Temple Univ. Adopts First-of-Its-Kind Academic Freedom Policy
by Jim Brown
July 28, 2006
(AgapePress) - - Temple University in Philadelphia is being praised for adopting a new policy affirming academic freedom in the classroom. The policy approved by Temple's Board of Trustees is designed to protect students against ideological discrimination and sets up a grievance procedure for students who feel they've been targeted because of their political or religious viewpoint. The new policy, which takes effect on Tuesday, declares that "Freedom to teach and freedom to learn are inseparable facets of academic freedom." The policy is modeled after conservative author David Horowitz's "Academic Bill of Rights" proposal.
Sara Dogan is national campus director with Students for Academic Freedom, a group started by Horowitz. She says Temple's academic freedom policy is unique and is the first of its kind, in that most universities' approach to such policies is from the perspective of the faculty's duties and responsibilities.
"It's very different when you've a policy phrased in terms of students' rights," Dogan observes, "and you actually put it in the university handbook that this policy will be done, so students at Temple University will know exactly what their rights are -- will know that, if a professor is abusing them for their politics or religion, they have a way of challenging it."
The Students for Academic Freedom spokeswoman says some students at Temple have complained of professors using classroom time to praise Communist leaders such as Mao Tse-Tung and Che Guevara. She feels Temple's new policy is just the revolutionary approach to student academic freedom rights that is needed in an atmosphere that could tend to stifle conservative thought or intimidate conservative students into silence.
"What's so important about this," Dogan points out, "is that virtually every university policy in the country on academic freedom, if you look at it, talks about professors and it doesn't really talk about students, especially not in terms of students' rights." The way most of these policies are worded, they indicate that "faculty have a responsibility not to indoctrinate students in the classroom," she says, "but almost nowhere do you see that students have a right not to be indoctrinated."
Earlier this year, Representative Gib Armstrong pushed through a bill in the Pennsylvania House based on Horowitz's Academic Bill of Rights and held academic freedom hearings. In this atmosphere of change, Dogan feels Temple's policy could serve as a model for other schools across the state, as well as across the U.S., in crafting more students' rights-oriented academic freedom policies.
Jim Brown, a regular contributor to AgapePress, is a reporter for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
