Trustee Responsibility Free Speech

Zack Beauchamp
Vox

 Excerpt: Rufo claims that the American system as we know it has been overthrown, subtly and quietly replaced by “a new ideological regime that is inspired by ... critical theories and administered through the capture of the bureaucracy.” Rufo’s “counterrevolution” is aimed at reversing this process; taking America back, starting with Florida’s universities.

Radicals haven’t taken over mainstream America; they’ve been taken over by it. It follows, then, that Rufo’s “counterrevolution” is not countering much of anything. His war on American institutions is not a defensive action against an ascendant post-Marxist left; it is instead an act of aggression against the liberal ideals he occasionally claims to be defending.

Liz Navratil
Star Tribune

Excerpt: Amna Khalid hears frequently from fellow professors who are shying away from teaching controversial material as political polarization rises and attacks on teachers' independence become more common.

"It's a rational decision for professors to be dropping it," said the Carleton College professor and founding member of the Academic Freedom Alliance. "I don't like it, but I totally understand it."

Jonathan Turley
Jonathan Turley's Blog

Excerpt: Below is my column in The Messenger on the new ranking of colleges and universities on the protection of free speech on campuses. There are few surprises on the list with many of the most elite universities filling out the bottom of ranking as the most hostile to free expression. Harvard now holds the ignoble distinction of being the most anti-free speech university in the country. For full disclosure, George Washington University (where I teach) was again ranked “below average” on free speech, coming in at 185 out of 248.

Michael Powell
New York Times

Excerpt: Yoel Inbar, a noted psychology professor at the University of Toronto, figured he might be teaching this fall at U.C.L.A. Last year, the university’s psychology department offered his female partner a faculty appointment. Now the department was interested in recruiting him as a so-called partner hire, a common practice in academia. The university asked him to fill out the requisite papers, including a statement that affirmed his belief and work in diversity, equity and inclusion. He flew out and met with, among others, a faculty diversity committee and a group of graduate students.
 
But a few days later, the department chair emailed and told him that more than 50 graduate students had signed a letter strongly denouncing his candidacy. Why? In part, because on his podcast years earlier, he had opposed diversity statements — like the one he had just written.

William Melhado
Texas Tribune
 
Excerpt: The political climate in Texas is the leading contributor to professors' desire to leave the state, a new survey of more than 1,900 Texas faculty members found. More than a quarter of those professors said they planned to look for positions elsewhere in the country this year as a result of political interference and widespread dissatisfaction with the state of higher education in Texas.

Of the professors surveyed, 57% cited the state’s political climate as their top reason for wanting to leave Texas. The second and third most cited reasons for a desire to leave were anxieties about salary and concerns over academic freedom, respectively.

Rick Sobey
Boston Herald
 
Excerpt: Just as the school year kicks off and students return to campus, Harvard University has been ranked as the worst college for free speech in the country. Harvard ranked last out of 248 colleges in a survey of more than 55,000 students across the U.S., receiving the only “Abysmal” rating in the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression and College Pulse free speech rankings.

“Each year, the climate on college campuses grows more inhospitable to free speech,” said FIRE Director of Polling and Analytics Sean Stevens.