Colorado State University at Pueblo administrators have banned email access for sociology professor Timothy McGettigan after he sent an email to people on campus criticizing the administration’s budget cuts, compared the cuts to the Ludlow Massacre a century ago by calling top administrators “hitmen,” and promoted a rally on campus to protest the proposed cuts.
In The New York Times yesterday, there’s an article by Rachel Swarns called “Crowded Out of Ivory Tower, Adjuncts See a Life Less Lofty.” In it is this line: Adjuncts say that much more is needed. It shouldn’t just be adjuncts. It should be all of us, from the newest student to the full professor getting…
On Thursday, January 16, 2014, President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama met with more than 140 education officials from public and private colleges and universities, corporations, foundations and non-profit groups to talk about college opportunity. Organized by White House economic adviser, Gene B. Sperling, the event drew pledges from the group for new…
(This article appeared in the latest issue of the Illinois AAUP’s newspaper, Illinois Academe.) By Keith R. Johnson, Oakton Community College The Great Recession impacted everyone, but it contributed to a real hit for public college and university adjunct faculty. Pressures on budgets over decades have slowly increased higher education’s dependence on adjunct faculty. Now…
This is a guest post by Richard McCarty, an assistant professor of religious studies at Mercyhurst University. His article, “Objects of the Inquisition,” appears in the January-February 2014 issue of Academe. The first incarnation of “Objects of the Inquisition” was a paper for the 2012 annual AAUP conference in Washington DC. I am grateful that it eventually…
The January-February issue of Academe marks a major milestone for the AAUP: It’s issue 1 of Volume 100. As we begin the celebration of the AAUP’s centennial, Nicholas Behm, Sherry Rankins-Robertson, and Duane Roen look to one of the AAUP’s founders, John Dewey, for a model of academic as public intellectual. There have been other…
In an article slugged “Tools for Teachers” on its website, the American Federation of Teachers presents what it says are “10 Myths About the Common Core State Standards.” I had a hard time getting beyond its rebuttal to the first “myth”: 1. “The standards tell us what to teach.” FACT: The Common Core State Standards define…
“‘Dying is easy, comedy is hard.’ I believe it was Shia LaBeouf who said that,” quipped Jim Carrey at the Golden Globes the other day. Someone always said it before. Maybe not exactly the same, but they said it. Question is, when is it influence, when imitation, and when outright plagiarism? In the Introduction to…
We all know how the totalitarian government of China censors websites by blocking access to their IP addresses. But it’s shocking to learn that the administration of Yale University is now utilizing this same tactic to ban access to a website they dislike.
The following post was written by Harry Hellenbrand, Provost and Vice-President for Academic Affairs at California State University, Northridge. It is posted here with his permission. Boycotts and Academic Freedom By Harry Hellenbrand What role, if any, should universities play in political disputes? When the American Studies Association passed a resolution urging American universities to…