AAUP-OSU Affirms Our Commitment to Academic Freedom
- AAUP OSU
- Dec 11, 2023
- 1 min read
Updated: Aug 10
Unwavering Commitment to Academic Freedom
In light of student and faculty experiences of inequity at Ohio State, our chapter of the AAUP strongly endorses the national AAUP’s November 15th statement “Polarizing Times Demand Robust Academic Freedom."
The statement recognizes that “in the aftermath of the events of October 7, 2023, powerful campus outsiders—including donors, legislators, and well-funded political organizations—have escalated demands that institutions crack down on what can be said or expressed on campus.” On a national scale “violations of academic freedom and shared governance now undermine the ability of faculty members to make educational decisions about their teaching and research without fear of outside intervention or reprisal.” In particular, “The AAUP rejects the characterization of pro-Palestinian speech or critiques of the Israeli state as invariably antisemitic.”
Government and other intrusions into our workplace threaten cherished values of academic freedom and open, truthful discourse in our teaching and our scholarship. As the national AAUP notes in an earlier statement, “[p]roponents of overly broad definitions of antisemitism and proponents of eliminating teaching about the history of racial and other violence share a desire to mobilize the government to enforce particular, emaciated accounts of history, harm, and injury.”
We stand firm against these attacks on academic freedom, in Ohio and anywhere else. Chapter Officers, AAUP-Ohio State, on behalf of the membership
