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“This recognition is a testament to our commitment to attracting top graduate students and faculty in one of the fastest-growing fields in today’s economy,” said New College President Richard Corcoran. “Being the only Florida university on Fortune’s list is an incredible honor and underscores the leadership and excellence of our data science program.”

Students in the Applied Data Science master’s program complete three semesters on campus in small, close-knit cohorts, learning from faculty with both industry and academic expertise. The program culminates in a full-time internship during the final semester, with industry partners spanning banking, insurance, consulting, nonprofit organizations, and state and federal agencies.

“The success of our alumni and this top-10 ranking are evidence of the high-quality education students receive here at New College,” said Prof. Bernhard Klingenberg, Director of the Applied Data Science Program. “It also highlights the strong value and real-world relevance of our Applied Data Science curriculum.”

Among a list dominated by large flagship public universities and private engineering schools, New College stands out as a small institution offering one of the most affordable programs. Florida residents can complete the 21-month program for less than $18,000—making it one of the most cost-effective options on Fortune’s list, where it was also ranked 11th for affordability.

View the Rankings

Enrollment for the Master’s in Applied Data Science program is now open for Fall 2025. To learn more about the program, visit ncf.edu/grad-applied-data-science or follow it on LinkedIn.

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SARASOTA, FL, UNITED STATES, February 14, 2025 /EINPresswire.com/ — New College of Florida, ranked the No. 1 Public Liberal Arts College by Washington Monthly (2024), proudly presents the 2025 Socratic Stage Dialogue Series, a premier national forum dedicated to intellectual debate, free speech, and civil discourse.

The Spring 2025 speaker series will feature an extraordinary lineup of influential scholars, authors, policy experts, and thought leaders addressing topics from media and medicine to law, immigration, and the future of higher education. Key speakers include Russell Brand, Tom Homan, Alan Dershowitz, Dr. Judith Butler, Dr. Scott W. Atlas, Chad Wolf, Steven Donziger, Dr. Stanley Fish, Mollie Hemingway and other highly anticipated speakers who will tackle the most pressing issues of our time.

“At a time when open dialogue is under threat, the Socratic Stage at New College is where real conversations happen,” said New College President Richard Corcoran. “We believe that the only way to move society forward is through open, honest, and often challenging discussions. New College is committed to fostering intellectual courage, fearless inquiry, and civil discourse and bringing the most interesting and important conversations to the mainstage.”

2025 Socratic Stage Series

New College will host eight major events in Spring 2025, held on campus at Sainer Auditorium, unless otherwise noted. Select discussions will be livestreamed on YouTube and X (formerly Twitter), and ticketing will be available at NCF.edu/SocraticStage.

A Conversation on Gender: Culture and Academia | Dr. Judith Butler & Dr. Stanley Fish | February 18

A Conversation on the Value of Liberal Arts Education Today | Dr. Joshua T. Katz, Tom Steiner & Dr. David Rancourt | February 25

Defeat, Hope, and the Creation of the Hebrew Bible | Dr. Jacob L. Wright | March 6

The Politics of Medicine: Who Controls the Future of Medical Education? | Dr. Scott W. Atlas & Dr. Stanley Goldfarb | March 8

Borders, National Sovereignty, Rule of Law: What’s Next for U.S. Immigration Policy? | Tom Homan & Chad Wolf | March 20

Thinking without Permission: A Conversation with Russell Brand on Free Speech, Censorship, and Cultural Power | Russell Brand & Mark Famiglio, Chairman, Sarasota Film Festival | Date and Location to be announced!

Truth, Bias, and Power: How the Transformation of America’s Media is Reshaping Society | Dr. Scott W. Atlas, Ben Domenech & Mollie Hemingway | May 6

Justice or Politics? The Weaponization of Law in Modern America | Alan Dershowitz & Steven Donziger | May 22

Also announced this week, Alan Dershowitz, one of the most prominent legal minds of our time, will serve as New College’s 2025 Commencement Speaker, underscoring the institution’s commitment to free inquiry and civil debate.

For more details, ticketing, and livestream access, visit NCF.edu/SocraticStage.

For more details on the 2025 Commencement Ceremony, event logistics, and media access, visit: NCF.edu/Commencement.

About New College of Florida

Founded in 1960, New College of Florida is a top-ranked public liberal arts college and serves as Florida’s Honors College. Recognized for its academic excellence, rigorous inquiry, and commitment to free expression, New College offers more than 50 undergraduate majors, graduate programs in Applied Data Science and Marine Mammal Science, and a growing NAIA athletics program.

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SARASOTA, Fla. – New College of Florida is proud to announce that Alan Dershowitz, one of the nation’s most influential legal scholars and defenders of civil liberties, will deliver the 2025 Commencement Address at Florida’s Honors College in Sarasota.

Dershowitz, a constitutional lawyer, Harvard Law professor emeritus, and best-selling author, has played a pivotal role in some of the most significant legal debates of our time. His career spans more than 50 years on the Harvard Law faculty, the authorship of over 40 books on law, free speech, and constitutional rights, and decades of advocating for justice, due process, and the First Amendment.

“New College is a place for bold ideas and fearless debate,” said New College President Richard Corcoran. “We are thrilled to welcome Alan Dershowitz to Sarasota for our 2025 Commencement.”

The New College 2025 Commencement Ceremony will be a landmark event for Sarasota, taking place on May 23, 2025, from 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. at the scenic Bayfront Lawn of the Historic Ringling Mansion College Hall.

As one of Sarasota’s premier intellectual and cultural events, the New College Commencement draws students, faculty, families, and thought leaders from across Florida and beyond. The ceremony celebrates academic excellence while reinforcing New College’s commitment to free inquiry, rigorous scholarship, and the pursuit of truth.

Dershowitz’s speech marks a defining moment in a year dedicated to exploring free speech and the future of American democracy. As a nationally recognized advocate for civil liberties and legal scholarship, his address will challenge graduates to engage with complex ideas and participate in shaping the nation’s future.

With a growing reputation as a hub for academic and civil discourse, policy debate, and leadership development, New College continues to attract top-tier speakers and scholars, reinforcing its place among the most distinguished liberal arts institutions in the country.

In addition to delivering the 2025 Commencement Address, Dershowitz will also participate in the 2025 Socratic Stage Dialogue Series, a nationally recognized platform for free speech and civil discourse at New College. As part of the series, he will speak on May 22 in a highly anticipated discussion titled: “Justice or Politics? The Weaponization of Law in Modern America.” 

For more information on the Socratic Stage Series, upcoming speakers, and livestream access, visit NCF.edu/SocraticStage. 

For more details on the 2025 Commencement Ceremony, event logistics, and media access, visit: NCF.edu/Commencement. 

About New College of Florida

Founded in 1960, New College of Florida is a top-ranked public liberal arts college and serves as Florida’s Honors College. Recognized for its academic excellence, rigorous inquiry, and commitment to free expression, New College offers more than 50 undergraduate majors, graduate programs in Applied Data Science and Marine Mammal Science, and a growing NAIA athletics program.

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By: David Rancourt, PhD & Mariano Jimenez Jr.

Beautiful Game

There has always been something special about college football. From the passion to the pageantry, this game exemplifies the true spirit of America—a force so powerful it can unite total strangers and divide close families. Tribal to its very core, football fans of all ages perform rites and rituals, embrace their team’s icons, and hope and even pray for victories.

Despite all its fanfare, what is most special about this game has always been its effect on the men who play it.

As young boys from all walks of life join local leagues to learn fundamentals and tactics, coaches and players alike will agree that football, more than anything else, is about the development of character, understanding each man’s role on a team, and learning to make the sacrifices necessary for success.  Players also learn that in this brotherhood, the only color that matters is that of the jersey on your back.

Football makes America better and stronger by instilling great values in the men who play the game.

Virtue Lost

Though purity remains in the youth and high school ranks, the virtue of the game is being destroyed at the college level.

Words like dedication, commitment, loyalty, team, sacrifice, and hard work have been lost for short-term gains of money and fame.  Recruiting has morphed from “what a better man a boy will become by playing for Coach Integrity at State U,” to nothing more than a bidding war.

Today’s talent auction pits the checkbooks and desire to win of D1 schools against one another to pay unproven and often ridiculously demanding 18-year-olds to sign what are now single-season letters of intent.

Of course, everything is temporary, no matter how good or bad the player turns out to be. At any time during the season, if things get difficult or coaches bench a player for well-deserved reasons, the player can simply quit, enter the transfer portal, sign a new deal elsewhere, and be celebrated again at the arrival of their next school.  Even great players in seemingly perfect situations are fair game for bidding wars. The unlimited transfer portal represents the essence of America’s tragic obsession with immediate gratification, eliminating virtues like commitment and resilience, teaching short-term gain over long-term development.

This is emblematic of a society that embraces shots for weight loss, pills for pain relief, and celebrities who are famous for nothing other than being famous.

What Caused This Mess?

As much as Name, Image, and Likeness (NIL) and the Transfer Portal have been detrimental to the game, watch as unionization, salary caps, and administrators clamoring for state funds to pay players further erodes all that makes the game special. NFL style management structures and private equity have now also entered the equation, proving that college football is little more than a minor league for the NFL.

Though unfair, it would be easy to blame the players for their newfound greed and selfishness. However, after decades of everyone else making money off their backs, must we wonder where student-athletes developed their thirst for money and fame?  The blame lies squarely, emphatically, and precisely with the leaders of our universities who allowed and enabled all of this to happen.

Though no single person or entity is to blame for this decades-long escalating arms race, all parties involved bear some burden of responsibility, one of these authors included. As higher education in America has come under harsh review for many deserved reasons, the popularity of college football allowed it to escape critique, preventing a meaningful evaluation of how tepid, weak leadership and the siren’s song of greed and victory created this football monster.

Exploited for years by shrewder, better-informed agents pitting schools against one another for the services of overpaid coaches, university presidents and trustees were blinded by the adulation brought by victories. Few athletic directors possessed the experience necessary to evaluate the risk of complex multi-year contracts and buyouts properly. Colleges abandoned decades-long conference affiliations, aligned by academic and regional interests, to lure more money from big television payouts from other conferences. This created national mega-conferences that were great for television but terrible for traveling fans, student-athletes, and budgets.

A Better Way

Fans who long for a purer version of college football have options.

The Ivy League still has amateur student-athletes playing exciting, competitive games. These student-athletes don’t have tutors spoon-feeding them and typically attend in-person classes with their peers. The Ivy League does not pay players, has no affiliated collectives, and has no athletic scholarships. It also requires student-athletes to meet high admissions standards and earn meaningful degrees.  National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics member colleges also have high-quality intercollege sports, played by student-athletes who typically expect to turn pro in something other than the sport they play.

Principled leaders must take a stand and call for an end to collectives and all other monetary payments from universities to student-athletes.

NIL may be the law of the land, but if colleges prohibit NIL payments as conditions for playing at a specific school, then the market will sort out who is worth what at no cost to institutions.  The transfer portal must be reformed so that there are limits and consequences to transferring. Four-year eligibility limits must return along with an admissions mandate that all student-athletes fit within reasonable academic tiers met by all other admitted students. The academic standards don’t need to be those of the Ivy League, but there should be higher standards and demands for in-class learning so student-athletes can receive an education comparable to their non-athlete peers.

Until leaders of National Collegiate Athletic Association universities develop the courage to find their intended purpose again and say enough to this madness, they will continue to shine as beacons of shallowness and hypocrisy, sadly advancing the belief that all that matters in this world is winning, money and fame, ignoring their mottos, mission, purpose, and obligation to society to educate students to be prepared to take on the world, not the NFL.

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Excerpts of the article, including New College’s role in providing classical education at the university level, appear below.

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Classical schooling in Florida has support from significant names such as Erika Donalds, the wife of GOP Rep. Byron Donalds, who leads a nonprofit organization dedicated to expanding classical education. And, in another shift orchestrated by DeSantis, Florida overhauled the state’s only publicly funded liberal arts university — New College of Florida — to implement a classical curriculum under the charge of former state education commissioner and state House Speaker Richard Corcoran; Corcoran’s wife also founded a classical, liberal arts charter school.

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Florida, at the same time, became the first state to require its colleges and universities to accept the Classic Learning Test for admissions, putting it on par with the SAT or ACT. More than 120,000 Florida students have taken the CLT college entrance exam in the year since the policy was enacted. Students also can take the CLT to qualify for Florida’s massively popular Bright Futures scholarship.

When asked for comment on this story, DeSantis’ office directed POLITICO to Corcoran. The university leader said in a statement that “the growth of classical schools in Florida and our unrivaled support for parents that elect to home school needs to be represented in our higher education admissions process.”

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Read the full article at Politico.com.

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