You've probably heard of the Koch Brothers. If you haven't, they are two extremely wealthy guys who have the oil industry in their pockets. The Koch brothers have played an active role in opposing climate change legislation, including the blackballing of solar power initiatives in the state of Florida.

They advocate conservative pro-oil and pro-corruption practices masked as religious policies, specialize in defending the construction of pipelines, and are the charitable front of the oil industry, even more so than Exxon Mobil.. and that's to put it lightly.

They are well-known for their generous donations to private organizations in order to further their agenda and policy.

Lately, they've been expanding their scope by donating to colleges and universities, in order to sponsor "educational programs" that further their free-market ideology and climate change-denying rhetoric. They want to influence the youth of America by controlling what they are taught, and so they're donating to prominent universities in order to further this goal- a partisan goal which has everything to do with indoctrination and nothing to do with free and ethical education.

So why are they donating to CNU?

According to Greenpeace, and also Charles C. Koch's 2015 tax documents, CNU received $89,000,000 from Charles C. Koch for "educational programs."

Well... to be clear, the reason you may not have heard of this, is that the Koch brothers did not donate directly to CNU. They technically donated to the CNU Educational Foundation. But the CNU Educational Foundation is where CNU conducts a significant quantity of its indirect expenses. And that "foundation"- which is also federally registered as a 501 c(3) charity- exists to "further the educational goals of Christopher Newport University."

So why are they receiving money from the Koch brothers?

Why did we take this money?

What does this mean?

I have the same questions you do, and I think we should hold our school administration accountable.

Why is our school accepting money from these corrupt oil conspirators who back crime after crime in the name of indoctrination? How is this what we stand for?

I look forward to the day CNU accepts accountability and pledges to reject donations from the Koch brothers in the future, as special interests are not what education stands for. I hope you do too.