Academic Freedom and Cancel Culture

[onthefringe]

Professors who won't pass students who refuse or fail to even pretend to adopt the liberal ideology of their professors is a well documented problem. Or at the least penalize them grade wise for that very reason. This is evident if one goes by ratemyprofessors and such. And I see no reason to not at least give serious consideration to some of it, especially in the presence of so many similar reports about a single individual, when they sound well enough grounded.

I truly hope you do not have a graduate degree in a natural science, social science, or in any form of mathematics.

I teach business. I had a student tell me for my class that he didn't want to deal with employment law and he would find people he could just pay "under the table."

So, how was I supposed to grade the section of his business plan on "Key employment laws with which your business will need to comply"?

Pass him because... big government nanny state bureaucracy?

So did he say in his business plan that he wouldn't follow the law? Or did he say that informally, while correctly explaining all of the relevant regulations in the business plan?

He should be graded on his assigned work, not on his attitudes. So in the first case above, he could fail. But in the second, he shouldn't. (Although in the second case he probably shouldn't ask you for a reference if he has any sense.)

Sometimes it doesn't even matter what course you're taking.

Comment about Professor Charles Davis, SUNY Buffalo Architecture Department
"The class he was teaching was an architecture history class, but instead, he made us watch Ibram X. Kendi's "how to be anti-racist". I repeated all of his woke desires in order to get a good grade. He did not talk about historical architecture, but only offered a continual critique of how history was taught in the past (It was Eurocentric)."

I can't even tell what argument you think you are making here. That we have a useful window into someone's classes via one out of context comment on RMP? Fairly ridiculous. That there's no useful race-inclusive lens through which to view architecture? Patently ridiculous. It's perfectly easy to come up with a different (imaginary) context for this comment.

The course in question seems to be "architectural history I" and the syllabus snippet I can see on coursehero says one of the goals of the class is to view all types of building as "architecture", moving away from Nikolaus Pevsner's "suggestion that the professional architect should only emulate the monumental buildings of the past [which] continues to haunt our conception of what constitutes architecture and who is responsible for its creation"

So it seems just as likely to me that this comment is from some right wing snowflake who was triggered by the idea that building done by other races and cultures might be just as important as a cathedral. It's impossible to know whether this one comment is a reasonable reflection of what actually happened in the class. And the other two comments on the site are positive.

Students are people and people are good at taking one aspect of an experience and inflating its importance. I once got a negative comment from a student saying I had "politicized" a lecture on using mice to model human disorders because I mentioned in passing that 'gender' is not a "polite" word for 'sex' and that we should refer to mice as having sexes not genders.

[mamselle]

Zimbabwean towers, anyone?

Ajunta caves?

Ankor Wat?

In fact, those were in my undergrad Art and Architecture History texts (B.A., OSU, '76), but classes often "ran out of time" to cover them because they were left 'til last.

When I started adjuncting in 2001, I made sure to start with them.

M.

[mahagonny]

I can't even tell what argument you think you are making here.

Kendi is a butthead.

[mahagonny]

con't

I'd be curious to see your RMP page.

You would probably never believe it. Something you may not know about me: although I have a few seriously unpleasant impressions of where higher education has been heading recently which I suspect the pseudonymous forum seduces me to reveal, I consider the students blameless. They think I like them and they are correct. They are just curiosity and some amount of drive, and I like a good dose of these.

Now, back to the discussion of the Hannah-Jones odyssey.

[Mobius]

Maybe mahagonny was one the one reporting bias at Boise State, which was found to be baseless.

[mahagonny]

Is this it? https://www.idahoednews.org/top-news/investigators-find-no-wrongdoing-in-boise-state-diversity-course/

My goodness, the complainant didn't prepare his case well. But they did install a hotline for students to report any problems.

'Course, if Hussman et al decide to stop giving millions of dollars to UNC journalism school, they don't have to prepare a legal case. They don't have to talk to people who expect to be convincing with things like 'right-wing snowflake student.'

[spork]

More on UNC and Nikole Hannah-Jones: https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2021/06/01/unc-donor-lobbied-against-hannah-jones-and-her-lawyers-set-deadline.

Donor objects to chancellor and trustee(s), board does not grant tenure.

Edited to add: Oklahoma City community college course cancelled due to censorship law:

https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2021/06/01/course-race-%E2%80%98paused%E2%80%99-community-college.

Possibility of "distress" when learning is now illegal in Oklahoma.

[mahagonny]

More on UNC and Nikole Hannah-Jones: https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2021/06/01/unc-donor-lobbied-against-hannah-jones-and-her-lawyers-set-deadline.

Donor objects to chancellor and trustee(s), board does not grant tenure.

Edited to add: Oklahoma City community college course cancelled due to censorship law:

https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2021/06/01/course-race-%E2%80%98paused%E2%80%99-community-college.

Possibility of "distress" when learning is now illegal in Oklahoma.

Well, the CRT advocates are promoting difficult conversations, some kind of thing where people experience the pain of white fragility, endure it, have it confirmed that they are having this experience in public, and then something positive results. So instead of complaining about a law that would spare students from distress over their whiteness (and all that that entails, according to the theory) and connecting it, somehow, to academic freedom protections, they are now prompted to argue, 'yes to intentional distress in the classroom for children of certain races. And here's why.' Why soft-pedal their main argument?
And if distress over uncomfortable truths is a goal, can a
*conservative* teacher ask the class: of you black people in the room, how many do not have your father living at home with you?

I can't even tell what argument you think you are making here.

Kendi is a butthead.

Fuller explanation: The student reports, on RMP believing he needed to feign alignment with the professor's left political views in order to have the possibility of getting a good grade. Though he doesn't prove it yet, this should be something to be concerned about. As should the comment upthread  'if it's just some right wing snowflake student.' Showing bias.

I tried to fan your flame here, Spork. It may be that the fora does not want to discuss these things dominating the news at this time. I suspect a lot of educators just hoped the whole CRT thing would just sail through without any real challenge. (Of course there is that thing called 'the public.')

[Mobius]

What a student writes on RMP is not concerning at all.

[apl68]

What a student writes on RMP is not concerning at all.

Complaints of that sort are awfully thin evidence to cite in support of a thesis that this is a widespread problem.

[mahagonny]

Complaints of that sort are awfully thin evidence to cite in support of a thesis that this is a widespread problem.

A comment like 'it's just some right wing snowflake student' suggests that if it were a problem, it is a problem only to someone the professor doesn't like, because of his political leaning. I wonder how common that is, because it's a recurring theme that I've heard, though no one else has to.

[Mobius]

I'd think the same thing if it was an SJW safe spacer.

I've had students claim I gave them a poor grade because they were liberal or conservative. Slate and The Daily Caller must call out my discriminatory behavior.

[dismalist]

More on UNC and Nikole Hannah-Jones: https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2021/06/01/unc-donor-lobbied-against-hannah-jones-and-her-lawyers-set-deadline.

Donor objects to chancellor and trustee(s), board does not grant tenure.

Edited to add: Oklahoma City community college course cancelled due to censorship law:

https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2021/06/01/course-race-%E2%80%98paused%E2%80%99-community-college.

Possibility of "distress" when learning is now illegal in Oklahoma.

Pro tenure or non-tenure arguments aside, one should come to grips with the fact that people disagree. And in the US it seems that people have sorted themselves by State. To channel that peaceably is possible through strong federalism. If a State wants to preserve freedom for donors or force a point of view on people, let it. So long as the points of view are different, there is no problem. [I think Tennessee even has a Butler Act like statute on the books. Charlie Darwin will adjudicate! :-)]

[onthefringe]

Complaints of that sort are awfully thin evidence to cite in support of a thesis that this is a widespread problem.

A comment like 'it's just some right wing snowflake student' suggests that if it were a problem, it is a problem only to someone the professor doesn't like, because of his political leaning. I wonder how common that is, because it's a recurring theme that I've heard, though no one else has to.

As a note I deliberately chose to phrase it that way because calling the student a "right wing snowflake" on the basis of precisely zero real evidence seemed like the obvious equivalent of you assuming the student's RMP comment reflected reality on the basis of precisely zero real evidence.

[mahagonny]

What a student writes on RMP is not concerning at all.

Now I'm curious:

You concluded that the Boise College controversy was settled by the law firm by talking with 30 students and multiple faculty (more than one faculty member, neither of whom reported being guilty of indoctrinating anyone) and President Tromp. Would you prefer someone from the law firm actually attended the class to see what was being done?
They haven't got the bill for their services yet. Hmm...

More on UNC and Nikole Hannah-Jones: https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2021/06/01/unc-donor-lobbied-against-hannah-jones-and-her-lawyers-set-deadline.

Donor objects to chancellor and trustee(s), board does not grant tenure.

Edited to add: Oklahoma City community college course cancelled due to censorship law:

https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2021/06/01/course-race-%E2%80%98paused%E2%80%99-community-college.

Possibility of "distress" when learning is now illegal in Oklahoma.

Pro tenure or non-tenure arguments aside, one should come to grips with the fact that people disagree. And in the US it seems that people have sorted themselves by State. To channel that peaceably is possible through strong federalism. If a State wants to preserve freedom for donors or force a point of view on people, let it. So long as the points of view are different, there is no problem. [I think Tennessee even has a Butler Act like statute on the books. Charlie Darwin will adjudicate! :-)]

+1
So who won this round? The CRT gang are howling they've been blindsided. All because of instead  of tenure she has a five year appointment.