Guest blogger Peter Dreier is Dr. E.P. Clapp Distinguished Professor of Politics and Chair, Urban & Environmental Policy Department at Occidental College. His latest book is The 100 Greatest Americans of the 20th Century: A Social Justice Hall of Fame (Nation Books, 2012). Dear Mitch Daniels: I’ve learned from recent news reports that thanks to your efforts as governor to…
This guest post was written by Michael DeCesare, a Sociologist at Merrimack College. With the new academic year waiting around the corner, I’m reminded of a popular motto from the 1980s: “Just Say No.” The story of the saying’s origin goes like this: At a meeting with schoolchildren in Oakland, then-First Lady Nancy Reagan was…
The following statement was made yesterday by the Purdue AAUP about plans to cut faculty positions at Purdue Calumet. An hour after the AAUP statement was released, the chancellor sent a memo expressing hope that the cuts can be rescinded. Faculty Terminations at Purdue Calumet The recent announcement of faculty terminations by the Administration at…
Sometimes we discover that administrators are not the enemies of the faculty but are companions in a single struggle. The following guest post is a repost of a piece by Tim Slekar of Schools Matter @ the Chalk Face. He is Dean of the School of Education at Edgewood College in Madison, WI.: Last week I…
UPDATE: Read Mitch Daniels’ response to this letter here. July 22, 2013 An open letter to Mitch Daniels Dear President Daniels: We are writing in response to the recent news reports about emails you wrote while governor of Indiana. In those emails, you criticized the historian Howard Zinn and his work, and you sought to…
By Peter N. Kirstein Peter N. Kirstein is a professor of history at St. Xavier University, and the vice-president of the Illinois AAUP. Mitch Daniels is president of Purdue University, and considered a moderate Republican. I am not sure what that says about immoderate Republicans, but his recently publicized efforts as governor to ban Howard…
By Michael Kazin Michael Kazin’s critique of Howard Zinn was cited by Purdue President Mitch Daniels in response to the controversy over Gov. Daniels’ emails attacking Zinn. Kazin, a professor of history at Georgetown University and co-editor of Dissent magazine, wrote this reaction to the issue. I don’t know if Daniels should be fired, but…
Henry Reichman, chair of the AAUP’s Committee A on Academic Freedom and Tenure, issued the following statement on July 1, 2013. On June 20, the University of Colorado Board of Regents voted unanimously to conduct a survey to determine whether political or ideological discrimination exists on its Boulder campus. The survey, to be conducted this…
On June 21, Florida Atlantic University reappointed adjunct professor Deandre Poole, who had sparked controversy by asking students to step on a piece of paper with the word “Jesus” on it in a lesson about conformity. The action followed a June 20 report from the FAU Faculty Senate’s Academic Freedom and Due Process Committee. The…
by Peter Wood This post was originally published on June 17 at Minding the Campus. Author Peter Wood is President of the National Association of Scholars. We asked for (and received) permission to re-post the article here, in light of a guest post by Allan Lichtman of American University that is a response to Wood.…