Why Universities Need the Racist Right
BY GALEN LEONHARDY Guest blogger Galen Leonhardy is an AAUP member living and teaching in Illinois. On December 19, my dear long-time friend, Starla, replied to “UW, WSU Brace for Speech by Milo Yiannopoulos, Breitbart Editor Banned from Twitter,” a Seattle Times article floating around Facebook. The article’s author, Katherine Long, tells readers that an infamous…
Journal of Academic Freedom: Academic Freedom in an Illiberal Democracy?
BY JENNIFER H. RUTH This is a guest post by Jennifer H. Ruth, the faculty editor of the AAUP’s Journal of Academic Freedom and professor of film studies at Portland State University. Ruth issued a call for papers for the 2017 Volume 8 of the Journal in September, at the time Volume 7 was released. The topics…
Whose Schools?! Our Schools
BY TIFFANY KRAFT Are you kidding me? University board chairs and college officials justify fat salaries while faculty and students are starving? This is not only unconscionable business practice, it’s intentional economic injustice that’s killing the American dream. Enough is enough: fight exploitation. Here’s a holiday story that is all too familiar for faculty and…
Saving Academic Freedom from Trump's "Post-Truth" Nation
BY ANDRE PERRY This blog post originally appeared as a column in The Hechinger Report on November 22, and appears here with the author’s permission. Guest blogger Andre Perry is the former founding dean of urban education at Davenport University in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The world is not flat; dinosaurs didn’t walk with humans and white…
Mainstreaming Hate after the Election
BY DONNA YOUNG This is a guest post by Donna Young, the guest editor of the November–December Academe issue. She is a law professor at Albany Law School and president of the Albany Law School AAUP chapter. My editor’s note for the current issue of Academe, which focuses on the theme “Race on Campus,” begins with the statement, “All is not…
Free (Or Fettered) to Teach at the Community College?
BY STEVE MUMME The academic freedom wars rage across the country as professors debate trigger warnings, hostile environments, bullying eradication, and multiple other sins infringing on academic speech. The discerning reader will surely have noticed that most of this discourse is located on university campuses, not community colleges. There’s a reason for that. As we at…
Trump University: Alleged Fraud, Racketeering, & the "Playbook"
BY TIFFANY KRAFT Guest Blogger Tiffany Kraft is an activist with Faculty Forward Network. It’s eye-popping to look at the facts and allegations involved in the open racketeering and fraud cases of Trump University, but it’s crucial to do so given that Donald Trump is running for the Oval Office. “It’s absolutely a con,” said…
Impacts of Prestige Seeking in Higher Education
BY DESIREE ZERQUERA Guest blogger Desiree Zerquera, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Leadership Studies at the University of San Francisco. Her research focuses on the structuring of access and opportunity for marginalized students, particularly within urban universities. With fall recruitment in full swing, many colleges and universities may be eager to tout…
AAUP Letter to Kennesaw State
BY HANS-JOERG TIEDE Below is the October 10, 2016 letter to the Kennesaw State Board of Regents from the AAUP: Members of the faculty at Kennesaw State University have urged the American Association of University Presidents to take an official interest in the issues of academic governance raised by the recommendation of the board of regents’ Executive and…