University of Austin

Origins (2021–24) The University of Austin was conceived in May 2021 when venture capitalist Joe Lonsdale, St. John's College President Pano Kanelos, British–American historian Niall Ferguson, and journalist Bari Weiss met in Austin. The proposal was publicized six months later in an article by Kanelos in Weiss's newsletter Common Sense (which subsequently evolved into The Free Press). Founding faculty fellows included Peter Boghossian, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, and Kathleen Stock. Other advisors included former Harvard president Lawrence (Larry) Summers, former ACLU president Nadine Strossen, and former president of the American Enterprise Institute Arthur Brooks. On November 11, 2021, Zimmer announced his resignation from the university board, saying that UATX had made statements about higher education that "diverged very significantly from my own views". Shortly thereafter, Pinker followed suit. UATX apologized for creating "unnecessary complications" for Pinker and Zimmer by not clarifying [sooner] what their advisory roles entailed. On June 9, 2022, the University of Austin opened applications for its "Forbidden Courses" program with two-week-long sessions in the old (pre-1954) Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas, Texas. Harlan Crow provided classroom space in Dallas. On July 6, 2022, the school announced that Richard Dawkins had joined its advisory board. In December 2022, board member Heather Heying resigned, stating that the school was not adequately invested in scientific inquiry and "does not represent my scientific and pedagogical values." in downtown Austin, home of the University of Austin In September 2023, assistant provost Loren Rotner and vice president of communications Hillel Ofek, in a faction that involved board member Joe Lonsdale, criticized the leadership of founding president Pano Kanelos. They did not succeed in persuading others of their position. Rotner and Ofek temporarily left UATX. After receiving certification in October 2023 from the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board to award degrees, UATX began accepting applications for its first four-year undergraduate cohort enrolling in Fall 2024, and established a campus in Austin's Scarbrough Building. The entire class of 100 students received full four-year scholarships, paid from private donations. By November 2023, UATX had reportedly raised $200 million from 2,600 donors and received over 6,000 inquiries from potential faculty. In late 2023, UATX reported a surge in interest from donors "horrified by the response at top-tier universities" to the 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel. In June 2024, the University of Austin announced a $5 million bitcoin endowment in partnership with cryptocurrency platform Unchained Capital. Active university (2024–present) On September 2, 2024, UATX held a convocation for its inaugural group of students, the class of 2028, beginning the college's first academic year. By this time, tuition was about $32,000 per year and the school employed about 20 faculty members. In November 2024, UATX was featured in a CBS News 60 Minutes segment titled "Disruptor U." In January 2025, a group of board members led by Lonsdale convinced the board that Kanelos needed to leave the role of president and that UATX should emphasize technology in its curriculum and deemphasize the "great books". It was announced that Kanelos would serve as chancellor instead. The next day, the school held its annual First Principles Summit, at which Niall Ferguson warned UATX leaders to "think twice" about whether Donald Trump was truly in the wrong to threaten Harvard University and Harvard professors truly in the right to resist his plan. Strossen, Rauch and Haidt also resigned. On November 5, 2025, UATX announced, in conjunction with a $100 million gift from Libertarian investor Jeff Yass, that they will never charge tuition or accept government funding. ==Academics==

UATX's undergraduate program begins with a core curriculum consisting of 15 courses based on a Great Books canon. In their junior and senior years, students specialize in interdisciplinary academic centers. A practical capstone project is undertaken across all four years. Faculty staff include Tim Kane, Boris Fishman, Eliah G. Overbey, Michael Shellenberger, and Coleman Hughes. Admissions Admission is based on a policy that requires both "Academic Capability" and a "Capacity for Creativity and Leadership". Academic Capability is demonstrated through performance on standardized tests or other public examinations, grade point average, class ranking, enrollment in an academically rigorous course of study (e.g., Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate programs), and English composition and writing skills. Capacity for Creativity and Leadership is primarily demonstrated through an applicant's reported activities, as well as a personal statement and essay. The university also selects applicants who will provide intellectual pluralism for each class. In March 2025, UATX introduced its "merit-first admissions policy" where applicants with at least a 1460 SAT, 33 ACT, or 105 CLT earn automatic admission. The automatic admission is contingent on meeting eligibility requirements and passing an integrity check. Accreditation UATX is a candidate institution for accreditation with the Middle States Commission on Higher Education (MSCHE). The Commission's most recent action on UATX's accreditation status on August 28, 2025 was to grant "candidate for accreditation" status and to make the university an official institutional member of MSCHE. According to its official website, UATX expects the final report of the accreditation evaluators to go to MSCHE in March 2028 and the university could be accredited prior to the issuance of its first undergraduate degrees. Enrollment and personnel As of 2025, the university currently enrolls only a freshmen and a sophomore class, owing to its recent inception. There are 150 students at the school and 34 staff members. ==Reception==

The initial announcement of the project received positive praise, including praise from libertarian nonprofit magazine Law & Liberty for ushering in "a new era in educational reform," and applause from conservative magazine The New Criterion for its efforts to "keep that old flame of free inquiry alive." New York Times columnist Ross Douthat saw the launch of a new university as a positive development, pointing out how few major universities have been established since the nineteenth century, while acknowledging how expensive doing so would be. He also saw conflicting forces in the project, including the "tension between the desire to promote great academic seriousness and the culture-war flag-waving that might be necessary to rally donor support". The project also garnered some criticism. Initial responses to the project included criticism of the lack of a plan to achieve the project's goals. Jennifer Wunder, a professor at Georgia Gwinnett College who participated in the process of obtaining her institution's initial accreditation, in a since-deleted Twitter thread, described UATX's 2021 business plan timeline to establish accredited graduate and undergraduate programs as nearly impossible to meet. The proposal for a University of Austin was described in 2021 by Gabriella Swerling in The Daily Telegraph as "anti-cancel culture" and by Alex Shephard in The New Republic as "anti-woke". After initially holding silent about the reasons for his resignation from UATX's advisory board, Steven Pinker told The Harvard Crimson that UATX had "confused freedom of speech with the political right"—that it had staffed itself primarily with people on the right, regardless of their position on free speech, extending to some opponents of it. == See also ==