FSD 19-21 Faculty Resolution to Stop Classroom Interference

FSD 19-21 Faculty Resolution to Stop Classroom interference and Practice of Academic Freedom

Purdue University Northwest Faculty Senate

Discussion Date: 4/10/2020

Senate Action Date: 4/10/2020

Approved

Whereas this has been brought to Faculty Senate’s attention that the Administration is adding the Department Heads and or Dean(s) to the class rosters surreptitiously, to monitor instructors through the means of electronic surveillance;

Whereas this practice is a gross and total infringement on the faculty’s practice of academic freedom and class room delivery and its integrity;

Whereas The Supreme Court has proclaimed that academic freedom is a “special concern of the First Amendment, which does not tolerate laws that cast a pall of orthodoxy over the classroom.”  Kevishian v. Board of Regents.;

Whereas Faculty members are, of course, uniquely positioned to determine appropriate teaching methods, and

“Academic freedom is also often protected as part of “academic custom” or “academic common law.” Courts analyzing claims of academic freedom often turn to the AAUP’s Joint 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure. The 1940 Statement provides a measured definition of academic freedom, stating:

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. . . . Teachers are entitled to freedom in the classroom in discussing their subject, . . . “  Academic Freedom and the First Amendment (2007). Presentation to the AAUP Summer Institute. By Rachel Levinson, AAUP Senior Counsel.

IT IS HEREBY RESOLVED that

The current policy of the Administration to monitor the Classrooms in any form and fashion should be stopped immediately;

That unimpeded and unhindered practice of the faculty to engage in subject matter communication between faculty and their students be restored immediately;

That the Faculty could engage in the best pedagogical practices that are so essential to the successful operation of Purdue University Northwest without the interference and fear of repercussion imposed by the administration.;

That this Resolution be implemented immediately upon adoption, and that no changes can be made to this by any administrator without significant consultation with the Faculty Senate Executive Committee, and approval by formal vote in the Faculty Senate by a majority vote of present Senators at a duly established meeting.