American college campuses are increasingly being viewed as ideological battlegrounds where civil discourse is often silenced and partisan pressures force students and faculty to reconsider sharing unorthodox views. Sal Khan, the founder of Khan Academy, is attempting to shift this trend by launching Dialogues, a new college admissions tool, which is now being accepted by numerous prestigious universities, including Columbia, MIT, and the University of Chicago. Dialogues is hosted on the Schoolhouse.world tutoring platform, where students record conversations on controversial topics such as abortion, immigration, and Israel-Palestine.
Participants in Dialogues are required to provide feedback on each other, such as ’empathetic’ or ‘good listener,’ and can submit a portfolio as part of their college application. This portfolio is assessed using a rubric that focuses on elements like empathy, curiosity, and the ability to find common ground. Students have the option to select which feedback they wish to include in their portfolio for consideration during the admissions process. Khan pointed out that he was inspired to create Dialogues after noticing that the growing pressure to self-censor on college campuses was affecting students even before they arrived at these institutions. He shared a personal anecdote about feeling uncomfortable sharing a moderate opinion at a dinner party in a liberal Northern California community, which led him to conceptualize the Dialogues initiative.
Khan hopes that Dialogues will contribute to an environment of open expression on American university campuses, benefiting not only conservative students but also liberal students who might be hesitant to share more moderate views. According to a 2025 study by the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), approximately 60% of college students felt uncomfortable expressing disagreement with a professor on a controversial topic, while nearly 50% were anxious about sharing their views with other students in communal spaces on campus. The study also revealed that conservative students reported self-censoring more frequently than liberals. The analysis indicated that a majority of students support avoiding the invitation of speakers expressing contentious views on campus.
Intellectual diversity appears to be lacking on campuses, as evidenced by a 2018 study of top U.S. News-ranked liberal arts colleges, which found that registered Democratic professors outnumbered Republican professors by a significant margin. A 2022 MIWI Institute analysis further revealed that Ivy League universities have a left-leaning student body, with 53% of students identifying as left-leaning and 25% as conservative. Khan aspires for Dialogues to equip students with the foundation to engage in challenging conversations with one another and enhance their understanding of differing views. He emphasized that the breakdown in constructive conversation and disagreement across ideological lines is not new to society, but the current generation of young people is especially affected by this issue.
Despite the potential for controversy, Khan maintains that the Dialogues program is designed to foster mutual respect rather than discrimination. He assured that the Dialogues team actively monitors feedback to ensure no bias exists in how students are evaluated. Additionally, he noted that the program has already produced positive results, with participants reporting increased empathy and greater understanding of perspectives that differ from their own. However, some parents have expressed concerns over the potential for the program to be used as a method of excluding conservative students. Khan clarified that the portfolio submitted by students only includes the peer feedback they choose to disclose, not the actual conversations they had. He added that the topics discussed are not included in the portfolios, and that the Dialogues team ensures fairness in the feedback process.
Some institutions have historically used nontraditional methods to achieve desired political outcomes, with the Supreme Court’s 2023 ruling against affirmative action prompting colleges to rely more heavily on personal essays as a means of evaluating race-based experiences. While the Dialogues program aims to promote intellectual diversity and open dialogue, the initiative’s reception and impact will be closely watched as it unfolds in the academic landscape of the United States.