorrow, you need to postpone it.
You will not be assessing knowledge. You’ll be assessing exhaustion, a commitment to democracy, and a million other things.
Your exams can wait a week. Thank you.— Sara Goldrick-Rab (@saragoldrickrab) November 4, 2020
An analysis from Bloomberg revealed that individuals in the education sector — especially college professors — were among the most likely to support presidential candidate Joe Biden over President Trump.
Follow the author of this article on Twitter: @BenZeisloft
