The Academic Bill of Rights created by conservative David Horowitz, seems appealing at first glance. Increase academic freedom for all, right? Well, not exactly. Ironically this bill would do just the opposite. It would restrict what professors teach, and instead give them guidelines for what they have to teach to ensure a balance in left and right viewpoints (most university professor are liberals). From this would arise another issue—who would regulate this bill, and what gives them the authority to do so? Nothing in the bill answers this question. Perhaps one of the most persuasive arguments against this bill is the fact that most universities and colleges already have a policy in place to ensure academic freedom. Why make these policies into law? Well, the answer is quite simple—to spread conservative values.
University professors don’t have all the time in the world to teach. This bill would allow them to only scratch the surface of some issues. Take human history as an example. Under this bill, a professor might have to teach Darwinism, and Creationism—two very complex views. However, most professors would only have the time to completely teach one perspective. What might happen if the professor only teaches one perspective? The bill states, “No faculty shall be hired or fired or denied promotion or tenure on the basis of his or her political or religious beliefs,
Comments
Horowitz goof
Oopsie!
We can separate the bill from its sponsors
The Bill of Academic Rights is, as you say, sponsored by a conservative group. An odious conservative group, even. David Horowitz and Students for Academic Freedom are transparently anti-liberal. Their agenda, from what I can tell, is not really to foster intellectual freedom so much as to tip the ideological balance of the academy toward the right.
This I know.
However, the document they've produced seems to me to evade partisanship and is, I think, an effective reminder that ideology should not influence evaluation. I think we are at greater risk of having free expression and inquiry squelched in the classroom if the accusations of Horowitz and Co. have a basis in fact. I'm not convinced they do.
But by agreeing to the Academic Bill of Rights, and by sticking to it faithfully, both conservatives and liberals are given more freedom and are less in danger of being limited.
I see the document as an agreement between me and the students in my classes. I promise to evaluate them independently of their views and I only ask that they provide me the same courtesy. That means I don't have to play-act the mythical 'objective' teacher. I'm not objective in my views on issues. I'm not interested in playing that charade. I can be objective in my analysis and evaluation of student work, though. And in return, I want to be able to express my opinions, as appropriate.
So while the SAF crowd gives me the willies, I'm willing to use the document they created because I think it can perform a valuable function in education, for conservatives and liberals and anarchists and libertarians and Christians and atheists and pagans and communists and animists and everyone else.
Power in the classroom
I share kevin's concern, and am appalled by Horowitz's attempt to force critical thinking out of the classroom, because that's what I see it as. In order to focus students' attention on problems and problem-solving in the philosophy/ethics course I teach, I have to argue from my own position, but I also have to be a devil's advocate when students make claims. I often end up arguing for or against claims in order to test their strength, not because I believe in them or am opposed to them. I sometimes appear to be more "liberal" than I really am because the students are so reactionary, spouting cliche's and ideology they picked up from bumper stickers and at rallies for the neo-conservative candidates of the Republican party.
I think there is a real underlying problem that this misguided bill of rights is directed at, however, and that's the way that some faculty treat classrooms as if they are their own spaces, not the students' spaces.
Who is supposed to be in charge in the classroom? Who owns it? I remember feeling "oppressed" by some professors when I was a student, but not because of political ideology -- it was because those professors thought they knew everything and we were supposed to be there to drink from the fount of their wisdom. Our opinions were worthless and our input, unless it was a question they could answer, was ignored. Professors like these abuse their positions of power, and they do exist, even if in small numbers.