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UCLA Students Urged to Expose 'Radical' Professors
rts008 writes to tell us Reuters is reporting that a conservative alumni group is working hard to expose 'radical professors'. The group is a creation of 2003 UCLA graduate, Andrew Jones, who stated that he runs the organization on his own with $22,000 in private donations. From the article: "Jones told Reuters he is out to 'restore an atmosphere of respectful political discourse on campus' and says his efforts are aimed at academics who proselytize students from either side of the ideological spectrum, conservative or liberal. 'We are concerned solely with indoctrination, one-sided presentation of ideological controversies and unprofessional classroom behavior,' Jones said on his Web site." The tactics used by Jones and his group are raising quite a few questions, however, offering to pay students for recordings or teaching materials that could provide 'evidence' against professors in question.
One student was "discriminated" against by one academic institution which laid out the rules he flouted before he flouted them.
You'd think a "conservative" would follow the rules.
Emma Goldman's words on war and free speech is not allowed at University of California Berkeley as of 2003. This is the same school where the 1960's Free Speech Movement started and apparently ended http://womenshistory.about.com/library/weekly/aa03 0115a.htm
If I had no integrity and chose to reward people for agreeing with me and punish those who didn't, there are institutional procedures and protocols set up by which students could appeal their grades. If this happened often, my grading practices would be placed under close scrutiny by the administration. I wouldn't last very long. Harrassment and belittlement are indeed more difficult to prove for the aggrieved student, but there are still ways.
What groups like the one mentioned in this article have thus far failed to do is to provide any credible evidence of such malfeasance. What they do instead is to present evidence of professors' political leanings on the basis of those professors' public statements and activities. Unfortunately, people like you, Anonymous Coward (and you do live up to your name here), take that as evidence that a conservative can't get a fair shake. All it actually proves is that profs have opinions, which I believe they are still allowed to do here in the U.S.
Shop as usual. And avoid panic buying.
Good point. Unfortunately, vouchers seem to have stalled, thanks to the teachers union. Woohoo. Shame I can't dismantle the teachers' union on my own.
As for the "blacklist", it's a free country, and they can do what they want.
Very true. But you're forgetting the context in which this is taking place. This stunt is about as transparent as it gets. See the link posted by Doormat in this thread.
It's no surprise the profs are playing the "poor victim" card - why can't they just stand up and being proud of their beliefs?
If you'd read the statements of the professors involved instead of just assuming what they're saying, you might be surprised to find out that that's exactly the stance they're displaying. Most of them know that they're not exactly mainstream, and are quite proud of it.
Just discarding the idea that students are discriminated against because of their political views (which have nothing to do with class) is naive, and reeks of some bias on your side.
You're right, I have not offered any evidence that people are not being discriminated against based on their political beliefs. That's because no one has yet offered any evidence other than "My grades are too low! Bias! Waah!" in support of the discrimination. Do you also expect me to prove the non-existence of white crows before continuing this discussion?
As long as they're fair, and include discrimination from all sides, not just the left, I think it's a good idea.
You seem to not have read the article: "The Web site of the Bruin Alumni Association also includes a "Dirty Thirty" list of professors considered by the group to be the most extreme left-wing members of the UCLA faculty, as well as profiles on their political activities and writings."
There is no similar "Dirty Thirty" list for extreme right-wing professors.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
Straight from the article: "The Web site of the Bruin Alumni Association also includes a "Dirty Thirty" list of professors considered by the group to be the most extreme left-wing members of the UCLA faculty, as well as profiles on their political activities and writings." That exact name does not appear on the site anymore, but a brief perousing of the site and the profiles makes it quite clear who the target is: professors deemed extreme left-wing by Andrew Jones. It's also quite clear that a professor more in the vein of Michael Savage or Limbaugh would be mentioned with praise as standing up to "an unholy alliance between anti-war professors, radical Muslim students, and a pliant administration".
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
- Their publication record. Have they extensively published in mainstream peer reviewed journals? Incidentally, if there is an ideological criterion, this is it. If the journals are not mainstream journals, the candidate is either shown to be deficient in this area or out in left field.
- Do they earn their department funding (perhaps THE most important at some schools!)
- Can they collaborate either interdepartmentally or between institutions (now a big one)?
- Are they able to teach? Most candidates have to give a seminar and/or teach an undergraduate class to show their qualifications
- Do they have a record of service to the universities they have worked at and to the community at large?
- Do they have people skills? Can they get along with the undergraduates, graduates, and professors who interview them?
Do some of us at university disagree on matters of abortion, economics, ID, and other issues. Sure, but except where the class explicitly calls for dealing with such issues, it's considered a bit gauche to bring it up (see below). Have I had conversations with students about such things? Yes, but only when they bring it up or when they are no longer my students.I have also seen intentional baiting of professors in class. A religious student takes a class on evolutionary biology (which may happen to be the professor's bread and butter) and then spends classes trying to get the professor to debate ID. Or a student takes a class on climatology and when the hockey stick graph showing a recent change in climate is brought up and its origins (dozens of studies dating from the 1950s onwards) explained, they will say "but isn't that a political move by the left to try to justify opposition to big oil?" Hint: Most scientists who teach the Big Bang, or evolution or climatology are making their statements based on their professional opinion and research, not specifically because of their political viewpoints (though often their research in the area they teach has lended to such viewpoints). In many cases such students are attempting to create heat and not light. They have a personal issue that detracts from the point of the class - and which they should be debating in the appropriate arena, and not wasting the rest of the class' time.
Most universities already allow for such debate where it is constructive. One can debate religion in religion classes, politics in political science classes, philosophy in philosophy classes, and science in science classes. This whole monitoring of classes for ideology is a bit frightening when mechanisms are already in place to deal with inappropriate professors. Put it in the context of the recently republished It Can't Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis, and you'll understand why there is such a hue and cry about paying students to monitor professors.