“The University of Chicago has hidden treasures, in secret kept, in silence sealed.” So (almost) wrote Charlotte Brontë in Jane Eyre.
Despite its institutional commitment to freedom of expression and inquiry, which rely on access to information, the University of Chicago has long operated under a shroud of secrecy relative to its peers.
The University’s failure to disclose organizational actions, admissions data, financial information, and policing records to students renders open and honest discourse impossible.
The University must work toward improved accessibility, transparency, and accountability or risk violating the very principles it holds so dear.
Just last month, the University sued the National Institutes of Health (NIH), joining 12 peer institutions in pushing back against an NIH memo that threatened university research funding. However, if you are a student, you might never have heard of the lawsuit. University President Paul Alivisatos explained the University’s rationale for suing only to faculty.
Though the University has sent several communications to faculty concerning the effects of Trump administration policies on the University, none have been sent to students. This lack of transparency is particularly striking given that the current presidential administration has clearly and repeatedly demonstrated its disdain for institutions of higher education.
That gap in communications reflects the University’s broader selectivity about information disclosure.
While UChicago’s class profiles include the number of applicants, accepted students, and enrolled students each year, as well as distribution by region and standardized test data, there exists no enrollment information broken down by race, socioeconomic background, or gender. By contrast, institutions such as Brown, Harvard, and Stanford release detailed information about race, ethnicity, and gender breakdowns of their admitted classes.
Furthermore, the University only began completing the Common Data Set—an annual survey jointly administered by the College Board, U.S. News & World Report—in 2021, and educational services company Peterson’s Guides to “improve the quality and accuracy of information provided to all involved in a student’s transition to higher education.” However, the University still does not provide information on the number of waitlisted and enrolled students or on early decision numbers—information that peer institutions publish.
Without transparency on how UChicago crafts its classes, members of the University community can critically assess neither the nature of the student body nor the extent to which the University is fostering a diverse academic community.
The University is also notably opaque about its financial operations. It provides no publicly available information on its investment holdings; proxy voting records; or environmental, social, and governance (ESG) performance data—a set of standards used to measure an institution’s social and environmental impact. A 2023 Amnesty International scorecard on university endowments and human rights rated UChicago zero out of 40, the lowest score among all rated schools, including a zero out of nine in the “Disclosure and Transparency” category.
By contrast, peer institutions like those in the University of California system disclose their investments, voting records, and ESG data to the public. Columbia University even has an Advisory Committee on Socially Responsible Investing, which includes student members.
UChicago’s $18 billion in assets under management, as reported in 2022, do not represent mere financial decisions; they are a form of speech, conveying implicit endorsements from the University. Even if one is to argue that investments do not represent institutional position-taking, choosing to hide investments certainly does.
Students deserve to know how their money is being allocated. Yet, budget town halls—one of the few venues where University finances are discussed at all—are invitation-only. Students are not on the guest list.
UChicago’s continued pattern of limited disclosure is especially concerning when it comes to student and community safety.
The University of Chicago Police Department (UCPD) serves a public function but is legally a private police force. Therefore, it is not required to meet the same standards of public accountability as the Chicago Police Department (CPD).
UCPD’s jurisdiction currently extends from 37th Street to 64th Street and from Cottage Grove Avenue to Lake Michigan. Of the 65,000 residents who live in the area that officers patrol, the “vast majority” are not University affiliated, according to the South Side Weekly. UCPD officers can search, ticket, arrest, and detain anyone within that six-square-mile area. In the past, detained students were held in CPD holding cells while UCPD processed charges.
While CPD is required by Illinois law to release all arrest records publicly, UCPD—Chicago’s largest private police force—has cast a veil of secrecy over their arrest records. Even arrests that occurred off campus are released only upon request and at the University’s discretion.
UCPD is also generally not subject to requests under the Freedom of Information Act, which allows press and the public to access police records. No such process exists by which reporters and members of the public can access UCPD officers’ body camera footage or tactical response reports. It is a black box within a university draped in gray.
We acknowledge, of course, that there is a line between transparency and privacy. The University would rightfully assert its responsibility to maintain privacy in its administrative and financial matters. This, however, is not about disclosing confidential information but rather about disclosing information that is the business of all parties to the University community—students included.
This lack of transparency finds increased relevance with facts and freedom of expression under siege by many in positions of power. But the underlying problems are not new and have already resulted in a University rendered opaque and a community left too long in the dark.
— Anika Krishnaswamy, Zachary Leiter, Eva McCord, Naina Purushothaman, and Anushree Vashist
Community member / Mar 6, 2025 at 3:46 pm
Not very good. This reads like a checklist of grievances rather than a coherent critique, bouncing from admissions data to endowment transparency to campus policing with no clear throughline beyond the vague assertion that “secrecy is bad.” The writing is heavy-handed and self-important, substituting florid metaphors (“a black box within a university draped in gray”) for substantive analysis. There is little effort to distinguish between legitimate concerns and trivial nitpicks (does withholding early decision numbers really rise to the level of a systemic failure of transparency?). The editorial fixates on comparing UChicago to its peers, yet never convincingly explains why the university must conform to their disclosure practices, instead relying on broad appeals to fairness and accountability without engaging in a deeper discussion of trade-offs or institutional priorities. This is not an exposé. It is a scattered list of complaints, too unfocused to persuade and too tedious to inspire action.