Only One Student Has Enrolled in New WVU Program Designed to Counter 'Woke Ideology'

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: MEDIAite

Jul 9th, 2026, 11:58 am


West Virginia University opened a new program in response to “woke ideology” in higher education. At the time of writing, just a single student had enrolled.

This fall will mark the first semester for the Washington Center for Civics, Culture and Statesmanship. The opening of the program has been in the works for the last two years and has cost approximately $3 million in state funding.

As noted in a report from West Virginia Watch, the formation of the program was mandated by House Bill 3297, a Republican-led effort at “teaching constitutional studies and ‘great debates of Western civilization.'”

The report added:

Lawmakers gave Gov. Patrick Morrisey the task of appointing its director in consultation with the Senate and WVU’s Board of Governors. Morrisey, who publicly supported the center, named Dr. Patrick Lee Miller to the position last October 2025. The state funding goes to Miller’s annual salary of more than $300,000.

“Dr. Miller and the Washington Center are going to push back on the woke ideology that has infected our schools and help return higher education to its true purpose,” Morrisey said during a press conference last year.

Read more: https://www.mediaite.com/media/news/only-one-student-has-enrolled-in-new-wvu-program-designed-to-counter-woke-ideology/

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Waste. Fraud. Abuse.

[maxsolomon]

1. Woke is an adjective derived from African-American English used since the 1930s

or earlier to refer to awareness of racial prejudice and discrimination, often in the construction "stay woke", recorded since at least 1924.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woke

Here's the doctor who's going to educate 1's of West Virginian youth in countering it:

https://www.duq.edu/faculty-and-staff/patrick-lee-miller.php

Patrick Lee Miller is an Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy. He is the author of Becoming God: Pure Reason in Early Greek Philosophy (Continuum, 2011), and co-editor of Introductory Readings in Ancient Greek and Roman Philosophy (Hackett, 2015). He has published articles on Heraclitus, Sophocles, Thucydides, Plato, Aristotle, Polybius, Augustine, Hobbes, Hamilton, Madison, Darwin, Nietzsche, Mill, Freud, Rawls, Rorty, Judith Butler, and David Lynch. But his recent philosophical writing uses Platonism to address current problems such as gender, sexuality, child psychology, education, natural evolution, virtual-reality, spirituality, indecision, truth-telling, and liberal government.

[BumRushDaShow]

4. But when the term was first brought up on DU

the site liked to have a hand-wringing meltdown.

[RussBLib]

16. really? I don't remember that

...perhaps it was during one of my several dormant periods. I'm glad the hissy fit has abated.

https://russblib.blogspot.com

[Stacey Grove]

25. DU has too many right wingers/propagandists and low key racists

The funny part is how clever and transparent/invisible/deep undercover they think they are.

They think no one notices.

[slightlv]

2. People are afraid. That person showed great courage signing up...

s/he knows their name is going to show up in one or more lists, and who knows what that list will be used for... and by whom? And the first thought in this administration will always go to the worst-case scenario first.

We have lost our rights and liberties, for the most part...handed them over to trump lock, stock and barrel. Our "freedom" is an illusion, and then only if you're MAGA. The rest of us pretty much know the score, especially if POC, female, or non gender normative.

[Prairie Gates]

3. Um, what?

The single student signed up for the anti-woke made up right-wing major.

[slightlv]

7. Huh? Boy, was something misunderstood in translation! LOL!

My KB is giving out on me... as soon as I can find a decent one around here and get it hooked up, I'll got back into the full story and read it... not just what was posted here. It *sounded* to me from that little bit... that a new elective going back to covering the history, etc., of DEI was being offered and only one student signed up for it. I didn't get a right/left angle to it at all. But, like I said, I only read the snippet. I'll dig a big deeper. Because I'd love to see some of these universities fight back for academic freedom.

[RockCreek]

8. Not in West Virginia!

[dpibel]

22. From the linked article

“Dr. Miller and the Washington Center are going to push back on the woke ideology that has infected our schools and help return higher education to its true purpose,” Morrisey said during a press conference last year.

[The Roux Comes First]

23. OK, Get Real! This is West Virginia.

Sadly, the Homeland of fentanyl and black lungs.

[reACTIONary]

5. Incredulous, as in....

Last edited Thu Jul 9, 2026, 09:26 PM - Edit history (1)

. .no credit. That's strange....

House Speaker Roger Hanshaw told West Virginia Watch that he anticipated low enrollment due to that the university had yet to approve the courses to count toward college credits.

No college credit for a college program. That sure does sound like a propegaanda or indoctrination campaign. Sounds like a wanna be Hillsdale college free online courses... But not free? And not online?

[reACTIONary]

6. Ummm, wait.... Better than free.....

.... They pay you to take the courses!

The new Washington Center for Civics, Culture, and Statesmanship will be offering 23 courses this fall. Students who commit to pursuing a minor (in Statesmanship), by taking one course, will be eligible to apply for scholarships up to $25,000 in value.

[BumRushDaShow]

10. ...

Lawmakers gave Gov. Patrick Morrisey the task of appointing its director in consultation with the Senate and WVU’s Board of Governors. Morrisey, who publicly supported the center, named Dr. Patrick Lee Miller to the position last October 2025. The state funding goes to Miller’s annual salary of more than $300,000.

Grift as part of their Waste. Fraud. Abuse. of taxpayer money.

[róisín_dubh]

24. $300 fucking grand?!?

They just, not two years ago, fired 174 professors and staff. I have friends and colleagues whose careers were destroyed by WVU.
I left that hellhole before the purge, because my research abilities were being curtailed due to lack of funding.
This is outrageous. But that whole state is a pit of grift and corruption.

[democratsruletheday]

9. The problem with West Virginia is.......(and I mean this sincerely)

that it's full of West Virginians

[mike_c]

11. did anyone really think...

...that university students would line up to get into this program? Sheesh. They're gonna need a class that fulfills half a dozen lower division gen ed core requirements simultaneously before they that major gets any traction. Maybe they can convince the local college republican chapter's members to add it as a cheap and easy minor.

"That's right, sir, I majored in accounting with a minor in right wing anti-wokism. I am the culture warrior your company needs!" No offense intended to accountants, of course.

[jmowreader]

12. Oh lord.

"Dr. Miller and the Washington Center (are going to) help return higher education to its true purpose."

WHICH IS BEING FUCKING WOKE. Okay? Take out all the stuff right-wingers hate about being woke and questioning things and you're left with a trade school. Didn't any of these assholes ever see South Park? "Children, there's a time and a place for everything - and it's called college."

[RussBLib]

17. I would love to see...

...what exactly they think is truly higher education's "true purpose."

BULLSHIT

I'd say that it has changed over time, adapting and adopting new ways of thinking and being, or is there some alleged "golden age" of higher education? How far back would that be?

https://russblib.blogspot.com

[ProudMNDemocrat]

13. A curriculum DOOMED to fail.

Which is why I have no intentions to ever set foot in WV.

[OAITW r.2.0]

14. No papers, no curriculum, no need to explain the core points of anti-wokeness,

You won't learn anything, but grading is a no-brainer., easy A.

[reACTIONary]

15. "it was imposed on the university"

“I do think that it’s important for the Legislature and for the governor to reflect on this… there is a question about whether or not this is the best use of public funds,” said Erik Herron, a professor of political science at WVU. “I think the Washington Center, ironically, seems to be exactly what it complains that higher education has become. It was created in Charleston, and it was imposed on the university, so it’s a big government mandate.”

https://westvirginiawatch.com/2026/07/08/one-student-enrolled-in-wvu-washington-center-after-gop-lawmakers-mandate-creation-of-program/

[Zertz11]

18. University of Iowa doing similar but as required courses

https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/politics/2026/06/05/iowa-center-intellectual-freedom-civics-courses-required-2028/90405293007/

The two courses will count toward fulfilling a student’s general education requirements. Each one will be three hours long.

It also says the Center for Intellectual Freedom "shall be the sole academic unit at the state University of Iowa responsible for offering courses that satisfy the requirements of this section."

The center, established by Iowa lawmakers in 2025, is part of a Republican push to expand civics education at the state's public universities. GOP lawmakers contend the center will help balance out what they view as overwhelmingly liberal viewpoints at institutions of higher education.

[BurnDoubt]

19. "Tilting At Windmills"

Invent a crisis and use it to energize your Racism.
Teaching Humans to Love and Respect each other IS Woke. Only immoral, unethical and hateful people don’t know it. Will it finally dawn on them when their religion’s Hell-Fire goes to work on them?

[BurnDoubt]

20. The Freedom to be an Asshole

Isn’t a requirement to be one.
I’m assuming the literature doesn’t mention that.

[Seinan Sensei]

21. Some day, "Anti-Woke Movement"

Will be a short chapter in all textbooks used to teach Race and Ethnic Relations classes

[Stacey Grove]

26. On brand for regressives

Greco-roman philosophical tradition (the basis of western "debate" tradition, mathematics, ethics, logic, and reason) cannot be separated from the pederasty that defined and structurally supported it.

Socrates wasn't teaching women how to reason.

Yeah, Socrates "corrupted the youth." Indeed.

The ideal love relationship in Ancient Greek philosophical times was between an older man and an adolescent boy.

Women were only used for reproduction, not romantic love.