BY DANIELLE SLAUGHTER Miguel Cardona Secretary, US Department of Education Dear Secretary Cardona, My name is Danielle Slaughter, and I’m an independent scholar, digital organizer, and mother of two young children. In 2017, I made the difficult decision to transition out of academia. I was pregnant with my second child, and, after the struggles I…
BY HANK REICHMAN Yesterday the University of Wisconsin at Madison began instruction online, a move that the great majority of colleges and universities have made or are making in response to the unprecedented COVID-19 pandemic. Here’s what English professor Caroline Gottschalk Druschke told the Wisconsin State Journal about the move: “None of us are going…
BY SIMON MALOY The following review of Campus Battlefield: How Conservatives Can Win the Battle on Campus and Why It Matters by Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA and creator of the notorious Professor Watchlist, is reposted with permission from Media Matters. Simon Maloy is a senior writer at Media Matters. Formerly a political writer…
BY HANK REICHMAN Charlie Kirk is the twenty-something founder of the right-wing “student group” Turning Point USA, sponsor of the notorious Professor Watchlist. Kirk’s group is so nutso that even the Charles Koch Foundation and the Young America’s Foundation have turned against it. Sarah Ruger, director of Free Speech Initiatives for the Charles Koch Institute,…
BY TARIQ KHAN My name is Tariq Khan. I am a father of three young children, a U.S. Air Force Veteran, and a PhD candidate in History at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. I spend most of my time juggling parenting duties with researching and writing my dissertation, though I can sometimes be found…
BY JOERG TIEDE Over the course of the last year, targeted online harassment of faculty has emerged as a significant threat to academic freedom. Fueled by websites such as Professor Watchlist, Campus Reform, and College Fix, campaigns of threats and harassment are directed against faculty members for what they are reported to have said in…
BY WENDY LYNNE LEE There is a great deal to be said about the rise of the Alt-Right over this past year, and while I understand the argument for identifying its platform with the ascent of white supremacism, I’d argue that “Alt-Right” encompasses something far more ambitious and dangerous, especially with respect to the country’s…
BY HANK REICHMAN Jordan Klepper’s “The Opposition” on Comedy Central tries to pick up where the old Colbert Report left off. Like Colbert, Klepper takes on the persona of an arrogant right-wing commentator to satirize the foibles and falsehoods often promoted by such. Last night his “correspondents” took on Turning Point, USA, sponsor of the…
POSTED BY HANK REICHMAN The following statement was released by California Scholars for Academic Freedom: The newly inaugurated U.S. administration has created an atmosphere of violence, racism, Islamophobia, and anti-Semitism. A less discussed aspect of these attacks is on academic freedom. The 2016 election has taken to new extremes the threats to academic freedom. We…
BY STEVE MUMME The author of this guest post is Steve Mumme, Co-President of the Colorado Conference of AAUP. One week into Donald Trump’s presidency it is clear that the new administration intends the harshest attack on American universities since the McCarthy Era. Enamored of Alt-Facts and an unhealthy skepticism of science itself, the new administration has…