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Academic Senate
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Statement
of Academic Freedom
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On a periodic basis, the Academic Senate reviews the
District's "Academic Freedom Policy". We have instituted such a
review this semester, with a committee chaired by Stephen Branch
of the History Department. When the committee finishes its
review, it may bring forward recommendations to the Board on
possible revisions to the Academic Freedom policy (or it may
make the recommendation that the current policy is acceptable
and does not warrant any revisions).
Academic Freedom is a right and a responsibility that applies to
all individuals who are part of the college, not just a select
group. With this in mind, the Senate is inviting participation
from the college community and its various constituencies. If
you are interested in serving on the Academic Freedom Review
Committee, please contact the Senate's administrative assistant,
Lita Wangen (x. 3058).
If you have any questions, concerns, or comments, please do not
hesitate to contact me.
Michael Dermody
President,
COC Academic Senate
Colleges are established by society to perpetuate the values of a democratic social order, to seek new perspectives and solutions, and to develop citizens capable of separating right from wrong, fact from falsehood, profound from profane.
As an individual, the college student expects to learn to understand her/his environments, her/his heritage, and those of others. Basic to this endeavor is the right of all participants in higher education to pursue truth. Since truth is elusive and, when faced squarely often painful, the quest for it must be protected from those both within and without the institution who would narrow the scope of learning and teaching. To this end the following principles are enunciated:
GENERAL PRINCIPLES
1. Academic freedom is an obligation, not a mere privilege. Our mandate is not to seek "some truth" or "safe truth," but to seek truth.
2. The scholarly pursuit of knowledge rests on the obligation to question, to analyze, and to evaluate the old and the new, the practical and the theoretical, the accepted and the controversial. The obligation to question brings with it the obligation to be questioned in the marketplace of ideas No idea, person, or institution is immune from responsible scrutiny. However, the irresponsible, the insensitive, and the fearful must not be allowed to deny, limit, or distort the freedom of inquiry which is at the very heart of a democratic society and is the essence of higher education.
3. Intrinsic to these concepts is the understanding that unpopular political opinions, taboo sexual behaviors and unorthodox religious viewpoints may be part of course content. It is recognized that an essential function of education is a probing of received opinions and an exploration of ideas that may cause some students discomfort.
INDIVIDUAL RESPONSIBILITIES AND OBLIGATIONS
4. Academic freedom implies responsibility and fairness. In a pluralistic society no one has the right to impose his own version of the truth on others. All serious theories have a right to be heard. The job of the teacher in dealing with conflicting concepts is not to endorse one view but to help the student acquire scholarly methods of investigation and evaluation.
5. However, the teacher will lose the respect of her/his students if he/she appears to be either a dogmatic pedant or a moral cipher. An occasional expression of opinion, so labeled, is consonant with scholarly virtue.
6. Those who enjoy freedom must be worthy of trust. In the classroom the teacher must know the boundaries of one's subjects and exercise care in handling controversial matters about which one is not professionally qualified to speak. As in other aspects of life, one must observe the canons of good taste. Selfcriticism and selfcontrol are the essence of professionalism
7. Freedom to seek truth is pointless if the search is not carried on actively. The community college instructor is not expected to engage in advanced research -- although one should be free to do so -- but the absence of tangible reports and monographs does not excuse one from the need to develop knowledge of ones subject and one's skills as a instructor.
INSTITUTIONAL RESPONSIBILITIES AND SUPPORT
8. An education which seeks to shield students from unpopular ideas, unpleasant facts and unwelcome problems does a disservice to the students and is a discredit to the community which supports the institution on the assumption that the purpose of study is a free, fearless and unbiased pursuit of knowledge
8.1 The freedom of all faculty to inquire, to teach controversial content, to model and encourage critical thinking, and to present all viewpoints in the teaching and learning process can only be guaranteed by institutional support of academic freedom.
8.2 Correspondingly, the freedom of all students to inquire, to have access to the full range of information available, to explore difficult and controversial material, to develop and practice critical thinking skills, to operate in a classroom climate free of intimidation and censorship must be similarly guaranteed.
8.3 Faculty rights to give and student rights to receive grades free from political influence, business oriented productivity standards or threat of lawsuit are secured by the institutional processes which support academic freedom.
8.4 The willingness to take risks in the assignment of textbooks, student learning activities and honest feedback to students requires insulation from the threat of political or personal attack. Both students and faculty need the opportunity to take risks in a supportive environment.
8.5 Finally, academic freedom must be extended to all faculty, whether of tenure or nontenure rank, and it is the duty of tenured faculty to inform new faculty of their academic freedom rights and to use tenured status to protect colleagues from any attack on these rights.
Truth is elusive; wisdom is rare. Academic freedom is no guarantee of either. But neither can flourish without it. |
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BACKGROUND MATERIAL:
ACADEMIC FREEDOM
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AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF UNIVERSITY PROFESSORS
1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure With 1970 Interpretive Comments
(NOTE: This statement was also adopted by the Statewide Academic Senate of California Community Colleges)
In 1940, following a series of joint conferences begun in 1934, representatives of the American Association of University Professors and of the Association of American Colleges agreed upon a restatement of principles set forth in the 1925 Conference Statement on Academic Freedom and Tenure. This restatement is known to the profession as the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure.
The 1940 Statement is printed below, followed by Interpretive Comments as developed by representatives of the American Association of University Professors and the Association of American Colleges during 1969. The governing bodies of the associations, meeting respectively in November 1989 and January 1990, adopted several changes in language in order to remove genderspecific references from the original text.
The purpose of this statement is to promote public understanding and support of academic freedom and tenure and agreement upon procedures to assure them in colleges and universities. Institutions of higher education are conducted for the common good and not to further the interest of either the individual teacher (The word ""teacher" as used in this document is understood to include the investigator who is attached to an academic institution without teaching duties) or the institution as a whole. The common good depends upon the free search for truth and its free exposition.
Academic freedom is essential to these purposes and applies to both teaching and research. Freedom in research is fundamental to the advancement of truth. Academic freedom in its teaching aspect is fundamental for the protection of the rights of the teacher in teaching and of the student to freedom in learning. It carries with it duties correlative with rights. [ 1 ] ( numbers in square brackets refer to Interpretive Comments which follow.)
Tenure is a means to certain ends; specifically: (1) freedom of teaching and research and of extramural activities, and (2) a sufficient degree of economic security to make the profession attractive to men and women of ability. Freedom and economic security, hence, tenure, are indispensable to the success of an institution in fulfilling its obligations to its students and to society.
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ACADEMIC FREEDOM
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a. Teachers are entitled to full freedom in research and in the publication of the results, subject to the adequate performance of their other academic duties; but research for pecuniary return should be based upon an understanding with the authorities of the institution.
b. Teachers are entitled to freedom in the classroom in discussing their subject, but they should be careful not to introduce into their teaching controversial matter which has no relation to their subject.[2] Limitations of academic freedom because of religious or other aims of the institution should be clearly stated in writing at the time of the appointment.[3]
c. College and university teachers are citizens, members of a learned profession, and officers of an educational institution. When they speak or write as citizens, they should be free from institutional censorship or discipline, but their special position in the community imposes special obligations. As scholars and educational officers, they should remember that the public may judge their profession and their institution by their utterances. Hence they should at all times be accurate, should exercise appropriate restraint, should show respect for the opinions of others, and should make every effort to indicate that they are not speaking for the institution. [41]
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1940 INTERPRETATIONS
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At the conference of representatives of the American Association of University Professors and of the Association of American Colleges on November
7-8,1940, the following interpretations of the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure were agreed upon:
1. That its operation should not be retroactive.
2. That all tenure claims of teachers appointed prior to the endorsement should be determined in accordance with the principles set forth in the 1925 Conference Statement on Academic Freedom and Tenure.
3. If the administration of a college or university feels that a teacher has not observed the admonitions of paragraph (c) of the section on Academic Freedom and believes that the extramural utterances of the teacher have been such as to raise grave doubts concerning the teacher's fitness for his or her position, it may proceed to file charges under paragraph (a)(4) of the section on Academic Tenure. In pressing such charges the administration should remember that teachers are citizens and should be accorded the freedom of citizens. In such cases the administration must assume full responsibility, and the American Association of University Professors and the Association of American Colleges are free to make an investigation.
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1970 INTERPRETIVE COMMENTS
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Following extensive discussions on the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure with leading educational associations and with individual faculty members and administrators, a joint committee of the
A.A.U.P. and the Association of American Colleges met during 1969 to reevaluate this key policy statement. On the basis of the comments received, and the discussions that ensued, the joint committee felt the preferable approach was to formulate interpretations of the Statement in terms of the experience gained in implementing and applying the Statement for over thirty years and of adapting it to current needs.
The committee submitted to the two associations for their consideration the following "Interpretive Comments." These interpretations were adopted by the Council of the American Association of University Professors in April 1970 and endorsed by the Fiftysixth Annual Meeting as Association policy.
In the thirty years since their promulgation, the principles of the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure have undergone a substantial amount of refinement. This has evolved through a variety of processes, including customary acceptance, understandings mutually arrived at between institutions and professors or their representatives, investigations and reports by the American Association of University Professors, and formulations of statements by that association either alone or in conjunction with the Association of American Colleges. These comments represent the attempt of the two associations, as the original sponsors of the 1940 Statement, to formulate the most important of these refinements. Their incorporation here as Interpretive Comments is based upon the premise that the 1940 Statement is not a static code but a fundamental document designed to set a framework of norms to guide adaptations to changing times and circumstances.
Also, there have been relevant developments in the law itself reflecting a growing insistence by the courts on due process within the academic community which parallels the essential concepts of the 1940 Statement; particularly relevant is the identification by the Supreme Court of academic freedom as a right protected by the First Amendment. As the Supreme Court said in Keyishian v. Board of Regents 385 U.S. 589 (1967), "Our Nation is deeply committed to safeguarding academic freedom, which is of transcendent value to all of us and not merely to the teachers concerned. That freedom is therefore a special concern of the First Amendment, which does not tolerate laws that cast a pall of orthodoxy over the classroom."
The numbers refer to the designated portion of the 1940 Statement on which interpretive comment is made.
1. The Association of American Colleges and the American Association of University Professors have long recognized that membership in the academic profession carries with it special responsibilities. Both associations either separately or jointly have consistently affirmed these responsibilities in major policy statements, providing guidance to professors in their utterances as citizens, in the exercise of their responsibilities to the institution and to students, and in their conduct when resigning from their institution or when undertaking
government-sponsored research. Of particular relevance is the Statement on Professional Ethics, adopted in 1966 as Association policy. (A revision, adopted in 1987, was published in Academe: Bulletin of the
A.A.U.P. 73 [July-August 1987]: 49.)
2. The intent of this statement is not to discourage what is "controversial." Controversy is at the heart of the free academic inquiry which the entire statement is designed to foster. The passage serves to underscore the need for teachers to avoid persistently intruding material which has no relation to their subject.
3. Most church-related institutions no longer need or desire the departure from the principle of academic freedom implied in the 1940 Statement, and we do not now endorse such a departure.
4. This paragraph is the subject of an interpretation adopted by the sponsors of the 1940 Statement immediately following its endorsement which reads as follows:
If the administration of a college or university feels that a teacher has not observed the admonitions of paragraph (c) of the section on Academic Freedom and believes that the extramural utterances of the teacher have been such as to raise grave doubts concerning the teacher's fitness for his or her position, it may proceed to file charges under paragraph (a)(4) of the section on Academic Tenure. In pressing such charges the administration should remember that teachers are citizens and should be accorded the freedom of citizens. In such cases the administration must assume full responsibility, and the American Association of University Professors and the Association of American Colleges are free to make an investigation.
Paragraph (c) of the 1940 Statement should also be interpreted in keeping with the 1964 "Committee A Statement on Extramural Utterances"
(A.A.U.P. Bulletin 51 [1965]: 29), which states inter alia: "The controlling principle is that a faculty member's expression of opinion as a citizen cannot constitute grounds for dismissal unless it clearly demonstrates the faculty member's unfitness for his or her position. Extramural utterances rarely bear upon the faculty member's fitness for the position. Moreover, a final decision should take into account the faculty member's entire record as a teacher and scholar."
Paragraph V of the Statement on Professional Ethics also deals with the nature of the "special obligations" of the teacher. The paragraph reads as follows:
As members of their community, professors have the rights and obligations of other citizens. Professors measure the urgency of other obligations in the light of their responsibilities to their subject, to their students, to their profession, and to their institution. When they speak or act as private persons they avoid creating the impression of speaking or acting for their college or university. As citizens engaged in a profession that depends upon freedom for its health and integrity, professors have a particular obligation to promote conditions of free inquiry and to further public understanding of academic freedom.
Both the protection of academic freedom and the requirements of academic responsibility apply not only to the full-time probationary as well as to the tenured teacher, but also to all others, such as part-time faculty and teaching assistants, who exercise teaching responsibilities.
5. The concept of "rank of fulltime instructor or a higher rank" is intended to include any person who teaches a
full-time load regardless of the teacher's specific title. (For a discussion of this question, see the "Report of the Special Committee on Academic Personnel Ineligible for Tenure,"
A.A.U.P. Bulletin 52 [1966]: 280-82.)
6. In calling for an agreement "in writing" on the amount of credit for a faculty member's prior service at other institutions, the Statement furthers the general policy of full understanding by the professor of the terms and conditions of the appointment. It does not necessarily follow that a professor's tenure rights have been violated because of the absence of a written agreement on this matter. Nonetheless, especially because of the variation in permissible institutional practices, a written understanding concerning these matters at the time of appointment is particularly appropriate and advantageous to both the individual and the institution. (For a more detailed statement on this question, see "On Crediting Prior Service Elsewhere as Part of the Probationary Period,"
A.A.U.P. Bulletin 64 [1978]: 274-75.)
7. The effect of this subparagraph is that a decision on tenure, favorable or unfavorable, must be made at least twelve months prior to the completion of the probationary period. If the decision is negative, the appointment for the following year becomes a terminal one. If the decision is affirmative, the provisions in the 1940 Statement with respect to the termination of services of teachers or investigators after the expiration of a probationary period should apply from the date when the favorable decision is made.
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