The members voted to disapprove a resolution supporting the American Association of University Professors Centennial Declaration.
The AAUP works to advance academic freedom and shared governance and to define higher educational values and standards, all to ensure higher education’s contribution to the public good, according to the AAUP website.
The association recently released the AAUP Centennial Declaration, which asserts the main purpose of institutions of higher education is to contribute to the public good, not to the good of the institution or to the good of an individual faculty member affiliated with the institution.
The declaration, broken into 10 points, states the primary mission of institutions of higher education is teaching, followed by researching and addressing social disadvantage.
The declaration further states that an individual faculty member should teach, research and address social disadvantage to disseminate knowledge and foster ?creativity, rather than to make a profit for an individual faculty member, an institution of higher education or a third party.
The declaration also states that faculty should use information and communication technologies to improve the quality of teaching and research, rather than degrade it by reducing faculty-student contact time.
Finally, the declaration states that the role of donors, trustees or administrators should not compromise the role of faculty in hiring decisions, promotions, curricular matters, budgeting and institutional planning.
Members largely ?expressed concerns in response to the wording used in the declaration and not to the sentiments expressed by the declaration.
“We polled our colleagues in the music school,” Jacobs School of Music Professor Jeffrey Hass said. “The answers we got back were, ‘We really hate the language, but we really feel like we should support this. Or, ‘We really hate the language, and we can’t support it.’”
Members particularly expressed concern regarding what they considered to be the use of inflammatory wording aimed at the ?corporate world.
“To me, this is asking them to hit back,” said Sharlene Newman, professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences. “It seems like you’re confronting them and asking them to hit back.”
Members also expressed concern that endorsing the declaration would portray the University in a negative light.
“This would become public knowledge,” said Steve Sanders, an associate professor in the Maurer School of Law. “Words matter. One of my considerations in deciding whether to support this is, do I think that we would be helped or harmed if legislators, donors, parents, citizens, on whose goodwill we depend, whether some of us like this or not, saw this document ... I think we would ?be hurt.”
Approving the resolution would have meant endorsing the declaration and allowing the BFC president to sign it on the council’s behalf.
Though the council did not vote to approve of the resolution supporting the AAUP Centennial Declaration, individual faculty members are free to endorse the ?declaration.
