BY HANK REICHMAN Readers of this blog may be familiar with the regular National Public Radio (NPR) feature “Science Friday.” Last week one 35-minute segment, “Science in the Crosshairs,” focused on governmental and other threats to the academic freedom of scientists. It began with fetal tissue research: After furor erupted over a video seeming to…
BY KELLY HAND We’re pleased to announce that the new volume of the AAUP’s Journal of Academic Freedom is out today. The Journal publishes scholarship on academic freedom and on its relation to shared governance, tenure, and collective bargaining. Current and past volumes of the Journal of Academic Freedom, which receives funding from the AAUP Foundation,…
BY JOHN K. WILSON On Sept. 21, political science professor Jackie Stevens began teaching her class at Northwestern University. Earlier that week, she didn’t know if that would happen. Stevens had been banned from campus (and prohibited from any contact with students) since July 28, when the administration announced she was a potential threat and…
BY PETER N. KIRSTEIN I was interviewed on Comcast Public Perspectives in the Chicagoland area on academic freedom in July, but they just posted the YouTube video. The half-hour show covers the AAUP Illinois Conference Committee A, the Finkelstein and Salaita cases, the contingent faculty explosion, and the Douglas Crowe case at Bradley University. I speak only for…
BY JOERG TIEDE Quincy Wright (1890-1970) served as the 20th president of the AAUP from 1944 to 1946. At the time of his election to the presidency, Wright had already served for almost two decades on Committee A on Academic Freedom and Tenure, and he would continue to serve on the committee for another decade.…
BY JOHN K. WILSON Earlier today, UC-Berkeley Dean Carla Hesse rescinded her Sept. 13 suspension of the DeCal course on Palestine. But the controversy over her original suspension remains a hotly contested debate. Dean Hesse writes, “I did not request or require any revisions of the content of the course,” a claim questioned by some…
The following letter from Dean Carla Hesse rescinds the suspension of the revised Palestine course at the University of California at Berkeley. BERKELEY: College of Letters & Science Office of the Deans 101 Durant Hall #2920 September 19, 2016 DEPARTMENT CHAIRS OF THE DIVISION OF SOCIAL SCIENCES DIVISIONAL COUNCIL OF THE ACADEMIC SENATE (UC…
BY EVA SWIDLER Guest blogger Eva Swidler is an environmental historian on the undergraduate liberal arts faculty at Goddard College and the Curtis Institute of Music. She also researches and writes in the fields of labor studies and political economy. Academic freedom is all the rage in newspapers these days. Are protests at speaking events on…
BY JOHN K. WILSON UPDATE: Berkeley rescinded the suspension on Sept. 19. Suspending a course in the middle of a semester is one of the most serious actions a university can take. On Sept. 13, Dean Carla Hesse of the University of California at Berkeley did exactly that to a student-taught DeCal class about Palestine.…
BY UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO FACULTY The following open letter from University of Chicago faculty appeared in the Chicago Maroon on Sept. 13. Dear Students of the Class of 2020: As you have undoubtedly noticed, you and your new institution have been in the media spotlight lately. We want to take this opportunity to voice our…