Are college students being indoctrinated by their environment? I fear so.

Academia has in recent decades been strongly affiliated with liberal idealism with almost half of university scholars being self-proclaimed liberals. In comparison, a scant 20 percent identify as conservative.

But, of course, in a country based on the principle of free speech, no one, including professors, can be faulted for holding an opinion. If nothing else, perhaps it should be heeded that such a significant number of our nation’s most educated are in such ideological unison.

In reality, however, those with a post-graduate education tend to be split quite evenly between conservatives and liberals. It’s only in a college atmosphere that a liberal tilt becomes obvious.

This would all be for nothing, however, if academic objectivity were practiced as much as preached. Unfortunately, it’s not. Instead, objectivity seems to be increasingly eschewed by the academic elite in the classrooms in recent years.

A revealing 2004 survey showed that 49 percent of students in the top 50 colleges reported professors frequently inserting political opinions in their courses, despite the relevance. Almost one-third reported feeling pressured to agree with the professor for a good grade.

The effects and ramifications of liberalism on college campuses are widespread and real. It is not a folly conceived by conspirators to undermine the academic world.

Youth are especially prone to outside political influence and professors around the nation have taken upon themselves to be this influence.

A simple look at electoral history exemplifies this. Both youth voters (ages 18 to 24) and those with post-graduate degrees voted for a republican for president in 1988. They did so with only a 3 percent difference in their votes.

For the past 12 years, both groups were solidly democratic in their choices, but the similarities get more frequent in recent years. In the 2004 presidential election, only a single percentage point marked the difference in voting trends between the ages of a traditional college student and college professors. One single point. In 2008, both spiked overwhelmingly in Obama’s favor.

Professional objectivity is either dead or dying. This is no distance concept relevant only in the halls of Ivy League schools. This affects us in Creighton as much as anyone.

We can no longer depend on the direction being given to us. If we let it, all our philosophies, thoughts and feelings will be stricken and replaced.

It is up to the students to promote discord and debate. It is the burden of the youth to move against the grain and challenge what’s commonly accepted, whether it’s liberal or conservative.

Nothing should be accepted at face value, and if we continue to let this happen, we’ll have no one to blame but ourselves.