Thought Police Steal a Victory from UNC-Chapel Hill
Free speech had already carried the day when a UNC-Chapel Hill instructor attacked a student by name in a classwide email. So why get the feds involved?
AAUP Report Sees Threats to Campus Freedoms from Patriot Act
Feb 5, 2004 ·
Jon Sanders
A report by the American Association of University Professor describes potential threats to academic freedom since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
A key portion of the report, which was prepared by a special committee tasked with “assessing risks to academic freedom and free inquiry posed by the nation’s response to the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon,” looks at provisions of the USA Patriot Act, which the report states “gravely threaten academic freedom.” In general, the report states, “The speed with which the law was introduced and passed [in October 2001], the lack of deliberation surrounding its enactment, and the directions it provides for law-enforcement agencies have raised troubling questions about its effects on privacy, civil liberties, and academic freedom.”
UNCW faculty accuse College Republicans of fighting for right to discriminate
Dec 31, 2003 ·
Jon Sanders
On Nov. 10, the University of North Carolina at Wilmington derecognized the student group the College Republicans. The university took the extreme measure — which involves freezing its funds and disallowing its use of campus facilities — because the CRs refused to add to its constitution the nondiscrimination clause the university requires. The university has also turned down a conservative student group’s application for registration for the same reason.
At issue are two nondiscrimination clauses that the Student Organization Committee requires to be in student groups’ constitutions.
Shaw fires prof, evicts student for their criticism
Mar 7, 2003 ·
Jon Sanders
Last fall Shaw University fired a professor for “disloyalty” and evicted a student from campus housing over a faculty resolution criticizing Shaw President Talbert O. Shaw and the Board of Trustees.
Dr. Gale Isaacs, head of the Dept. of Allied Health, admitted to helping write a resolution criticizing the university on several grounds.
Political indoctrination on campus?
Oct 18, 2002 ·
George Leef
Are claims that some professors use their classes more to indoctrinate students in their own political ideology than to teach them anything true? Or are they like Elvis sightings? Liberal faculty members and administrators often scoff at such complaints, saying that the students who lodge them are just hypersensitive gripers.
AAUP committee will work to ensure academic freedom — of the left
Oct 4, 2002 ·
Jon Sanders
If the announced concerns of the American Association of University Professors’ special committee to study academic freedom in the wake of Sept. 11 are any indication, look for more rarefied hand-wringing over the academic left’s travails and cricket-chirruping silence over others’.
Free Speech for Some
Nov 9, 2001 ·
Jon Sanders
On October 5 the American Association of University Professors issued a statement denouncing criticism of professors opposing the war on terrorism by those who seek to “demonize” them.