BY JOERG TIEDE Walter P. Metzger, professor of history at Columbia University for his entire career and the AAUP’s official historian for most of that time, has passed away. Professor Metzger dedicated his entire professional life to the AAUP, both by contributing to the ongoing work of the Association, in particular on Committee A on Academic Freedom…
Peter Wood at Minding the Campus complains about the AAUP’s unanimous vote to censure the University of Missouri Board of Curators because “the AAUP has yet to find anyone to censure over abuses of Title IX.” What the hell does that mean? The AAUP censure list is a list of university administrations. The AAUP has…
In March I reposted from the WMU-AAUP blog comments delivered to the Western Michigan University (WMU) Board of Trustees by WMU-AAUP President and AAUP national Council member Lisa Minnick. Below are comments delivered today, June 29, to the same board by Professor Minnick. They offer a truly eloquent and effective defense of fundamental academic values…
BY HANK REICHMAN Yesterday the Chronicle of Higher Education published an article by Peter Schmidt entitled “AAUP Rethinks How It Fights Governing Boards.” In a nutshell, the piece argues that as college and university governing boards, often overseeing multiple state institutions, increasingly overreach and interfere in governance matters best left to faculty and administrators, the…
BY PETER N. KIRSTEIN “Yes Virginia, there is a constitution”: an AAUP constitution. While inexplicably not included in the “centennial” edition of the Redbook, (American Association of University Professors Policy Documents and Reports, 2015, Eleventh Edition) there is indeed an AAUP constitution. It does appear along with an excellent preambular historical statement on pp. 283-90 in the tenth edition…
The AAUP at its 2016 annual meeting today voted unanimously to censure the administrations of the College of Saint Rose, for the dismissal of 23 tenured and tenure-track professors, and the University of Missouri (Columbia), for the Board’s dismissal of Melissa Click without due process. The members also rejected a proposal to give Committee A authority to…
BY HANK REICHMAN Two days ago I posted a piece about the University of Chicago’s ill-considered attempt to discipline graduating senior and student body president Tyler Kissinger for his leadership of a peaceful and brief sit-in advocating, among other demands, a $15 minimum wage for campus workers. Kissinger’s disciplinary hearing was held yesterday and The…
BY HANK REICHMAN On June 4, following Committee A’s annual spring meeting, present and former AAUP leaders, activists, and staff members gathered in Washington to join family members and friends in honoring the memory of Jordan E. Kurland, who passed away in January at the age of 87, still actively employed by the AAUP. Jordan…
BY JOHN K. WILSON The AAUP today issued a report on the University of Missouri, condemning the Board’s decision to fire Melissa Click. The full report is well worth reading, and I have previously argued in defense of Click, but I want to make a personal response to the Mizzou Board of Curator’s 10-page letter that it…
Among other things, I am (or have been) an historian of railroad labor, so I was especially thrilled to learn that University of Wisconsin-Madison labor historian William P. Jones had joined the conversation around the assault on tenure in the Wisconsin system. Professor Jones, by the way, will be the plenary banquet speaker at AAUP’s…