CPHE Standards and the Threat to Independent Accreditation
The following is a letter submitted by Nancy MacLean, a fellow at the AAUP’s Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom, to the Commission for Public Higher Education (CPHE) concerning the CPHE’s proposed evidentiary guidance for accreditation standards. The CPHE is a new accrediting body aimed at first implementing their standards at certain public universities…
An Invitation: Know Your Governing Board
POSTED ON BEHALF OF THE COALITION FOR ACTION IN HIGHER EDUCATION On behalf of the Coalition for Action in Higher Education (CAHE), we share with you a template titled Know Your Governing Board. This document’s purpose is to encourage and enable us as faculty members to learn more about bodies that too often do not…
AI, University Legitimacy, and the New Social Contract
BY NATE BENNETT When a Northeastern University professor was discovered secretly using generative AI tools to create course materials while prohibiting students from using them, the controversy exposed more than personal hypocrisy. It illustrated a broader legitimacy crisis confronting higher education. Versions of this story surface repeatedly in conversations with colleagues: AI is already woven…
How Academic Freedom Committees Can Help Our Universities Find Their Spines
BY KATIE RAINWATER AND MARTHA SCHOOLMAN University administrations in red states (including Texas and Florida) are increasingly using vague statutes and oral directives to pressure faculty to trade away their academic freedom. In Florida, departments in at least two universities—including Florida International University, where we both teach—recently adopted a censored Introduction to Sociology textbook and…
The American Historical Association, Scholasticide, and the Inherent Politics of History
BY ALAN PARKES History is always political. Last month, the American Historical Association’s (AHA) leadership chose to override its own members for a second year, again vetoing a resolution on scholasticide in Gaza along with a resolution opposing attacks on academic freedom, especially those drawing attention to Israel’s US–sponsored genocide. As the AHA fails its…
The DEI Debacle
BY NIMISHA BARTON Following the infamous “Dear Colleague” letter sent out by the Department of Education in February 2025, colleges and universities rushed to shutter diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) offices in the hopes of avoiding the fate of so many other institutions—namely, incurring the wrath of the Trump administration that views such programs as…
Ask for Reflection, Not Reaction
BY MICHAEL SCHWALBE In a society free from superstition and bigotry, a society in which anti-intellectual reactionaries held no sway, Samantha Fulknecky’s complaint would have gotten no traction. Fulnecky, as most followers of higher education news are aware, is the University of Oklahoma undergraduate who submitted a religious screed to fulfill a reaction paper assignment…
Mutual Academic Defense Compacts at Liberal Arts Colleges
BY THE DICKINSON COLLEGE AAUP CHAPTER EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE On May 8, 2025, Dickinson College’s faculty overwhelmingly approved a resolution to propose and help establish a mutual academic defense compact (MADC) with institutions in the Annapolis Group of Liberal Arts Colleges. The purpose of the MADC is to defend academic freedom and institutional autonomy in response…
Join Me in Supporting DEI Policies and Academic Freedom
BY ELLIOT BENJAMIN I joined the AAUP this fall and recently attended both a general member meeting and a meeting for the AAUP’s at-large chapter. I voiced my interests and concerns about attacks on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs and academic freedom at the at-large meeting, where it was recommended that I share on…