Illinois State University (ISU) has received an undesirable designation: it has been named “Speech Code of the Month” for September by the Foundation for Individual Rights (FIRE), a libertarian organization that criticizes restrictions on student free speech.
Cary Nelson recently ended a six-year stint as president of the AAUP, and while in the office, he made a priority of media outreach. In “Media Matters,” Nelson’s article in the newest issue of Academe, he gives readers tips on successfully getting the AAUP name and viewpoint into the news and into public awareness. It’s…
In the September-October issue of Academe, Stephanie L. Kerschbaum writes that administrators and other leaders can take positive steps to help ensure access for all faculty, before specific needs arise. For example, braille nameplates next to all offices can be the norm, so that faculty who need them will feel included from the start. Kerschbaum also points…
Twenty years ago, I was a teacher/administrator at a New York City private school. About halfway through the year, the head of the school asked me to conduct a vote among the faculty. I did so, and took the results back to the chief administrator. He looked at them, shook his head, and said, “No.”…
On October 10, 2012, the United States Supreme Court will hear arguments in Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin, a major affirmative action case that could fundamentally change college admissions for many students. At issue are questions of how schools achieve racial diversity in their student bodies—or if they should even be trying. The…
In 2010, Wesleyan University began offering courses and holding events in its new College of the Environment, a new interdisciplinary school and associated think tank. Each school year, the College has a broad theme (the first three were stress and vulnerability, water, and environmental justice) and approaches that subject from a variety of viewpoints. In…
In response to Mitt Romney’s disastrous declaration to his donors that 47% of Americans are moochers who regard themselves as victims and are unworthy of voting for him, the right has uncovered a 14-year-old video of Barack Obama using the word “redistribution.”
Margaret Bellafiore is an artist and a professor of art at Bridgewater State University in Massachusetts. She has never served in the military, but over the last few years, she noticed that some of her students were creating art that included militarized imagery. The students were veterans who had returned home and gone to college,…
Last week, the Queensborough Community College English Department voted to refuse a reduction in workload hours for its First Year Composition courses, supposedly a necessity for the City University of New York’s new Pathways to a Common Core initiative. Vice President Karen Steele then sent an email to the department that seemed to threaten draconian…
At the end of August, the Center for the Future of Higher Education released its second policy report from. The report is titled “Who Is “Professor Staff? And How Can This Person Teach So Many Classes?” It offers a very detailed and deeply unsettling view of how our colleges and universities exploit contingent faculty. The…