October 2024 Newsletter

Articles of Interest

In Princeton news, the following controversy tops the list. You may remember our coverage last spring ofThe Princeton Council on Academic Freedom:A New Faculty Group Brings a Common Sense Approach to Academic Freedom. 

This new statement by a group of the Council’s members aims to prevent faculty-wide political statements: Using faculty meetings to declare political positions undermines Princeton’s mission

By Flora Champy, Stephen Macedo, Leora Batnitzky, Jonathan Mummolo, Sanjeev Kulkarni, Eve Krakowski, and Emmanuel Bourbouhakis, The Daily Princetonian, October 10, 2024

In a closed October 21 faculty meeting, an opposing faculty group came out against faculty neutrality, presumably because they are in favor of the Faculty Senate taking official positions on controversial issues of the day, and against the Council’s proposal: At closed meeting, faculty postpone vote on controversial proposals to April

By Olivia Sanches, the Daily Princetonian, October 22, 2024

Read the opposing group’s full statement on X. Among the 15 signatories is Dan-El Padilla Peralta, one of the faculty members who broke into Clio Hall last spring, along with students in protest against the war in Gaza. Some students still face criminal charges, Padilla does not.

In national news, the top of the list this month is a 9,000 word article:

The University of Michigan Doubled Down on D.E.I. What Went Wrong? 

A decade and a quarter of a billion dollars later, students and faculty are more frustrated than ever.

By Nicholas Confessore, New York Times, October 16, 2024

Here we excerpt the New York Times’ summary: What to Know About the University of Michigan’s D.E.I. Experiment  

A decade ago, the University of Michigan intentionally placed itself in the vanguard of a revolution then beginning to reshape American higher education. Around the country, college administrators were rapidly expanding D.E.I. programs. They believed that vigorous D.E.I. efforts would allow traditionally underrepresented students to thrive on campus -- and improve learning for students from all backgrounds….

In recent years, as D.E.I. programs came under withering attack, Michigan has only doubled down on D.E.I., holding itself out as a model for other schools. By one estimate, the university has built the largest D.E.I. bureaucracy of any big public university.

But an examination by The Times found that Michigan’s expansive -- and expensive -- D.E.I. program has struggled to achieve its central goals even as it set off a cascade of unintended consequences....

Instead of improving students’ ability to engage with one another across their differences, Michigan’s D.E.I. expansion has coincided with an explosion in campus conflict over race and gender. Everyday campus complaints and academic disagreements are now cast as crises of inclusion and harm.

University of Michigan Spent $250 Million on DEI, Made Students Unhappier 

Michigan’s D.E.I. expansion has coincided with an explosion in campus conflict over race and gender,” notes The New York Times.

By Robby Soave, Reason Magazine, October 16, 2024

Professors in Trouble Over Protests Wonder if Academic Freedom Is Dying

Universities have cracked down on professors for pro-Palestinian activism, saying they are protecting students and tamping down on hate speech. Faculty members say punishments have put a “chill in the air.” 

By Anemona Hartocollis, The New York Times, October 23, 2024

Another Harvard Crackdown on Free Speech

By Andrew Manuel Crespo and Reshmaan Hussam, Chronicle of Higher Education, October 22, 2024

Quote of the Month

The freedom of each Princeton faculty member to speak candidly on all manner of issues is indispensable. If faculty cannot express a broad range of intellectual views, including controversial ones, then the University’s mission to further human knowledge and educate students to become discerning, thoughtful citizens cannot be fully realized. …

… [W]e believe every member of Princeton’s faculty should be free to express political opinions, both in their official capacity and in their private speech. Likewise, if a group of faculty members — or other members of our community — seeks to collectively express a shared opinion, we support their right to do so. … 

However, we object to efforts by any subset of the faculty to speak for all of us. We must all have the freedom to speak for ourselves. …

While faculty may entrust a small number of colleagues to vote on routine academic matters, they should not be authorized to make moral or political pronouncements on behalf of the entire faculty. We oppose faculty meetings being used as a political arena where colleagues must either engage in potentially rancorous opposition or risk a false sense of consensus on otherwise controversial questions. …

Let us reserve faculty meetings for their intended purpose: governing the University. By doing so, we will further our core mission — the pursuit and dissemination of knowledge — by protecting the right of every member of Princeton’s campus to speak for themselves.

Leora Batnitzky, The Ronald O. Perelman Professor of Jewish Studies and Professor of Religion

Emmanuel Bourbouhakis, Associate Professor of Classics & Hellenic Studies

Flora Champy, Associate Professor of French in the Department of French and Italian.

Eve Krakowski, Associate Professor of Near Eastern Studies & Judaic Studies

Sanjeev Kulkarni, William R. Kenan, Jr., Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and Operations Research and Financial Engineering

Stephen Macedo, Laurance S. Rockefeller Professor of Politics and the University Center for Human Values

Jonathan Mummolo, Associate Professor of Politics and Public Affairs