BY HANK REICHMAN The American Federation of Teachers and its state affiliate, the California Federation of Teachers, have established a disaster relief fund to assist “displaced members and their families—our educators and school staff, pre-K through college, in Southern California.” In an email to members, AFT President Randi Weingarten and CFT President Jeff Freitas wrote,…
BY JOHN K. WILSON The new year brings a wide range of different events related to academic freedom and deadlines for opportunities. Here’s a quick summary of some activities, and you are encouraged to add any additional opportunities (such as AAUP state conference and chapter events) in the comments. The AAUP’s Journal of Academic Freedom…
BY KATHERINE FRANKE The following is the text of a statement issued on January 10, 2025 by Katherine Franke, formerly the James L. Dohr Professor of Law at Columbia University. It is posted here with her permission For the last year and a half, as students at Columbia University and across the globe have protested…
BY RENEE L. BOWLING AND MATTHEW J. MAYHEW Some good news for the new year: Over three hundred campuses have partnered with the Interfaith Spiritual, Religious, and Secular (INSPIRES) Index to assess and improve their campus climates for diverse worldviews. Encouragingly, many campuses participate repeatedly in the annual research-based assessment and share their names or…
BY DANIEL A. SEGAL An opera based on Michael Chabon’s novel The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, with music by Mason Bates and libretto by Gene Scheer, had its world premiere at Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music on November 15. The opera is glorious, and the performance, with every note sung and played…
POSTED BY JENNIFER RUTH Please consider signing this open letter to the NYU administration. The text is below. Click the preceding link to access the form itself so you can add your name. On December 12, the NYU administration invited the NYPD to arrest two faculty members who were supporting students involved in a nonviolent protest…
BY ILANA GERSHON Academic freedom sounds so academic—especially for employees frustrated at work because they are answering workplace surveys all the time, and yet somehow their insights about how to make an office or a task function better are never taken seriously. Faculty members are not the only experts in their workplaces, so, if we…
BY MICHAEL ANTHONY LEWIS It’s been over a year since Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack on Israel; we’re still witnessing Israel’s response. All this has made the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians front page (or front screen) news. We’re constantly hearing debates about the perennial issues that make up this conflict. I’m a CUNY faculty…
BY MATTHEW BOEDY My former classmate Phil Christman wrote a long essay at Plough about the future of higher education, the humanities, and his particular context as a lecturer at the University of Michigan. If you haven’t read it, I wanted to bring it to your attention because it’s great. I wanted to highlight the…
BY JOAN W. SCOTT The victory of Donald Trump in the presidential election has caused great concern for many in academia. When, on the campaign trail, J. D. Vance, now the vice-president-elect, commented that “professors are our enemy,” when the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 called for the abolition of the Department of Education, and when…
BY JOHN K. WILSON In the war of words between advocates of the AAUP and the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), we need to recognize the value of both organizations. I wrote an essay at Inside Higher Ed, “In Defense of FIRE,” responding to Joan Scott’s critique of FIRE. FIRE president and CEO…
BY TEXAS AAUP-AFT The following statement was released November 19 by the Texas AAUP-AFT. Upon the passage of Senate Bill 17 last year, Texas faculty warned of the detrimental impacts the state’s so-called ban on diversity, equity, and inclusion programs and practices would have on the ability of colleges and universities to perform their duties…
BY HANK REICHMAN A year ago I began a post to this blog, “Yesterday’s election results in Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky and elsewhere have boosted the spirits of Democrats and progressives. One of the less widely publicized results, however, has been the stunning rebuke suffered by book-banners and transphobes like Moms for Liberty in school board…
BY MATTHEW BOEDY As attacks on higher education and tenure spread, it behooves faculty to make sure stakeholders such as legislators know the facts about tenure. The most common reasoning for post-tenure review is the myth of the “deadwood” tenured professor. We on campus have always known it is a myth. But now the very…
BY ROBIN D. G. KELLEY This post is part of a blog series, organized by Annelise Orleck, that will focus on recent crackdowns on protests at US college and university campuses against Israel’s war on Gaza. You can read the first post and an introduction to the series here. On Monday morning, October 21, 2024,…
