BY SUZANNA DANUTA WALTERS I recently received a curious email from my dean querying $300 I submitted for an Amtrak fare. While she also sent this message to my program manager, I decided to respond directly to her in the spirit of both relieving an overburdened staff member and to question the dean’s decision to…
BY DEAN SAITTA One year ago, the national AAUP released its report In Defense of an Independent and Representative Faculty Voice: The Case of Faculty Senates. The report suggests that senates and other faculty groups (such as unions, and, I assume, advocacy chapters) should work together to protect the faculty’s role in university governance. That’s…
BY HILARY HOULETTE The professoriate has changed over the last several years, and it is indeed an odd time to be a faculty member in US higher education. Efforts have successfully eliminated diversity, equity, and inclusion across college campuses, while LLMs and AI technology impact how students and instructors engage with learning and assessment. The…
BY ANNA FEDER This post was published previously on Academic Freedom on the Line, a Substack of the AAUP’s Center for the Defense of Academic Freedom. (Note that when the post was initially republished on Academe Blog, it was missing the last several paragraphs, which were added back soon after.) Counterintuitively, the most important legal tool…
BY DANIEL A. SEGAL Academe Blog published the author’s post, “The AAUP Errs in Endorsing Cait Conley for Congress,” along with a response by Giulia Zanni, Robert Newton, Ezra Susser, Sarah Borden, Susan Witte, and Page Fortna, “Why We Stand by the AAUP’s Endorsement of Cait Conley.” Below is Segal’s reply to that response. I…
BY GIULIA ZANNI, ROBERT NEWTON, EZRA SUSSER, SARAH BORDEN, SUSAN WITTE, AND PAGE FORTNA Below is a response to Daniel A. Segal’s post, “The AAUP Errs in Endorsing Cait Conley for Congress.” Segal’s subsequent reply to this response is also being published on the blog. We are grateful to Academe Blog for publishing Daniel A.…
BY DANIEL A. SEGAL Academe Blog is publishing a response to this post by Giulia Zanni, Robert Newton, Ezra Susser, Sarah Borden, Susan Witte, and Page Fortna, “Why We Stand by the AAUP’s Endorsement of Cait Conley,” and Segal’s reply to that response. As part of its new program of political endorsements, the AAUP has…
POSTED BY THE AAUP We are excited to announce the publication of volume 17 of the AAUP’s Journal of Academic Freedom. This year’s call for papers was inspired, in part, by urban and cultural studies scholar Davarian Baldwin’s rousing call for courage in the face of political and material repression in US colleges and universities:…
BY MADHAV TR AND LEXI ALLISON What is happening at the New School is happening to higher education across the United States. The story is a familiar one: an administration determining a university’s future without consulting the people who keep it running, including students, faculty, and staff. The only people they do consult are those…
BY JOE LOCKARD Book bans and censorship in middle and high schools also affect higher education. They shape the reading knowledge of students who graduate and enter colleges and universities. An absence of knowledge about racial, ethnic, gender, and sexual diversity and histories among incoming students creates learning gaps and campus culture problems. Crucially, censorship…
BY MICHAEL FERGUSON Following is the editor’s introduction to the fall 2026 issue of Academe, “The Brave New World of Higher Ed,” out this week. The full issue and table of contents can be found here. This issue of Academe arrives at a pivotal moment for US higher education—and for democracy. As midterm elections approach, the federal…