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āThe Atlanticā Features ¹ū¶³“«Ć½app¹Ł·½ās Will Creeley: āShould Professors Be Fired for Damaging a Collegeās Reputation?ā
The Atlantic prominently features FIREin an article out today: āā
For authoritative answers on faulty firings at Louisiana State University, Mount St. Maryās University, and beyond, as well as the trendās far-reaching implications in the world of higher education, Atlantic reporter Laura McKenna turned to ¹ū¶³“«Ć½app¹Ł·½ās Will Creeley:
According to Creeley, the increasing pressure to police speech at colleges makes it a particularly perilous time to be a professor and has a chilling effect on faculty members. Faculty across the ideological spectrum seem to be under increased scrutiny. Creeley pointed to a conservative professor at Marquette University who was terminated for criticizing another faculty member, while Laura Kipnis, a liberal professor at Northwestern University, was subjected to a two-month, āKafkaesqueā inquiry for discussing sexual harassment on college campuses.
According to Creeley, several factors are driving these trends. The strain on university budgets has led to a āstudent-as-consumerā model, which puts a premium on student evaluations. The rise in the number of administrators at colleges has created a class of people whose job is to micromanage and police campus activities. The pressure from the federal government to respond to cases of sexual harassment has caused colleges to overreach and overreact. University decision-making, Creeley said, has become about minimizing riskāabout prioritizing institutional inertia over dynamic teaching: āWhen universities allow risk management to drive decision-making, speech that might rock the boat is the first casualty.ā
To find out which schoolās ājaw dropping, reactionary, and brazenā faculty firing Will called āone of the most egregious examples of censorship that Iāve seen,ā and to find out what he thinks young people need to know about campus censorship and academic freedom, on The Atlanticās website.
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