There Be Dragons

BY JONATHAN REES I’ve been reading a lot of books about the history of maps and mapmaking lately. Apparently, one of the great myths of cartography is that medieval maps would label sections of unexplored territory “There be dragons” in order to discourage people from going to those places. Of course, even had this actually…

Add Your Name to the Professor Watchlist!

BY KELLY HAND Yesterday, the AAUP shared with members a petition inviting them to ask to have their names added to the Professor Watchlist, a website that purports to expose faculty who “advance leftist propaganda in the classroom.” To counter these alarmist accusations, we will include the names of all who sign the AAUP petition–open to nonmembers also–in an…

In Memoriam: Gordon Aubrecht

BY MARTIN KICH Gordon Aubrecht passed away at age 73 on Monday, November 21. Gordon was the long-time President of the advocacy chapter at Ohio State University. For almost a decade, I had had contact with him through the Ohio Conference of AAUP. But our acquaintance went much farther back than that. Gordon and I…

Teaching in the Age of Trump

BY STEPHEN KUUSISTO When I was very small I didn’t know that I’d meet people who wouldn’t like me until one day, climbing stairs with my father, my hand in his, we met an elderly Swedish woman who lived just below us and who said, “Tsk, Tsk” because I was blind. I was only four…

OCAAUP 2016 Annual Meeting: Resolution 2–Instruction First

POSTED BY MARTIN KICH Whereas the primary mission of Ohio’s colleges and universities is to educate students, Whereas colleges and universities have increasingly and irresponsibly devoted resources to bloated administrative bureaucracies, to equally ambitious and expensive sports programs supported by ever-more elaborate and more expensive athletic facilities, and a seemingly endless succession of other expensive…

What's a Teacher/Scholar to Do?

BY AARON BARLOW There’s an essay on Chronicle,com by NYU professor Eric Klinenberg called “What Trump’s Win Compels Scholars To Do.” After discussing the overreach of Big Data, Klinenberg writes: There’s one other thing that universities must do better: teach student skills for learning, discerning, reasoning, and communicating in an informational environment dominated by quick…

The Remove to Representation

BY AARON BARLOW Sometime around 1970, when I told an aunt and uncle that the FBI was spying on American leftists, they turned to me in outrage and spoke in unison, “You don’t really believe that, do you?” This, from a couple who had just told me I should be willing to go fight in…