Important piece. I do find it problematic that though Academic Freedom is on the ballot this November, our universities are weirdly silent. Instead, they are, by their inaction, caving in to the important role as an independent force in the betterment of society. Their silence won't save us.
-Angela Valenzuela
The Dumbing Down of the Purpose of Higher Ed: The university’s core values are under attack.
Academic freedom is being voted on in the midterm elections, but you wouldn’t know it from the gags muzzling the voices of college presidents. Too many leaders have taken a vow of silence when it comes to addressing difficult issues in American life, even those that directly threaten the academy, our students, and faculty. The implications for the future of higher education and this nation are dire if we presidents fail to break out of our posture of self-censorship and take our rightful places in the bully pulpit.
In a recent Chronicle survey, an astonishing 80 percent of presidents responded saying they would self-censor their comments on national political issues “to avoid creating a controversy for themselves or their colleges.”
My fellow presidents! If we do not speak out about racial justice and political suppression of the truth about American history, or our right to teach “divisive concepts” as fundamental to the entire idea of a university, or the urgent need for immigration reform for our undocumented students, or the protection of voting rights as bedrock to a functional democracy — if we fail to speak out, how dare we robe ourselves in velvet and satin and march into our fall convocations to orate on the greatness of our institutions?
College leaders have significant obligations to the public good beyond the stewardship of our individual institutions. Higher education is the great counterweight to government in a free society, and we are responsible for raising up and defending the values we embody in the public square. We must not be intimidated by those who would silence us by denigrating fundamental moral values as mere “political issues.”
We should use our bully pulpits to teach the difference between political issues people can respectably disagree on and the foundational values that demand consensus to sustain a free society. We must be champions for civil and human rights, proclaiming the dignity and worth of all persons not only within the confines of our campus but in the larger society. We must insist on the freedom to speak, to teach, to enlarge knowledge through research and scholarship. We must demand truth as essential for governance in a good society.
Presidents must have the courage to confront the corruption of truth that spreads through politically expedient lies — whether the manipulation of language about slavery or the rejection of scientific truth about climate change, or the undermining of public-health protocols by mocking masks and vaccines, or the persistent denials of verified election results or the daily toxic stew of “fake news” that makes it difficult for citizens to understand the real threats to our democracy.
If all we presidents do is work to enlarge our endowments, win sports championships, and move up in the U.S. News rankings, we will have failed our ultimate stewardship obligation — to protect and enlarge the fundamental rights and freedoms that are the foundation of our society. The idea of the university is central to our nation’s ability to move closer to its ideals of freedom and justice through each generation. Democracy demands a well-educated population to ensure its continued vitality. Authoritarians say they “love the uneducated” and work in overdrive to disparage and diminish universities because education is kryptonite to tyranny.
Popular reductionist rhetoric about higher education drives a wedge through the heart of our moral purpose. The rhetoric emanating from political and corporate sectors is that we should be more about jobs and less about ideas — that we need fewer great thinkers and more skilled technicians. PayScale cannot measure the worth of those who mount barricades to demand equity and justice; the College Scorecard ignores the ROI in the common good of our graduates who choose public service over private corporate gain. We are measured by metrics that fail to represent the real values of the academy. In our begrudging silence, we become compliant, even complicit, in the dumbing down of the purpose of higher education as merely utilitarian rather than a force to elevate society and educate true citizen leaders.
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